3 reasons for the popularity of online florists in Singapore

Its very easy to get a website developed for any business however it requires a strategic approach to maintain the website.As a matter of fact, its not easy & affordable in Singapore to have a full time web developer to maintain the website,so every business owner must make sure that they hire an affordable web development company based in Singapore & get a suitable website maintenance package from them.

Since in every website maintenance package, there are set number of hours allocated for the web maintenance activities,there must be a prioritized list for those activities.In this blog, we will share 6 points which must be included in the priority list of website maintenance packages.

1)       Website Speed: Webpage speed is very critical for the digital user experience.As a user, when you come across such webpages which take too long to download,you would certainly abandon those pages.Same happens to your website as well.So you must make sure that your web maintenance package should have website speed testing & fixing activity.

2)       Fresh Content: There is a proven theory of online markeing: Updated Content=More Traffic & More Profits.Let us explain.When you add fresh content to your website regularly, search engines are able to index more content from your website and therefore the website shows up in more searches which in turn increase the website traffic and thereby profits as well. So,your web development company must offer you a website maintenance package which should have content updating activity in the top priority list.

3)       Software Upgrade: If you don't take care of your health, you will get sick.Right? In the same way, you must take care about the health of your website by updating its software regularly.You must make sure that your website software/technology must have upgraded version at all the times which can avoid harmful threats and attacks on your website.Therefore,website software upgrade must be an important element of your website maintenance contract with your web developer

4)      Design Changes: Who doesn't like new changes? In the same way, your website visitors would also love to see new graphics and fresh design updates on your website.You can ask your web development company to include design changes in the web maintenance contract.

5)       Code Fixes: This is one of the common reasons of website maintenance for which the companies would hire web development team.Needless to mention,this must be included in your website maintenance package so that you can get all the unusual errrors fixed and make your website good for your users.

6)       Server Housekeeping: There are several things to do when it comes to server housekeeing like website backup,email settings,webpages housekeeing & critical situations like website downtime etc. These are some of the activities that your web development company can include in the website maintenance contract to make you stress-free. 

5 Most Common Web Design Mistakes

Although,every web design company tries to develop a website which is error free,however there are still some chances of huge mistakes which can be bad from users point of view.In this blog, we thought to share 5 common mistakes that usually happens during web designing process & we will also share some suggestions to avoid those mistakes.

Mistake#1. Bad Navigation

While developing the website and complying it with the clients' requirements,the web designers tend to overlook the menus/linking structure and the website ends up with a complicated navigation which is not good for the users.After all, every website must be developed for users readability.

Solution:You can avoid the bad navigation problems by simplifying and labeling them so that the users do not require a high degree qualification to go through your pages.Simplfying the navigation includes having appropriate font size (neither too big nor too small) and using colors that makes the navigation stand out from other elements of the website.You may also have a different color for active navigation so that it's easy for the users to understand where they are.Labeling of navigation includes a proper channel/hierarchy of links which we also call as bread crumbs.A bread crumb helps user to understand the clear path of current page.Of course,implementing bread crumbs also help in search engine optimization as well.

Mistake#2. Browsers Attention

Due to the lack of attention on multiple browsers,most of the web designers leave a space for visitors to quit the website.There are several browsers like Internet Explorer,Google Chrome,FireFox,Safari etc. which are commonly among web users.On the top of it,each browser comes up with regular version update which affects the old websites.

Solution: Every web designer must make sure that a website must run properly on all the major browsers and their respective versions by testing the website on various tools available for cross browser compatibility.One of the best tools is CrossBrowserTesting which has a trial package along with the paid one.

Mistake#3. Presentation of Text

Since a website is the virtual face of the company,it is very important to take care of the overall presentation of both graphics and texts.Usually the web designers take care of graphics very well but they often don't pay attention to the presentation of texts & information on the website.Every web designer must remember one thing that most of the visitors usually scan the web pages in just 8 seconds so a website must be able to convey the important message to the visitors in few seconds.This can be done only when the text has been displayed in well formatted/indented manner.

Solution: The solution to the problem of messy text presentation is very simple.The designer can avoid this mistake by using proper headers,ample paragraph spacing,appropriate bold style,using underline for links,using bullets & numbering and taking care of text color vs background color.

Mistake#4. Broken Links

The broken gives a bad impression not only to the website visitors but also search engines therefore a web designer must make sure that the website should not have any broken links after the launch.A minor code/tag error can create the problem of broken links therefore sometimes it become very difficult for the website designer to notice the problem of broken links.

Solution: As mentioned earlier that it becomes very difficult sometimes to trace the issue of broken links especially in case of large size websites,it is recommeded to check for this issue using some nice tools.We,at Innomedia use Xenu tool which is very useful for testing a website for broken links.It's free to use.

Mistake#5. Design Consistency

Design consistency throughout the website is very necessary for brand building and every web designer must understand this.While developing the website,a web designer tends to forget following & maintaining the design consistency.Its not just about branding, but consistency also makes website easier to use because visitors don't need to find new ways each time they want to read any specific page.Here we are mainly talking about the design consistency which a web designer must follow.

Solution: A web designer must make sure to prepare a website checklist and keep the most important elements on the top to make sure that a website follows the standard design protocol.Those important points are navigation style,breadcrumbs usage,text/font formatting style,brand colors,fixed elements' coordinates (left top right and footer panel) & anchor text style.

4 Rules of Logo Design

When deciding upon a logo design, consider your brand first because a logo is one of the critical aspects of business marketing.A logo doesn't represent only the design understanding of a company,but it also explains the emotions that a brand is trying to convey through the colors of its logo.Therefore,there has to be a hard exercise which you must do before you assign logo design to  web designer on a logo design.Let's go through some of the points which will help you to decide an appropriate logo for your new company.

Logo Design Rule #1: Look & Feel

Your logo design must be captivating and attractive enough to grab the attention.The logo design must be so appealing that it should be easy to remember for the audience.

Logo Design Rule #2: Unique

Since the purpose of a logo is to distinguish a company from rest of the companies so you must make sure that your web designer must come up with a unique concept for logo design.A logo must have unique dimensions, colors and tagline.

Logo Design Rule #3: Simple

It has been observed that 80% of the brands which are recognized by their logos have one thing in common-Simplicity.A simple logo deisgn is key to success in brand recognition.Insist your web designer to create your logo as simple as possible.

Logo Design Rule #4: Color Contrast

The color contrast scheme of your logo must stand out.Try to keep maximum 2 or 3 colors in your logo design.Studies say that a logo with 1-3 colors are recognized as huge brands by the audiences.
Having a good web design company is really very essential for every business because they can understand the importance of having a perfect logo for any comany's branding success..
- See more at: http://www.innomaxmedia.org/web-blog/4-rules-of-logo-design.php#sthash.Qj1Lj1Ce.dpufWhen deciding upon a logo design, consider your brand first because a logo is one of the critical aspects of business marketing.A logo doesn't represent only the design understanding of a company,but it also explains the emotions that a brand is trying to convey through the colors of its logo.Therefore,there has to be a hard exercise which you must do before you assign logo design to  web designer on a logo design.Let's go through some of the points which will help you to decide an appropriate logo for your new company.

 

Logo Design Rule #1: Look & Feel

Your logo design must be captivating and attractive enough to grab the attention.The logo design must be so appealing that it should be easy to remember for the audience. 

 

Logo Design Rule #2: Unique

Since the purpose of a logo is to distinguish a company from rest of the companies so you must make sure that your web designer must come up with a unique concept for logo design.A logo must have unique dimensions, colors and tagline.

 

Logo Design Rule #3: Simple

It has been observed that 80% of the brands which are recognized by their logos have one thing in common-Simplicity.A simple logo deisgn is key to success in brand recognition.Insist your web designer to create your logo as simple as possible.

 

Logo Design Rule #4: Color Contrast

The color contrast scheme of your logo must stand out.Try to keep maximum 2 or 3 colors in your logo design.Studies say that a logo with 1-3 colors are recognized as huge brands by the audiences.

Having a good web design company is really very essential for every business because they can understand the importance of having a perfect logo for any comany's branding success..

 

When deciding upon a logo design, consider your brand first because a logo is one of the critical aspects of business marketing.A logo doesn't represent only the design understanding of a company,but it also explains the emotions that a brand is trying to convey through the colors of its logo.Therefore,there has to be a hard exercise which you must do before you assign logo design to  web designer on a logo design.Let's go through some of the points which will help you to decide an appropriate logo for your new company.

 

Logo Design Rule #1: Look & Feel

Your logo design must be captivating and attractive enough to grab the attention.The logo design must be so appealing that it should be easy to remember for the audience. 

Logo Design Rule #2: Unique

Since the purpose of a logo is to distinguish a company from rest of the companies so you must make sure that your web designer must come up with a unique concept for logo design.A logo must have unique dimensions, colors and tagline.

 

Logo Design Rule #3: Simple

It has been observed that 80% of the brands which are recognized by their logos have one thing in common-Simplicity.A simple logo deisgn is key to success in brand recognition.Insist your web designer to create your logo as simple as possible.

 

Logo Design Rule #4: Color Contrast

The color contrast scheme of your logo must stand out.Try to keep maximum 2 or 3 colors in your logo design.Studies say that a logo with 1-3 colors are recognized as huge brands by the audiences.

Having a good web design company is really very essential for every business because they can understand the importance of having a perfect logo for any comany's branding success..

Time For Your Website Checkup

With the ever changing algorithms and updates of search engines like Google,it is imperative to make sure that your website is performing well.Therefore,we recommend that you must have a regular checkup of your website and at the same time we understand that it is sometimes not affordable for small companies to hire web designers on regular basis.So we are here to share some of the best tools through which you can check the performance status of your website yourself.

Checkup #1 Website Speed 

A very important checkup for your website in order to make sure that all the users are able to access your website easily and quickly.In the modern age of 3G & 4G, users have become impatient and expect every webpage to be downloaded in less than few seconds.Studies show that an average web user would wait for up to 6 seconds and if the website is not downloaded within this timeframe,they tend to quit the website immediately.Therefore you must make sure that your web designer has used optimized codes for CSS,JavaScript & images.You don't need to worry if you are not technical because you can check the website speed on your own without help of any technical staff.You may simply open the web based tool like pingdom and test your website speed.If your website takes more than 6 seconds to download,you may consider this as an alert to get the speed issue fixed.

Takeaway #1: Web based tool to check website speed-http://tools.pingdom.com

Checkup #2 Malicious Codes 

Malicious codes are set of scripts that is intended to cause security breaches or damage to a system.Broadly speaking,a malicious code could be in the form of viruses,worms,Malicious acvtives or Trozan horses.A malicious code can do anything on your website like writing some messages,deleting some of the files,generating sound on the website and sometimes stopping some or all of the applications running on your website.If any website is affected with the malicious codes,it may show an error message like "This site may harm your computer".So,before its too late,you must make sure that you have a regular checkup of your website for harmful malicious codes.

Takeaway #2: Web based tool to check malicous codes on website-http://www.urlvoid.com

Checkup #3 Broken Links 

Any link which shows up a dead page or 404 (page not found) error, is considered as a broken link.There could be several reasons for a broken link however the most common reason of a broken link is the missing page to which the link is connected.A broken link would affect not only users experience badly but it also affects the search engine rankings of your website.Therefore you must make sure to check your website regulary for broken links.There are many free tools available out there for the web designers to test a website for broken links.One of the most popular and effective tools is XENU.

Takeaway #3: Web based tool to check broken links-http://xenus-link-sleuth.en.softonic.com/

Checkup #4 Spelling & Grammar Mistakes 

Studies show that a website may lose business due to bad English or Grammar mistakes in the content(especailly in Europe & America).So whenever you add new pages/blogs on your website, you must make sure that you check the language very carefully.There are few tools available to help you to check the spelling and grammar mistakes on your webpages.

Takeaway #4: Tool to check spelling & grammar mistakes on website-http://spellcheckplus.com

Checkup #5 Browser 

Compatibiltiy With an endless flow of updated versions of old browsers and upcoming new browsers,every web designer must make sure to build a website which is cross browser compatible.It doesn't end with the designers' confirmation because you can also keep checking your website for different browsers by using several tools available for you to check.If your website doesn't support any of the major browsers,then you must be losing lots of visitors and sales as well.So,in order to avoid these losses,you must make sure to ask your web design company to run through a test for your website for browser compatibility.

Takeaway #5: Tool to check browser compatibility of website-http://crossbrowsertesting.com   We really hope that you enjoyed reading this blog and you will definitely care about your website when it comes to its regular checkup.

How to handle the out of stock situation in eCommerce websites

For the businesses who are into online products selling through their eCommerce websites,it becomes challenging when any product is out of stock and there is still huge demand for it.The customers who come to the website and want to purchase their favorite product but due to the zero availability in the current stock for that product,they will quit the website and would prefer to search for other vendors.But this situation is not healthy for eCommerce businesses because the gone customers can't be forced to come back to the website when the stock is available again.

Here comes the need of backorder feature for eCommerce websites.Through the backorder feaure,the customers are still able to purchase the products or join the waiting list even if the quantity of their desired product has arrived to zero.Broadly speaking,there are two ways to handle backorder products on eCommerce websites and both have different process.Let's learn how and when we can implement backorder feature on our eCommerce websites to retain our existing customers and prospective customers.

Option #1: Backorder Feature with Buying Option 

The retail companies can choose the allow customers to purchase the products which are out of stock.Through this feature, the customers are still able to pay for the product and they are generally notified through email about the availability and shipping status of the product.

Option #2: Backorder Feature with Joining List Option

In this option,the customers don't require to pay for the products which are out of stock.Instead,they join the waiting list for that product and whenever the product is available in the stock,those subscribed users will be notified about the product availability through emails.

We suggest that every eCommerce based retail company must use backorder feature on their website in order to retain their customers.The growing popularity of this feature has made it very easy for every web design company to implement it without any hassle because the backorder modules are available free of cost.

Handy Tips for Web Design

Today, people spend a lot of time online browsing through various websites. When you start your own website, you have to make sure that you are able to attract at least a good percentage of this audience. If you are planning to use the website for business needs, you need to pay even more attention. A leap in the right direction might win you a fortune but a wrong step might push you into a deep grave from where moving out might be a hard row to hoe. Here are 9 tips that would come handy while designing a website.

Easy-to-remember URL 

The URL of your website should be impressive and easy-to-remember. Long URLs with complicated spellings are tough to remember. Choosing a name that is related to the contents of the website or something that entices the web users would be ideal.

Easy navigation 

People visiting your website should not find it hard to toggle between sections on the pages. The different sections of the website should be arranged in a prompt manner with easy to use tabs. If the users find it hard to shift between pages on the website, they might close the page and leave. Winning back an unhappy visitor wouldn’t be an easy task.

Enhanced visibility

When you put up a website on the internet, your website is just one among millions of others. You need to make sure that the name of your website is listed on the search results of major search engines. If the visibility of your website is not enhanced, you will find it hard to promote your website. You can seek the aid of companies handling Search Engine Optimization to get this part taken care of.

Browser compatibility 

When you discuss about your requirements with a web design company, you need to talk to them regarding the compatibility of the website with all sorts of browsers available. Not all users would be using the same type of browser and hence you need to design a website that works well with all possible browsers.

Updated content 

The content of your website should always be up-to-date. You need to keep adding meaningful information periodically in order to win the attention of major search engines and also the regular audience.

Consistent Layout 

The web designer you choose should help you with a consistent layout for the website. You can also provide ideas to the designers and ask them to bring in necessary improvements from time to time related to the overall layout.

Meaningful Content 

You should not try to fill the pages of your website with junk content or fillers. Even if you have very little info to portray on the website but wants to keep it filled, do not include content that is totally unnecessary. However little the content you have, include it in the best manner with no room for baloney.

Easy downloads 

The pages of the website should load easily. People live in a very fast paced world today and no one is patient enough to see the page loading sign displayed on their screens. Hence, try to include minimum amounts of graphics and other elements in your home page unless it is absolutely necessary.

Security Assurance

You might have to accept payments and personal information of your business prospects through your website. You need to provide the inclusion of encrypted pages using Secure Socket Layer in order to accept sensitive customer centric information. Secure browsing facilities is vital in order to attract a large number of users to your website. Hence, you need to mention the need for the same when you assign the task to a web design agency.

Use all these tips while designing your website, if you want it to be good enough to sail through the busy world of internet! 

30 Questions to ask before website development

Having a successful website is not so easy even if you hire a top-notch web development company.If you really want to have a website which helps you to grow your business manifold, then you must do some basic exercise which will make sure that you are going to have a successful website for your business.Because you know your business better than anyone else!

In this blog, we have laid down some of the important questions for which you must find answers before getting started with any web development company.

Basic:

1) What is the purpose of website?
2) Who is the target audience of your website?
3) How you want to differentiate your website from your competitors?
4) Have you chosen the colors for your website? 
5) Have you settled on the features of your website?
6) What are the mistakes that you don’t want to follow from your old website?
7) Do you have some reference websites that you like a lot?
8) Is your hosting server secured and renowned?
9) Do you have a fixed budget for your website development?
10) Do you have the contact details of developers who are involved in your website development?

Website Scope:

1) Do you have a finalized logo yet?
2) Do you want to use favicon?
3) Do you want to follow any tagline throughout your website?
4) How many pages you have estimated to have on your website?
5) Are you planning to have media files like videos, images etc. ?
6) Is your server capable enough to support heavy media files? If not, what is your plan of action?
7) Do you have photos to be used on the website?Or you are planning to purchase royalty-free images?
8) Are you planning t have online chat feature on your website?
9) Do you intend to have blogs and news on your website?
10) Have you instructed your developer to use only seo-friendly URLs for all pages of your website?
11) Does your website development proposal include mobile responsive website?
12) Are you planning to have multi-lingual website?
13) Which Content Management System (CMS) will be used by your website developers?
14) Which social sharing icons will you be using on your website (Twitter, Facebook etc.)?
15) Will you be accepting payments online? If yes, have you already signed up with any payment gateway (Paypal etc.) already?
16) What is the most important objective and measurement of success on your website? Leads, Call or Subscription?
17) Have you already finalized a support/contact phone number to be displayed on your website?
18) What is the estimated timeframe of your website completion?
19) Does your web development company have SEO expertise as well?
20) Does your website has backup feature already in place?