Comparison of ASP.NET CMS and Its Web Development Cost

Websites can be built using different platforms. Different platforms mean different features and varying costs. In this article, we will help you get your hard-earned money’s worth and help you choose the best platform for your website. While we can’t give you a perfect pricing guide, we will give you an idea of the size of budget and investment you should be anticipating.

Sitefinity

Sitefinity can handle the needs of small, medium, and big corporates. Founded in 1981, it is one of the most popular CMS used today by marketers and developers. Sitefinity is a marketing analytics platform built to maximize the potential to succeed in today’s rapidly-changing world of digital marketplace. It gives developers and ITs the tools they need to support enterprise-level digital marketing, optimizing the client’s experience across different technologies and devices.

Basic installation: $30,000 – $50,000

Advanced installation with personalisation of content:  $60,000 – $100,000

Kentico

Specialising in eCommerce, Kentico is not anywhere far to Sitefinity. Often used as a central hub of digital operations, it tends to have more integration points. that translates to high project costs. Their website boasts that they are the only fully integrated ASP.NET CMS, Online Marketing, and E-commerce platform available today.

Basic installation: $35,000 – $60,000

Advanced installation with personalisation of content: $70,000 – $150,000

Umbraco 

One of the most user-friendly CMS is Umbraco. Used by both small and large-scale websites, it can be used to set up a website fast and cheap. Although Umbraco is not feature-rich and can only accommodate the basics, some websites who do not need advanced features can benefit from this as their pricing is one of the cheapest.

Basic installation: $20,000 – $30,000

Sitecore 

Built on Microsoft and recognized as the leading CMS in Gartner’s report of 2015 for Web Content Management Systems, implementing Sitecore can be quite a bit more expensive than any other CMS. It has a user-friendly WYSIWYG editor with an interface similar to Windows. Aside from full tracking and reporting on users’ behaviour, Sitecore also delivers targeted and relevant content to visitors using their latest technology.

Basic installation: $50,000 – $100,000

Advanced installation with personalisation of content: $120,000 – $250,000

Magento

Magento can be utilized by small retailers with their Community Edition and by international companies using their Enterprise Edition. Unlike Umbraco’s user-friendly interface, Magento is not for beginners. Extensive work is needed to configure offer functions, delivery options, and customised reports. Its all-embracing features and the ability for customization make it an excellent tool for marketers who have the resources to implement advanced technology. Magento is currently used by big companies like Zumiez and Burger King.

Community Edition: $20,000 – $50,000

Enterprise Edition: $60,000 -$150,000

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Native Apps vs. Web Apps: Which is Better?

Mobile App development requires detailed planning and various processes to come together to build a harmonious whole. The process begins with an idea for the app, then continues to the planning stage, app design stage, app development stage, testing stage, and finally, the release of the app to the planned mobile device/s. However, there is something that you need to decide on even before going through the stages of app development mentioned above.

You will have to determine the specific technique in which you would want to produce and deploy your app. In this article, we will give you two options that you can choose from: you can develop either a Web app or a native app.

So what exactly are native and Web apps? How do they differ from each other? Which of them are more suitable for you?

Overview
Native Apps are apps that are essentially developed for a particular mobile device. It is directly installed on the intended device. Native app users normally download the apps via the Google Play Store, the Apple Store, and other avenues. As an example, the Camera+ for iOS devices of Apple is considered as a native app.

On the other hand, Web Apps are apps enabled by the Internet. They are accessible through the Web browser of the mobile device.

They do not need to be downloaded onto a mobile device. The Safari browser is considered as a mobile Web app, for example.

Comparison
a. User Interface – From the point of the users of the mobile devices, various native and Web apps seem to look and work in the same way, with very small differences between them. The decision between the two kinds of apps has to be made only when you have to determine whether to produce an application-centric app or a user-centric app.

Several companies develop both native and Web apps, so they can increase the reach of the apps that they develop while providing a satisfying overall experience for the user.

b. App Development Process – The process of app development of these types of apps is what separates them from each other.

Every mobile platform where the native app is developed for specifies its own individual development process. For Web apps running on a Web browser of a mobile device, the difficulty that emerges is that every type of mobile device have different features and also have unique problems.
Each mobile platform makes use of a different native programming language. Objective-C is used by Apple’s iOS,  C++ is used by Windows Mobile, Java is used by Android, and so on. On the other hand, Web apps make use of languages including HTML 5, JavaScript, CSS3, and some other Web application frameworks that depend on the preferences of the developer.
Every mobile platform allows the developer to have its own development tools, standardised SDK, and other elements for the user interface which they can utilise to develop their native app with relative comfort. For Web apps, that kind of standardisation is not present and the developer does not have access to tools or SDKs of any kind.
Of course, several frameworks and tools are available for developers which they can use to deploy apps to various Web browsers and mobile platforms.

c. Accessibility – native apps are fully compatible with the native features and the hardware of the device, including the camera, and the accelerometer. Web apps have access to only a limited amount of the native features of a device.

Native apps work as a standalone entity. However, the problem is that the user has to continue downloading updates. On the other hand, a Web app updates itself even without the intervention of the user but must be accessed through a browser of the mobile device.

d. Making Money on Apps – monetisation of Apps with the use of native apps can be challenging, since certain manufacturers of mobile devices may place some restrictions on integrating some services with some mobile ad networks and platforms. On the other hand, Web apps allow you to monetise apps through charging fees for membership, advertisements, and so on. However, while the app store handles your revenue and commissions for native apps, you must establish your own payment system for your Web app.

e. Efficiency – Native apps are more costly to develop, but they are considered to be faster and more efficient since they work in tandem with the mobile device that they are developed for. They are also assured of quality, as its users can have access to them only through app stores online.

On the other hand, Web apps may have higher costs of maintenance across various mobile platforms. There is also no specific regulatory authority that controls the quality standards of these apps. However, the App Store of Apple features a list of Web apps developed by them.

Summary of Pros and Cons

Native apps and Web apps both have their own set of strengths and weaknesses. Listed below are some of the pros and cons that you can consider when deciding what type of app you will develop.

Native Apps

Pros
a. Faster to open and can be accessed anytime as these can be used even when you are offline.
The performance is faster in some cases since they locally store data and start synchronising with the server only after the user is finished using a particular app.

b. They enable users to make use of hand gestures that are device-specific. iOS and Android are constantly developing various conventions for user interaction, and these kinds of apps respond the way that is expected by its users.

c. They have the approval of the app store that they are designed for, which indicates that the user can be guaranteed of the improved security and safety of the app (most of the time). Native apps receive full support from the intended marketplaces and app stores. Its users can effortlessly find and download the apps of their choice from these stores.

d. Native enables uninterrupted access to the hardware of the device that is either impossible or more difficult with a mobile app (accelerometer, camera, etc.)

e. They work out better for the developers who are provided with the SDK and all the other tools to develop the app with much more ease.

Cons
a. They tend to be more expensive for the developer. This is especially the case for the developers who would like their apps to be compatible with various platforms and mobile devices.b. The costs of app updating and app maintenance are also more expensive as compared to Web apps, especially if the app supports various mobile platforms.

c. The approval process of the app store can be very long and tedious for the developer. It does not result in success all the time. There is also no assurance that the app will become instantly popular with the users.

d. The users of different mobile devices may be making use of different versions of the app, which makes it harder for the developer to provide and maintain support.

 Web Apps

Pros
a. Easier to maintain
b. Instantly accessible to users through a browser across various devices

c. It is easier for the developer to update or maintain these kinds of apps

d. These are much easier to discover since they are listed in common search engines such as Google

e. Can be developed as database-driven web applications that very much act like native apps

f. The development of these apps is more time and cost-effective as it uses the programming language that is commonly understood

Cons
a. They have a limited scope as far as having access to the features of a mobile device
b. Variations between web browsers and versions of browser and phones make it challenging to develop a stable web-app that can run on all the devices without any issues.

c.  They are not available in app stores.

d.  Users may not be guaranteed security and safety of the app.

e. They are unavailable when offline

Conclusion
Deciding on which of the two kinds of apps is better all depends on the end goals of the developer. If you aim to establish a vast mobile presence, then you should opt for a mobile web app.

But if your goal is to develop an application that acts more like a computer program instead of a website, then a native mobile app would be the best choice for you.

In deciding which among the two kinds of apps will be suitable for you, you must consider the following:

1. The performance and the speed of the app
2. If you want your app to support various devices and mobile platforms, and if yes, how many
3. If you want your app to be enabled by the Internet
4. If you would like your app to include any features that are device-specific
5. Your budget and the estimated cost of developing your app
6. If you would aim to monetize your app in the future

You must consider the above-mentioned aspects and then make an informed decision on the method that you would want to adopt in developing your app.

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Steps to Build Effective Social Media Marketing Strategy

Innovation is flying like a rocket. Being a business entrepreneur, you need to keep pace with it. Certainly, it is not new for you to strategize for social media marketing. But, you have to think something different to remain in the competition. The first question appears in your mind is how?

The best answer is whatever step you take on social media, connect it with your social media marketing plan. Link everything including comment, post, like and reply to your strategy. At the initial stage, you will find it a bit complicated. But, if you make a strategy for each social media effort and follow it correctly, success is yours. In this post, we will discuss correct steps to build the best social media marketing strategy. Here they go-

Build Your Goals And Objectives

Social media marketing strategy becomes simpler with clear goals and objectives. With clear goals in mind, you can avail the best social media ROI. For desired results, you should align your social media plan with your business objectives. You must not limit yourself to likes and tweets. To avail better results, consider web referrals, total leads generated, and conversion rate. Ensure that you create each goal which is relevant, precise, measurable, achievable and time-oriented.

Conduct Deep Research On Social Media Audience

Around 80% adults use Facebook. But, you need to think that does your potential customers use this channel that much? It is crucial to learn important things regarding your potential customers. This may include their age group, their list of preferred products or services, and the channel they use the most. Categorize your audience into groups. Find out which age group is the toughest to persuade.

Now, it is time to explore the demographics of your best social media channels. Like we made this clear that you must follow a set goal for the success of this strategy. Once you are clear about our goal and audience, you can easily correlate your goals and audience.

Recognize Prime Success Metrics

By this time, you are done with your goal setting and audience research. You should start working on prime success metrics to assess their potency. It is good to rely on easy to understand metrics. Straightforward metrics are the best to trace the success of social media marketing strategy. The key metrics include-

• Audience Reach
• Leads
• Customers’ sentiments
• Traffic generated via referrals
• Community engagement and growth

Being a business person, you should keep it in mind that each success metrics is not meant for your marketing plan. You need to pick those that have something to do with your business.

Focus On Creating and Curating Content

If you create and curate content, then the half battle is won. You should draft the content strategically. It is a winning plan to build the following kind of content-

• Useful and entertaining content always grabs attention as it acts like a problem solver.
• Information on contests, giveaways, and freebies.
• Content containing step-by-step guidance as it spread awareness.
• Promotions and coupons always get attention.
• The last step while curating and creating content is to make it audience-specific.

Perform Keyword Research

In the previous step, you learned to create and curate content. But, robust keyword research will make it more valuable. All potential followers will be yours if you induce specified keywords and hone your content. You can look for the best terms on Facebook, Twitter or any other social media network. Apart from this, you can also rely on a powerful social researching tool. Whichever tool you adopt, it must provide your content enough weight to fulfill specific demands of customers.

Execute Analysis and Optimization

It is time to assess and optimize your strategy of social media marketing. Rewind the performance of key success metrics we discussed above. If you got results of major metrics, your way is clear toward the analysis and optimization. Sprout social and Buffer are nice tools to evaluate your marketing activities. After this, you can assess key metrics against the KPIs.

Conclusion

The team from Webby Central hope that your fear regarding the success of your social media marketing plan must have lessened. You just need to follow all these steps honestly and reap the desired results. Thus, sketch a perfect plan and your burden will vanish. Best of luck in advance!

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Understanding the Basics Before Hiring A Web Designer

Owners of businesses experience a continuous learning curve with the technology in our world today. It is usually not enough to only a business leader, having a good understanding regarding the landscape of social media that is surrounding the ever-growing opportunities – to be able to reach out and attract new clients – are now considered to be more important than ever before. It now appears that you are now required to jump on board this trend or else you will be left out.

With that in mind, it is best to know the extents that you should go to understand and learn more about the technology that is building your website when it comes to web presence. Unfortunately, most business owners are confused and are not familiar with the technologies that are used on their websites.

It is important that you understand the basics so that you will know exactly what you want when you are planning to invest in the re-development of the website of your business in the future.

The Basic Processes in Building A Website

Building a new website requires a lot of processes. You should at least have an idea about them so that you will be able to work with your designer during the process of developing your website. It will be a huge advantage on your part if you will be able to let your designer know what your vision for your website is.

Listed below are the processes that are involved when building a website.

1. Wireframe

A wireframe is a blank canvas that is laying out boxes to indicate where you would want the various content and images on your website to appear. The layout is essential as this will dictate the progress of the development.

2. Design

The Photoshop (PSD) design does not only involve where the punchy images will go as it will also include designs for text colour, font, link colours, background colours, layout, and heading styles and sizes.

It is also best to note that the same layout will not be applied to all of the pages of your website. For example, the design of your homepage will always be different from the pages that are intended for the content. Therefore, different layouts will be required for every page.

3. UX (User Experience)

In the web world of today, one of the most crucial aspects of web design is designing a website or a webpage from the point of view of the user. You must make sure that your design is clean and easy to read. Navigation must also be easy on your website. Most of all, you must ensure that your website will deliver an excellent user experience. You would want people to come back and re-visit your website and recommend your site to other people. That is why user experience is considered as the most important aspect of web design.

4. Platform

The software that is utilised for the development of your website is called the “platform.” Platforms are used to make it easier for the owners to update the content on their websites by themselves instead of being required to ask for the assistance of their web designer every time they have to change or add something to their websites.

Various “open source” platforms are available for use. An open source is when software has been developed by a community of developers. It is available to download for free to the server that will host the website. Drupal, Magento, Joomla, and WordPress are some of the most well-known platforms that are used by the majority of web designers.

5. Development

After creating a wireframe and reaching an agreement on the design, you can now proceed to have your website be converted to a real and live site. This process will involve development work such as CSS, Java, and PHP, HTML 5 – the language that the programmers develop code in to make your website deliver the things that you want and look the way that you want it to appear. However, some bugs that are needed to be fixed can be discovered from time to time despite the skills and expertise that are required from your developer in building your website. This process usually takes some time.

The development must be tested after it has been completed. It is important that your website will be able to work across all the browsers. Your website must also be viewable on mobile devices. You and your developer must make sure that you have checked off all of these prior to agreeing that your site is already ready to go live.

6. Value for money

When you ask for a quotation for your new website, and the quote may be higher than you thought, they must be a good reason for the price. You must follow due diligence and ask for at least three (3) quotes from different web design companies so that you can compare their prices. However, you must make sure to get a quotation for packages that are “like for like” so you can have a better comparison between the quotations.

You will likely discover that web companies may have different approached and use different software which may make it difficult to compare one package against the other. However, it would be easier for you to make that decision if you understand and know what you require for your website.

Nowadays, websites are considered to be important for companies especially when it comes to marketing. That is why you must make sure that your website will be beneficial for your company and will give present your company and its products and/or services in the best way possible. Being able to know and understand the basics of the design of the website of your company will help you do just that as it will make it easier for you to propose some improvements on your website. It will also be easier for you and your web designer to come up with the best possible website that is aligned with your vision for the site.

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Top Reasons Why An SEO Audit is Needed For Your Website

People, especially site developers, are aware of the value of search engine optimization practices. It is an important tool and practice that drives their websites to the top of the results pages of search engines and generates their all-important leads which result in profitable customers consequently coming to use. However, just like all the things in life, you should always invest invest money and time so that you can make things better. Through the continuous streamlining and optimizing of your implemented SEO practices, you can make sure that your site is running its full potential, maximizing your opportunities for huge volumes of web traffic which results in a rise in the number of leads and profitable customers that is received by your business.

Introduction to SEO Audits

An SEO Audit examines a website and identifies the weaknesses of a particular site. An SEO audit is not just about the aesthetics since a website is much more than a wonderful combination of graphics and colours. An SEO audit takes the whole of the website into account.

Most SEO Audits look at:

1. Overall keyword strategy
2. On-site optimisation
3. Website user flow
4. Content strategy
5. Backlink profiles
6. Analytics

An SEO Audit offers an overview regarding the health of your website when it comes to SEO. You should also receive various actionable points according to the strategy, which either you or the agency must implement.

An SEO audit can serve as the initial point of call for establishing an SEO strategy (if you do not have one already). However, if you already have an SEO strategy, it will serve as a valuable second opinion that might flag up the critical issues that you have with your existing strategy.

A professional SEO audit will provide you with everything that you must know regarding the current condition of your website and its current ranking on the search engines. This will give you all the information that you need to improve your website to make your site the best that it can be.

Even though an audit is renowned for being a bad thing such as IRS or tax audits, an SEO audit is an important tool that should be used by your business on a regular basis since the results of the audit will benefit your business positively.

Reasons Why Your Website Needs an SEO Audit

Are you still not convinced regarding how an SEO audit will be beneficial for your website? Listed below are some of the top reasons why you would need one.

1. You should invest in the well-being of your website

Availing an SEO audit for your website is a lot like taking your website for a routine check-up at the doctor. The audit will compare the condition of your website to the benchmarks that are established by the online industry including Google. The results of the audit will be able to notify you of the problems that are experienced by your site as well as a detailed analysis of the statistics of your website. The statistics can include data such as your bounce rates; the time that your visitors have spent on the pages of your website and the effectiveness of the referral plans that you are running and managing currently.

This kind of general overview and analysis of your website will be able to examine various areas as well as fundamental SEO aspects such as your links, citations, your sitemap, the data that is provided on your social networking accounts, and how effectively your website is linked internally. An SEO audit will also be able to notify you if ever your website has some ‘red flags’. The ‘red flags’ will include the possible penalties that Google can impose on websites for poor content, therefore causing harm to your website’s overall search engine ranking.

You should also remember that search engines are modifying their requirements and guidelines for good SEO practices constantly. If you are focused on operating and improving your business, you can miss the said updates, or you may simply not have the time to study the current guidelines, which is why it is important that you bring in the services of a professional expert on SEO.

With the information provided by the professionals, it will be easier to identify the weaker areas of your SEO practice, thus allowing you to correct them to introduce improvements to your website.

2. SEO Audits Reveal The Technical Issues of Your Website

An SEO audit helps in identifying some technical SEO issues. Listed below are some of the elements that are identified by an audit:

1. Website Speed: This refers to the time that it takes your site to load a page. Google considers the load speed of your website. This is because Google puts UX as its top priority over all other things. Typically, a faster-loading website implies a better user experience. If your website takes a longer time to load, your users are likely to bounce. Your website may have the greatest content on your website, but it will be pointless if the visitors of your site already closed your page at 5 seconds.
2. 404 Errors, 301 Redirects, and 302 Redirects: These kinds of redirects should always be minimal, and the 404 errors must not be existing on your website. Redirect can contribute to a slower experience for the users while 404 errors appear to be roadblocks for the users. You must resolve these kinds of issues so that you will be able to present a remarkable experience for your site visitors.
3. Site URL Structure & Architecture: Your website should make use of subfolders to establish excellent site architecture. The URLs on your website should also be brief and descriptive.
4. Crawlability: This is how a particular search engine will be able to crawl to your website easily. You can be assured of good crawlability by having a dynamic sitemap, correctly making use of robots.txt file and rel=noindex tags.

3. An SEO Audit Identifies the On-Page Issues Issues of Your Website

The changes that you can apply on the content of your website easily are called On-page SEO. These are the simple changes that you can execute to improve your SEO.

The following element will be covered by a good SEO audit:

1. Meta Titles and Meta Descriptions: The Meta Titles of your website must be 35-70 characters only. It should incorporate the keywords that are found on your website. On the other hand, Meta Descriptions must always have less than 160 characters.  It should include the keyword, and also a CTA, if appropriate.
2. Headers: Headers a much like the headlines in a newspaper. The headline that has the biggest font will inform the visitors the most regarding the content of the newspaper.
3. Content: The content of your website is always the most important aspect of your page. With regards to SEO, you must make sure that the content of your website is keyword-centred. However, you must remember not to overstuff the content with the keywords as you will be penalised for it.
4. Internal Linking: It will help the visitors of your website to navigate your website better if your site has internal links.

4. Competition is Identified by An SEO Audit

Attempting to establish your online presence without studying the websites of your competition is just like aiming to build the world’s tallest skyscraper but not having an idea about the height of the other skyscrapers. Though it is vital that you know your competition, it is still not considered to be enough. You must also know what the competition is doing. An excellent SEO audit will be able to distinguish the competition, know their strategies, and devise a plan to create a taller skyscraper.

5. Your Backlinks are Identified by An SEO Audit

Last year, backlinks continued to be considered as a significant part of the algorithm of Google, and we do not see that it will be changed anytime soon. Typically, the trend is that the rank of your website will be better if you have more notable links to remarkable content. Some of the things that are identified by an excellent SEO audit includes:

• The number of backlinks that are on your website
• Spammy backlinks on your website
• The number of backlinks that are on the website of your competition

One thing that you must remember is that you must never spend on backlinks. You must concentrate on writing great content that is shareable and resourceful. The backlinks must always come naturally.

6. SEO Audits Identifies Your Visitor Count

You may learn that the number of people that are visiting your website is decreasing. This happens because search engines make constant updates to their algorithms to look for new and effective ways to list websites. If you have failed to update your website for quite some time or if you are not making use of effective SEO methods, search engines can kick you down the results page of the search engine proactively.

Lower visitor count is a very obvious sign that your SEO methods are not good enough. SEO audits will be able to identify the errors that are causing the problem, allowing you to correct or improve them.

7. An SEO Audit Will Help You Establish A Content Strategy

After receiving all of the data from the reasons that were enumerated from 1-6, you must utilise the data to establish strategies for your content. You must use these strategies for the development and improvement of your website. If you are being out-ranked because of your keywords, you must examine your competition, improve your content, optimise the meta titles and descriptions of your website, and identify where you will be able to earn some gains in your backlinks. A good SEO audit will help you in staying focus on your content strategy.

Conclusion

If you have been operating your website for years, or have just recently launched your online business, an SEO audit is necessary so that you can improve the online presence of your website. By investing in SEO audits sooner, you can start to address the issues that your website have immediately thus, allowing you to observe more positive results earlier.

 

 

 

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Planning A Successful Intranet Project

Developing an Intranet or redeveloping one that is already existing can be a difficult process. It is a project that requires consistent and well-planned approaches.

It does not matter how small or big the project is. A project plan that is carefully constructed can make or break the success of the project that you are working on and its potential to be delivered within budget and on time.

What Is An Intranet?

An intranet is a helpful tool to facilitate the communication among the employees at all of the levels of the company and to promote and develop collaboration and teamwork in the workplace.

Creating a Successful Intranet Project

When you have been tasked to develop an intranet project, you must have been too excited to work on your project that you have instantly visualised a solution that will enable you to easily create an interactive intranet. However, when you tried to start working on your solution for the very first time, you realise that you have no idea regarding web-design. You also realise that you know nothing about where and how to start the project.

What are the Steps in Planning a Succesful Intranet Project?

One thing that you must keep in mind is that you do not need to be a highly-skilled graphic designer so you could able to develop a good intranet. The first thing that you must remember is that your intranet should not be identical to your external website since the external site is built for the existing and potential customers and partners of the firm whereas the users of the intranet are the employees of the company.

This article will help you learn the steps and the element in planning and working on a successful intranet project.

1. Set Up a Goal

Before choosing the colours and fonts and thinking of all the exciting parts for the visual appearance of your intranet, you must first go through the vision, mission, and goals of the project.

The first thing that you must do is to determine the goals of your project. Some usual reasons for developing a new Intranet includes:

• Providing and improving a tool for collaboration and communication
• The existing Intranet of the company is already old, out-of-date and dysfunctional
• Providing self-service and up-to-date staff contact information
• Distributing corporate news via electronic newsletter
• Making the policies and procedures of the company available online
• Sharing company documents online rather than making use of shared drives
• Enabling employees to to have access to work files from their homes
• Better and simpler way of looking for important documents

The principal focus of your intranet project should first and foremost be on providing the employees with an easy and quick access to the tools and information that will help them perform their tasks. Begin with establishing a content plan that will include the kinds of information that should be seen on your intranet. Consider having the creators of the content and the people who will be responsible for updating the content of your intranet involved in the project early on so they will have a better understanding on what is demanded from them.

2. Determine the Scope and the Audience of Your Project

Some of the things that you must consider in determining the scope and the audience of your project include:

• Will the intranet be used exclusively by the staff or will it also be available for the contractors and partners?
• Will you enable the employees to have access to your intranet even when they are at home or at a site visit with your client?
• Will you allow mobile access?

3. Create a Site Map

You can use various tools such as Visio to build a sitemap. You can even make use of hand-drawn drafts to create a sitemap. The main branch is typically represented by each department.

4. Determine the Key Application That You Would Want to Use

You must also determine the type of main applications that you would like to use on your intranet. Some applications include those that will support matters such as news and blogs, documents, a shared company calendar, a database of corporate images, online policies and procedures, personnel database.

5. Establish Permissions

An intranet should always have a strong permission system. It will also help in easily distributing information. You may also want to include an area where people in a certain department can create or edit specific content while the other employees can just view it.

These restrictions can be easily done by establishing permission such as Group, Sub-Groups, and Roles.

The Organisational Chart of the company will be helpful in making this task easier.

6. Decide on the Look of Your Homepage

The homepage will be the first page that everyone will be able to see. It will be worth the extra effort to carefully design this page as it will serve as the gateway to all the other information and content that is available on your Intranet. You can easily look at the homepages of other sites for inspiration so you can decide on how you would want the homepage to appear. However, you must remember that it is best to keep your homepage simple and clean.

You can also feature a navigation menu where you present the content of your intranet the employees in various ways. You can present them alphabetically or by subject. The best way to present the information will depend on the target audience of your intranet. You must remember to name the sections of your intranet with explicit headlines that will help the employees look for the right content easily. You can also opt for an intranet solution that will offer an advanced search function to make the navigation easier.

7. Consider Your Budget and Resources

You must determine the number of the users of your internet. Most vendors of Intranet software usually price their products by the number of the users.

You must also determine the provider of your software and your internal project team. A project sponsor, a project manager, a technical support contact, and a representative from the marketing or communications division can comprise your team. However, smaller companies may have fewer people involved in the project.

8.Establish Your Timeline

You must carefully plan your timeline as every company is different. Some significant points to consider that may cause some delays include:

• Looking for the source of the hardware
• Obtaining access throught the office network
• Finalising your design
• Updating the list of users
• Content population
• Content migration.

9. Determine Future Plans

Numerous intranet projects lose their momentum following the initial launch phase. You must remember that a successful intranet is something that develops over time. You must start with a simple project and gradually add new features. You must also learn from the feedback of the users and implement the requests of the users wherever feasible.

Small improvements can make a big difference. You must keep the original team, and you must regularly meet with them for reviews of the project and brainstorming of some new ideas.

10. Start As Soon As Possible

The most important step is implementing all your plans. You must immediately start on the project and prepare for the adoption of the company of your intranet.

You must also be prepared to train the content authors, managers, and owners of the company. You must also set some standard and guidelines and determine a process of decision making for changes and improvement to your intranet project. It will also help to determine the central team that will manage some aspects of the site.

Important Points to Consider

In developing creating an Intranet Project, you must remember the end user of your project. You must always keep in mind that the people who will be using it are employees that have varying degrees of skill when it comes to the use of technology. The best possible way to overcome this concern is to keep your project simple and consider usability and ease of navigation.

Once the intranet is in place, you must continuously obtain feedback from its users and make continuous improvements to it accordingly.

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7 Tips for Creating High-Quality Web Design

People who are working in the world design for quite some time might often hear the phrase “Pixel Perfect Web Design.” Those that cater to web agencies and clients of the smart web work hard to accomplish the expression that has shunned each and every designer.

This guide will tell you about the things that you need to know about pixel perfect design and how you can create them.

Pixel Perfect Design

Pixel perfect is a process where the designer considers every element of your design, down to its individual pixels. It is different from designing stuff that has compression artefacts and is primarily dependent on the setting.

Once a Photoshop file is provided to you, for example, you should use your skills in HTML/CSS to ensure that every part of your work is equivalent to what it is in PSD.

Pixel perfect designs make sure that every pixel is rendered meticulous attention to ensure that your design receives the sharper appearance instead of a sloppy one. Everything must look sharp, clean, and intentional. It ensures that each of the 72 pixels that make up every inch of the design is perfect and in harmony. In short, with pixel perfect web design, measurements, additions, and multiplications are everything.

A change of even half a pixel will stop the design from being pixel perfect. Minimal flaws in appearance, including colour differences, blurred edges, and objects that “jump” in position between pages undermine the image the user will have on your brand.

Clients think that Pixel Perfect is a process to have similar appearances of your design in all browsers. For the majority, it is all about maintaining a certain kind of perfection.

Can You Achieve Pixel Perfect Web Designs?

A developer or designer will inform you that the easiest and best possible way to produce pixel perfect designs is to directly post the image from Photoshop and ignore CSS and HTML. The idea would be more suitable for education rather than accomplishing the design through practical situations.

Pixel perfect designs appear as a flawless masterpiece while you are in and out of the Photoshop. However, as you continue with your coding, problems will start to arise. The problems with several browsers that differently interpret the same code and inconsistency in viewport sizes also do not do justice to the concept of pixel perfect designs. Similarly, you cannot foretell the desktop size that is used by people as some may be making use of conventional desktops while the majority are using laptops.

You cannot predict the viewport of the readers which may also create problems. The concerns can be corrected with a design that is responsive, but your desired design may appear out of the picture. Pixel perfect web design is not about achieving 100 percent pixel-perfect, it is more about having your design as close to 100 percent pixel perfect.

Achieving High-Quality Web Designs

Listed below are seven tutorials that you can check out to assist you in working through your journey of achieving high-quality, pixel perfect web design.

1. Pixel Hunting

The strategy from the Go Tree House team will amaze you. It shows the method of removing unwanted anti-aliasing and producing perfect pixel alignments. The process is reasonably one of the most important elements that you should study and include to your own skill set.

2. Pixel Fitting

Dustin Curtis also offers a useful guide that tackles the technique called as “Pixel Fitting.” It is utilised to enhance vectors in Photoshop.

The method considers the practical use of vector graphics and microscopic control of Photoshop to avoid flaws produced by anti-aliasing. It is achieved by porting enhance vector graphics from Illustrator to Photoshop.

3. Pixel Perfect Techniques

When looking for maximum accuracy via Illustrator and Photoshop, consider checking tutorials from the guys at Medialoot. It shows an in-depth tutorial on six important techniques that use Photoshop in their first tutorial. It also shows an article that outlines methods and options for the design while making use of illustrator.

4. Pixel Depth

Pixel Depth is a tutorial that will train you to add some depth to designs. It will show everything that you need to learn about depth of design – from strategies to effectively using contrast to mixing light and dark pixel thing lights.

5. Pixel Perfection for the Web

Alex Scian, a freelance web designer, shows a tutorial on pixel perfect optimisation for the web. It is one of the few in-depth tutorials that tackles pixel perfect design for the web that is available since the majority of the people do not even try, going for responsive designs instead.

6. Pixel Rotation and Nudging

This tutorial from the people at Smashing Magazine offers a useful compilation of advanced techniques utilised to manipulate the elements of pixel-perfect designs without breaking them up in the process. With their tips, you will be able to avoid having to redo everything whenever you need to edit a design that is already completed, thus saving you time and money as well.

7. Pixel Art

Pixel Art is the earliest and the most traditional practice of producing the pixel perfect design. It is even older compared to the web, and it originates from video games. It is considered as the toughest applications of perfect-pixel design as it is hand-crafted from scratch and without the use of any vectors or shortcuts.

Important Point to Considers

Pixel perfect web design is not about achieving a design that is 100% perfect. It is more about getting it closer to perfection and meeting the requirements of your client.

It is basically a vision that disturbs the sleep of developers and designers. Learning to achieve the aspired design will take time, however, by studying the above-mentioned tutorials, constant practice, and perfectly executing the techniques, you too will be able to achieve pixel-perfect web designs.

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The 3 Page Builder Plugins That Will Empower Your Website

WordPress is a fantastic, easy-to-use CMS. Page builders allow anyone to build smart and professional-looking articles and websites. It helps developers build pages quickly, and assists beginners create sophisticated pages they could not make on their own. With page builder plugins, you don’t need an HTML/CSS guru to make your website look great.

Have you ever experienced some problems positioning texts and images in the WordPress editor? That’s where WordPress page builder plugins come to rescue.

So, whether you want to create a landing page or just want make all of your WordPress content stand out, you’ll find a plugin that’s right for you, both paid and free. In this article, we will walk you through the most powerful and feature-packed plugin available today.

1. Elementor (Free/$49+)

Released in mid-2016, Elementor is one of the first page builders to offer features usually proposed by premium drag and drop builders. With Elementor’s live editing, there is no need to update or press preview to see any changes you have made because everything is instant.

Elementor boasts its complete command over every single detail on your pages. It includes beautifully-designed pre-built page templates you can use and edit. It will also let you undo and redo any changes you have made, so you don’t have to worry about experimenting while using Elementor.

The paid version also includes post grid widgets that make showcasing regular WordPress posts and custom posts uncomplicated and easy. One of its best features is the Embed Anywhere which allows you to embed Elementor layouts everywhere on your website. Additionally, twenty premium templates are included to help get you started.

Overall, the interface is easy to use, loads fast, and the included template system lets you save your layouts and use them on your website. If you’re on a tight budget, Elementor will be a good choice as most major features are included in the free version.

2. Divi Builder (Demo/$89-$249)

Just like Elementor, this powerful page builder plugin includes modules and a variety of options that give you power over your entire page. Its creators, Elegant Themes, has a reputation for giving its clients great value for money.

Divi Builder comes in two forms: the “Back-end Builder” and the “Visual Builder.” The Back-end Builder is used for making immediate adjustments rather than creating new pages. The Visual Builder lets you create your pages on the front-end of your website so you can see exactly how they’ll look when published.

Divi Builder comes with Divi Leads built in, so you will love this feature if you are into split-testing. Divi Leads allow you to split test so you can thoroughly develop every aspect of your page, helping you boost conversion rates for your website easily.

Divi Builder comes with more than 20 pre-made templates to help you get through the starting phase and more than 40 content modules that will allow you to add comments, portfolios, tables, and everything in between. It may have a hefty price tag, but it’s worth every penny!

3. Beaver Builder (Demo/$99-$399)

Beaver Builder is a front-end editor that gives you the same view as your website visitors, what you see is what they see. And because you’re editing the front-end view, it’s easy to get pages looking exactly how you want them.

It also offers over 15 templates for landing pages and content pages, so you don’t have to start from scratch. It works with almost any theme, but will truly shine if you use their Beaver Builder Theme available for plans $199 and $399.

Beaver Builder’s user interface isn’t just simple to use, but loads quickly too. Their modules are customizable with colours, fonts, padding, margin, and the like, all editable in the user interface. They have also added Mobile Views so you can see how your page appears on mobile devices directly within the editor, as well as customizations for a particular module if mobile devices are detected.

Beaver Builder also has an amiable community behind it, and their customer support representatives are fantastic. Based on their website, they are likely to keep a close eye on improvements and added features in the future.

The Bottomline

Now it’s time to pick a plugin and start building beautiful pages for your site. Many WordPress plugins come with a 30-day money-back guarantee, but requesting a refund is time-consuming. If you are looking to create landing pages for your website, we recommend the Elementor page builder.

The decision is still in the palm of your hand. Don’t disregard the free demos just yet as you need to understand the visual interface of your chosen plugin and check if it includes all the modules you need.

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