General Web Site Development Iissues.

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Not Quite Dvorak

Development Issues

In order to develop a cost effective web site solution, there are areas where you can assist in the development process. No project can become reality without raw material. In the case of a web site, the kinds of materials needed include, text, graphics, perhaps database files and possibly other unique artwork (i.e. logos; licensed stock art). While PCMG has the resources to produce all of this material for your project, you can speed the development cycle and reduce the total cost of your project by providing us with all, or a portion, of these materials.

Site material can be provided in any number of formats. However, there are preferred formats for sharing copy and graphics:

Print Copy: This usually includes general information about you and/or your company. Product information; Fact Sheets; FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions and Answers); Guarantees; Disclaimers; Return Policies, and any other internal business practices your customers may need or want to know about are helpful.

It may be necessary that portions of this material be provided "as is" without any editorial change. (Information conveying legal liability is one example.) Other information may benefit from review and change to best suit the web. Good copyrighting places a critical role in obtaining and maintaining your site's visitor base! Your visitors want professional, informative, information on your business or service. What's more, search engines rely to a very large degree on what is viewable to web surfers! Good copy and search engine optimization or indelibly intertwined. (Which makes for more relevant searches and better designed web sites!)

Preferred Format: Supplied as an electronic file (preferably in Word (DOC), Lotus WordPro (LWP) or Corel formats. We can also make use of hard copy you provide. Our ability to OCR (optical character read) this material is dependent on quality of the original, fonts used, and other issues. The more print copy you can supply us with, the easier (and less expensive) it is to develop your site.

Graphics-- Logos; Product Photos; Informational Shots; Team Member Single and/or group photographs, product photographs. In general, it is good to provide "too much" of this type of material. Be sure to maximize your return on investment by including any artwork, logos, or designs which may have been developed in-house, or in conjunction with third party advertising or creative agencies. In many instances, this material can be electronically manipulated to easily be used as part of your new web site's design.

Preferred Format: Supplied in file format. Preferably Macromedia Fireworks (PNG) or Adobe Photoshop (PSD ) compatible formats. Hard copy material is also acceptable but will need to be scanned and optimized prior to inclusion on your site.

PCMG Consulting is able to assist you in the development of all your graphic needs. In many cases, we can add value to your web site development project by working with members of your organization, or other outside consulting group(s), to ensure that materials created for your site can be utilized in other ways including brochures; product fact sheets; stationary; business cards and more.

Links to other sites: It is often a good idea to include links to other sites that your audience might find useful or would lend credibility to your site. Your ability to provide URLs for sites you feel would be appropriate for your web domain is welcomed and helpful.

While link exchange is one method of generating additional traffic to your site, PCMG Consulting feels it is important to carefully weigh the value of every "reciprocal" link agreement which you might be tempted to enter into. We also do not subscribe to the notion of building links "blindly" in the hope of influencing certain search engine databases. (Google's Page Rank purportedly relies in some small part on the number of external links to a site in its ranking algorithm. In our opinion, the quest for high Google positioning, has led some SEO Consultants to promote the creation of links at the peril and potentially expense of their clients.

Want to learn more? We invite you to continue reading our marketing sections for additional ideas and information.

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PCMG Consulting
7252 Highway 70 South #1403
Nashville, TN. 37221
Toll Free: 866.646.7472
615.476.3770
Fax: 615.646.7472