A web consultant can advise you, tutor you and consult with you about which strategies would be best implemented for your particular web site concerns.  Web consultants are usually very adept at what they do, are quick and efficient and can carry out tasks in a short amount of time.

For me web consulting has been a wonderful way to connect with people who want to become involved in their business website and want to learn about it.  I love it when my clients have a desire to take the reigns of their web presence in their hands – they no longer have to feel that they are reliant on a web developer to make updates .  That is one of the best qualities of WordPress, the ability to make the updates yourself without having prior HTML knowledge.  When my team and I build a site from the ground up, we make sure the WordPress programming incorporates user-friendliness and the owners ability to update their site so we can turn your awesome website back over to you!

Many times when I am approached to build a website, the client often doesn’t have a clue of what’s in store…for them.  What I mean by that is many people are under the assumption that when they hire a web developer-that

they (the client) will have little else to do except give some general direction.  WRONG!!!  I think it would be valuable to educate the business owner about what is expected from them before they endeavor their website project.

NAVIGATION: What will the pages to your website be?  Have you thought about succinct labels for each page?  Will the pages contain all necessary information that you will need to relay to your Internet audience? Really put some thought into this.  Often I end up directing clients to incorporate another page or two so that your web audience will be able to find exactly what they are looking for in a concise and quick manner.  Remember you only have approximately 15-30 seconds to keep your website visitor on your website…make sure they can find what they are looking for quickly.

CONTENT: The client is responsible for providing all written content for the website.  This might sound relatively easy, however it can be daunting if you’re not prepared.  Before you approach a web developer for bids, first have your pages thought out, then start developing your content.

Content is KING! Don’t approach your website with any other viewpoint.

The richer the content, the more the search engines will see you as a valuable addition to the myriad of websites already on the World Wide Web.  Be sure to incorporate the keywords you believe your audience will use to seek out your business in a logical manner repeating those keywords/phrases at least two to three times. What will set you apart is genuine, original CONTENT.

PHOTOS: Have all your photos ready to send to your web developer and specify which page they coordinate with.  The LARGER the better.  If you have some measly 120px wide image and you think we can enlarge it to look great on your website, think again.  Smaller images cannot be made larger and look good.  If we start with a large image we can then optimize it for web browsers.  Don’t have all the images you think you’ll need?  Peruse through www.iStockphoto.com or my favorite stock photo vendor www.dreamstime.com.

HOSTING PROVIDER: There are so many great hosting providers today.  Many of which will host five to an unlimited number of sites on just one package ranging from $50 to $100 a year.  Please don’t choose GoDaddy as your hosting provider.  They make it difficult for developers to do the regular run-of-the-mill things we always do on other hosting provider’s backends  because of their proprietary ways geared toward laymen who don’t know how to build websites.  That being said, I recommend a couple of providers I’ve worked with a number of times.  My own hosting provider www.addaction.net and www.hostgator.com. If you can pick a hosting provider, your web developer will be happy to set it up for you.

And don’t forget about investing into marketing your website by having it optimized for the Search Engines (SEO) and investing in some valuable Search Engine Marketing as well so you can achieve that coveted 1st page Google Ranking

This is by no means a complete list of items you should keep in mind when you are considering a website project, however they are some of the most time consuming ones you will have to tackle.  Once these are accomplished you will be ready to fly through the web development process and on your way to seeing your website project a realization sooner than you can say GOOGLE

I have been an active Yelper since 2008.  More so for checking out reviews for services I am researching.   So far, I have not been let down.  The last service I did research for was for a nail salon.  I wanted to purchase a gift certificate for my dear friend and wanted to make sure I hooked her up with a great salon experience.  From what she said the Yelp Reviews did not steer me wrong and she walked away with wonderfully painted and polished toes as did her young daughter.  Prior to that I researched moving companies as I had a positive life change BACK to my beloved Carlsbad.  I found one via CraigsList and was ready to hire them for their very low rates.  However I thought I should check their ratings on Yelp and low and behold they were awful!  Yikes, I knew I couldn’t hire them.  I immediately searched for a moving company on Yelp and found one that had all 5 star ratings.  They were hired and they performed their moving services to a ‘T’.  I mean movers doing a GREAT job is almost unheard of, but they did and absolutely no overcharges.

Of late I am actively posting reviews of businesses I have used…I hope my words of Yay or Nay will help a clever consumer make a good choice.

Be proactive about your shopping experiences and share your opinion and better yet, check out Yelp ratings before you go out to that new restaurant or go get your car fixed-you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

I started developing WordPress Websites at the beginning 2008.  I am amazed at the revolution that has occurred within this wonderful content management system.  “WordPress?  I thought that was for blogs.”  I remember hearing this quite frequently back in the day.

Now I have savvy clients seeking out WordPress web sites for ecommerce, hotel booking websites, online supplement sales, classified advertising sites.  The capabilities are never ending it seems.  And the way the WordPress community develops plugins that enable developers like myself to incorporate the niftiest functions within a site are amazing.  Used to be we’d have to program everything from scratch which would be costly to the client.  Now the cost of producing interactive functions (newsletter signups, photo galleries, PayPal shopping carts) is so much less for my clients because of the capabilities that are possible with WordPress websites. You still need us developers to tweak those capabilities, but at a fraction of the cost that it was only 4 years ago.

The SEO features of WordPress are also quite impressive.  I have had sites built in WordPress go very quickly up the Google Ranks.  It takes time, wisdom and energy to have the data behind those organic rankings, but the SEO plugins and frameworks make it wonderfully handy to incorporate.

I know there are other great platforms out there, but for me I’ve got the WordPress bug.  Now it seems that the general public is catching onto the possibilities and pros of building their website in WordPress.  Glad to experience this evolution and be a part of it.

That opportunity was taken away from me to a good extent over the last couple of years.  Now that I have the freedom to do what I love again I am so grateful.

Web design for a wanna be artist such as myself is a total creative outlet; an outlet I must have in my life to feel complete.  It’s like the poet or journalist who has a gift for words and a passion for the written word…if they didn’t have that outlet something inside them would be lost.  When forces beyond my control detoured my energy in other directions I felt lost.  Now I am using the gift inside me once again to be creative and strategically implement marketing.

The marketing part of me is another gift-the gift of resourcefulness.  I am one of those research queens- If I don’t know your industry when we begin to work together, by the time I am done with your project I will be fully immersed in it and understand who your competitors are and what we need to do in order to get you to the first page of Google (always my goal).  I will find every way possible to make sure you get the traffic your website deserves.

I will never give up the freedom to express myself again and I will continue to use the gift of resourcefulness.  I want to be the best web developer and SEO that I can be.

Hard work and perseverance pay off.

I am proud to say after only a week of working on getting my site BACK to the top of the SE’s (search engines) I have succeeded.

ACA Web Consulting is now #3 on the 1st page of Google for the term “web consulting” out of over 31 million competitors.  A testament that our search engine practices work.  Ethical SEO practices, consistent and on target.  Content is king and relevance is the key.

I look forward to other successes ACA Web Consulting will establish for our clients.

Through this experience I have learned how much I love what I do. I have always known I enjoy web design and SEO, but a renewed LOVE for my profession has evolved and I am so grateful. For those of us in this industry that are able to provide for our families doing something we absolutely enjoy…We KNOW how blessed we truly are.  If you don’t yet I hope you realize it one day.

Thus the newest version of ACA Web Consulting has been born. Upon developing this site, simple- to the point and informative to my audience, I came to a realization. Not only do I love what I do…I’m really good at it. I’m not bragging, it is a gift and I need to utilize it to the best of my ability for my clients and myself. My gifts are art, resourcefulness and perseverance. And with these I am able to forge ahead in providing unique web design and successful SEO services.

Thank you to all my clients over the years. You have given me opportunities to be creative and help you succeed for which I am truly grateful.

The days of static websites are gone. Companies want control over their websites. From simple updates to adding new photos to the company blog. All of this is possible with WordPress Websites. WordPress is referred to as a “Content Management System” or CMS. The CMS enables you, the administrator to log into the backend to make any necessary changes or updates to your website. No HTML needed, however having a little knowledge under belt isn’t a bad idea either.

Check out the functionality of WordPress at www.WordPress.org. If you are in the San Diego area and are considering building a website for your company or your ready to redesign your old Flash website give ACA Web Consulting a call at 760-586-1155 or 619-500-4011.

Is it because I am so hard on myself? The qualities that make me a great developer…attention to minute detail, coding excellence etc, are fabulous for my clients. But they wreak havoc on my head when it comes to even thinking about a redesign for myself.

So, I will contemplate it; get inspired (lots of great inspiration coming my way lately) and delve into this in the coming weeks or maybe months.

Stay tuned.

Granted he’s talking about ‘great web designers’; the elite designer/developer that focus’ on great design, easy user interface and clean code. NOT homemade unstudied, throw something together in FrontPage (uck) people who call themselves designers.

This article is dated (2006) but has a lot of pertinent wisdom when it comes to a client’s interaction with their web designer.

Thanks Seth.