Text Content
Concisely articulate what you do
- Sum it up in a headline
- Then sum it up in a paragraph
- After the paragraph place a call to action
- More text can follow below if you want to flesh out your ideas
SEO – Search Engine Optimization
Decide on SEO Keywords
- SEO Keywords are a group or words (usually 3 – 5 but can be more) that you anticipate people will search for to find your website
- Look for keyword groups that are specific enough to have fewer competing websites but general enough that people are searching for them. Or get very specific and lead people to your niche.
- Locality is a good definer
Work keywords into your writing
(Please Read This – I Forgot to Emphasize it in the Talk)
- Devote one page to each important keyword group
- Place keyword in your page title (this should also appear as the main heading on your page)
- Write at least 250 words of original, informative text.
- the keyword group should appear once or ideally twice in the text as well as the page title.
- Your Platform with probably have a way to add the keywords to the code of your site
- For WordPress I recommend the plugin Yoast SEO
Do not depend on SEO alone to bring people to your site.
Images
Consider a photo shoot with a professional photographer
- Plan before the shoot
- Look your best
- How can you depict various aspects of your work?
- Do you want more people in the photos?
- Ask for shots that can be used as banners
Stock Photos
- Subscriptions you can cancel anytime give the best rates. Here are two I have used
- This is more expensive but who knows, you might find that perfect image
Creative Commons
- These images are offered free but may require attributions
Use images without permission at your own risk. It is rare, but I know people who have been sued for this.
Website Platforms & Software
Hosted vs. Self-Hosted
- Self-Hosted – you use a free software, like WordPress, and sign up with a hosting company to Host it.
- Advantages
- More expandable – you have complete control
- Huge selection of Themes and Plugins from 3rd party developers
- Take advantage of free hosting support
- Disadvantages
- One more step in setting it up
- You have to keep the software up to date
- Susceptible to hackers
- Self hosting recommendations
- I recommend WordPress as a self-host software
- I recommend Bluehost for hosting
- Hosted – you sign up at a monthly rate. Software and hosting is included
- Advantages
- They are responsible for software updates and security
- There is chat support
- Disadvantages
- You get what they offer – can not add new functionality
- Recommended Hosted Platforms
- Squarespace. Weebly and Wix are also popular
- Shopify for serious ecommerce
- You can also set up a shop of WordPress & Squarespace
- There is also a hosted WordPress at wordpress.com
- Sign up for a free blog to practice and see what it is like to use WordPress, but you will have to pay a monthly fee for a professional website
- It is limited like the other hosting platforms
Design Tips
- Don’t get too creative unless your confident (Them that know…). Use simple styles.
- White backgrounds are good
- Use one font family for headings and one for basic text
- They can be fresh, but choose clean fonts
- Avoid colored text (except for links and highlights) – use shades of gray
- Stick to 3 or 4 font sizes
- If you avoid the pitfalls of bad design you are well on your way to good design
- The bottom line is constancy and attention to detail
Placing Images
- If you have a series of images make sure they are the same size
- Consider the relationship and proportions of text and images on a page. Examples: here and here.
- I recomend Photoshop Elements
- use the crop tool and fill in the pixel sizes to create consitant sized images
- Learn image sizes in pixels
- An image that takes up half or a third of the page should be 600- 800 pixels wide
- An image that spans the whole screen should be 1900 – 2100 pixels w
Videos
- Upload videos to YouTube or Vimeo. From there you can embed them in any site
