How can i know I’m getting a good website when i pay someone for it?

Don’t worry. There are a few constants in the vast expanse of variables that produce a good site time after time. If you, your company or organization needs a website and want to get an idea of what you’re getting into, or if you are among the millions who just want to know, here are a few essentials to getting a good solid website:

1. Purpose.

This could be the single most important factor that will help a website succeed or fail. A clear and defined purpose will help the other pieces fall into place. Why do you have a website? Who are you trying to reach? What are your objectives and how do you measure success? Purpose will allow you to make clear and concise decisions about everything from your color palette to technology and even features. Define clear objectives, plot your course, and move on to number two.

2. Clean Purposeful Design

I could have just said design here, but that doesn’t cover it. Ask any designer worth their salt and they will tell you that there is “design” and then there is “good design”; and the difference between the two is like east from west. Websites can be, and often are “over-designed” by amateurs who ignore design principles, throw every Photoshop trick in the book at a design and call it a website. Professional designers know what effective design is; and are experienced and disciplined enough to know when to stop designing. When talking about things like color choice, layout, imagery, and relevant metaphors, you really have to make a conscious effort to design with a specific idea in mind. In short, know your target (objective) and purposefully design towards it. And for Pete’s sake use white space! Moving on!

3. Clear Message

Every pixel of your website should have a purpose and a certain efficiency. Each one complimenting the others, together making up the content and imagery that shape your message and create a consistent brand image. Don’t try to fill up every last bit of space just because it looks “empty” (again – white space is important). Identify your target audience and what it is you want them to do. Make it easy on your users. Guide them where you want them to go, and help them find what they want to find with very little effort. Once you get them there, you have to provide them with the right information and a meaningful, compelling call to action.

4. Simple, Usable Architecture

How well are your pages and content organized? Is it intuitive? Will your target audience find what they are looking for? Can they use the navigation and is it understandable? If not, you’ll frustrate your users and they will bounce.

5. Reliable, Standards Compliant Framework

A good website must start with a good foundation. Starting from the ground up, quality, reliability and compliance with web standards means that your website will look the same and work the same in more browsers across platforms. What that means for you is a more consistent and powerful brand image to all of your website users.

6. Search Engine Marketing/ Search Engine Optimization

Hook Search Engines up with your website. Look at it this way: Search Engines like Google, Yahoo, and MSN are your best friend, and you know this smokin’ hot website (yours) that would be perfect for them. A match made in Heaven (well, maybe utah). Making search engines like you is just a game – kinda like the game of love. Get it wrong and you’ll find yourself dumped. Do it right and you’ll be rewarded with lots of attention and free, targeted traffic . It’s not difficult, but like anything else it just takes experience, know how and planning.

7. Technical Excellence

Getting a clever, relevant and memorable domain name is huge. Having fast, efficient, managed hosting with enough bandwidth and reliability to handle all the traffic you’ll get from your great new website’s marketing, and knowing which technologies fit within your website’s objectives and goals are all marks of a good website. After you have all that, find a professional webslinger who knows how to spin a site like no ones business and you’ll have a GREAT website.

Check out our design showcase to see some of the good websites we’ve done for our clients. And if you need a good website, drop us a line and we’ll do the same for you.

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The technology behind Sprint’s Xohm Network… WiMax »

The new wireless broadband network, Xohm, requires WiMax, short for Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access. WiMax is based upon the IEEE 802.16 standard, developed to deliver non-line-of-sight (NLoS) connections between a subscriber and a base station with a typical cell radius approximately two to six miles. This 4G (fourth generation) technology will let users connect to the internet through the Xohm network at true broadband speeds of 2 megabits per second (download) and greater.

What Xohm’s Network Means for Business »

The mobile user is becoming more common in the workplace, both in corporations and small businesses. Secure tunnels and faster connections have enabled users to work from anywhere in the world and stay connected to the office. But wireless wide area networks like 3G and AT&T’s Edge have been limited in connection speed. Add to that the bandwidth overhead of a VPN and you start to crawl.

The Xohm/WiMax network could truly empower the mobile worker and can have a greater impact on certain industries that require high mobility as well as companies that want to allow their employees a bit of freedom.

What Xohm’s Network Means for You »

From a personal and professional standpoint, true wireless broadband access to the internet would be incredibly valuable. As a web designer, creative frustrations can get in the way of progress. The need for speed, however, often outweighs the need for a change of scenery. In a creative crunch, the connectivity offered by the Xohm network would allow me to relax my mind by the harbor with my laptop or have a coffee at Starbucks without having to pay for WiFi to work and stay connected.

As a consumer using the Xohm/WiMax network , you could have a day at the park with the kids while staying connected. Have a video call with your spouse or children (watch the videos attached to this article). Check your email, Facebook, Stock Quotes or bank account from anywhere with speed and ease. There are several potential applications that would (hopefully) make life a bit easier.

So, will Xohm pricing cause a personal economic crisis »

Pricing for the Xohm/WiMax network from Sprint is supposed to be comparable to other wireless broadband networks provided by carriers like Verizon, but can be charged by the time period and type of customer. For example, 24 hours of unlimited usage is only $10. Home Internet service is available for $25 a month. You can also pay for “on-the-go” service at $30 monthly. The best part about Xohm pricing: no contract! In an “effort to free customers of restrictive long-term plans,” Sprint is not requiring a signed contract to use the Xohm/WiMax network.

The Drawbacks of Xohm »

Drawbacks, you ask? For now, you have to live in Baltimore – which might be a problem for people in, say, Fort Walton Beach, Florida. You also have to purchase a Xohm-branded, WiMax enabled Samsung Express air card ($59.99) or a ZyXEL modem ($79.99). The Xohm/WiMax network requires one of those two devices.

Sprint executives did sport laptops connected to the Xohm network with embedded WiMax chips, however, like the Lenovo ThinkPad X301. By the end of 2008, a variety of WiMax enabled phones and devices will be available, including dual-mode devices that utilize the 3G and the Xohm network (4G).

Xohm/WiMax Network Coverage, Future »

Although true wireless broadband in the US is no loner a pipe dream, deploying the technology still has a ways to go. Developing an infrastructure of this type is costly and often slow-going. According to Sprint CEO Dan Hesse and Xohm President Barry West, it will take $5 billion to build out a national network.

Sprint is planning to expand the Xohm/WiMax network to Chicago and Washington D.C. soon and later to Philadelphia, Portland, Ore., Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas. Sprint is also going to joint venture with Clearwire to expand former CEO Gary Forsee’s dream of the nationwide WiMax network.

Xohm aims to provide enough WiMax network coverage to reach up to 140 million people nationally by the end of 2010. West also said that 100 major cities could be covered by the Xohm/WiMax network as early as 2015.

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