blog

1. People are talking about you online. Not all of them are saying nice things.
2. Nobody can "just call Google" and have them remove negative mentions of you or your company on other websites.
3. Facebook and Twitter might be free, but building an audience takes time, energy and persistence.
4. You don’t need to squat 279 website domain names. It’s expensive and confusing.
5. Don’t be afraid to put your client list on your website. Your competition already knows who’s on it. Be confident you are servicing them better than the competition ever could.
6. Don’t be afraid to put your management/employee list on your website. Your competition already knows who’s on it. Be confident you are treating them better than the competition ever could.
7. No CMS magically makes you a designer. It’s still HTML, and you can still screw it up.
8. Websites typically don’t just “stop working”. If your junior IT guy was in there monkeying around and broke something, we aren’t going to be mad, but we do need to know or we can’t fix it.
9. It’s like a house; the price changes based on how big and how nice.
10. It’s like a house; once it’s built, a change means more time (and likely money) is needed to do something different.
11. It’s like a house; if the deadline is January 1st you can’t wait until December 31st to approve the blueprints and expect to finish on time.
12. Don’t require users to fill out a form to access your content. Your users don’t want it that bad and your competitors are just going to enter fake data.
13. You can’t keep me from stealing your images. Turn the right click back on.
14. You can’t tell somebody everything at once, so stop trying. Slow down and focus on what really matters.
15. You can’t force people to stay on your site. If you want them to stay, give them a good reason to. No, opening external links in new windows is not a reason.
16. Your site has to have content.
17. Your site has to have good content before other people will link to it.
18. You can’t steal that content from other people.
19. Good content is hard work. Hire a content strategist and copywriter.
20. Use straightforward, meaningful, real words in your content. Nobody knows what it means to “synergize core competencies through proactive dialogue” (nor are they searching for that).
21. It’s okay for a page to scroll. Honestly, if Target.com isn’t worried about it, neither should you be.
22. Make the logo smaller. Big logos don’t mean people will remember you. It means you have a logo that’s too big.
23. I don’t care what your print designer is telling you…If you don’t make the link look like a link; people won’t know they can click it.
24. Don’t ever tell a designer to “make it pop”. It’s not helpful feedback and they’ll be secretly wishing that you stub all of your toes later.

Aztek is a Cleveland, Ohio based web design firm who sincerely hopes you appreciate that we are only using humor as a vehicle to illustrate our points. But seriously, don't make the logo bigger.

As a business, you want to protect your intellectual property on the Web, especially on your own website. Oftentimes, that involves with the use of a trademark symbol on a product name or logo. But many businesses are not sure which symbol to use, when to use the symbol, or how many times to repeat it. To assist you in understanding the proper use, our good friends at the Law Firm of Brouse McDowell have shared some pointers on trademark use.

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1. Content is a cookie, and once they're done eating it, they should want more.
2. Tell a story.
3. Tell your story one snippet at a time. Being too broad makes you boring.
4. The hook comes first. More...

It’s been almost three years since we launched aztekweb.com. And like we tell our clients, that’s about the average lifespan of most websites. Things change. The Internet evolves, new technologies become available, old technologies may no longer be the best choice. Companies offer new services and stop supporting others.

It’s no different for us.

In 2010 we saw the rise of “Apps” and the “Mobile Web”. And we’ve added those services to our offering. We upgraded the blog. Our client list evolved and we wanted a portfolio interface that worked more naturally on an iPad *COUGH**COUGH* sorry, “Touch screen device”. We revisited what was working, and what wasn’t. We simplified. We grew. We even threw in some hidden Easter Eggs for those of you willing hunt them down (Hint: we played a lot of Konami games on the Nintendo growing up).

Plus, our creative team was bored with the old design.

There are many other great things planned for 2011. We hope the new aztekweb.com serves our clients (and potential clients) well.

As the year wraps up, it’s a good time to make some plans for things to accomplish in the New Year. Budgets are being decided, strategies being finalized. Make sure there is some time and energy set aside for your organization’s website. Even if you just finished a huge website project last year, there are still lots of other things you should be considering this year.  And since your website doesn’t need to quit smoking or call it’s mother more often, here’s a few more appropriate ideas… More...

Beginning a new website project can be a daunting and intimidating task. There are so many moving parts it is easy to overlook some of them. This doesn’t just go for the web designer; it goes for the client as well. In an effort to help make the process a little less frightening, here is Aztek’s website project checklist for the client… More...

Website content…It’s the most important part of your project, yet it is often treated with the least regard. You probably hired a professional web design firm to build you the site (because hey, you’re no web developer right?), but you plan to do the copy yourself…Later…When you can set some time aside. More...

File this under ethics.

“Google Certified! Microsoft Certified! WC3 Valid HTML! Wow! These guys must really know their stuff! Sign the contract!”

“Not so fast. Did you verify they weren’t lying?”

“What do you mean? They have the little logo right there on their website. See? It says “Microsoft Partner.” More...

Dave Skorepa and Josh Brown of Aztek were recently interviewed by Dan Hanson (greatlakesgeek.com) about the latest web design technologies and techniques such as HTML 5, CSS3, jQuery and the Mobile Web. You can watch the YouTube video below.

It happens all too often. After selecting a (seemingly suitable) web design firm and committing to a project, you may find the company you picked was not a good fit and the relationship sours. Like an unhappy marriage, you want out -- and want to take what’s yours with you. You did after all, pay for your website.

Not so fast buddy. More...