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.

People like easy. Easy to make 10 minute dinners, easy self checkout lines at the grocery store, easy cheese in a can (ok, nobody likes that) but you get my point. This desire for simplicity permeates our lives and the Internet is no exception. People expect ease of use and speed on the websites that they visit. This is espcially true for ecommerce websites. More...

Justified text alignment is great for newspapers and magazines since they use smaller, defined columns and have a target area width that they can depend on. But the web is an entirely different beast, and it just doesn't work the same way as print-media. More...

Search Engine Optimization is a well known term and online marketing tool. Most companies spend a pretty penny on SEO and consulting services. A good portion of these same companies become so wrapped up in optimizing their websites for the search engines with the goal to drive the most traffic as possible to their site. "The more eyeballs the better", they might say. While it is essential to drive targeted traffic to your website, it is also important that these visitors take action once they get there. This very important step is often times forgotten. If your website's visitors are not taking the next step and becoming a customer or a lead- in reality, this traffic isn't helping your bottom line. This is where conversion optimization becomes part of the website success equation. More...

When starting a web site project, it is important to consider if the site will require an SSL (Secure Sockets Layer). Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) is a type of protocol that adds a level of security to online transactions. 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...

Job Title: Business Development (Sales Rep)

*UPDATE*
Due to the overwhelming response of resumes submitted for this position, Aztek is offering an additional Sales Team Information Session on Tuesday, November 30th from 3:00-4:30pm.  The information session will be held at the Aztek office.  Interested candidates must register by sending your cover letter highlighting your qualifications, as well as your resume to Christine Mooney at cmooney@aztekweb.com. Upon completion of the Information Session, individual (one on one) interviews will be scheduled.  Candidate offers will be made on or before December 15th.

Based upon tremendous growth over the past 13 ½ years, Aztek is ready to continue the plan and add a new sales team to the organization. The new team will be comprised of three (3) talented young professionals seeking an opportunity to begin a career in sales. Targeting the Web industry, one of the fastest growth markets globally, the sales team will be working closely with clients servicing their needs in the areas of Website Design and Development, Web Application Development, Web Marketing and Hosting. See www.aztekweb.com for more information on the services offered. 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...