A domain name — Shakespeare once asked a simple question: “What’s in a name?” This article will attempt to answer the above question as far as your website is concerned. You will discover that quite a lot is at stake when it comes to a name.

A domain name is the name (usually in English) which your site will go by on the internet. This name is associated with an IP address as well, since computers and network infrastructure use these numeric addresses to locate your site – the domain name primarily purpose is to help humans to find your site.

Surprise! Do you know that having a domain name for your website is not a requirement? In contrary having an IP address is a necessity, since that’s how computers will find you on the web. Having only an IP address for your site can make it difficult (to say the least) for web surfers to find your site, however.

During the early development of the internet, domain names were chosen with the goal of making it easier for people to remember the name of your site, because it was important for users to be able to type that name into their web browser. Nowadays thought with search engines, bookmarking and social media being much more useful, it is becoming less important for surfer to memorize a name.

Let me be quick to point out that however, from the standpoint of marketing it is still a good idea to have a memorable domain name for your site – for instance, greatmaps.com is better than fantasticcarstographicofrepresentationandgeographicalfact.com. While they are both descriptive of your business, it’s without reasonable doubt that one is far easier to remember than the other.

Remember also that the name you decide on for your site can have a big impact on how much traffic you’ll receive and how long this will take to begin. If you have a great website or great products and/or services, the word will get around – eventually. Having a good name will make things much easier for you though – like them or not, Google chose well for their name.

Given that there are literally millions of websites out there, you may not be able to get your first choice for a domain name. You might have to try a few names to find one which you want. Since there are simply so many websites, it is unlikely that you will get your first choice of domain names; but domains do expire, so you may be able to obtain the name you want at a later date if it is not available now.

You can also choose an expired domain names service or software that will search for and alert you whenever a good name becomes available. All you simply do is ask for the domain name you want and when this name becomes available you will be notified and given the opportunity to purchase it. Always remember though that it’s good to have a good name but don’t fret too much if it’s taken.

Although this is a “top 10″ list, most of the following things could easily be listed as the #1 most important consideration, so take them all seriously. It doesn’t matter if you are a large company, a small one, or just a hobbyist who wants to display photos of hand-painted electric trains. Everyone needs to consider the same things, just to different degrees.

Now, remembering that there is really no firm order to these, let us consider the top 10 things to look for in a web hosting:

1. Reliability (”uptime”) – Your host should be reliable, stable and fast, and should guarantee its uptime, the minimum figure for which should be 99%. A straight 99% is actually considered low these days, as 99.5% or higher is rapidly becoming the new standard. Check to see if the host provides a prorated refund if uptime falls below the stated benchmark. With how much business a company can lose any time their website is down this crucial aspect of web hosting probably does deserve to be in the #1 spot, but read on for other important info.

2. Data transfer (traffic or “bandwidth”)?– Data transfer mean the number of bytes delivered from your site to its visitors as they browse. If a web host advertises “unlimited bandwidth,” find out how much traffic the particular deal you’re considering really allows. Most new sites that are not archives, storage or “drop-send” sites normally use less than 3GB of bandwidth per month. If you expect your traffic requirements to increase over time, check the host’s policy for “overages.” If there is a charge (usually per additional GB) over the allowed bandwidth, you need to determine if it’s cheaper to pay it once in a while (if it will not be ongoing) or to upgrade your service level.

3. Disk space?– Be on guard against the “unlimited disk space” deals, too, and view them with the same skepticism as you just observed being applied to data transfer. The vast majority of sites need no more than 10-20MB of web space, so don’t fall prey to enticements like 500MB, or “unlimited space.” To get an idea of relative size, a site with about 200 pages and the usual assortment of text, pictures and motion graphics will use only about 10-15 MB for all of the pages and supporting files.

4. Technical support?– Is the tech support 24/7/365? You should probably avoid a host that has no staff working weekends or holidays since things have a habit of breaking down at the worst possible times. A claim of “24/7 support” is not always true, so test the sales pitch by e-mailing or calling on a Friday night or holiday. Measure how long it takes for you to connect with a human being on the other end. In addition response time, ensure that the support personnel are technically proficient. Believe it or not, some tech support personnel are converted sales people “learning on the job,” which is not the kind of help you need in an emergency that threatens your business.

5. Technical features (FTP, PHP, CGI-BIN access, SSI, etc.) –?What once were luxuries are now necessities. Fact is, you simply must have all of these. There are many commercial hosts that require getting their approval to install PHP or CGI scripts, which means that you cannot implement a feature on your site when you so desire. You need these functions if you want to customize error pages, maintain databases, set up additional security measures and so forth. Make sure you have full access to these tools, and find out about any restrictions on their use.

6. Server type?– The operating system and server can be very important, and there are good, practical reasons for choosing one server over another. If you intend to take advantage of ASP, for example, it is available only on a Windows NT/2000/XP server. However, it is often cheaper to go with a Unix system running the Apache server software, which is stable and dependable. Another advantage of Unix-based hosts –using Linux, FreeBSD, etc. – is that an Apache web server lets you create and manage error pages, block IP addresses, stop email harvesters and more, without needing your host to install or approve a thing. Finally, if you plan to do some e-commerce on your site, find out if you get SSL (Secure Socket Layer), MySQL and a shopping cart. At the very least, you will need SSL if you plan to get credit card information from your customers over the Internet.

7. Email services – You have your own domain now, so you probably want e-mail addresses with the domain name. Although the vast majority of plans include e-mail services, find out about the quality and level of auto-responders, mail forwarding? and list management. Ensure that you also have web access to your mail (”webmail”) and investigate the spam tools that are provided.

8. Control panel?– It may be called this, it may be called your “Net Tool Kit,” but all hosts give you a set of utilities to manage the particulars of your web account, and a web page from which to do it, too. You need to be able to manage your e-mail, change passwords, block spammers and so on. These are all standard maintenance chores for webmasters and if you have to wait on your host’s tech support to take care of things, you will lose important control over your business.

9. Price and payment plans –?Naturally, price is always a consideration, but remember that the most expensive hosts are not necessarily the best. Factor in price, and be wary of great price differentials on similar plans. Most web hosts offer annual or even quarterly payment plans that discount the monthly rate, but if you are using a new or less-well-known host, you should consider paying monthly until you establish their reliability. When you are satisfied with the host, you can change your payment plan and grab that discount.

10. Reviews – What do others say about the hosts? Use Google to track down both complaints and congratulations, and consider the source of each comment.

There’s a lot to do, but with your business possibly at stake – or at least the fate of those model train photos – you can’t be too careful. Get the information you need to make an informed decision, and weigh things carefully. You will save yourself a good deal of frustration if you do.

Web Design and Web development is highly crucial for any website. Website development is a process that used ‘mark up languages’ like HTML to exhibit the content you want on the internet. This content is displayed by a web browser or other web-based graphical user interfaces (GUIs). The very first website design process was carried by Tim Berners Lee, the inventor of World Wide Web, published in August 1991. At this stage certain monopoly and interest generated as people with website development capability began achieving supernormal profits.

The early versions of HTML were very basic and had only headings and paragraphs, and had the ability to link using hypertext. Users found it easier to jump or switch to other pages using hyperlinks. As website design technology progressed, the markup languages also became more complex and flexible. Web development process became sophisticated with the addition of images and tables to web pages. Thus, web development became famous and is a huge requirement for business that seek profit maximisation.

The function of website design is to create a website that presents content (text, pictures and interactive features) to the end user in the form of web pages. Such content can be in the presented in various forms like text, bit mapped images, etc that can be placed on the page using HTML, XHTML or XML tags. But if one wants his website to be more interactive and display more complex media (videos, sounds, animations etc), then plug-ins such as Flash, Java, Quick Time etc are required.

The latest standards of website designers are aiming at the various browsers’ ability to deliver a wide variety of media and accessibility options to the user without using plug-ins. Web pages are classified as ‘Static’ or ‘Dynamic.’ These are the technical properties of pages that help in easy navigation and appealing presentation.

The Static web pages don’t change the content and the layout till a web developer manually updates the pages.

The Dynamic pages change their content or appearance depending on the interactions of the user. But the content is changed only on the users’ side.

Different aspects of a web site:

1. Content: The information or the images on the site should be relevant and according to the segment of people it is targeting.
2. Traceability: the site should be easy to find via most search engines.
3. Appearance: The entire graphics and text on the site should be in a single style and be appealing.

If these aspects of a website are kept in mind during website design and website development stage, the website can achieve higher conversion rate. Web design is crucial for this role. Website development stage ensures that the above aspects are placed best in mind before taking any action for the web page. If website design keeps into mind the customer needs, profits can get a boost. Ultimately, web development aims at providing user friendly web pages and achieving maximum hits from visitors. More quality referrals would mean that website design has been successful.

This article has been designed to help you understand how subtle factors of web design can have a massive effect on you design as a whole. The article looks at the use of colour and different colour combinations as well as the implementation of sound, background images and text effects.

When you visit a website, the way the layout has been designed can often have more of an impact on the way you perceive their site than you realise. Typically, when a surfer visits a site, their decision to continue with the desired action can all happen in the first 7 seconds. So it’s important to get your information across fast.

It is possible to create an appealing website and still capture the attention of all your visitors. You just need to follow a few simple rules:

•Ensure you contain a summary of what the purpose of the site is. By including a concise description of your company near the opening of your page, this will give your readers the information they need to continue reading and feel reassured in your product. •Keep products and services displayed prominently on the page as this allows new and returning customers to visualise what they will be getting. •To balance the appeal of your page for new and returning customers, include a sentence or two on the product with clearly defined links to other pages with more information on. For example ‘About you’ and ‘Company Information’. •Include news, press releases and event announcements. This will give your company credibility, and allow your visitors to research further into your company.

Your graphic designs and web imagery should get your readers in the right mood for your page. In the web design world there are certain taboos you should steer clear of when constructing a webpage.

1. Black background with light, white or pale text: using this style can make your website look pretentious and is very difficult to do well even by the most talented designers. Another problem created by this design is that some browsers like to try and print this background, wasting ink. 2.Black with dark text: readers will not be able to read the text unless they highlight it 3.Tiled background images that are too busy: these types of web designs are currently very popular with new web designers, but these images will add to the download time of your site and add no real value to the customer’s perspective. The one exception to this rule is wide tiles that are larger than your screen as they can create a left side gutter on the screen. 4.Everything centred: this can make the page really hard to read and can often be perceived as very boring to look at 5.Too many headlines, over emphasis on themes and bold/italics words: every line should not look like a headline as this will confuse your readers on what to read first. 6.Blinking text: was originally the perfect way to say all you needed to say to your customer. Through over use on many new sites, this design has lost its appeal to surfers and is nearly always impossible to read. 7.List of links: this only becomes a problem when every line is a link. If you do want to list URL links, add a paragraph to each to explain why they are worth viewing. 8.Too many images: this relates to the overuse of icons at the bottom of your webpage. If you have more than 2 icons, there are too many on your site 9.Sound: everyone has different music tastes, so if a reader hears a song that annoys them, they may leave especially if your website does not have the resources to let them switch it off.

By following these simple rules, you can achieve your ultimate goal of winning the attention of your customer. The right use of graphic design, imagery and layout, can make a real difference to the success of your site, simply by tying in all your themes into a coherent structure.

Once you have created a web site for your business or organization, the next step is to use it to increase your sales. Web site submission is a fast and economical way to do so.

Web site submission arranges for your URL address to be indexed on the major search engines which help to define who you are and what type of business you conduct on the internet. Once the search engine has the information from you to begin the indexing process, you can often be ranked with the big search engines such as Google, MSN and Yahoo fairly quickly. This brings targeted customers to your web site and increases the revenue that results from visitors. Simple mathematics tells you that the more people that view your web site, the more likely you are that sales will result.

Search Engine Optimization

Search engine optimization is a beginning step in web site submission to increase your revenue results. SEO can be done by hiring a professional skilled in the procedures and methods of making your web site most effective. SEO can also be done by learning about the process either through a good tutorial or by taking advantage of some of the great software packages. Be sure to review the software reviews so you know what you are getting and what specialties might limit the software for your particular industry. Either way you refine and polish your web site, you will improve your chances of being indexed with a good score.

Page Ranking

The page ranking is a somewhat arbitrary assignment of quality done by some of the search engines along with indexing the web site. Web site submission depends on review and ranking of the information on the web site in order to determine how and where to index the information included. A high page ranking means your web site is more likely to be seen by searchers, while a low page ranking means your information will be too far down the list for most people to even get to that point on the search engine results page (SERP).

Human readers

Regardless of how creative you are with the search engine optimization techniques and how high your page ranking for the web page you have created it is important to remember that the real reason for web pages and for web site submission is for the human readers who will be viewing the pages. Search engine optimization can’t measure creativity. Page ranking doesn’t have an ‘interesting’ index. Even human readers will vary in their responses to a web page. But, it is the humans who make the decision to purchase your product or service and it is the human readers whose attention must be captured.

Page revisions

It is important to keep your web site current and fresh, or visitors will have little or no reason to return. Your web site submission only needs to be done once, though, for the search engine spider to return on a regular basis in order to check for revisions or updates to the page. It is not necessary to resubmit each time you make a change to your web site. However, if you do a major overhaul to your site, you may also want to consider requesting another visit from the search engine robots.