Website development starts with intense conversations about what the site should look like and what it should do to meet the desired goals. Typically several people on the client’s end are tasked with describing what the company’s needs are from each of their perspectives and to ensure nothing critical is missed by the web developer. At the other side of the table, the web development team will ask many, many questions first to understand the company’s needs and then to make sure the site’s functions are clearly defined. After these conversations, a site specifications document is drawn. The web developer …

Unless you have an e-commerce website where the action you want your visitors to take (buy now) happens within the site itself, you have to work a little harder on adding legitimate calls to action to your site without going over the top with “click here” buttons.

The idea is to guide the visitor to an action on each page of your website without being pushy. Most of us just want people to call. We know we can take it from there. But you need more than your phone number on the …

Let’s face it: the classic blog post is boring.

Barring the text and images, each one generally has the exact same layout. We see little originality from one post to the next. Of course, consistency and branding are extremely important to consider when designing a website or blog, but what about individuality? Does a blog post about kittens deserve the same layout as one about CSS hacks?

=====

That was one heck of an opening, and just the sort of thing mb/i has been looking for to explain the importance of building an engaging, well-branded WordPress presence.  Of course there’s a …

What is CMS software in the first place?
CMS stands for Content Management System, and for the purposes of this article we will be discussing website content management systems. Web CMS software allows you to easily and efficiently manage a website and all of the associated text, images, and other files without having the technical knowledge of web programming. That being said, as a person who does possess the technical skills of a web developer, I wouldn’t even consider foregoing the great benefits of a CMS for the nostalgic joys of manually managing a website and its content. …

Nowadays most business websites have a Content Management System driving them so their owners can make edits without having to go back to the original web developer. They have become sort of the norm and most business owners request such functionality when purchasing a new site.

If you hire the right web developer, the process of building such a site will be smooth with your having to make some key decisions along the way. However, regardless of how great your web developer is, he will eventually require content from you.

In the past—with static websites—content could be provided in simple Word documents… …

It’s nearly impossible to make a modern website without first building a site map that serves as the basis for the navigational menu. In order to achieve the most user-friendly interface for an audience, a web designer first needs to understand the site’s purpose.  Here are four navigational models that can help match purpose to navigation.
Designing for the Shortest Path
Most websites are designed on the theory that visitors know where they want to go, and would prefer to get there in the fewest number of clicks possible. The best way to accomplish this is to construct a hierarchy for …

MB/I central has become a lively place over the past couple of months. By concentrating representatives from sales, administration, design, programming, and management in one location, Marissa has given us the chance to brainstorm, integrate efforts, and share broad design philosophies even as we work on specific projects.

My own focus, whether testing a new CMS or adding content to an existing site, tends to be on the ease and usability of our systems. The easier it is to find or change information, the more I tend to like a site. …

Trick-or-Treating has been part of the American Halloween tradition for about 80 years, and part of the Scottish Halloween tradition for even longer. October 31 is not the only day known for fancy dress, but if you say the word costume, it is the holiday that will most likely come to mind.

But why do we dress up for holidays? On the one hand, it’s an escape, a way present yourself in a different light. On the other hand, it is a conspicuous way to mark those holidays and traditions you find valuable; few things are more conspicuous than overhauling your …

Looking for original artwork, but don’t have an in-house designer?  DeviantArt (dA) is definitely a good place to start.

Since 2000, dA has been providing an interactive community for artists of all sorts.  The includes the following key features:

• a categorized and searchable gallery of artwork
• feedback space for every work of art in the gallery
• e-commerce interface for artists ready for digital sales

Admittedly, not every artist is prepared to sell their work over the internet, but this does not have to be a dead end.  The deviantArt gallery also includes contact information for the contributing artists, giving you the …

The Pin Poet of Berkeley first introduced me to MOO during a discussion of different media suitable for small form physical branding.

Because of the Printfinity technology that MOO uses, it is possible for a designer to give them any number of custom images and they’ll print a series of cards using every single one (even if this means a different image on every card).

But what really hooked me was their Inspiration page, which highlights different innovative ways to make use of their products, from their hallmark MiniCards …