CONCEPT

UX - It's a term you may have heard when talking about websites. But what does it mean? UX is one of, if not THE most important things to consider when building a website. It stands for User Experience and refers to how your online visitors interact with your website. The goal is to create the most seamless, intuitive experience your clients can get. That means, they come to a site with a question and can find the answers to this question with little to no effort. Creating an

When building a website, once of the first and MOST IMPORTANT steps is to select your domain name. This is the address users would type or search to get to your website (for example, conceptcomputers.ca). There are a lot of things to consider when choosing your domain, because it will affect how well users can access your site and how searchable it is on search engines. When crafting your domain, remember to: 1. Keep it simple - The shorter and easier to spell the better 2. U

Want to know one of the best ways to keep your clients engaged and up-to-date on your products and perhaps refer you to other clients? Email marketing. Marketing studies have shown that 73% of millennials prefer to receive business communications via email and that 99% of consumers check their email on a daily basis. Email marketing allows you to: - personalize content - collect feedback - direct clients to your site - advertise in a cost-efficient manner - advertise to a per

So you got yourself a beautiful website and you figured you would do any content updates yourself. But... when you went to update some text and/or change an image, website-mageddon happened and now your site looks like a bomb went off. Sound familiar? There are a lot of balls to keep in the air when maintaining a site. Building in more or less text may change the dynamic of a page, it may throw off the alignment of other elements or change the relevance of other surrounding e

What is HTTPS (vs. HTTP) and why should you use it? When building a website, you want to ensure that your data, and any you receive is secure. This is especially important if you are dealing with sensitive information (i.e. personal client or payment information, passwords, confidential files etc.). http(s) is the protocol by which information is sent between a web browser and a website. You will notice it at the start of a website address, for example: https://www.conceptcom

Happy Summer! A season when everyone is out and about, enjoying the beautiful sun... and less likely to sit indoors at their desktop computer surfing your site. Have you thought about how mobile-friendly your site is? Statistically, more than half of the world's internet traffic is mobile. So that means that if your site isn't mobile, friendly, you are losing over 50% of your potential clientelle. Keep in mind, that mobile-friendly doesn't just mean being able to see your sit

What is alt text and why is it important? Alt text (also called alt descriptions) are the words that appear when an image fails to load. It can also often be seen when you roll your mouse over an image. The text should accurately describe the image and how it relates to the main body text or page it accompanies. There are three important functions of alt text: 1. It makes your site more accessible. Visually impaired users use alt text to understand the image on the page. 2. I

Fonts are in integral part of an eye-catching website! They can make a reader either want to check out the content... or stay away from it. While creative fonts can certainly set your style apart from others, something too crazy will confuse your site visitors, causing them to move on. Your site fonts should match your general style AND they should be legible. Remember, that above all, your potential customers are looking to find the information they need as quickly and intui

We're often asked how to improve a website's ranking on search results. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) rankings use key words and phrases to match a query to the most relevant sites. Once upon a time, key words could be stuffed into a site based on which words were most likely to be entered into a search query. But with smart devices and virtual assistants at our fingertips, users are now more likely to use long-tail phrases in place of keywords. Think about how you usually

Building a beautiful website is only a small part of the process of having a successful online presence. One of the most important components of a website are links. Your site should contain multiple links to content both within the site and externally. Links are one of the criteria for increasing SEO ranking. This means a process of verifying all links, ensuring that they go to the correct page or even the correct place on the page. If they direct you to a form, is it the co

You've built a great website with the help of Concept Computers expert skills, but how do you keep your site from being hacked? Here are a few simple tips to keep your site secure: 1. Keep your software up to date - super simple and obvious, but often a major point of attack. Software updates often include security patches, so hackers can find their way in easier if your software is not up to date. 2. Use complex passwords - we love password managers! You know those annoying

We often focus on the things you can do to make a great website, but you should also be aware of some of the things you should avoid. So, what makes a bad website? Here are some of our top to-don'ts: - complexity: your users want to get to your website and understand clearly how and where to go to get the information they are seeking, but if they land on your homepage and there is no intuitive menu, a mishmash of unrelated visuals and text, they are likely to lose patience an

What features can you add to your website? Make your online space as useful as possible! With more and more business being conducted online, it can be useful to have scheduling and calendar apps, online shopping and more... Here are some of our favourite options: - blogs: these are THE BEST for keeping your site current and loaded with the best keywords and phrases - chat: if you have someone available to regularly monitor your chat, these can be useful for quick questions an

Are your site's SEO rankings lacking? Here are some tips on how to improve those standings: Review your content: is it relevant? does it provide the information your potential clients are looking for? Does your written content contain enough keywords and longtail phrases and are they appropriately placed? Update: stale content slowly drops SEO rankings. A great way to improve this is with a blog or by consistently updating products, services or media. Check on your metadata:

Do you really need a website if you're active on social media? In a word: yes. Social media and websites serve different, although very complimentary purposes. With social media, you are: - connecting with your customers or potential customers and encouraging them to interact with your brand - building your brand up - sharing your content - reaching new audiences with target audiences / demographics / regions - often encouraging visits to your website With a website you are:

Your website users (potential customers) want to know why they should use your services. Convince them. Users tend to trust analytics over conviction, so use this to your advantage. Provide your site visitors with metrics that show how many people you have helped, how many items you have repaired, how many years you have been serving your community, what your average customer satisfaction rate is... you get the picture. Show them the numbers! Advertising your data has other a

You've probably heard of mobile-friendly navigation, but what do you know about thumb-friendly navigation? There are over 3.4 BILLION smartphone users around the world, and what do so many of them do when they're bored? They scroll. Think about how you scroll. Do you use all your fingers? Your index finger? Take a moment to observe yourself the next time you are surfing the web on your mobile device. We're willing to be you do a lot with your thumbs. Heat maps have tracked th

Beyond design, there are other start-up elements you will need to consider for your website, namely your domain and host. A domain is the address of your site, much like conceptcomputers.ca is ours. There are three parts of a domain to consider: the subdomain (www. or shop.), name (conceptcomputers) and the extension (.ca, .com, .org etc.). Subdomains are not essential, but may give your user a bit more information about your site (i.e. is it informational or an e-commerce si

Ever wonder what the difference is between image file types and when you should use them? When you're building a website, certain types of images will display better in specific formats. Three of the most commonly used image file extensions are .gif, .png and .jpg. GIF (graphics interchange format) images are limited to 256 colours, meaning they are not great for images with gradients. These images are lossless (no data is lost) when compressed for storage and are best for li

What is a website call-to-action and why do you need it? A call-to-action is usually a button or link that helps guide your website users to how/where they can engage with your services. For example, a call-to-action button might say something like "CALL NOW" or "SHOP ONLINE" and the button would either link to a phone number or your online shopping page. In short, this is the button that answers the question, "what do you want users to do when they visit your website?" This