What’s a Website Worth?
Well, when you're in the business of web design - quite a lot!
And so after months of quietly ignoring my site I have finally redesigned. A big word of thanks to my friend and collegue, Kyle Crouse for motivating me to get this thing started and helping me with quite a bit of coding. And, as always, big thanks to my wife Meredith for letting me stay up until 2am for many nights in a row getting it done.
So what could possibly motivate someone to redesign their site in a few short weeks?
A Discouraging Meeting
A few Fridays ago, Kyle and I went to an early meeting with a potential client to discuss a redesign of their site. As with many meetings I have had in recent months, I found myself trying to explain the concept of a weblog format website. The format seemed perfect for a company that is constantly posting press releases, documents and news about their company. A weblog would allow their non-technical staff to post these in a timely manner, and would automatically archive old news into a searchable database — perfect!. Not to mention the potential boost in credibility should one of their resident industry experts decide share their knowledge via the company blog.
Unfortunately, weblogs are not an easy thing to desicribe as others have noted. Compounding this dilemma is the question that always follows, "Can you show me a good example of what you're talking about?"
You bet!
...Just to name a few.
What's the obvious, glaring omission? My own site.
Practice What You Preach
In an effort to end the cycle of neglect, I have given myself permission to design now and refine later. With the combined force of content management, structured markup, and CSS design I will be able to do just that.
The real beauty of modern website design methods is this separation of content from code and code from design. It is what I preach to my clients and it is now what I will put into practice myself. By taking careful steps and employing the methods I know to be best, I can allow this site to change to accomodate the growing needs of Top Dead Center Design. That is, after all, what makes this medium so great.
I hope that my work as an author for this site will not only help my business (after all, that is the primary goal of any business site), but will also contribute - at least on a local level - to an awareness of modern web design methods and their inherent benefits. There's been quite a bit already said on the subject by folks that know a lot more about it than me. For the most part, these people are preaching to the choir. My goal is to distill that information and bring the important bits to you the business owner, novice blogger, and marketing professional. There is such an incredible wealth of opportunity online beyond brochureware and simple contact forms and I aim to illuminate the possibilities.
So, with my efforts here, the next time I get asked for a good example of a weblog, I intend to answer,
Yes, right here!
Phil Hertzler | 07.19.04 | 0 comment(s)
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