The Basics

HTTP – Hypertext Transfer Protocol

HTTPS – Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure

SSL – Secure Socket Layer

TLS – Transport Layer Security

To put it as basically as I possibly can, HTTPS is an encrypted, secure connection between the user’s device and your website. In order to achieve this encrypted connection, the user’s browser uses either an SSL  or TLS connection to your web server. The server has something called an SSL certificate, which the user’s browser automatically uses to verify it is talking to your website, and not someone’s malicious spoof of it. Once a secure connection is achieved, the little green lock icon shows up in the browser reassuring the user they are connected securely to your website. 

Why You Should Care

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a big reason you should care. For starters, Google gives a boost to any website that is secured with an SSL certificate. If you’re trying to rank for certain search terms, having a secured site will definitely help get you there faster. 

Along with preferential treatment, Google intends to further shame unsecured websites starting in January 2017. They reported they will start flagging unsecured pages that have password or credit card fields as “Not Secure,” further illustrating the Google preference for a secure web. It’s not too far of a stretch to imagine as time continues, secured sites will be given even more preferential treatment in search rankings as well. 

Aside from increased visibility, another major reason to think about a secured site is that your customers will feel much more comfortable providing you with any information, such as name or email address. A secure connection means they can rest assured no one is going to intercept any information they share with you through your site. 

One of the services included with any website we develop is the option to secure the site with an SSL certificate giving your customers and visitors peace of mind when visiting your website. If you have questions about SSL certificates, or our web design services in general please Request a Consultation, and we’ll be in touch as soon as possible!

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Bill Price, from Business Begins Here LLC, has put together some great tips for overcoming cold call rejection.

The dreaded cold call.  The bane of the salesperson’s existence.  Why then, do we keep using it?  Because it works!  Is it the only way to sell effectively?  No, not at all.  Is it the most efficient way to book appointments fast if you have an empty pipeline?  Absolutely!

What makes cold calling so scary?  Fear of rejection.  We, as people, love to be accepted.  We have an innate desire to be wanted, respected, and loved.  Obviously rejection does not do that for us.  So of course we fear rejection because it goes against our nature to seek out negativity.  Every time we hear “no”, it breaks us down a little.  We don’t hear “I don’t want your product”, we hear “we don’t want YOU.”  This can be very deflating, and it shows for a lot of sales people.  According to Health.com sales workers ranked 10th in depression rates by profession.

What can I do?  One thing that separates a “sales person” from a “sales professional” is the ability to separate product rejection from personal rejection.  I’ve talked to quite a few top sales professionals across multiple industries and I’ve found that almost all of them see prospecting (including cold calls) as a challenge rather than a struggle.  To the top dogs, it’s a game.  They relish in the hunt.  It’s a part of their personality and it drives them to perform.  In many cases this competitive spirit is present in all aspects of their professional and personal lives.

What can I do to start thinking that way?  There are several ways to push yourself towards the mindset of competition over personal rejection:

For the complete article, please visit http://businessbeginshere.com/crushing-sales-secrets-4-beating-cold-call-rejection/

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1. Bad SEO

This is so important that I felt compelled to list it as the #1 reason. Builders like Wix are absolutely not SEO friendly. A multitude of problems exists from the naming of urls, to even the way the page loads and renders content. Overall, optimization to get yourself ranking well on the search engines is extremely difficult.

2. Web Design Experience

It takes years of education and experience to become a good web designer. Companies like Wix suggest you can create a “stunning” design without that experience. Without now knowing and understanding best practices for page design and element placement, you’re shooting in the dark. 

3. WordPress is just better

WordPress, the preferred CMS framework I use, is an open source project contributed to by a massive community of designers and developers. Without a doubt, no website content management system can compete with WordPress. 

4. Hidden Costs

What they don’t tell you is that your “free” site is very limited. You’ll have to display ads for them on your site unless you’re willing to pay them a monthly fee. Unless you want your online presence to look like a nascar driver’s uniform, that free website you wanted is going to cost you monthly. 

5. You’re stuck with them

That’s right, you’re stuck. If you want to go somewhere else, you’re going to have to recreate your entire site from scratch. 

In conclusion, these are just a few reasons as to why I would recommend choosing a web developer over using a service like Wix. You will fair far better in the battle for Google rankings, have a professional design using a proven CMS, pay no hidden fees and own the rights to your content so you can move to whatever host you want, whenever you want. All-in-all, it’s a much better option for a small business looking to build an online presence to hire a web developer. 

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The blog is a full width design and utilizes 3 different ad networks to generate revenue. This site is a good example at how we can help you generate revenue from your new or existing site! Stop by and check it out sometime. 

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With a smaller title on individual articles and the reduction of white space, the site will be able to display ads to generate revenue more efficiently. Specifically, this allows an ad to display “before the fold,” which is crucial when considering ad placement. 

ReckNews is an entertainment site, catering to all sorts of interests. Check them out, I’m sure you’ll find their articles entertaining!

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Another requirement of the project was to ensure clients would have the ability to fill out a form requesting a photo shoot, while providing details on the property and the requested date. Simultaneously, when the form is sent, an additional email is sent to the property owner with some helpful tips for preparing the property.

Finally, the last requirement for this project was to provide the ability to allow clients to login and access photos from shoots they requested after they pay a fee relayed through paypal. Check it out in our portfolio here.

See the live site here!

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The new look features a cleaner, responsive full width design and leverages some new techniques that I’ve acquired over time to speed up the rendering of each page. I’ve also enhanced security to prevent hostile takeover by Russian and Chinese hackers (LOL). 

Software and Web development is an ever changing field. For that reason I’m constantly reading tech blogs and news, and even taking continuing ed courses to stay on top of the latest and greatest. You can rest assured that when I build your website, I’m going to use every tool in my toolbox. 

I’m also stepping up efforts to increase our visibility on social media. I’ve got a new Social Media manager to help me out with things, so in the days and weeks to come, check out our News section for updates and helpful articles. We’re always open to suggestion as well as to what type of content you would find helpful or entertaining on our social media sites or blog, so if you have any suggestions, please let me know! In the mean time check out the new design and let us know what you think!

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Logging In

Before we can post anything, we have to log into the website so the web server knows you are authorized to make posts. 

For enhanced security, your website doesn’t have any sort of login button, so you’re going to have to navigate to the login screen manually. What you need to do, whether you’re on a mobile device or a PC, is go to your navigation bar in your web browser(the location where the web address is displayed), and move the cursor to the very end of the line, and ensure the entire line is not highlighted so you don’t delete the text already there when you start typing. Then simply type:

“/wp-admin”

without the quotes and hit return or go, depending on your device. 

 

The Login Screen

Once you enter the /wp-admin at the end of the web address, your browser should load a page like one of the ones depicted to the left, depending on whether you’re on mobile or PC. 

Once on this screen, simply enter the user name and password that I have provided for you via email. If you need your username again, please give me a call. If you lost your password, you may simply click the link at the bottom of the form for lost password. 

Enter your login credentials and press the Login Button to proceed.

The Dashboard

Once logged in, you’ll be re-directed to what’s called the WordPress Dashboard. From here, you can perform various maintenance activities, such as uploading images, creating posts, etc. Not to worry, you’ll only have access to delete the content that you upload or post, so nothing regarding site’s structure can be effected by your activities here.  Here is what the dashboard should look like for PC and mobile devices. 

Creating a New Post

In order to post news, or information on a special you want to run, we need to create a new post. To get started, we just need to click new at the top of the nav bar on desktop, or the plus symbol on mobile, and then select the word “Post”. 

Composing a Post

Once we’ve selected  create a new post, we’ll be taken to a familiar looking word processor type of screen. Here you of course enter a title, and the text of your post in whatever format or style that you prefer. You can also insert images into the content by pressing the “Add Media” Button. Before you “Publish” the post, you’ll want to make sure you’ve set a Category and a Featured Image, so the post will display on the web site in an aesthetically pleasing way. This will be illustrated below. For now, prepare your message and lets take a look at inserting an image into the post next. 

Adding Files

Once you’ve selected “Add Media” You’ll be taken to a screen that looks like one of the adjacent images. From here, the process is quite similar to attaching a file to an email. You simply select the file from your device that you want to upload and it will be uploaded into the sites media database. On desktop this is very easy as you can even drag and drop files from Windows folders. 

Inserting the Image

Once you’ve selected and uploaded a file, your window will change to a window of thumbnails. This is your media library. Again, not to worry, as you won’t be able to delete any images from this area that you haven’t uploaded yourself, so nothing can be broken on the main site. The image that you just uploaded should be the first one listed. The image that is to be inserted into the post will be highlighted and checked with a blue check mark. Once you’ve verified that’s the image you intended to upload, you can go ahead and click the “Insert” button. 

Changing the Image Size – Desktop

It is inevitable that you will insert an image that is naturally way larger than you want it to appear in your post. In order to fix this, you’ll have to re-size the image once you’ve inserted it into the post. Doing this on a desktop PC is a bit easier than on a mobile device, but both are possible. With Desktop it’s a familiar click the corner and drag situation, like you’re probably used to seeing in most windows applications. Simply click the image to make it highlight. Then click one of the little boxes on the sides or corners and drag it. In the picture I’ve shown, I dragged the bottom right corner. You’ll see an outline of how the image will look when you let go of the mouse button. 

Changing the Image Size – Mobile

On mobile it’s slightly more complicated to change the image size, but not a ton. First you’ll have to start by clicking or touching the image itself to get it highlighted. Once highlighted you’ll see a pencil and an X icon in the upper left hand side of the image. First, we’ll click the pencil icon (first image). This will take us to a new screen that shows us a bunch of details about the image itself. We need to scroll down on this screen until we see a section that says “Size.” In this section, you’ll see 2 boxes that list numbers representing the images width and height in screen pixels (second image). The current size is shown, so adjust the image how you think it should look numerically, then click update, and look again and see. It may take a few tries of tinkering with those numbers to make it the size you’re wanting it to be. Regardless, changing the size of an image is possible both on desktop and on mobile devices. 

Before You Publish – Set a Category!

A good rule of thumb before you click the “Publish” button on any post, is to make sure you have both a category and a Featured image selected. Categories provide a good way of organizing posts, and also allow customers to search your past posts easily based upon those categories. To select a category is essentially the same on a PC and a mobile device. On Desktop, the categories field is on the right hand side of the screen. On the mobile device you’ll have to scroll down, but it’s there. Simply select one or more categories and then scroll down a little further to find the “Featured Image” section. 

Setting a Featured Image

The Featured image is the image that is displayed in your news Section as part of the excerpt of the post. You want to use the highest resolution images possible for Featured images, so they look great when you post them. Adding a Featured image is the exact same process as adding a media file inside a post. The only difference here is that there’s a specific section of the entire post composition we need to use to set the image. Once you’ve chosen the image, that’s it, you’re done! If you’re satisfied with the post go ahead and hit the “Publish” button!

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