There is a minority group of developers that have been evangelizing validation and markup. One of our most successful clients was approached by someone willing to redesign the site to conform to W3C Validation Standards, and was sent a list detailing 244 errors in the markup and 4 warnings!
So What is Validation?
Validation is simply a check to make sure the code conforms to certain language standards, similar to the way written English language conforms to grammatical rules. You’ve heard of Grammar Nazis? Well, The Validation Evangelists are their spiritual twins.
There are several validation standards the most common being HTML, XHTML. Because web languages are constantly evolving (just like the English language only faster), validation standards are frequently updated with new requirements being added to cater for groups such as visually impaired and compatibility issues across browsers..
The whole point of Validation was originally created to ensure websites look the same across multiple browsers/platforms, however the major browsers have completely overlooked this point and have their own peculiarities that will display even valid code completely differently. Internet Explorer has been notorious in the past for ignoring web standards when it comes to displaying HTML, CSS, XML.
So Developers STILL have to test their site in all the major browsers and tweak accordingly. In some cases we're forced to break standards to get it to work!
Why is it so difficult to validate websites?
A website that consists of a single html page and form with nothing fancy is easy to check and validate. The problem arises when creative developers start pushing the boundaries of what's possible using a blend of JavaScript, CSS and AJAX to create elegant user interfaces and deliver dynamic content. There are no fixed standards for the combination of these technologies because they are innovative and cutting-edge. Standards are created after the technology has matured and everyone involved is aware of the limitations. We're a long way from standardizing the internet.
So back to these 244 errors and 4 warnings
The site in question is ironically one of our most successful recruitment project. It was built with a intuitive interface that guides potential candidates to jobs by filtering the data on-the-fly. The conversion rate is one of the highest I've ever seen for a site in this niche.
It also has a self-optimizing database that automatically assigns priority to certain pages and optimizes those pages for search engines. And the results are great rankings in Google with minimal effort.
It efficiently solves the two main problems facing all websites, attracting visitors and converting them.
Now we could remove some of the features as suggested to make the site more compliant, maybe spend a few days tracking down the more obscure validation issues to make those Validation Evangelists happy.
But wait lets see how the big players do Validation....
As you can see most of the big players don't bother with web standards, Validation is a non-issue. It's for developers with too much time on their hands and not enough clients or creativity.
My problem with Validation Evangelists
There are a few companies like Google, Ebay, Amazon that forge the way with bold concepts and innovative ideas, responding to the changing internet with fast user-centric sites. The vast majority simply try to imitate them with a few bells and whistles added. Then you have the Validation flock... nitpicking at the code and missing the point entirely.
This would not be so much of a problem if the Validation guys kept to their own HTML, but they are insistent on spreading the word, sharing the joys of lovingly crafted code, markup so strict it flagellates the user. Sending my clients fire-and-brimstone emails with 244 errors in the markup and 4 warnings!
These Validation Evangelists generally have absolutely no creative or inventive ability, unable to create anything new or push the boundaries of any web technology. They blindly stumble along the path created by those who have gone before them, with no comprehension of the underlying principles of the internet, clutching the stone tablets of validation as if it was handed to them by Moses himself.
If Grammar Nazis had their way in the early days the English language would still conform the archaic rules of Ye Olde Englishe with thee's and thou's abound. Similarly obsessive compulsive developers that insist on perfect validation would force us to use coding techniques and technology that's equally out of date.
Asif.
Importance of Web Marketing & Designing Techniques
A simple illustration that makes a big point, unless you stand out; you are invisible. If you're invisible how are you going to sell? The point being that you need to create a product and organisation that is remarkable in order to get that much needed growth.
How can you expect remarkable results without being remarkable? It's simple.
Have a Purple Cow effect. (What is a purple cow? In a field full of cows a purple cow would stand out, you would remember, it would be remarkable, until all cows became purple, of course.)
There are many websites out there that are well designed, they look professional, they download quickly, they're all the same, and they’re boring. The idea of "safe" is becoming somewhat of a phenomenon on the internet like it is in business. The problem is you then don't stand out!
Hopefully, you must have spent some time researching potential suppliers on the internet? Like you hit Google, put your phrase in and started to work through the sites to build up a list of potentials to talk to. However, have you ever noticed that after only a few sites you very often get the feeling that they are all starting to merge into one?
A site that was different would stand out, you would remember. But you will have to accept the fact that a chunk of people will hate it. They'll hate the site and won’t like you for making it that way. But that's OK, you have really made an impression on those that "get it", and they will buy (actually or metaphorically depending on you site) - and they will tell other people that get it. And so on.
Web design briefs should be fairly simple. Give a list of your top competitor's websites to your web designer or agency with this brief - make it look nothing like those! See what they come up with, remember these guys are often very creative and will relish this type of challenge, and you should end up with a website that stands out, that's different, and that brings in the business.
In order for this to work though the site needs to fit with the overall positioning of the organisation. It should still look natural. There is no point in suddenly creating a pink website out of the blue just because everyone else is using yellow. And this is the real trick, particularly in B2B organisations - to create something imaginative and different while remaining true to often conservative brand guidelines. But it can and should be done.
The elements to consider:
There are many elements that make up a website and therefore there are many ways in which a remarkable website can come about. The three biggest and most obvious factors are content, navigation and overall design.
An obvious example:
One of the most famous examples of a website that didn't follow the trend at the time was Google. It differentiated itself using two main elements, overall design and content. Well actually it was mostly the lack of content that made Google stand out. While all search engines were packing as much information on the page as possible, as pioneered by Yahoo!, Google provided nothing but search results and the cleanest least cluttered design of the time.
Google's other advantage was of course its ability to return results that were at least vaguely relevant to the query entered. Interestingly enough Google's popularity is still based on being different and trying something new - although search wise there's nothing between the top engines for relevance nowadays.
So how much would you pay to be the obvious example in your industry?
Websites and businesses can not afford to become invisible through playing it safe. What was once considered safe is safe no longer. What was once risky is now the standard. Technology and people are becoming ever more sophisticated. Inevitably this is putting ever increasing pressure on businesses to adapt, to change, to no longer do what was done in the way it was done.
Businesses are therefore putting more pressure on employees for results. Return on investment is no longer a term for Finance but for everyone in the organisation. Interesting solutions that can be measured will become the norm. A website that doesn't stand out won’t get the returns required. An advert that looks good but doesn't achieve the results in a measurable way will be canned. Although this will inevitably increase pressure it should also lead to new and interested ways to communicate with prospects and clients, even if that means simply using existing technology in new or creative ways.
--
Compiled By
Sarah Shafiq
e-IT Solution(UK)Ltd
(Ref: Edward Hasting-Evans - : www.apple-marketing.co.uk)
e-Business and Web Marketing
A standard definition of marketing as:
“The management process of identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer’s requirements at a profit.”
GO WILD ON A WIDER WEB MARKET
The wider web makes the world a narrow place; geographic borders are less defined, deadlines shorter. International time and distance is as relative as the space between your keyboard and fingertips.
As you read these words, businesses are saving billions for themselves and their customers through implementing e-commerce sales cycle. For example, vast transportation cost savings are made by comparing logistics tenders by countries online.
Despite the initially shaky start, the Internet is the thirteenth biggest economy in the world. Its no longer just website, e-commerce, e-solutions or area networks – web-marketing is business and everything attached to it, from mobile phone to music centres.
For all the technology, businesses still rely on targeted, value-added sales prepositions to draw in new customers whilst securing existing ones. Web-marketing techniques strengthen relationships with stock holders, employees and suppliers.
It touches every aspect of your marketing mix from sales and distributions to advertising. In doing so, web-marketing positively distinguishes your organisation from that of your competitors. While people are reading these lines, every four seconds, a further eleven organisations establish their internet presence linking themselves to the world’s most successful broadly spread dot-com communication network – the www now a days – due to the popularity of internet from “teeny techeis” (aged 6-16) to “silver surfers” (aged 50+) are surfing the web.
So this popularity of the web is only a part of a bigger web-marketing picture. What will you say when you know that “Radio attracted 50 millions listeners in 38 years, TV attracted 50 millions viewers in 13 years and amazingly Internet attracted 50 millions surfers in just 4 years. It doesn’t astonish me because this is the “web of market”
Today’s customers expect from the businesses to provide them goods and services quickly and efficiently and also at a location that suits their requirements more conveniently. This kind of thinking is a two-way street, just as your customers and trading partners need to sense that they are in control, so you too need to have firm control of your web business.
“Some companies driven by media exposure into market superstar status had no foundations.”
To a traditional businessman, e-business is a chaotic system on the surface, and e-companies appear to defy logics, and nature, in significant ways. But nature itself can appear chaotic although, of course, beneath its seeming vagaries there is inevitably a logic that man must simply work to understand.
Old economy earnings-driven companies must learn how to invest in the internet in such a way that they reap the benefits, without suffering its pain.
--
Compiled By
Sarah Shafiq
e-IT Solution(UK)Ltd
References
(Ref: Internet Marketing by J. Jonathan Gobay)
(Ref: e-business to the power of 12 by Thomas Powel)
ELECTRONIC TRADE/COMMERCE
ELECTRONIC TRADE/COMMERCE:
Electronic commerce, or "e-commerce," is one of the biggest buzzwords
in today's business world. In its simplest form, e-commerce just means taking
things that your company is already doing in person, through the mail, or over
the telephone, and doing those things in a new place--on the Internet.
It may
seem special now, but in a few short years it'll be just another part of how
every company does business. In fact, we're rapidly headed for a time when businesses
that aren't on the Internet will be as far out of the mainstream as a business
without a telephone number is today.
Businesses can do things with e-commerce that would be prohibitively expensive
or logistically difficult to do through older channels of commerce. A Web site
is naturally a 24-hour-a-day operation, unlike a traditional 9-to-5 company.
It is much easier to keep a Web site up to date with all your company and product
information than it is to do the same thing with print materials. And the interactivity
and completeness of an e-commerce Web site can engage customers more directly,
giving them a feeling of empowerment and control that is difficult to duplicate
through other methods of doing business.
8 CONVENIENCE FACTORS:
Which do you prefer -- going out to the mall where parking spots are scarce
and crowds are plentiful?
Or shopping from the comfort of your robe and slippers
and finding exactly the items you want?
When designing and developing your e-commerce site, the assumption should be
that your customers are online because they have limited time; they want to
find items quickly and easily; and they often have a specific need for a certain
product.
That being said, here are some important factors of convenience you should consider
before launching your Web store:
Accept credit cards and as many other forms of payment
as possible. There is little to be gained if you launch a great site and then
ask for payments to be mailed to you in the form of a check or money order.
It is better to wait for your merchant account to be approved before going
live prematurely.
Carry as many items in stock as possible to avoid
backorders. Often convenience goes hand-in-hand with timeliness and customers
want to know right away if they have to wait three days or three weeks for
an item.
Send an e-mail confirmation for all orders. Some sites
state on the final transaction screen, "Print this page for your records."
Well, what if the customer doesn't have an accessible printer at the time
of the order?
Only ask for the basic information required for order
processing - shipping address, billing address, e-mail address, payment data.
You can follow-up with your market research questions another time.
Offer a variety of shipping options including overnight
express. You don't want to eliminate orders from last-minute shoppers because
the only form of shipment constitutes a five-day wait for delivery.
Your site should be searchable by keywords or phrases.
Many customers want to get in, find the item, checkout and get out.
Post all the company's contact info visibly. Sometimes
a customer just needs a quick question answered before making the final click
that processes the order. Don't run the risk of abandonment because a shopper
couldn't find your toll-free number.
Make sure all the components of the site load quickly.
That includes all text, graphics and interactive elements. In this instance,
time is definitely money. Customer frustration starts to build as they wait
for pages that don't load.
Providing a shopping experience that is as quick and painless
as possible will help to generate a loyal repeat customer base. If a consumer
gets just as frustrated at the keyboard as they do at the mall, they may find
little reason to click and spend.
LAST MINUTE:
Consumers have accepted the e-commerce business model less readily than its proponents
originally expected. Even in product categories suitable for e-commerce, electronic
shopping has developed only slowly. Let your customers select and order different
products and pay you online. Make it easy for them to do business with you.
Compiled By
Sarah Shafiq
e-IT Solution(UK)Ltd
What’s Microsoft .NET Framework?
Microsoft .NET is software that connects information, people,
systems, and devices. It spans clients, servers, and developer tools, and consists
of:
The .NET Framework , used for building and running
all kinds of software, including Web-based applications, smart client applications,
and XML Web services—components that facilitate integration by sharing
data and functionality over a network through standard, platform-independent
protocols such as XML (Extensible Markup Language), SOAP, and HTTP.
Developer tools, such as Microsoft Visual Studio .NET
2003 which provides an integrated development environment (IDE) for maximizing
developer productivity with the .NET Framework.
A set of servers, including Microsoft Windows Server
2003, Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft BizTalk Server, that integrates,
runs, operates, and manages Web services and Web-based applications.
Client software, such as Windows XP, Windows CE, and
Microsoft Office XP, that helps developers deliver a deep and compelling user
experience across a family of devices and existing products.
.Net is a new and powerful technology for creating dynamic
web pages. However, as you know, it isn’t the only way to deliver dynamic
web pages, so let’s refine our definition a little: “A new and
powerful server side technology for creating dynamic web pages that lets
you use any fully-fledged programming language supported by .NET”
One of the principal features of .Net’s model is
the flexibility to choose our programming language. ASP.NET works with scripted
languages such as VBScript, JScript, Perlscript, and Python, as well as compiled
languages such as VB, C#, C, Cobol, Smalltalk, and Lisp. The new framework uses
the common language runtime (CLR); our language source is compiled into Microsoft
Intermediate Language code, which the CLR then executes.
The .NET Framework is an integral Microsoft Windows component
for building and running the next generation of software applications and Extensible
Markup Language (XML) Web services—components that facilitate integration
by sharing data and functionality over the network through standard, platform-independent
protocols such as XML, SOAP, and HTTP.
The .NET Framework provides:
A highly productive, standards-based environment
for integrating existing investments with next-generation applications and
services.
The agility to solve the challenges of deployment
and operation of enterprise-scale applications.
The .NET Framework consists of two main parts: the common
language runtime (CLR) and a unified set of class libraries, including ASP.NET
for Web applications and Web services, Windows Forms for smart client applications,
and ADO.NET for loosely coupled data access.
The framework also provides for true object-oriented programming (OOP), and
true inheritance, polymorphism, and encapsulation are supported. The .NET class
library is organized into inheritable classes based around particular tasks,
such as working with XML or image manipulation.
We can break down our discussion of the .NET Framework into a few topics:
MS Intermediate Language (MSIL) – all
the code we write is compiled into a more abstract, trimmed-down form before
it’s executed. Wichever .NET language is used to write the code, the
Trimmed code that’s created from it is defined using MSIL: the Common
Language of .NET.
The Common Language Runtime (CLR) – this
is a complex system responsible for executing the MSIL code on the computer.
It takes care of all the nitty-gritty tasks involved in talking to Windows
and IIS.
The .NET Framework Class Libraries – these
are code libraries containing a mass of tremendously useful functionality,
which we can very easily bolt into our own applications to make complex tasks
much more straightforward.
The .NET Languages – these are simply
programming languages that conform to certain specific structural requirements
(as defined by the Common Language Specification), and can therefore be compiled
to MSIL. You can develop in any of the languages, such as C# or VB.NET, without
any restrictions, and make programs constructed out of several of these languages.
ASP.NET – this is how the .NET Framework
exposes itself to the web, using IIS to manage simple pages of code so that
they can be compiled into full .NET programs. These are then used to generate
HTML that can be sent out to browsers.
Web Services – although not strictly part
of .NET, web services are definitely enabled by .NET. They are components
that can be accessed via the Web, and can be anything from news headlines,
weather forecasts, and stock tickers to virus protection and operating system
updates.
Manal Rassas
Lebanon
Web programming VS Application programming
Some people think that there isn’t much difference in programming and they are absolutely right to some extent, because you just have to develop a computer based system which will serve for some specific purpose. I am totally agreed at this point.
But when you move towards the Application Programming VS web programming discussion then a web programmer really seems to be a victim, no one tries to understand their working domain, Clients expect that as soon as the graphics designing completed they are now ready to trade (in case of e-commerce websites), or ready to use the system. While in fact a totally new story begins here.
At this point let me explain some major difference between the web and application development trends, psychology and nature.
Let’s consider application development first, when you go for application development you just have to agree on some certain requirements and those are most like to stay same even a year after development, you are going to develop a system which is for specific requirement and for specific time period (even 5-10 years is specific!) in order to do this you can use different built-in controls to satisfy your client. Then you can use number of third party controls for different purposes furthermore you have full control on your development, you only show the working system, no concern with source code.
Now on other hand, web development is always a never-expiring thing. If you are using something in your code, you should keep in mind that in future enhancement which could be in near or far future, you have to keep in mind that for each and every requirement and enhancement, the client expect only one answer and that is YES!. Think yourself when you are doing a something which you know have no fixed limit of requirements…. then what can you do? how much perfection you can bring in?
I would like to give you an example to leave it up to you to decide how you compare it.
Let say you have a shop you can get some POS (Point Of Sale) today, tomorrow you are converted into a distributor role, you need a totally separate software, again your business grows and you became something else, say you are manufacturer. In this period your name, logo location brand is same and you are just changing your application, on other hand you cannot afford to have new website every time you grow in business, you cannot change website’s structure to avoid losing your search engine ranking. In my example it’s quite simple and clear to understand difference between application and web.
Let’s consider another one, what if you have a home and if you don’t like it or have spent 10 years in it you will feel it is old fashioned and you can buy a new one but what if you have a 100 story plaza, by the passage of time you are building more stories in it and do you think even in 20 years time you will consider to rebuild it from scratch just because it is old fashioned, certainly not you will just keep adding on new things in it and improvements then can you predict what improvements you want to have in it? I think not. Similarly think of application as a home and web as plaza and you will realize that web developer have to taker everything in account. even those possibilities which you cannot imagine! They have to think that what modification will come, at what stage and how they will fit into the database.
I myself think a web develop as a builder with the same bricks and mortar, every time building new home. While an application developer is fast, up to date highly qualified engineer in this field, even then it’s proven that web developers are successfully taking their industry ahead of application development.
Summarizing my discussion I would like to say that web development is not as easy or simple as people think. And application development is not as difficult or hard as people believe. Being in both roles I can better understand the responsibilities and difficulties on both development sides and my article represent conclusion of my understanding. The purpose of the article is not to defend web developers but to highlight the key difference between web and application technologies.
Regards
Ammar M Hussain
E-IT Solutions (UK) Ltd.
Projects in Progress
We have a number of varying projects currently in progress. Below is a list and brief description of each client.
All projects have been custom developed to meet our client’s exact needs. All our sites are programmed and developed with search engine listings in mind with one main goal, to make our clients a serious online profit.
All our clients to date have broken into profit within the first six months of their sites going live and this is taking into account the initial development costs.
This client has been established in tile retailing and fitting for 18 years. Like many other retails experts in their field they have now focused their attention to online trading. This project began in October 2004 and is at is closing stages as far as the main database development is concerned. We have already achieved some key positions in MSN and Google for the products on the site but this is just the start. Once the final touches have been made to this site we can focus heavily on the search engine listings.
As above this client has also been established for many years supplying and fitting wooden flooring to homes and businesses. This client is also new to online trading and has already seen some trade on the site before the project has been completed. Finishing touches are also being applied to this project which began in November 2004.
www.mtselect.co.uk
This client has been established online for over 4 years. Initially we were taken on to optimise the existing site and improve the search engine listings. Specialising in motor trade recruitment we got to a point where almost all titles and sub titles were being found in the search engines. However we reached the limit on how much could be optimised due to the site being an off the shelf product with many constraints. We have now custom re-designed the entire site and built in our own features to further improve this clients search engine listings. Every feature on the new site has been developed programmed by e-IT. This project began in February 2005 and is due to go live early June.
This client is looking to compete with the heavy weight teacher recruitment sites. We strongly believe this site will out perform other teacher recruitment sites for the following reasons 1) all features have been custom designed using the vast experience and knowledge our client has built up over the years. The target market has been catered for in great detail. 2) the success this site will have in the search engines will make it the No1 site for teacher recruitment.
This Project began in December 2004 and is due to go live early May.
Established in catering supplies for over 15 years this client is another new comer to online trading. The site will provide one of the most comprehensive ranges of catering supplies online. This project began in October 2004 and is due to go live early May.
Complete Package Holiday Solution
We have completed the development of a comprehensive e-commerce package holiday solution. The client has total control of data administration through quick and easy to use back admin facilities.
You can see a live version @ www.flytwi.co.uk. A test version with full admin facilities will be available soon.
The administration features include:
Hotel Listing - Listing hotels details
Hotel Photo Gallery - No limit to amount of photos used
Hotel Facilities - Edit and customise facilities for each hotel
Hotel Room Facilities - Edit and customise room types
Hotel Discounts - Edit and customise your own prices
Hotel Supplements - Edit and customise for each hotel
Hotel Upgrades - Edit and customise for each hotel
Hotel Pricing - Pricing can be customised for every month and over 2 seasons
Airport List - Edit and customise the airports you use
Flight Type List
Booked Up Hotels - Set room availability limits
Package Specials - Edit and customise all your special offers
Booked Packages - View and modify all packages bought and paid for online
Excursions – Sights - No limit on information on local history and sights
Excursions – Outings - Edit outings
Mailing List Types - Customise different mailing lists
Mailing List Members - View and modify members
Delivery Charges - Edit charges
Brochure Requests - Requests made online
Print Brochure Labels - Print labels direct from site back end.
Deleted Booked Packages - Deleted package with full feedback features
This database e-commerce solution will cater for any package holiday specialists and can be set up and trading within 3 months.
TK
Wedding Bells
The official launch date for this site is 05/01/2005. Although the site is virtually complete and live it is in the beta stages and being vigorously tested.
The new address is www.weddingdesignonline.co.uk and we would welcome any feedback.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
04/11/2004
We are currently developing a site that will provide a comprehensive range of wedding products and services. The product range will also cater for parties and events and can also be rented.
Wedding venues, photographers, dresses, catering and many other services will feature as well as tips, bride and groom mini announcement sites, forums and photo albums.
We have no doubt that this site will be one of a kind.
TK
Minerva Re-Location
Minverva International continues to expand its operations which have resulted with the headquarters moving to much lager premises and the addition of a third office in Warrington.
The new headquarters can only be described as impressive with an extremely high standard of decor and amples of space. The data cabling has been installed out of sight whilst the interior was being designed and decorated. Apart from a slight misjudgement of the amount of cable needed for such large offices (8000sq ft) the installation went as smooth as can be expected.
In the process of the move the ISP was upgraded to accommodate two new remote offices. The Warrington office and the main office in the USA are to become part of the entire Minvera Network using VPN technology. In total four offices located around the UK and the USA will act as one large Network. Minerva has recently expanded into China and will no doubt need the Shanghai office to also join the network in the near future.
Minimal network downtime was experienced by the head office. All other offices were able to operate during this process. Servers and workstations were also upgraded and all data was successfully backed up and transferred over to the new system without any complications. The entire network now runs much more efficiently than before as we were able to address technical issues that were inherited. There are now no technical issues or restrictions regarding the Minvera IT infrastructure. Talks are now in progress on further IT expansion in incorporating other offices around the world.
To sum up, this was an extremely successful re-location with no complications and a positive step towards improving hardware and fully utilising the potential of the technology at hand. Minerva International have adapted extremely well to the new IT faculties we have provided them over the past two years. They are now in an ideal position to drive home their competitive advantage with regards to VPN IT Networking.
TK
Package Holidays Online (FlyTwi)
Airline and holidays companies have always done well from online trade. This project is targeted at capturing a new audience for the Northern Cypriot holiday market. Although competition at the top of the search engines exists there is still room in this area for an online market leader to establish itself.
This project has so far taken us nine months working closely with Ibrahim Kanli (director of Jewels of The World & FlyTwi). Mr Kanlis input and industry knowledge has enabled us to develop this database driven site with comprehensive administration facilities allowing the site to be operated independently. All data entered into this site can also be used by resellers operating with their own identity with full control over stock allocation in the hands of FlyTwi.
On the 27th of October the ordering system was complete and package holidays could be booked online. Immediately the site received bookings and up to the 20th of November over 40 package holidays have been booked and paid for through the online ordering system. The same again has most likely been booked over the telephone as a result of the site being found in the search engines.
Although we did not set a target the number of bookings has certainly exceeded our expectations at this early stage. We will now be focusing on the search engine listings and working towards firmly establishing FlyTwi as the largest online Package Holiday provider for Northern Cyprus.
Watch this space as I will be updated this log as we progress.
This site has grown from strength to strength in the past few month and has now reached on average 1200 unique visitors a day. This figure exceeded all expectations and has resulted in David Savage having to hire a receptionist to deal with all the enquiries generated from the site.
What seemed to be our biggest challenge has turned out to be one of our biggest successes.
------------------------------------
20-10-2004
I approached David Savage two years ago in our early days when we were barely known for what we do and had to try ten times harder to please. I discovered his website researching the furniture industry and pointed it out to Asif. Asif immediately fell in love with the furniture David Savage designed and insisted that I should do whatever I can to get him on board. In the hope that David would one day design and make Asif a little stool for his son.
Although David showed interest and displayed some knowledge about the optimisation industry he later went on to try his luck with another company. This company promised to deliver the Earth. Months went by and Earth was nowhere to be seen. So David decided to give us a call to ask us why their efforts had failed and why our methods would succeed.
Before we knew it David Savage was finally on board and Asifs chances of having a stool made by the man himself had increased.
I always believed that we could have an impact in the search engines for commissioned furniture, especially for one of the best and well known furniture designers and makers in the country. Then again, I am an eternal optimist. Asif however (the incurable realist), felt that it would extremely hard to generate revenue for this site as
1) the customers had to be wealthy enough to pay from 15k to 80k for piece of furniture
2) the furniture industry in general was extremely competitive in the search engines and
3) David Savage will only design and make a one off piece of furniture for you if he likes you!
as well as you having to be extremely wealthy.
In all honesty as we took the work on and time passed the odd doubt even crept into my mind. This challenge would be our toughest to date. A few months had gone by and although we had some degree of success we were limited by the infrastructure and design of David’s existing site. A total re-design was required to press forward. This led to deep discussions and heated debates and it was at this point I was savaged by David. 'You said this, you said that' David reminded me. 'You never mentioned I would ever need a re-design' he told me. 'How long is this going to take?’
David had a small taste of success in the search engines and wanted more. He was also attached to his web site which had been around a good few years. Many hundreds of hours had gone into developing the site with all the rich content he had added and all his work on display, it's no wonder he wasn't happy about changing everything after so long.
However we had come to a dead end as far as our work was concerned. The structure of the website would not allow us to build any further on the progress we had made and this could only be realized when we reached that point.
Eventually we agreed on a re-design and work could progress after all. Six months on www.finefurnituremaker.com now features over 200 number one spots, over 500 top five positions and over 1000 top thirty positions in ALL the major search engines, google in particular. These are for words such as 'Fine Furniture', 'Furniture Maker', 'Modern Furniture Maker', 'Furniture Commissioning’,’ Modern Furniture Courses' and so on.
The real test was if after all this a customer would materialize. The web site statistics most certainly improved, telephone enquiries also rose and finally the first customer did emerge as a direct result of the positions and the design of the web site. He passed all of Davids requirement to qualify as a client, namely being wealthy and liked by David.
PS. Asif still hasn't got his specially design one off stool.
Our most recent project was to install a 2 Server Network at main headquarters and two smaller remote Networks, all acting as one. The old Network was to be totally replaced and the old accounts package to run on the new set-up until the new accounts package arrived.
This will have a major impact for Eurocup as their old network was over 5 years old, had no internet, no e mail Exchange system and the accounts package was a DOS system. All aspects regarding this project were overseen by e-IT Solutions UK. The hardware, research and referral for a new accounts package, the installation of all three offices and finally the remote support and maintenance have all been carried out by e-IT Solutions UK.
The planning was impeccable and the implementation was as smooth as can be expected. Obviously BT and Dell caused a few hiccups with software being sent out incorrectly by Dell and IP addresses not being assigned by BT when confirmation was given to us that they were assigned. Putting those aside this is one of the smoothest installations we have carried out. Following all three installations not one call came through regarding a technical problem with the work carried out.
Calls that did come through were regarding how to best use the new facilities. With remote support and maintenance Eurocup will be in good hands for the coming years and will discover the positive aspects of IT. This is the perfect case study on how IT can hugely enhance your business.
