E-retail, online shopping, e-commerce

Shopping online offers a wide range of advantages for consumers: it is often faster, cheaper and more convenient and the product range is virtually infinite, including clothes, books, toys, movies and music (both digital and physical), tickets, classes and even groceries and delivery. Plus the service industries are selling packages and promotions online through their own sites and deal sites like Groupon and LivingSocial. The industries are investing more and more into e-commerce especially with the impulsive convenience of being able to purchase anywhere at anytime with Smartphones. You can browse, read user reviews, and even try on your clothes on a virtual version of yourself to mimic, or replace, the old fashioned shopping experience. Fun Facts: Amazon.com, which started in 1995, is the most popular online shopping site today and the most popular item purchased on tablets (like the iPad) was apparel.

As a business owner you can reach a much wider customer base and sell all over the world assuming you can ship your products. You can make a big impact on your returns by focusing attention on local customers and geo-targeted online advertising. A great way to encourage your clients to buy online is by offering free shipping. 48.8% of e-commerce transactions during the first quarter of 2012 included free shipping. It is also important to streamline the checkout process in your online shopping cart or purchasing experience. Make it as quick and simple as possible (you don’t want to lose customers because they get frustrated trying to buy your products). People are very visual and photos are often more important than a detailed description but it all depends on what you’re selling. No matter what you have to make your product appeal moreover you have to convince the visitor to click “buy now”.

What is required to start selling online? You could get a domain name and build a website with a full fledged shopping cart which calculates tax and processes credit cards or you could use a 3^rd party website like ebay or amazon to sell your merchandise. Each end of the spectrum has its advantages and disadvantages. To oversimplify, your own e-commerce system will be more costly upfront but give a much higher return in the long run. 3^rd party sites will allow you to sell a limited range of products but at a cost; they take a percentage and/or fee. Furthermore, you don’t have as much control over how you market the products. There are also mixed solutions like using your own site together with a 3^rd party payment gateway or shopping cart like paypal and opencart.

Whatever you’re selling, be it product or services, wherever you’re selling it, be it on the web or on a smartphone, WbC Web Design can help you get up and running quickly so you can sell sell sell!

Contact us today for a free consultation. 514 909-8773

If you are planning to establish a mobile presence for your business or organization one of the first considerations is whether you want to create a mobile application for users to download (app) or a mobile website, or perhaps both. Mobile websites and apps can look very similar at first-glance. Determining which is most suited to your needs will depend upon a number of factors, including target audiences, available budget, intended purpose and required features. Both apps and mobile websites are accessed on handheld devices such as smartphones (e.g. iPhone, Android and Blackberry) and tablets.

A mobile website is similar to any website except it has been designed for the smaller handheld display and touch-screen interface. Apps are actual applications that are downloaded and installed on your mobile device, rather than being opened with a browser. Users visit device-specific portals such as Apple’s App Store, or Android Market (now Google Play) in order to find and download apps (sometimes at a cost). Generally speaking, a mobile website should be considered your first step in developing a mobile web presence, whereas an app is useful for developing an application for a very specific purpose that cannot be effectively accomplished via a web browser. There are a lot of benefits to having a mobile version of your website that apps can’t provide: mobile websites are instantly available, to users via a browser across a range of devices. Apps on the other hand require the user to first download and install the app from an app marketplace before the content or application can be viewed – a significant barrier between initial engagement and action/conversion. Mobile websites can be updated instantly, are found and shared more easily (by publishers and between users), can’t be deleted (the avg. lifespan of an app is thirty days), are cheaper and faster to develop, etc… So when should you build an app?

Despite the many inherent benefits of the mobile web, apps are still very popular. Generally, if you need one of the following, an app makes sense:

• Interactivity/Gaming
• Regular Usage/Personalization – If your target users are going to be using your app in a personalized fashion on a regular basis (e.g. EverNote)
• Complex Calculations or Reporting – Take data and manipulate it with complex calculations, charts or reports (e.g. banking or investment)
• Native Functionality or Processing Required – mobile web browsers are getting increasingly good at accessing certain mobile-specific functions such as click-to-call, SMS and GPS. However, if you need to access a user’s camera or processing power an app will still do that much more effectively.
• No connection Required – If there’s a need to provide offline access to content or perform functions without a network/wireless connection.

WbC Web Design has created mobile versions of websites for many clients. Whether from the outset or converting an existing site into a handheld-friendly version let WbC help you grab hold of the fastest growing market share. Contact us for a free consultation today wbcwebdesign.com 514-909-8773

How to pull off the ultimate event

If you’ve ever planned a wedding, Bar Mitzvah, business conference or any big event you know there is a lot of work and costs involved in the planning and execution. However, you can pull off an amazing event for less money and with less effort thanks to help from a few websites and some creativity.

First step to planning the ultimate gathering is picking the date and letting people know about it. Be sure to check the calendars to see if there is anything happening on or around that date. Google Calendar allows you to add national and religious holidays to your calendar and you can always do a search for the date. WhichDateWorks.com is a free service that makes simple work of finding the best time for a scheduled event. Choose a good location. About.com has a great event planning section with lots of advice on choosing a location. Don’t forget to check user reviews online if it is a restaurant or big venue.

Once you have locked down a time and place you will want everyone to know about the event but you’ll also want to create some buzz and an attractive invitation is a great way to encourage attendance. WbC can create you a custom invitation that will give the impression you want and with a little creativity and flexibility on a budget too! Nowadays, printed invites are only part of the equation. While we love to design and print our specialty is the web. Why not turn that smashing invitation into event branding and use the same look and feel for everything from a save the date and seating cards to customized menus and thank you cards. Use the same theme on the Facebook event or e-vites which we can help you set up and promote. We can even create a basic website where guests can find all the info, RSVP, and even post and view photos after the event. If it’s a paid event visitors can register and purchase spots online. There are lots of ways to market your event online and off. For example, using sites like Meetup, Eventbrite, YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Upcoming. You can also print banners and flyers or create a contest or give-away. WbC can help with all of that and we can even write your press release or invitation and have it translated into several languages!

So now that everyone is excited about the upcoming gathering how do you get it all organized? First, make a checklist and a budget. Thegreatevent.com has a free checklist and sample budget you can print out (or copy paste into Word to modify).

When the day comes and everyone is arriving, be sure that you keep people happy and that you’ve optimized your event to create additional buzz. Have high-speed wireless available – this allows people to tweet and converse more easily. Promote following the event’s Twitter account for event updates. Don’t forget to have a unique hashtag for the event. Have a web page or even a giant whiteboard where people can share their social media contact information too.

For people who cannot attend the event, consider setting up a live stream. Live video services like Ustream and Mogulus make it possible to stream out key portions of events. You don’t have to stream everything – just the good stuff. If you can’t stream, upload videos to YouTube afterwards.

Finally, and most importantly, listen to your audience – do they complain about a specific speaker, the food, entertainement, or a lack of responsiveness? Address their needs by tracking the Twitter conversation for a large event. For small events, simply ask them for their feedback or have an online survey guests can fill out.

From planning and organizing to promotion and execution let WbC Web Design‘s team of experts help you pull off the ultimate event. Contact us today for a free consultation.

514-909-8773
Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Web Site

Additional Resources:
Event Planning Apps 

Part of branding yourself includes how you sound on paper. Words create a huge impact on our psyche. Quoting films and film characters has become apart of our daily lexicon, when we think of brands to buy taglines from ads whisk across our brain, and the websites that stand out in our mind the most are well written, easy to read, and catchy. Good writing across all mediums, be it academic, journalistic, or prosaic, is an essential component in how you present yourself to others and this is especially important to a website. In addition to using the right keywords to optimize your site so that it’s found in search engines you also want your visitors to stay on your site once they arrive. Even more importantly, you want them to take action like clicking buy or registering. In technical jargon that’s called a conversion because you convert the visitor into a buyer. The best way to increase your conversions is with well written content and catchy titles – but not all of us are writers. Good news! WbC works with professional copywriters, editors, and proofreaders so you can get the most out of your website and online marketing campaign. When you combine visually stunning graphics with enticing content and thought out navigability, your website is guaranteed to have a major return on your investment (ROI).

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Facebook.com/WbCwebdesign
Twitter.com/Design4Success
Plus.google.com/101143768564754226327
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While there is no single rule for determining if something is legit there are a few guidelines you can follow. Use common sense. Take the second to ask yourself: Is this from someone I know and trust? If it’s from a supposed organization (like the government, financial institution, charity) ask your self is it normal for them to be contacting me by email, and not in writing? Is it professionally written without spelling mistakes or grammatical errors? Are they asking me for money or personal information? Promising some thing unbelievable? Look at the address and the links of the website or email do they match the place they claim to be coming from? What if it’s not that obvious; go with your gut. If you have any doubts try looking it up on Snopes.com the definitive Internet reference source for urban legends, folklore, myths, rumours, and misinformation. Even just Google it!

So you have determined it’s a scam what do you do? Usually you can just delete the message or post. However, you can also be a good ‘netizen’ by reporting the fraud to the RCMP (info@antifraudcentre.ca)! If you have already given out personal or financial information then start contacting your bank, credit bureau, and local police, in addition to reporting the email to the RCMP. The RCMP also has a section of their website dedicated to frauds and scams with a wealth of information (http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/scams-fraudes/index-eng.htm).

In addition to being vigilant you can set up spam or junk mail filters in your email program. Use a primary email address for friends and colleagues and a completely separate email address for online activities like filling out forms or joining online communities. Never reply to, or click on a “remove” or “unsubscribe” link in a suspicious spam message. If you do respond, it will confirm your address and cause you to receive more spam. Never click on any links in sketchy messages or on suspect websites. Keep your software and OS up to date. Make sure you have trusted anti-virus software which is updated and protects against malicious software (malware). Never click on any window that pops up on your computer screen claiming that your system has been infected. Don’t open attachments in your emails unless you know what you’re opening and where it’s from…

There are a billion and one different shams out there and there’s no better way to protect yourself than using your judgment. However, you can improve your judgment by educating yourself about some of the most common techniques and what you can do to protect yourself.

Let us answer your questions… just ask: QandA@wbcwebdesign.com
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Once you create your account in Google+ you can edit your profile and start adding friends to your circles. Instead of adding or following everyone as a friend you drag-and-drop people and/or companies to different circles like family, friends, acquaintances, etc… You can create your own circles and add to several circles. Your profile also displays who is in your circles, and who has added you to their circles. You can change the privacy settings on the left-hand side of your profile to make this data public or private. So why should you create circles in the first place? Simple: you want to share different things with different friends. You may want to share a risqué photo with your close friends, but share a link about your company’s newest hire with just your business network. Google+ Circles gives you the ability to have this kind of control over both what you share and what appears in your stream.

There are a few differences between the Google+ Stream and the Facebook News Feed. Posts by your friends move back to the top based on which post has the most recent comment, though eventually older posts are eventually buried in the stream. Instead of “liking” a post, you can “+1″ a post — this is part of Google’s push for the +1 Button. You can also share posts with your circles or mute a post if it’s clogging up your stream.

One feature that’s a big hit is Hangouts. A novel twist on the traditional group video chat, lets up to 10 users simultaneously video chat with each other and it’s definitely received a positive reaction from the Google+ community. It has so many features unto itself we couldn’t even list them all here: hold hangouts via Android smart-phone, share your screen, draw together, create and edit documents together, hold topic-based hangouts, broadcast your hangouts…

Of course there is a lot more to Google+ including great media sharing capabilities for photos and even the ability to edit video before posting. Surprisingly there was no search capability when it launched but Google has finally added search capability. Businesses’ abilities to create brand pages was also only added to the G+ repertoire recently but all the major brands are already on there and you would be remiss not to join them. However, this new kid on the block still has some growing pains.

Google+ still has some kinks to work out. It doesn’t work with Google Apps accounts and the Stream is too “noisy”. Posts are pushed to the top whenever there’s a new comment, something that most users think is unnecessary.

If you’re wondering how to import all your friends from Facebook, it is doable but they don’t make it easy. The best way to do it is using a Yahoo! Account to import your Facebook friends and then import your Yahoo! Contacts into Google+. If you’re already using Google+, add us (WbC Web Design) to your circles for interesting articles like this one and other goodies.

If you have any questions about Google+, Facebook, Social networking or the web in general don’t hesitate to ask:
QandA@wbcwebdesign.com
Facebook.com/WbCwebdesign
Twitter.com/Design4Success
Plus.google.com/101143768564754226327

For a complete guide to using Google+ see Mashable’s article here.

Anything related to the World Wide Web, Graphic Design, Marketing, Printing… we’ll try and answer your questions in a concise yet comprehensive and easy to understand response. How much for this expert advice? It’s FREE! All  you have to do is ask.

Submit your questions to QandA@wbcwebdesign.com or contact us on twitter.com/Design4Success or facebook.com/wbcwebdesign

So what is a parent to do? You can take actions to monitor and control internet use at home. There are many programs available to block certain websites on your home computer or child’s laptop. These work either by blocking all sites except for ones you have allowed or by blocking what it considers to be a suspect site. You might want to check your existing anti-virus software as well. Some, such as Norton, include parental controls. Keeping the computer in a common area where you can monitor and control your kids access is imperative. Use and enforce time limits. Make sure you have all the passwords to any email or social networking sites being used. Monitor your child’s activity on the Internet by storing names of sites and/or snapshots of material seen by your child on the computer for you to view later. Configure your search engine (e.g. Google) to limit results to content appropriate for kids… However, most of these controls have one major limitation: they only work in the home!

While a large amount of your child’s internet use may be at home there is still a lot of access and exposure to the world wide web outside of the house as well. Kids are resourceful and inquisitive, they can use a friend’s computer when they go over for a play date, they can get a hold of a smart phone, or maybe you already got them one for their last birthday, there’s internet café’s and free Wi-Fi, etc.. That is why the two most important things you can do as a concerned adult is 1) educate yourself about the internet, its benefits and its potential dangers 2) educate your child about the potential dangers and benefits and how they can protect themselves.

Some benefits include: Access to rich educational and cultural resources (text, sounds, pictures, and video), obtain up-to-the-minute information, stay informed by accessing your community and school Web sites, Play fun and educational games…

Some Dangers include: Easy-to-find sexually explicit images and text, sites promoting hatred, bigotry, violence, drugs, cults, and other things not appropriate for children. Inaccurate, misleading, and untrue information. No restrictions on marketing products such as alcohol and tobacco to children. Marketing that deceptively collects personal information from kids in order to sell products to them or their parents. Requests for personal information for contests, surveys, etc., that are used in unauthorized ways. Easy access to games with excessive violence and gender stereotypes. Ability to communicate with predators or impersonators. Cyber-bullying…

Regularly spend time online with your child to learn about his or her interests and activities. Teach your child to end any experience online when he or she feels uncomfortable or scared by pressing the back key, logging off, and telling a trusted adult as soon as possible. Give lots of examples of inappropriate internet situations so they know how to recognize a bad situation. For example, instruct your child never to give any personal information like their true name, age, address, school they attend, etc to anyone. And if someone is asking for any of that information tell an adult right away.

Informational Resources

www.facebook.com/safety/groups/parents/
Facebook Safety Tips for Parents

http://www.google.ca/familysafety/tips.html
Google Safety Tips

www.commonsensemedia.org
Common Sense Media is an independent non-profit organization dedicated to helping families make the best media choices for their kids.

www.getnetwise.org
GetNetWise is a public service brought to you by a wide range of Internet industry corporations and public interest organizations. The GetNetWise coalition wants Internet users to be only “one click away” from the resources they need to make informed decisions about their and their family’s use of the Internet.

www.netfamilynews.org
New Family News is a nonprofit public service providing weekly “kid-tech news” for parents and educators in more than 50 countries. This site is based on the premise that informed, engaged parenting and teaching are essential to kids’ constructive use of technology and the Net.

www.netsmartz.org/Parents
The NetSmartz Workshop is an interactive, educational safety resource that teaches kids and teens how to stay safer on the Internet. Parents, guardians, educators, and law enforcement also have access to additional resources for learning and teaching about the dangers children may face online.

www.Wiredkids.org
Wired Kids, Inc. is dedicated to protecting all Internet users, especially children, from cybercrime and abuse. It operates several programs and Web sites designed to help everyone learn how to protect their privacy and security online and to teach responsible Internet use. Wired Kids is best known for its expertise in child, teen, and parent Internet safety programs.

Blocking and Monitoring Tools

www1.k9webprotection.com
K9 Web Protection blocks a wide range of objectionable websites (including those with racism and gambling) and also sets time restrictions on Internet usage.

www.chatshield.com
ChatShield is specifically for Internet messaging. The program checks the identities of people chatting with your children and blocks unidentifiable contacts.

www.parentalcontrolbar.org
Parental Control Bar is a toolbar that you can download. It blocks access to adult-oriented websites.

www.netnanny.com
NetNanny is one of the most popular paid options out there. It is easy to use and effective, according to reviews. For $40 a year you get a detailed report of what your kids are doing, along with the standard blocking and filtering. However, it comes with just one licence — if you want it for more than one computer, it will cost another $20 per machine.

Beware: Kids are smart. There is this handy-dandy webpage out there that tells them how to get around parental control software. You may want to keep that link to yourself. http://www.wikihow.com/Get-Around-Parental-Controls-on-the-Internet

By using various techniques you can optimize your site (SEO) so that search engines find it easier to index. For example, creating an XML and HTML sitemap that is submitted to all the major search engines such as Google, Bing, Yahoo! will make your site easier to find. Other important aspects of SEO are choosing the right keywords or key-phrases, improving the number of times they are used, as well as, deciding how and where they are placed (for example in the page title, or headings), and so on.

SEM is more about paid advertising such as Google’s Adwords. Paid placement (or pay for placement [PFP]) is a model whereby advertisers, webmasters, search engine optimization specialists, etc. pay to have their pages/content included and ranked artificially higher than other results in an index of similar or competitive content. Paid Inclusion (or pay for inclusion [PFI]) is a different model than paid placement. PFI allows web marketers to pay in order to have guaranteed inclusion in the index but with no guarantee as to the ranking. One can also pay for contextual advertising (for example a link to your gardening site in the context of an article about planting tulips).

Search engines have special criteria for having your web site come up first. One of the main factors is “fresh content”. Having your web site content updated daily is crucial to climbing the ranks of organic (unpaid) search results. That said, we are aware that social sites like Facebook and Twitter are setting the bar pretty high with content being added every second. This is why it is important to use what social networking sites have to offer. Avoiding SMO is not smart business, even if you think you’re too old for Facebook! Another important factor in getting to the top of the search results is link popularity. Think of Google as choosing the prom king and queen for each keyword. It not only looks at whether your page has had SEO for those keywords but it also looks at how many sites (including Twitter and Facebook) make reference to your site, and what words they use to link to your site. This is your page’s popularity on the internet.

We can help you with your online presence from selecting the right keywords to writing the proper content and SEO. We also manage your social media networks presence. By doing so, your content will not only be on your site, but many others, as well, where you can easily update and have others spread the word about your services or products. We can also submit your site, and/or articles related to it, to other specialized forums with a link back to your site. We have a team that is ready to get your site to the top of the rankings by implementing our various SEO techniques. By taking one of our customized service contracts, you will see the before and after effect these techniques will have on your web site and, in turn, your business. WbC knows that you want a return on your investment. A proper web strategy can have a huge impact on your bottom line.

Get your free consultation now: www.WbCwebdesign.com 514-909-8773

While any new advancement has its dangers and pitfalls, the benefits greatly outweigh the negatives. As a general rule of thumb: assume whatever you post will be read by everyone and be available online forever; even if you think you’re targeting a specific group once it’s out there, there is no putting Pandora back in the box.

If you prefer to interact with people in real life, where you can actually talk to them, don’t rule out the WWW just yet! You can meet people who share the same interests as you through sites like meetup.com where persons create and join groups of common interest and meet up on a (semi-)regular basis. Join one of the many Business Networking groups in Montreal or a more specialized one like the “Montreal Real Estate Networking Group”. I’m a member of the web design Meetup.

WbC can not only set up all your social networking accounts and update them regularly, we’ll also monitor them and respond to any questions quickly. We even track Twitter for any mention of keywords targeted to your business and message them directly to generate new leads.

Contact us for a free online marketing consultation today!

WbCWebDesign.com 514-909-8773