Executionists - We Get Web Done

We’re pleased to announce the successful launch of another customized website using the popular Magento Go e-commerce platform. Silverlit Toys is a Hong Kong-based manufacturer of robotic and remote-controlled toys for children. Silverlit’s easy-to-use store features toys by category, price, and recommended age. Click here to learn more about our e-commerce capabilities.

We recently launched another site based on Magento Community Edition, one of the leading open source, customizable e-commerce platforms on the market. Voomerang.com offers daily deals for Los Angeles, with other cities to be added soon.

Voomerang.com - recently launched by Executionists, Inc.

We’ve been busy here at Executionists developing our expertise in the Magento family of open source e-commerce customizable platforms. We recently built Phillipe’s Watches from the ground up using the Magento Community platform. Phillipe’s Watches is a legendary boutique in Beverly Hills dedicated to selling and servicing luxury timepieces. They required a web store that could manage their extensive inventory with ease and elegance. The recently launched site easily handles multiple features associated with their products and has an elegant look and feel suitable to the high value of their products.

Phillipe's Watches Home Page

Many ecommerce stores cost tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars to develop and maintain. Magento GO is a low-cost, full-featured ecommerce solution. Because it is a templated, hosted solution you will be somewhat constrained to the available templates and functionality. One of the best ways to see if Magento GO is right for you is to review the features and functionality they offer and see if it will be sufficient for your business.

Full list of features: http://www.magentocommerce.com/go/features/
Plan pricing: http://www.magentocommerce.com/go/plans/

Then sign up and select a template that has a basic layout you like. Then we can create custom graphics and modifications around that template to better promote your products and brand.

Our Magento GO services encompass the following:

Consultation: The initial consultation is free. This should allow us to understand your basic requirements and provide you a proposal on next steps.

Discovery/Definition: Many times our recommended next steps will include a Discovery and Definition phase. This phase will allow us to more clearly understand your business goals, determine if Magento GO matches your requirements, and plan out the scope of the effort.

Interface Design: Magento GO already has a variety of templates that you can use for your store. Most businesses will want to customize them with their branding and design that reflects their desired customer experience. You may have an existing design ready to go or we can work with you to customize the interface design and page layouts within the Magento GO framework. Once you have approved the design our technical team can code it using HTML/CSS and PHP.

Technical Integration: Our developers will take the approved interface design, which is usually in Photoshop PSD files, optimize the files, and convert them to HTML/CSS code. This code will then be integrated into the Magento GO templates as required. We can enable various features of the templates and enhance them within the constraints of the framework. Once the templates have been customized we will import several products. The remaining products will be uploaded by the client or we can do it for you at an additional cost.

Maintenance Services: Post-launch, our design and technical teams can provide services to help you keep your Magento GO store up-to-date.

Marketing Services: Our team can provide SEO, email campaigns, Social Media, and other promotions to help advertise your online business.

Rates: Our rates range from $75 – $120 an hour depending on the tasks required. We can work on an hourly and/or project price. We also offer discounted Retainer Rates for website maintenance work. Please contact us for more information. 310-754-3807 or magento@executionists.com.

by Jessie Jo Blalock

Nearly 1 in every 5 Americans access the web daily and by 2012, 1 in 2 mobile subscribers will own a smartphone. Due to such a rapid growth of smartphone sales and mobile browsing, it is imperative that web designers and developers educate themselves with the best practices of strategic mobile web design. With new technologies comes a new set of challenges, in which case, remember what your mamma taught you:

Less is more

… Especially when it comes to mobile web design! Mobile design should be regarded as scaled down versions of their parent site. And since smartphone screens vary in size and shape, mobile website design must remain clean and simple.  If so inclined, you can always leave the option to visit the standard site through a simple link.

Actions speak louder than words

Literally. There is such little room for content on a mobile web page and mobile users are typically on the go, wherein mobile web designers must prioritize their content with actions (IE a login page, product search, store locator, etc.). Remember: person’s goal for browsing the web from a mobile device is vastly different than a desktop or laptop.

Cleanliness is next to godliness

Clean and semantic markup will guarantee that the browser is capable of accurately displaying the web page and provide the mobile users with a more pleasant experience with little to no errors or difficulties.

Better safe than sorry

An ample amount of white space is essential in mobile web design. Though the objective of most companies’ websites is to engage users and present them with as much information as possible about their products and services, too much content will appear chaotic on a smartphone.  Afford plenty of white space in your site design to ensure your site will be displayed properly on any mobile device.

Waste not, Want not

With mobile Internet connection speeds generally being slower than desktop Internet connection speeds and a variety of screen sizes, implementing images and pictures does more harm than good. Excessive use of images will produce an unfriendly user experience; mobile users want functionality over design aesthetics.

Executionists, Inc. offer mobile solutions for websites, click for a free consultation.

See Our Work

How Much Does A Website Cost?

Almost every potential client asks this question. I’ll get to the answer in a roundabout way but first some obligatory back story. Over the past 13 years we have developed hundreds of website with budgets ranging from $1000 to $50,000. We have also worked on Fortune 500 company websites in conjunction with other development companies, these total budgets have been $100,000 – $1,000,000. For websites of this scope the team can consist of 10 or more people working full-time for six months or longer.

Websites just don’t happen, they are the result of the execution of a methodology or process that arrives at a successful result. Our website design methodology is based on 13 years of experience, starting with a website for FootLocker.com back in 1996. Our methodology has evolved over time, to make the process more streamlined and flexible. Our basic approach is:

1. Discovery
2. Planning
3. Interface Design
4. Integration
5. Testing
6. Launch/Maintain

This simple 6 step process can be modified to fit a smaller project by reducing the amount of effort spent on various steps. For example the “Discovery” process can involve just one simple phone call with the client to learn about their brand and goals or it can involve several all-day meetings. The “Planning” process can involve a short document that addresses the creative and technical requirements or it can involve days of research into the competition and building matrices of features and functionality. So you can see that each step in this process is flexible and can be modified to fit a target project budget and requirements.

Flexible process = Flexible Effort = Flexible Cost.

So, how much does a website cost?

It depends on what you are trying to build. Here are some of the key elements that we need to consider:

• Online Marketing Strategy: Do you have one? Don’t think that “if we build it they will come”. It’s important to have an understanding of marketing channels and how your business will use them.
• Branding/logo: Do you have your logo developed? Do you have a style guide for your brand?
• Interface Design: How long will it take to arrive at the look-and-feel that you envision for your business?
• Features and Functionality: This is the meat of the website, what features do you want (online portfolio, media downloads, etc) and what functions do you need (ecommerce, interactive forms, etc.)? Although ecommerce, search and membership are commonplace on the web – that does not mean that this is easy to develop. There are a lot of pre-built (open source) solutions but they invariably have to be customized and that effort can be time-intensive.
• Hosting: This is usually a small cost but still an important part of the process. Will your hosting company allow us to easily configure the options we need for your website?
• Testing: The more complex your website, the more testing is required. Also what browsers do you want your site to work on? If you want IE 6.0 or Safari that could take a lot of additional time to test and troubleshoot.

The above list illustrates that there is a wide difference in requirements for websites and many questions that need to be answered.

More Requirements = More Complexity = Higher Costs.

So how much does a website cost?

When we estimate a project we try to get a good understanding of the project requirements and then estimate the number of hours required for the following 3 primary tasks:

• Interface Design = Design for all site graphics and page layouts, may also include Flash animation design (if required).
• Programming = Hosting setup, database setup, application design and programming, testing, technical project management.
• Project Management = Primary point of contact with the client, project schedule and milestones, communication, consultation and testing.

Other tasks like Logo Design, copywriting, and Marketing Strategy can also be added to the requirements if needed.

Once we have estimated the number of hours for each task we multiply that by our hourly rate which (at the time of this article) is approx. $90 an hour for most services. We then provide the final project estimate to the client and if accepted, our in-house team strives to keep the project within the approved budget. During development, if there is danger of the project exceeding the budget due to unforseen circumstances or new client requests, the issue is brought to the client’s attention so that the budget can be adjusted or compromises made.

Note about our rates: If you search for website design and development services you will find a wide range of fees. Offshore companies may have rates as low as $17 an hour. Students fresh out of school may charge $15 an hour, boutique development companies range from $75 – $150 an hour, larger national firms can easily charge $250 and more per hour. Keep in mind that there is a world of difference between the experience of a $17 an hour developer and a $150 an hour developer. Our rate is based on what we believe is reasonable for the bulk of our clientele which are small to mid-sized, Los Angeles-based businesses. Our methodology has been tailored to deliver design and development services based on that cost.

So, how much does a website cost?

Let’s walk through a few brief client scenarios to help you get an understanding of costs:

Client One: MJ Associates

This small, professional services business needs a website primarily for marketing purposes. They have an offline brand/logo and some website design ideas. They will provide the content for their website which consists of text, headshots, logo and a video of their CEO. They provide a short list of websites they like during a meeting that our Project Manager and Art Director have with them in our/their offices. They don’t require any databases but we will hook up a 3rd-party email management tool for them so they can collect client inquiries and send out email blasts. There will be approximately 8-10 pages.

Estimate is as follows:

Interface Design: 20 hours – will include some Flash design
Programming: 32 hours – HTML, PHP and CSS
Project Management: 18 hours
Total: 70 hours = $6,300

Deliverables:

Following is a semi-complete list of the deliverables from our team:

• Planning document that lists creative and website goals
• Content checklist and schedule
• Access to our project management tool (if desired)
• 2 home page design options that get modified based on client input to arrive at one  approved design
• Design for website pages (based on the home page design) and all associated graphics
• Flash design elements (usually a promotional animation)
• Programming for the website and integration of 3rd-party email management tool
• Integration of all client content
• Integration of Google Analytics
• Upload to client’s hosting server and setup of email addresses
• Testing and Launch
• Proactive submission of site to the major search engines
• At the end of the project we provide the client with a complete copy of all our original files on CD (.PSD, .FLA, HTML, etc)

This type of project accounts for about 1/2 of the projects we do. Post-launch, these companies often come back to us for content updates and enhancements. We bill these at our regular hourly rates or fraction thereof. Clients who require regular edits can save money by getting one of our Retainer Plans that offer discounted rates.

Client Two: Ecommerce Website

This mid-sized business needs a marketing website and ecommerce for their product line. They have an offline brand/logo and some design ideas. They will provide the content for their website which consists of text, headshots, logo, product photos and PDF downloads. They provide a short list of websites they like during a meeting that our Project Manager, Art Director and Tech Director have with them in our/their offices. They have a merchant account.

Estimate is as follows:
Interface Design: 24 hours – will include some Flash design
Programming: 60 hours – HTML, PHP and CSS plus integration and customization of Php-based cart for online shopping.
Project Management: 30 hours
You can expect to pay a little more for the hosting and an SSL certificate
Total: 114 hours = $10,260

Deliverables:

Same as client one above but add a few hours for training on the ecommerce solution.

Client Three: Membership Website with CMS

This business needs a marketing website for a new brand. They also need membership and email marketing components. They will provide the content for their website which consists of text and video clips. They provide a short list of websites they like during a meeting that our Project Manager, Art Director and Tech Director have with them in our/their offices.

Estimate is as follows:
Branding design and online style guide: 36 hours
Interface Design: 60 hours – will include some complex Flash design
Programming: 140 hours – HTML, PHP and CSS plus integration and customization of Drupal or similar CMS and membership modules.
Email template design and programming: 16 hours
Project Management: 48 hours
You can expect to pay a little more for the hosting and an SSL certificate
Total: 290 hours = $26,100

Deliverables:

Same as client one above but add a few hours for training on the CMS solution.

Cost of Website Add-ons

There are a thousand add-ons you can use to enhance your website. The estimates below reflect the general requirements we have seen, however there are many factors that can push these estimates higher. If you don’t see your add-on here just give us a call and we can provide an estimate.

• Custom Content Management Systems- For clients who want to manage their own content we integrate and customize  content management systems (CMS). We work with PHP-based open-source CMS solutions like Drupal. Costs for integrating and customizing Drupal can range from $4,000 to $20,000 and up.
• Custom Blog- Many clients want a WordPress blog within their website customized to their website branding and design. This ranges from $1,250 – $3,000 and up.
• Email Marketing Campaigns- Clients that want to gather emails and send out branded email blasts for announcements or newsletters require an Email management tool. We integrate the 3rd-party tools (graphicmail, mailchimp, constant contact,etc.) and create an email blast template design, we can even manage your email blast. $720 and up.
• Branding/Identity Development- Logo design is something we are often asked to do. We start with an 8 hour process that generates about 6 rough logo concepts. If one of these is chosen we go through several rounds of edits to arrive at a final version.  $900 – $3,200
• Style Guides- An online styleguide is important because it establishes brand consistency and provides a guide for all your print collateral and online marketing. Basic styleguide $1,440.
• Targeted Landing Pages- Landing pages are pages that promote a specific product or service. They are usually part of an email, social media, or banner ad campaign. We can design and create these pages starting at $650.

So that’s how much a small business website costs.

One final note: If this website will be a significant part of your business please don’t skimp on the design and development. If you’d expect to pay $100,000 for a brick and mortar retail shop (inventory, interior design, furniture, rent, utilities, staff, equipment, insurance, etc) – then don’t balk at paying reasonable rates for the creation of your online business.

Feel free to send us your requirements or call 310-754-3807, and we’ll get back to you quickly to let you know how much your website will cost.

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The Evolution of Internet Marketing
Social media is the latest step in the evolution of online marketing. There are over 200 million active Facebook users, 8 million Twitter users and other social media platforms account for millions more. By strategically using social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, you have the potential build your online business presence immensely.

Inform customers of your products and services
If you sell a product online, chances are that a good portion of your customers are on Twitter or Facebook, sharing opinions, asking for advice on which new products to buy, and complaining about brands they dislike. If you are in the professional services industry, your clients are probably online, letting their Twitter followers and Facebook friends know how you’ve exercised your practice to assist their needs. Now you have the opportunity to engage and reach your target audience wherever they gather.

Utilize communities to engage, listen, and respond to your customers
Rather than constantly selling and blasting product releases, we recommend that you provide free tips and resources that allow your customers to appreciate you for your knowledge and experience. Social media can help you build long-term relationships, credibility and customer loyalty.

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1) Organic Traffic: With their Universal Search protocol, Google has started showing press releases in organic search results. If your press release is well-optimized, it can rank for two to three days in Google organic results. The press release can also get traffic from Google News and other news aggregator websites.

2) Link Building: You can use your important keywords as anchor text and link them to relevant pages on your website. When the press release is distributed these links will be picked up by distribution partners. Links from many of these sites will not be counted, but some of them will.  No matter how big or small your business, link building within your website is a great way to get aggressive on the web.

3) Reputation Management: If someone has criticized your company, one sure way to get the criticism off the first page of Google Blog Search or Google search results is to issue multiple press releases. Of course, if you want to do a professional job, then you need to get external links to your press releases and bookmark and tag these releases.

4) Bloggers and Web 2.0 Audience: Many bloggers subscribe to online press release distribution services like PRWeb. If your press release interests them, they might blog about it and give a link to your press release or your website. If you consistently reach out to this audience, you can get significant links, traffic and sales from them.

5) Traffic from Traditional Media: If your press release interests journalists, they will follow up with you and write a story about your business.This will most certainly lead to a short term boost in your website traffic and sales.

By: Milind Mody

Article Source

Times are tough.  Business owners are trimming expenses wherever possible.  But now, more than ever, it is important to have a quality website that accurately portrays your product or service.  Statistics prove that companies that focus on their marketing during tough economic times do much better than companies that reduce their marketing efforts. Your website should be an integral part of your marketing strategy.

Don’t Lose Customers!

When visitors find  your website, they have already done a majority of the work for you.  They are seeking what you have to offer and if your website doesn’t paint a clear and compelling image of your product, then you have lost what could have been a potential customer.  Your home is the most important because the visitor makes a decision within seconds about the value of your brand, product or service.  The cost investment of redesigning an under-performing website is well worth it when you analyze the high “bounce rate” (the percentage of visitors who arrive to your homepage then immediately exit) because your website doesn’t properly promote your business.

A well-crafted website acts like another salesperson within your business.  You should make it easy for your visitors to navigate your site and gather the information they want  in order to make well-informed decisions.  If it’s difficult for the visitor to find what they’re looking for they will quickly be discouraged and jump to the website of your competition.

Experience Equals Quality

Don’t underestimate the value of a well designed website to market your business.  With over 15 years of experience we know how to work with you to build customized (not templated) sites that will deliver your business’ message clearly.  We can also implement search engine optimization strategies(SEO), online marketing solutions, and create social media profiles such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to maximize your online marketing goals and push your business through the tough economy.

Call us for a FREE CONSULTATION about your website: 310.754.3807 or check out our Design Portfolio.

by: Jeanelle Rabadam
Executionists Marketing Team
email: jeanelle@executionists.com

Image Credit

We have developed many ecommerce websites using several eCommerce frameworks and products including Commerce Server 2007, MediaChase ECF, ASPDOTNETSTOREFRONT and some others. Recently we came across the Magento ecommerce and were very impressed with its outstanding features available right out of the box.

We will not compare Magento Commerce with any of the above frameworks mentioned as each one of them still plays very well in its market share. In this post we will highlight some of Magento’s most valuable features available out of the box.

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