Sweet Thursday Web Development: Wordpress Web Sites

What if you need a website fast? What if you’re more concerned about a web presence then a great design? But what if you don’t want “Quick and Dirty”? What if you want “Quick and Quality”? Well, WordPress if perfect for that. You may be a start up or just don’t have the money to pay a designer and programmer thousands of dollars for an upscale website….but you also don’t want to hurt your business either.

A simple, clean design is what WordPress’s twentyten theme gives you. With a few tweaks by me it can still  represent your brand AND be a great, top-notch, quality website: Search Engine Friendly, blog ready and able to handle as many pages as you need. Even if you don’t have a lot of money to spend, don’t sacrifice quality. Robert Berkstresser has been doing expert witness work for a few years, but needed a website: he needed it fast, he needed it to be inexpensive and he needed search engine friendly. That’s what he got.

There’s no reason you can’t have more than one website on your domain. Maybe you have three related sites, maybe you just want to run some different sites for your family: reunions, new babies, family gossip….whatever. WordPress is can handle that fine and you can install multiple WordPress programs on one hosting account with many hosting companies.

In my own case, as a web developer, I am currently running three distinct websites on sweetthursdayweb.com that all relate to my business. The last my quest to motivate someone to create a great USA Web Development Magazine. My site: “I Want a Great USA Web Magazine” is hosted at http://usawebmagazine.sweetthursdayweb.com/. It’s also a WordPress website and I put it up in a couple of hours. It uses the WP twentyten theme. Search engines are already giving it some decent rankings…..though a new magazine would even be better……..

You may think that because I’m a web developer and programmer that I have tons of money to spend on the design of my own websites. Yes, go ahead, think that. However, like many of you, this is not the case. I programmed SweetBooks to “Manage Your Business on Your Website” and now I’d like to start selling it to the public. But I don’t have a lot of extra cash floating around my house to pay for a customized design as much as I’d like to do that. I learned a long time ago that I’m a skilled programmer, not a designer (A man’s got to know his limitations!).

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This client doesn’t have a website and has been putting it off, she says, for the last six months even though she knows she needs one. As an Insurance consultant she’s not so much interested in getting business off the internet, but she does want a website she can send people to for general information to save her time.

She also wants to have control over what people see if they search her name on the internet. Here’s a nice little test: search your name and/or company in Google or any major search engine. Do you like what comes up? If so, you’re good. If not, a website that you have control over is a great answer.

This site will be launching in the next week or so…..

Morris & Giacinti LLP had a one page website that needed to be updated. Attorneys Suzanne and Nicole wanted something that they could update themselves, something they could blog with and something good for SEO (Search Engine Optimization). They didn’t have a lot of money to spend. WordPress was a perfect fit.

The Artisteer templates didn’t fit what they wanted, but they could not afford custom design and customized implementation of that design into WordPress.

One of the things that I love about WordPress is its versatility. While reading one of my trade magazines I came across a WordPress theme that I thought would work for Morris & Giacinti. There are literally thousands and thousands of WordPress themes out there. Some are free, some you have to pay for. This theme cost about a hundred dollars.

Once the theme was installed I tweaked it to Suzanne’s and Nicole’s specifications: added a new header with image logo searchable by search engines, new image heading on home page, dual sidebars (one for regular pages one for their blog) along with CSS changes throughout (this affects letter-spacing, font-colors, etc).

The result is a clean, professional looking website. WordPress comes through again.

They liked the design, but they wanted a site they could update themselves. This site was built without Artisteer. Although Artisteer is a great program, it really only fits a particular set of needs. If you have more complicated needs I can handle those too. I took the present design of the site and integrated it into WordPress. This gives the owners of Conways’ Tennis the ability to add and change content, add photo galleries, add new pages and generally take control of their website.

BNI needed a new website and needed it quickly and at minimal expense. As with all the sites listed here, Artisteer made website building process quick and efficient.

The new site can handle as many pages as they want, can be updated themselves, is good for SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and if they get tired of this look they find free themes or pay for themes if they wish.

You don’t have to spend a lot of money for a great website. Contact me (Glen) at Sweet Thursday Web Development if you have any questions (619.303.3796).

The new Alan’s Music Center WordPress website has launched.

David Neff is a massage therapist. He’s had his site, GreatHands4U.com for quite awhile. It was built with tables and the design of the site was outdated. However, like a lot of people in this economy David didn’t have a lot to spend. Once again Artisteer, WordPress and Sweet Thursday Web Development make the perfect solution. read more »

Alan’s Music Center has been around for a long time…since 1954. They sell and rent instruments, repair instruments, provide music lessons, sell sheet music and much more in the La Mesa / San Diego area.

Their website has been up for a long time and like a lot of websites it was adequate when it first launched. The internet, however, marches on at an alarming pace and what was adequate 10 years ago is not so today. read more »