Because Miami has such amazing weather, being warm and sunny even in the dead of winter, it is not uncommon to see hundreds of people walking the streets, going to and fro in their busy lives. What all of them will attest to is that, while they are walking, their eyes are catching the glimpses of different business logos around downtown Miami. In other words, even when a business is not advertising, they are still trying to build their brand by getting potential customers interested in their graphic.

This is known as brand recognition and it happens on a regular basis. Consider the two largest mobile phone providers. You’ve got Verizon Wireless and AT&T. Verizon and AT&T both have very well known logos and it is because of that, whenever one puts out an ad against the other, people are able to know exactly who the other is referring to even if they don’t mention names. That is brand recognition and companies spend millions of dollars a year to ensure that people know their brand.

Brand recognition, though, doesn’t have to cost millions of dollars a year. It can start with very little money and a simple logo which we, as your local Miami Graphic Design firm can make for you. To get started on building your brand recognition and developing a logo, contact us so that we can arrange a meeting. At this meeting, we’ll go over the type of business that you own and what you are hoping to gain.

For example, if you’re looking to have graphics for new pamphlets created, we can do that. If you’re looking to just get a simple logo made for your company, we can do that as well. The basic truth is, we can do whatever Miami Graphic Design that you need done.

We are a well acclaimed Miami Graphic Design firm and every time a customer needs work done, they come to us for a simple reason. We don’t play games with them. We charge them a fair amount of money and in return, they get the graphics exactly to their specifications. It is because of this that so much of our business is return business. They are pleased in the products that we create, but more importantly, they are pleased in the fact that we are an honest business to work with.

If you’re thinking of recreating the brand for your company, contact us immediately so that we can get to work on it. The sooner you get to work on brand recognition, the sooner you’ll be able to develop it for the years to come.

Miami Graphic Design is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design

More often than not you will find that a true “web developer” is made up of a team or a company such as RT Design Group. It would be very difficult for one person to have all the knowledge that a team of people have. At RT Design everyone has their own specialty. We have one person that does only graphic design, one who does SEO and SEM, one who does PHP coding, and so on down the line. So when you come to us with a request or a need 9 times out of 10 we have a specialist on the team that knows exactly what to do. When you combine all these specialist into one group you have a very potent team of web developers.

RT Design, unlike many local web developers in Naples and Fort Myers, do not act like shady used car salesmen and try to pressure you into a deal. We find one of the best ways to secure a sale is to allow the potential client to come into our offices and take a tour, see us working and be introduced to everyone. As you walk down our long hallway towards our large conference room you are greeted by different people. The first door on the left is our PHP guy, we call him Wood but his real name is Ryan Underwood. Because the boss and him share the same first name we decided to call him “Wood” to avoid in office confusion.

Next door to Wood is Brian, he’s the guy who sends out paychecks and the one we have to beg when we need some money to spend on something. As you walk down the hallway you meet other people from SEO to graphic, sales, CEO, and more. When you get to the end of the hallway the last two doors are inhabited by Mike, our video guy. In that room you will see he has his greenroom setup for making commercials and doing video walkouts. You may have seen some of RT’s commercials on WINK News, those were made right in that room.

I guess I’m starting to babble on so I’ll go ahead and end this blog post here. Just remember that if you’re looking for a Naples Web Developer you should at the very least stop by our offices and meet everyone.

Naples Web Developer is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design

Good web design is all about putting yourself in the eye of your audience. Seeing things from their perspective ensuring the site appeals, is readable and easy navigate and use. This is why we ask so many questions about the intended or target market of the site, so we can design with that in mind.

One of the main things you learn when surfing as a user is to put as few clicks as possible between the user and the information or product as possible. This is the single most important element of website design. Studies have shown that you have anything from 1 to 3 seconds to interest a visitor to your site in order to keep them there for any length of time. Every second counts! Splash pages, slow loading pages, music, flashing banners and all the other questionable devices take away valuable seconds while the visitor attempts to get what they need from the site.

Ensure when they use a link or the URL of the site that they arrive on a home page with meaningful information right there for them. Also make sure there is a usable menu system in order for them to navigate around the site. Use those seconds to get the visitor straight to the heart of the site. The home page text must be tight and engaging, enough to keep them there looking for more.

Keep pages succinct is another “rule” for a successful website. While sometimes unavoidable, and forgivable in some circumstance reduce scrolling as much as possible and don’t overload pages. Too much information can be as much of a turn-off as too little. If you have a lot of information to impart or a story to tell, keep each section no longer than two pages long. Any longer and you should be dividing it up into separate pages.

Ensure there is always a link to your home page of every single pages of the site. Visitors needs to be able to navigate the site effectively if they are to hang around. In fact, make sure you include a menu on every page. Make it as easy as possible for people to find things, and pages while they are on the site.

Lastly, don’t use frames. As tempting as it may be, frames have downsides that impact a website too much to consider using. It may be easier to have the same header or menu system throughout the site but there are the downsides. Firstly the address bar doesn’t change when navigating. This makes bookmarking difficult, especially if a user wants to bookmark something specific. There are so many ways to share bookmarks or links nowadays that any site owner needs to be able to capitalize on them to get ahead. The other main downside to using frames is when the site comes up in a search engine result. If the search engine has indexed something other than your main page, the frameset won’t appear when they link to your site. This means the subpage will appear on the screen without the frame around it. While this isn’t earth shattering, it is a consideration to be borne in mind when designing a page for usability, after all, you want search engines to find out and return everything they can about the site.

Make Web Design Straightforward and Stuff Easy to Find. is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design

Graphics, images and media are a very important part of any web design. They make the site more appealing, pleasing to the eye and therefore popular. It is likely that the images you use give your visitors the first real idea of the products or service you sell. The quality and placement of your images on the page is essential in order for it to look attractive to the viewer. A quick glance at any of your favourite websites should show you how images are used within a page. The more popular and readable the site, the better the image quality and placement will be.

By having a website you are either wanting to sell something, promote something or just talk. Whatever its purpose the site has to be easy to read and navigable. Writers refer to it as white space. An area between text to break the copy into easily digestible chunks. Web images are the internet version of white space. Careful placement will break up a page with something much more interesting than white space. If the image is relevant to the text it is placed near then it gives added weight to the text, or clarification if any were needed.

The standard format for web images are either JPEG or GIF as they can be optimized for the web better than the others. This means they can load quicker which improves the overall response of the site. Because of this JPEGs are mainly used for photographic images and GIF is for other graphics and images. Not everybody has broadband so an eye has to be kept on the page weight and loading times on lower bandwidth connections. If a page takes too long then your visitor is going to get bored very quickly. You have three seconds to capture a visitors attention, so if you page takes longer than that to load, you’re in trouble!

Aside from customer experience, any image intensive website is going use its bandwidth allocation quite quickly unless the pages are optimized. Most hosting options have bandwidth limits included in the price. If you go over that it can become an expensive business, so it pays to keep an eye on it.

There are free tools on the internet that will optimize your images for free if you don’t have a graphics program that can do it. A word of caution though, JPEG format is lossy, so every time you redo a picture it loses a bit of quality. It is advisable to keep the image in its native format and only convert it to JPEG once complete.

Pictures can paint a thousand words and the right images, in the right places can enhance the readability of your site no end. Careful thought must be given to these images so they don’t cost you more than they earn. Poor quality, badly placed or slow loading images are going to put people off your site rather than bring them back.

Pretty Pictures is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design

There is no denying that having a blog is a good way of promoting your website and a way of regularly adding new content. All have something to say, however useful, but with so many, they are all too easy to forget. While the quality of your content will influence the popularity of any blog, the site design will have a greater influence on whether anybody remembers you or not.

With an internet full of blogs, how can you make yours stand out from the crowd?

1. Take one design feature and wring the life out of it. When you have the basic structure of your blog sorted and an overall design, take on element of that design and maximize it. Make it the focal point of the design and as eye catching and memorable as you can.

2. Further to this, make your blog design unique. It is tempting to just buy a template or even worse, download a free one off the net. Try not to if you can avoid it, as you will be joining one of potentially thousands with the exact same theme. If you do buy a mass market one, then try and optimize it for you own needs. Change the color, design element or whatever you need to do to make it your own.

3. Increase the functionality of the design. A blog is not only a portfolio for your work but an interface between you and your audience. There are plenty of plugins for Wordpress or Joomla that can add instant functionality and cool tools for your audience to play with. If you use other platforms then you can code something if you have the skills, and buy it if you don’t.

4. Pay attention to the boring bits. Footers are often overlooked by web designers, but are an excellent opportunity for you to make your site stand out from the crowd. Admittedly there isn’t a great deal you can do with them, but pay them some attention and come up with something special to make the site really stand out.

5. Be different. This is the one thing that encapsulates all others. In a sea of ordinary, makes yours the one extra ordinary. Stand out from the crown and do something different. Originality is one thing that everybody seeks, but few find. This can be through use of color, design, layout or whatever. As long as the site works as it is supposed to, play with it and do something to set yourself apart from the crowd. However, don’t do something different just for the sake of it as you will compromise your design. Try to keep the differences positive ones, because they will generate positive responses.

Following any or all of these tips will get you well on your way to popularity if not notoriety. Making your blog original as well as readable is the only way to make your site memorable and unforgettable.

Five ways to a better blog design is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design

Real estate is a tough business to be in right now but has always been a relatively tough business before the economic troubles. Most real estate agents have embraced the internet as another marketplace, and as over 70% of potential purchases search for their new home on the internet, it’s a good job!

Attracting visitors to a real estate website is a tough undertaking. Competition is fierce for the keywords, content and visitors. The visitors themselves are looking for information, news and advise as well as property, so a limited maintenance program of merely adding new properties has gone by the wayside. To be competitive the website has to have good, up to date content offering the information the audience wants.

The most important thing for any website is to be user friendly. It needs to be clean, attractive, fast and simple. The links needs to be descriptive and easily accessible and the search function needs to be on the very first page.

Content is king. A dangerously overused cliché, but so true. A website has to have good, unique and informative content. As mentioned, it isn’t enough just to update with new listings any more. A blog or news section is the ideal way to keep the content updated and fresh, while offering a service to your visitors. Articles on the area, region, property market, or anything relevant to your cause is also very useful.

If you have spare articles, offer them to other relevant sites in exchange for a link to your site. This is a good way of getting good inbound links without having to go on bended knee to webmasters.

Write about the place you live and/or do business. Offer information for those coming into your area, like schools, commercial districts, main employers and the like. More good quality content for you and your visitors.

Use traditional SEO techniques with regard to keywords, alt text and tags. If you don’t know what you are doing, then employ an expert like the boys at RT Design. If you want to be seen, you need the search engines to see you, and think you are worthwhile listing.

If you have the time, add a forum to your website. This is a great way of engaging with your audience and place yourself as a subject matter expert or authority figure. Answering forum questions can build loyalty and that is worth money.

Offering a weekly newsletter is also an excellent way of promoting your site. Including things like new listings or deal of the week is a way of including content unique to each edition and will keep your audience reading it regularly.

In essence a real estate website should be alive and constantly evolving. It should be easy to use and offers something for every visitor especially value-add things like the news, and area information. Having constant, relevant updates to the site will also help your search results and therefore your bottom line.

How to Improve a Real Estate Website is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design

The first step that I mentioned was to decide whether you wanted a unique logo or just to use your company name. For instance, you can use something like IBM, but it’s very basic. However, then there are companies like Apple that just use a cracked apple as their logo. They both do the same thing, but one is more creative than the other.

Typically, when you’re trying to decide which route to go, it is good to envision what you see when thinking of your company/site. Do you see the name of your company or do you use something else? If you see something else, that’s great. It’s time to take that idea in your head and put it down on paper so that you can bring it to a graphic design agency to create something that is real professional.

The trick to that initial sketch is to look at what you do on a regular basis and then apply it to the logo. For instance…President Obama ran on the campaign of change. “Change We Can believe in” he used to say. However, when looking at his logo, it has the red and white for the stripes of the American flag as well as what appears to be a sun coming in. Times are changing like the sun is what I take when looking at that. This logo says what he wanted it to say: things are going to be changing in America because that’s “Change We Can Believe in.”

So, figure out what you want your logo to look like with a few basic sketches and then put it aside for a little while. You need to decide now whether the logo is going to be used for all your advertising needs or if it is JUST a logo. Check us out to find out the trick to that.

Creating a logo is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design

When thinking about the face of your company, it’s not going to be the employees or the management. It’s not going to be what kind of a building you operate out of. The face of your company is the logo. The face of your company is the first thing a person sees when coming to your website: your logo. With that basic understanding, it is tremendously important to have your logo look proper.

There are three steps to making your logo look proper. Each step is its own process; however, these three are the basic steps required to setting up your logo. By following these three steps, you’ll be able to create the perfect logo that will say “This is my company, that’s that.” Here are the steps:

• Do you just want it to say a name or do you want it to be something truly unique?
• Will the logo be used only for your site or all future advertising?
• What’s the final look going to be?

If you just want the name of your company is nice print, that’s simple. However, if you want it to be unique, it’ll be important to create a plan for it. What this means is you’re going to sit down and sketch out some ideas. Chances are, you’re not an artist, but you have an idea of what you want. Sketch it out.

The next step is to determine if this logo is going to be just for your site or if it will be plastered all over the place for advertising. If you create an ad, you may want to use that logo. However, you may only want it to be used for your site. Determining this will help you to better understand what it should look like.

Finally, what’s the final look? Here’s where you want to find a company that can do it. Since we’re in Atlanta, you could hire us to do it. You sit down with us, we draw out a plan and we execute it. You can do it yourself, but sometimes, it’s better to hire a professional Atlanta graphic design group to do it in this case.

Your logo is one of the most important aspects of your company. It’s brand recognition. You need to be recognized. If you’re not, you’re as common as the next average company. We don’t want common. We want exceptional.

Logo Creation: step 2

adobe-photoshop

Congratulations! You have just accomplished the hard tasks of getting a logo created. Now that you have done that, you can do the final step which is to sit down with your local graphic design group, in this case, Atlanta graphic design. The process of sitting down with the group does not have to be a daunting one and, in actuality, it really isn’t all that hard so long as you follow a certain number of rules.

• Present your sketches and be as open as you can about what you want. You’re not an artist, but they are, so they are going to want to run with it a little bit. See what they have to say, but don’t be afraid to say, “No, not interested.” They may be artists, but you’re paying for it. In the end, it’s what YOU want.
• That leads to the next point of determining the number of revisions you get. Some firms provide only one revision while others provide an unlimited amount. The truth about revisions, though, is that if you and the designer really plan everything out in detail, there is no need to have revisions.
• Plan everything out. Talk about the colors and if you want the dot on top of the “i” to be large or small. Determine everything so that when the designer gets to work, he or she has their notes in front of them to get to work on the logo as soon as possible. This is tremendously important. Notes are KEY.
• Understand that a lot of firms have an upfront fee. That means that they want you to pay a percentage of the cost and then the rest upon completion. This is to ensure that they don’t scammed, but it’s also a way for you to know that you’re going to get your money’s worth. Once you invest, they’ve got to provide a good product. It’s really that simple.

These are four rules of dealing with the graphic design firm and getting your logo created as effectively as possible. Getting through each step from your sketches to your supplemental designs for advertising to the final product doesn’t have to be hard. It simply requires a little bit of pizzazz and some delegation to create that perfect product.

Most importantly, though, is to get that product. You want to have the product and want to ensure that it is exactly what your site needs. Congratulations! You’ve got your logo and have started down the path of creating that brand that people cannot, even if they wanted to, forget.

The final part of your logo creation

As we’ve been discussing over the past few days, there are some procedures to creating a logo before even considering coming to a graphic design group. The previous post was to decide whether you wanted to use your company name as your logo or something unique. Now that you’ve determined what you want to use for your logo, the next step is to determine whether you are going to use that logo for only your website or if it will be used for your advertising as well.

Using the logo for only your site can really help you to have something tremendously unique that looks good for the site only. However, often times, if you make your logo exclusive to your site, building that brand for the site is limited. The only way that people know what the logo stands for is to come to your site rather than getting the logo out there as much as possible.

This is often an issue for people, but not one that needs to become a problem. There are ways around it. For instance, if you were to Google Intel logos, you’d see that there are different types. There is the basic Intel one that has the circle around it, but then there are ones that say Intel Inside and things like that. It allows you to use your logo, but also use it elsewhere. Another example would be to look at the different variations of the Apple logo. There are some that are silver, the old ones used to be a rainbow. The logo stayed the same, but when advertising, they’d change it up.

What does all this mean for you?

It means that when creating your logo for branding abilities, you want to get one that can be manipulated for your needs. While you may want your logo to be blue and red on your site; you may create a product down the line and decide that you want it to be the exact same logo, but in brown and green. By creating a more diverse logo – one for both advertising and your site – you can better market and brand your site.

Congratulations…You’ve now accomplished two out of three steps to creating a successful logo. The first one was to sketch out your plan to guarantee that it works perfectly for you. The next was to decide whether or not you wanted to use it for advertising or not. This would give you the chance to sketch other forms out. The final step is how to deal with the graphic design company that is going to make your graphics.

Creating a logo is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design

The good news is you can contact a graphic design group and ask them what they suggest. Chances are, it’ll turn in to a very successful agreement where they’ll develop the site for you. However, what they’ll be able to do is help you figure out which colors are best. For example, do you want blues and greys or do you want reds and blacks? Or, do you want to mix a little bit of brown and green to give it that slight outdoors look to it? If you’re not a designer, it can be really difficult and intimidating to deal with all these questions.

Here are a few rules to keep in mind when you’re dealing with colors. They’re not always the rules, but nine times out of ten, they’re a safe bet and a good way of determining what is and what isn’t. Here they are:

If you’re going to use a dark background, such as a dark blue, dark grey, or a dark black, you need to have a color that offsets it well. Don’t use yellow because yellow contrasts too much with most colors. Try a white, cream, or light grey to be used for the wording.
• The more color on a site, the brighter it appears, the better. However, that doesn’t mean have a rainbow on the site. What it means is that you need to make the site brighter. Lighter colors with a darker text is better because it appears “happier.”
• With the understanding of a site looking happier…Blues are easier on the eyes than reds. When someone sees something red, naturally, it’s a stimulant. Blues are more of a depressant. This doesn’t mean that looking at a blue site will make the reader depressed. It doesn’t trigger some sort of a mental discomfort like a red might.

These are just three of the many rules out there about coloring. Do you use a light grey or a dark grey? Do you use blue or green? There are so many questions that you can ask, it can definitely lead to an overload. Your best bet is to sit down with a designer and explain what your needs are. They’ll be able to suggest what colors to use and how to make the site look the best possible. So, call your designer.

Finding Colors That Work For Your Site is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design

Anyway, the point of this post was to make it known that we are going to start targeting this niche. Right now I’m just focusing on Naples but soon as this area is going well I’ll move to Fort Myers and Cape Coral and get things going there. Don’t hesitate to contact us for any of your web or graphic design needs.

Naples Graphic Design is a post from: Fort Myers Web Design