I enjoy designing websites and have been doing so for the last 7 years. However, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s best for me and the business if we only take on jobs that we find interesting.

There is just way too much time involved in designing a website and dealing with clients.

At this time I feel like there are two ways we could go with the business.

1. Streamline the business and figure out the fastest and easiest way to design websites. Use an assembly line approach and try to put out as many web designs per day as possible.

2. Become the elite in the web design business and build a name that we can proudly stand behind. Only take on clients that are serious about building a web presence.

Believe it or not I’ve spent a good bit of time considering the direction I want to go. While I am sure there is more money in the first choose, I enjoy what I do way too much to build an assembly line approach to what has become an art to me.

I enjoy playing with web designs and figuring out how to create them in such a way that they are able to both drive traffic and convert traffic. At this time in my life I am unwilling to trade money for what has become an art to me.

And it’s for this reason that we will be turning down more web design jobs then we will be taking from this moment forward.

I personally feel that this is in the best interest of me, Geeks on Steroids and my clients.

There are things that happen in life that make me stop and wonder what the heck these people are thinking.

The other day I was talking with another web design company, they wanted us to design a site for them. The salesman started pointing out some adult websites for me to take a look at. I asked if the site they were wanting designed was an adult website and he said no but needed me to look at these adult websites because from what he understood, adult websites had the ability to hold visitors longer then any other kind of website.

At first I thought he was kidding, I mean…people stay on adult websites because of the naked women. It’s not that adult web designers have found some type of magic key, men have been spending all their time thinking about sex and trying to see naked woman since Adam and Eve left the garden.

I guess there are times in life when you have to look beyond what you want to see and actually look at what is going on. People spend more time on adult websites than any other type of website not because of the website design but because of the naked women.

I find it sad that someone that is charging money to build websites is unable to understand how they work and why people spend time on them.

There are three types of websites;

1. Entertainment

2. Selling a Product or Service

3. Information

An information site as well as an entertainment site is designed to be sticky and keep the visitor on the site. However, a site that is selling a service or product needs to get the web visitor into the checkout process as quickly as possible.

A site that is designed to be sticky will not convert as well as a site that is designed to sell a product.

When spending lots of time on a site people become blind to banners and products and this is not good for a site.

Search Engine Optimization Analysis

Analysis is the process of breaking a complex topic or substance into smaller parts to gain a better understanding of it. The technique has been applied in the study of mathematics and logic since before Aristotle, though analysis as a formal concept is a relatively recent development.

I spent a good part of the last six years posting on forums and blogs and trying to help others make money as well as learn new techniques for myself. The one thing I have come to learn and understand is that people in the search engine optimization industry love to attack other people that are doing search engine optimization. It’s a lot easier then listening to new ideas or a different way of doing things.

When I first started reading and posting on forums I was new and had no idea were doing. I could understand the attacks then but over the years we have managed to rank for just about ever competitive keyword within this industry yet the attacks continue.

The funny part is that if you do a search for their sites you find most barley rank for a couple non-competitive keywords. Maybe I just need to find a better quality of forms to post in.

If you are trying to make money online, you do not need to understand how the search engines work you need to understand how the people searching work.
Focus on them and not the search engines, and you can make money online.

Most consumers will head to Google and start searching in hopes of filling their needs and/or desires. Our goal is to put our site between the consumer and affiliate site.

At this point our site needs to be able to presale the consumer and send them to the affiliate site. We do this by building a site that is emotional and shows the consumer that his or her life would be better, more complete, more profitable, and happier if he/she owed what it is we are selling.

At this point they click to make the purchase, enter the affiliate site and we make money.

The recession is over yet 450,000 jobs were lost in the month of June, after the recession had ended.

I’ve seen a lot of my competition begin to struggle and many others go out of business. Yet prices across the board for web design services have remained intact. The recession caused people to tighten their grip on their wallets and useless products are no longer being purchased.

People are now thinking about how they spend their money and many are starting to pay off credit debt. If nothing else we’ve learned that nothing in life is for sure, including your job or the faith of the company you work for.

Companies have now started calling outsourcing, Cloud Commuting and it is being looked on as a good thing. It’s one of the things that have kept many companies in business and allowed them to keep prices low and keep current employees.

Geeks on Steroids has been busy this year helping many companies improve their web presence and turn old websites into money making machines. Source that have not been considered in the past are being considered today.

The difficult times are far from over but the companies that see this as an opportunity to change the way they do business will remain in business and continue to grow.