I’ve just finished writing a small piece for another website on web design for small business and my partner suggested that I should post it here too. We’ve been involved in web design since 1996 and still operate a web design business here in Hervey Bay that specialises in work for small business. You can find us at Copy Text Online.

So here are five tips that we would give anyone who is looking to have a web site developed by a professional web designer. There are plenty of other things we could suggest but here are five fundamentals.

1. If he wants you to agree to a splash page full of Flash run away as fast as you can. Splash pages are so last year. Besides splash pages are slow to load, annoy the crap out of prospective clients, do nothing for search  optimisation and cost lots of money.

2. If he wants to include music run away almost as quickly as you would in point 1. Occasionally there is a good reason to have music on a web page but it’s rare and should never be played over and over again.

3. Ask your designer if he sees all surfers arriving at your site via the index page or arriving on your site via any of the pages on your site. If he tries to tell you that all your visitors will arrive via the index page find a new designer immediately. The one you’re talking to believes the earth is flat.

4. Ask you’re designer what he plans to do about search engine optimisation. If he tells you that it’s all about getting links or the only way to get traffic is by pay-per-click then you’re talking to another guy who believes the world is flat.

5. If your designer is going to arrange the purchase of your domain name make sure that it is registered in you’re name. Some designers will want to register it in their name and that means they have complete control over it. You might find that they never give it back to you.

 

Running a fast food outlet or a cafe in Hervey Bay may not be as easy as you might think.

In just a short stretch of the Esplanade at Pialba one has closed, one cafe is on the market and two fast food shops are also up for sale. Bayaroma is currently for sale through Elders Hervey Bay and the two fast food outlets are for sale through Fraser Coast Business Brokers

Being open 7 days a week, even in somewhere as nice as Hervey Bay, would certainly takes its toll.

 

An arson attack on Favourite Pets in Torquay Road Pialba destroyed a shed that housed 60 pets behind the main shop. None of the pets housed in the shed could be saved from the fire that was lit around midnight last night.

 

If you’re one of the small businesses here in Hervey Bay that does business overseas then you will have seen your income steadily dropping as the Australian dollar continued to climb against the US dollar.

While we haven’t stopped to quantify what that has meant to our small business one person I was talking to last week – who earns his money overseas - suggested that over the last few months, due to the increasing value of the Australian dollar, he has basically taken a 30% pay cut.

Fortunately though there might be light at the end of the tunnel as a report, on the Courier Mail’s website suggested … unfortunately that report has now been removed.

Of course, for some of us, there’s also the possibility of turning our focus back on the market place here in Hervey Bay. If you’ve been competing successfully overseas you’ll find that the competition back here in the Bay is a lot weaker than what you’ve been used to.

Well I’ve just seen another infomercial in a local newspaper for a local web design company here in Hervey Bay that talks the talk and walks the walk but doesn’t seem to produce a damn thing. I’ve even gone to the website that they are pointing to as an example of their work and seeing nothing but web and search engine marketing errors.

Getting it right isn’t rocket science but it seems that at least one of the big three web design businesses here in Hervey Bay are so far behind the times that I should find it funny instead of incredibly frustrating.

If you have a business here in Hervey Bay and your website isn’t performing as well as you would hope – or if you’re looking for a web design business in Hervey Bay – then call Copytext on 0438 655 110 for an obligation free quote on getting the design of your business website handled by people who know what they’re doing and have been doing it right for years.

 

Aquavue, right on the beach at Torquay, has introduced a new breakfast and lunch menu from this weekend. We could carry on and tell you how succulent and tasty the new meals are – and what a wonderful chef Scott is - but that would just sound like hype.

Instead head down to Aquavue and try it for yourself – you won’t be disappointed.

They’re open from 7am for breakfast and you can find them opposite the Torquay Post Office.

If you live here in Hervey Bay it’s easy to think of Wide Bay Water as only being involved in this very local area. However Wide Bay Water is stepping out onto the international stage.

Currently Wide Bay Water is involved in a tender worth $US44 million to reduce leakage in the water supply system that supplies Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam.

You might be surprised at just how many Hervey Bay businesses – both big and small - are doing business at the international level.

 

There’s a new bookshop about to open in Hervey Bay.

Mary Ryan’s looks set to open some time this week where the old post office was in Central Avenue.

The new bookshop will include an ABC Centre and that has to be good news for book lovers here in Hervey Bay.