We were approached by an artist who is based both in the UK and the United Arab Emirates with this idea of an online gallery where art lovers could enjoy and collect art from various high calibre artists from around the globe, and artists could show off and even promote their works to an appropriate audience of art lovers. We designed a solution which allows artists to get involved, upload their art, upload a profile and even make some money from the digital versions of the art. The system then allows art lovers to peruse the art on screen and keep their own collections in their accounts, which then could be used on their TV's, mobile devices and digital pictures frames.. in a similar way to their music collections.

The idea is brilliant and although the system is quite complex, using it is very easy and intuitive. It is great for artists because they can get their work out there and they don't have to pay expensive art gallery prices to do so. However its even better for art lovers because it brings together all of these brilliant pieces of art, to leave you only to have to pick your favourite. we love the site and cannot wait to hear it become a household name, for the art-minded of course!

The site is currently in Beta mode whilst the owner of the website finds the appropriate artists to join the online art gallery revolution, but is expected to be in full swing during the second quarter of 2011, so keep your eyes peeled for this site if you love art.

We have just launched a new website for one of first ever clients, we first starting working with Craig Freeman back in 2004 and we first developed a site for them back then. We have now developed a brand new website for them based on the new branding and we think it looks great. The company is a firm of specialist dental accountants who mostly work with dentists, however they do also take on other business type clients and they are in fact our accountants and have been since we incorporated the company. More recently they have worked with a wide variety of clients whist growing their business in terms of the dental accountancy services. We of course thoroughly recommend these guys as accountants, particularly if you are looking for an accountant in the Cardiff area.

Take a look at the new website here.. Specialist Dental Accountants

We were approached by Direct Cane who are a leading Cane Furniture supplier for the South Wales area; they came to us with the requirement of designing a professional website to represent their Cane Furniture business. The website was to look good and perform well in the search engines for searches related to cane furniture and specifically in the South Wales region.

The website is located here cane furniture so if you are looking for a piece of furniture for your conservatory or garden then you simply will not find a better price and a more professional service, I am certain of that!

We were approached by James Installations and Maintenance for a new website that would both improve the appearance of the company online and potentially bring new business in through people searching on Google for an electrician in Cardiff or an electrical contractor in the South Wales area. We developed a new image for the company and then proceeded to develop the website and content, the result is this electrician website, which the client is very happy with.

On a personal note, I have used James as an electrician at my home and the work completed was faultless and very reasonably priced. I would recommend James Installation and Maintenance for any electrician type work large or small.

The latest addition to Google’s SERPs is their new Instant Preview feature. This allows searchers to “preview” a website or landing page prior to clicking through to it. Searchers can preview any listing in the organic results by either clicking the description, or the small magnifying glass icon to the left of every listing. The overview is displayed in a pop up window which shows a snapshot of the destination page, highlighting where the relevant search term appears on that page.

Through the preview pop up screen, searchers can get a feel for the site on the other side of the link; images, headlines, colour and general layout all have a major impact.  With relatively small size of the pop up window, prominent design features are more likely to catch a searchers eye as small text is difficult to read. This will make the first impression, or snapshot of your site, vital to traffic generation much like an advert in a magazine. You will only have 2-3 seconds to grab the searchers attention.

Some factors to consider when designing for instant preview:

Images

The prominence of images which are product or service specific will become even more important in your web design. Larger images allowing a clearer view of your offerings should be used to communicate instantly the thrust of your site. Smaller images or cluttered images will have less impact than a clear, large image in the new preview window. Pages containing long, text heavy content will look very dull and uninviting, whereas an image will allow you to make best use of the 2-3 second exposure.

Headlines

With small text so difficult to read in the preview window, anything in a larger font or bold will stand out as a headline. The searchers eye will be drawn to these sentences first, so make good use of them. Ensure your keywords are present and that the message you are trying to convey is clear and legible within your headlines.

Page load time

Page load times are an important factor in SEO as well as web design, but speed will be even more important with instant preview. If your images fail to render in the short space of time a searcher is hovering over your listing they will very, very quickly move onto the next. Combine this with the need to have bold images on your site, and a balance will need to be struck between image size, quality and load time.

Flash

As usual, Google has a problem with Flash, and Instant Preview is no exception. Flash sites or page elements are failing to display in the preview, making sites look broken or incomplete. This will deter searchers from clicking through to your site, especially if that flash element was critical to your product/service offering. This will result in fewer clicks, which will in turn lead to lower rankings and fewer sales.

Introduction pages

A good website designer will avoid introduction pages altogether, but there are still a great deal of sites out there using intro pages. Again, we have seen issues with these pages failing to display in previews, making your site appear broken and unattractive. This will have a serious impact on your click through rate and your rankings in the search engines.

So overall, instant preview presents new challenges as well as opportunities for web designers, both in design and SEO terms. Greater consideration will need to be given to what is legible and effective within the smaller preview window as well as on the site itself.

Here at Designer-Websites.co.uk we can ensure you have the edge over your competition with website design which takes advantage of Google’s new instant preview feature.