You need experts in several fields in order to maximize your site's potential. 

• Graphic artist to make the site appealing and invite exploration
• User interface designer to be sure that site navigation is easy
• Application developer to create forms to collect data and produce reports
• Content maintenance or web master to keep content fresh and relevant
• Search engine optimization to identify keywords and promote back links
• Security engineer to guard against old and new threats

Fortunately this does not mean that you have to spend a fortune on your web site. 

You benefit by having the best experts in each field design their part of your web site by using Joomla! which is free open source software.  Parts of the effort that do not require technical expertise, like monitoring keyword effectiveness, and promoting back links, can be done by you, because you will do a better job and can delegate responsibilities to those that know your business best.

Graphic Design

Thousands of graphic artists design Joomla! templates.  Some are free, others range in price from $20 up.  Templates can be customized to allow you to have a unique look.  It is fun shopping for templates, search for  'Joomla 1.5 Templates'.   Changing templates takes a few seconds and dramatically changes the look of your site without changing the content.  It is fun to change templates with the season or for an occasion.

User Interface Design

The Joomla core product is designed for easy menu creation and display.  Menus can be displayed horizontally or vertically.  Multiple menus are maintained in the "Menu Manager".  The order of the menu selections, sub menus, and creating new selections are done in the "Menu Manager".  The module design for menus, allows you to display menus on chosen or all pages.  We will provide the user interface design for you, but after the site is set up, you can make additions and changes.

Application Developer

A web site without applications is just an advertisement.  With applications, your web visitor can be taken on an adventure and allowed to interact with expert systems to find information or products that meet and exceed their needs.  There are over 5,000 applications currently available for Joomla!  Customizing and creating applications is our primary focus.  We have a dozen applications listed in the Joomla Extension Directory, and dozens more not yet submitted and can provide you with the Internet and Intranet applications that will fit you like a glove.  While we focus on development, we recognize the importance of creating exciting web sites to stay in touch with users needs, and generate projects.

Content Maintenance

This is where Joomla! shines.  In the past, a customer would request a change, for instance replace a picture.  Upon replacing the picture, it becomes apparent that it is now too large.  The customer contacts the web master to resize the photo.  Now it is too small.  One more call to get the photo resized.  Sometimes the process for making a simple change could become involved and take days. 

With Joomla!, imagine that you are checking your web site and reading the content to improve it.  You find a sentence that needs to be rewritten.  Click the edit icon that is only visible to you as the administrator, make the change right there on the page,  and save it.  A process that could potentially require several phone calls, and some frustration, is reduced to minutes.  Everything is exactly the way you want.  Resizing photos and including videos are easily done by the site owner with a user friendly editor that assists with adding diverse content.

Search Engine Optimization 

Another field where Joomla! excels, SEO. Database driven web sites require special abilities to interact properly with spiders that index your site and determine your rank on searches.  Experts in the field constantly tweak the search engine optimization features in the core Joomla! product to ensure that your site is indexed in an optimum way.  We help you pick target keywords and secondary keywords that will not just help you attract traffic, but will help you attract traffic that you can convert to sales.   We use search engine optimization software to determine statistics about keyword usage and density to help you tweak content so that high rankings are earned for searches.

Saving the best for last, we have designed Google Product integration software, that will automatically create the xml file required to post your products to Google's price comparison feature.  This often gets you a link on the first page with a picture of your product and price comparison with others!  We have yet to see anything that comes close to this for getting high page rankings with just the click of a button.

Security Engineering

Another area that requires constant vigilance, security.   Joomla! experts continually upgrade the core software to guard against old and new threats.  Having one security engineer is nice but that is like going to war with one soldier.  When you go to war with an army, you are more likely to succeed.  There is a Joomla component that monitors all traffic to your site.  People that try to hack your site will be added to a list.  Any user that subscribes to the list will ignore any transmissions from the violator.  As a group, Joomla! sites are well protected and watching each other's backs!  In addition to the constant vigilance by Joomla! experts, we add our own security measures, like hiding the administrator log in and scripts.  We make several files read only preventing certain site hijacking measures.  If you want that secure feeling, go with the army!

Conclusion

The value of a web site has many determining factors requiring all the above disciplines to reach its maximum potential.  With Joomla Web Site Design, you have graphic design, user interface design, content maintenance, search engine optimization, and security engineering in one software package. Since Joomla!  helps you get most of the expertise required for little or no cost, you can focus on content, allowing you to have a site that competes with the big players and that will help your enterprise grow.  Let us help you pull the pieces of your puzzle together in a way that will make it look like you have an army working with you because you do!

Examples:

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