Erich Stauffer

Category: Web Design

  • Two Types of Clients

    In the 10 months since I went full-time running Erich Stauffer I have taken clients from a dysfunctional, disparate web presence to having a cohesive web platform that they can use to self-market their own business in a responsive manner. I’ve converted clients to WordPress, implemented Google Apps, and ensured their files were getting backed-up.

    I had a client email me to tell me. “[We] are progressing with WordPress. Little steps but steps none the less. Although I was not always thrilled with the WordPress idea I do want to thank you again for leading me down this path. All things considered it is not everything I want…but, it has allowed [us] to make changes and updates from my desktop that were never possible before.”

    All of this has led me to discover that the clients I have now are not the same clients I had 10 months ago. They are not the same clients without a website, a social marketing strategy, or an email newsletter. They are clients with questions about how to use their new marketing platform to integrate into how they run their business. They are businesses who want to get more out of their initial marketing to see a return on that investment (ROI).

    Integrated Marketing is Responsive Marketing

    When you use your web platform to respond to marketing data to fulfill daily production goals, fill appointment slots, or push a particular product, you are practicing integrated marketing techniques. At Erich Stauffer, we can teach you how to have a responsive marketing strategy that is integrated with your business processes and procedures. We will train you or your staff to use your web marketing platform to work for you.

    I still serve that first type of client who needs their first web page or their web site converted to WordPress for easier management. I still help people setup their Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, and Pinterest accounts. I still help people setup or optimize their email marketing solutions, but now we also do more. We are technology consultants specializing in web technology and business analysis. I am Erich Stauffer.

  • Coding WordPress Columns to Match Length

    A client recently asked what they could do to make the content in their sidebar column match their main content column.

    The short answer is: it’s not easily user-editable, but it can be done.

    WordPress works by using “theme files” to construct a web page ‘on the fly’. The content of the page is stored in a database, but the design of the page is stored in theme files. While WordPress only requires two theme files (index.php and style.css), most WordPress web sites use at least six files. The main theme files are as follows:

    • header.php – contains information for the header
    • index.php, front-page.php, page.php, or single.php – calls the header and footer; contains instructions for the middle part of the page
    • footer.php – contains information for the footer
    • sidebar.php – contains instructions for the sidebar

    In this client’s particular design, the header and footers go all the way across the page and the middle content area is split into two columns. The sidebar is a column that goes all the way from the top, just under the header, to the bottom, just above the footer. The other column is where the post or page content goes. Whichever column’s side has more content will determine how long the page is. The sidebar only appears when it’s ‘called’ to appear. Each page you see could be a different type of page. Page types are as follows:

    • Front page – what the home page looks like (front-page.php)
    • Page page – what a Page looks like (page.php)
    • Post page – what a Post looks like (single.php)
    • Category page – what a Category view of Posts looks like (index.php, category.php, or archive.php)

    For example, the front-page.php theme file controls the home page and it doesn’t call the sidebar. There are other types of theme files like search.php for searches, but this is a short list.  There are also more specific theme files that can be created based on a page name. For example, I could create a theme file called “page-health-benefits.php” for the Health Benefits page and I could code it to look completely different if I wanted to. I could also call a different header, footer, or sidebar, for example.

    Here are some options for when columns don’t match up in your WordPress design layout:

    • Stop using the sidebar – You can eliminate the problem by only having a one-column layout.
    • Page-specific theme file(s) – I can code a theme file specific for the Health Benefits page which would show a different sidebar altogether or none at all.
    • Page Continuation / Pagination Code – to make the sidebar area never have white space at the end, I could code in a ‘page continuation code’ so that when the content gets to a certain length, it paginates to a ‘page 2’.
    • Manually Code in Scenarios to the Sidebar: I can code in scenarios that say, “If the page is Health Benefits, then display more content in the sidebar”. This would not be something you could easily edit.

    Summary

    It’s not uncommon for sidebars to have more or less content than it’s corresponding column. Dynamic changes to column length are possible through custom coding. Custom coding makes the site harder to keep updated in the future, but that’s not really your problem unless you’re doing it yourself. If it really bothers you, go to a single-column layout. If you can’t get over that extra white space, contact us. We are an Indianapolis web design firm that makes custom WordPress websites.

  • On Developing Our Professional Email Signature Product

    Recently, like Seth Godin suggested, we started looking for way to “redefine a service as a product”.

    We’ve found that custom HTML email signatures was a way to use our web design and email management skills to create  an introductory product that’s great for a wide variety of clients. Our typical clients are independent business owners or non-profits who can make their own marketing decisions, but now we have a product that can help franchisees or real estate agents who don’t or can’t have their own web site, but do have control over their email signature.

    Email signatures provide a way to offer increased interaction, coupons, calls to action, and integration with review sites, business directories, social media sites, and home pages. They can be inserted into many of the major web based email programs as well as traditional email clients. The images can be hosted on your web server or ours.

    We’ve considered branding for the email signatures can range from “mini-web sites at the end of your email” or “custom HTML email signatures”. When we do keyword research for doing our SEO, keyword terms like, “professional email signatures,” “email signatures for business”, and others come up so we might use those.

    On our home page, we currently have a huge image of the email signatures product with a giant button that says, “Learn More”. This is in response to feedback we got about our old page design which lacked a central call to action. In the future, we’d like to have that central image and text swap out in what’s called a “content slider”.

    This is a new product for us and we’re still doing customer development and looking for feedback. We’ve done many customer interviews and implemented a lot of what we heard in order to continue to iterate the product. The end product may change from where it is now, but so far, it’s shaping up to be something people really like.

  • Increasing Productivity In Website Maintenance

    This is a guest post from Robby Slaughter, who runs an Indianapolis consulting firm.

    Hiring a web design company is only one step of the process.  Once you have a new custom website designed that meets your needs, you still have to maintain it.

    Sure, there are many website design companies in Indianapolis (and elsewhere) that you can pay to manage all of your site content and marketing. But that may not be within your budget. For many small businesses, keeping their website current falls on their own shoulders. And with all of the work that you have to do for clients, managing the website may fall by the wayside.

    Ensure You Have a CMS

    One of the benefits of working with a web design firm like Erich Stauffer is their use of a CMS, or content management system, to build your website. A CMS is a software application that lets you edit most of the text and  some of the imagery and layout in your site using point-and-click tools.

    WordPress, which is the CMS I’m using to write this post, is a popular and effective product in this category. I don’t have to worry about coding or technical details in order to add content to the site. I just login and type.

    Get Training on Your CMS

    At first, it may seem like you don’t need training to use a tool like WordPress. It’s similar to a word processor. There’s a box you can type into, and there are buttons at the top that you can use to change formatting or insert pictures.

    However, just like a word processor, you don’t know what you don’t know. There are some incredible features inside every CMS and without training, you probably won’t find out about them.

    Schedule Time To Maintain Your Site

    If you plan to write a new blog post once a week, put an hour aside on your calendar and make an appointment with yourself. Or better yet, reserve a day on your calendar to write blog posts for the next two months. Then use, the scheduling feature of your CMS to parcel the blog posts out over time.

    Don’t know how to schedule posts? Talk to your website design company.

    Create a Guest Login

    This is an incredible productivity secret that will save you time. If you want to have others post on your blog, create a guest account for them. That way, you don’t have to ask them to send their post by email, copy and paste it into WordPress, and deal with formatting issues. Instead, you’ll find out that there’s a new post ready to be reviewed. What could be easier?

    In short, you can actually be more efficient when maintaining your website. Talk to your website design company about your CMS. And if you don’t have one, considering checking with Erich Stauffer about moving to a platform like WordPress.

    Good luck!

  • Why Have a Website?

    What’s the value of a website? What does it do for your business? What’s the point?

    We make websites. We know what they can do and what makes them tick. But what we were unsure of was what problem they were solving. We wanted to know what value websites bring to a business.

    Are they strictly utilitarian? Are they a commodity? Are they something you just have to have?

    We remember a time before the world wide web. We recall relying on the phone book, the library, and recommendations from people you know in order to make decisions on where to shop or go.

    We remember a time when websites were new and [literally] flashy. It was a new medium for your message and the rules hadn’t been written yet. It was the wild west and everything was new.

    It’s been nearly 20 years since the first web page went up. Websites have become more professional, technology has improved, and there are much more rules, but only one that really matters.

    The value of a website is in the information it provides. Remember the “Information Superhighway” and it’s king, Content? The purpose of a website has always been the same: Information.

    So what does this mean for business owners looking to market their business online?

    • Eliminate the Unknown – Make sure your potential customers get the answers to the questions they have about your business to remove any fears (rational or irrational) they have about doing business with you.
    • Tell Who You Are – Customers want to know who they will be dealing with. This includes, but is not limited by the bio in your About page. Use real (not stock) photography whenever possible and let your personality show.
    • Share Your Process – What’s it like interacting with you? What sort of interactions will I have with you? What will it cost? What are you hiding? What’s your motivation? Your website can and should explain all of these things.

      • You may have heard the expression, “Know, trust, buy,” which means that a customer has to know you before they trust you and trust you before they buy from you. Your website can ease and accelerate that process because they’ve already spent a lot of time on your site getting to know your business to the point they trust you enough to call you. This doesn’t mean your website is selling for you, but it is enabling you to sell. Think of it as an advertising brochure that someone is reading at the exact moment when they need your service. That’s the power of the Internet and if your website isn’t responding to a customer looking for services you offer, you’re business is missing out on a huge opportunity.

      Erich Stauffer is an Indianapolis web design firm that uses the power of web technology to grow your business.

  • Facebook Cover Photos

    Unless you act before March 30th, Facebook will automatically change your Facebook Page to the new Timeline layout. This means that your business page will no longer look the same and therefore any custom tabs or images you created for your Facebook Page will move or be changed. The biggest change is the addition of an optional “Cover” photo which is 850px wide by 315px tall. We’ve designed some Facebook Page covers for several of our social media management clients that we’d like to showcase here.

    Please let me know what you think about them in the comments below.

  • WordPress: Questions and Answers

    Q. I am getting an error with most of my plugins in WordPress. How do I fix it?

    A. Disable the plugins one by one until the error goes away. Once it does, note the last plugin you disabled and you’ll have you’re culprit. If that doesn’t do it, change the theme back to default and test again. In this way you’ll rule out whether it’s a plugin or the theme doing it.

    Q. How do I make my website more popular?

    A. First, write content that people care about and then let people know about it. You can find out what people care about using Google Trends, Google Insights for Search, and Google External Keyword Tool. Sign up for Twitter and Google+ to post things that you have written on your site. This is part of a good content marketing and SEO strategy.

    Q. How do I change the order of displayed items on a page?

    WordPress defaults to displaying posts in the order of which they were posted (latest first). The easiest way is to change the date/time in which they were posted. To do this, go to the post and click Edit, then change the time so that posts are in the time order you want them.

    Q. Can I install WordPress in a sub-directory or a sub-domain?

    A. You can set it up inside a folder or sub-domain, but you have to create a SQL database first or (if your web host provides it) use a one-click install. Bluehost and Dreamhost both have one-click installs. Otherwise you’ll have to set up your own SQL database and upload the WordPress files manually.

    Q. How to post a new page in WordPress?

    A. In your dashboard, go to Pages and click, “New Page”. It may or may not display in your navigation automatically, depending on your theme.

    Q. Where is the image folder in WordPress?

    A. The image folder is usually a sub-directory of your theme folder, which is located under your wp-content folder. To get to your wp-content/[theme name]/images folder, you’ll either need to use a FTP client or login to your host’s web FTP panel to change the image. You can also use WordPress itself to make the change by uploading the picture to the Media directory, copying the location, and then editing the Stylesheet.css in the Theme editor.

    Q. What are some good WordPress themes for businesses?

    Businesses can benefit from having a custom WordPress theme created for their website. This will help them match their website to their brand and better differentiate them in the market. Erich Stauffer specializes in creating WordPress website designs for small businesses in the Indianapolis area.

    If you need Indianapolis WordPress hosting, web design, configuration, and support, Erich Stauffer is your cloud computing expert web design and Google App implementation shop.

  • A New Logo for a New Direction

    I realize we just updated our logo a couple of months ago, but consider that an iteration on the way to the final product, which you can see here. The last logo was a circle of blue around an empty center, with a cutout at the bottom. It was meant to symbolize a ring of water encircling the customer, but some people just didn’t get it or thought it looked like an unfinished life preserver.

    Our new logo essentially means the same thing as the old logo: it’s a water shawl surrounding the customer representing the suite of services we provide. But one peculiar thing happened once the new logo was created. I was on my way to Lafayette to visit a networking meeting and I realized that the “water shawl” could also represent a “cloud”. It was if a light bulb went off and I didn’t know how I had missed it before. Erich Stauffer was a cloud consulting firm that specialized in WordPress web design and Google Apps integrations.

    Who is Erich Stauffer?

    Erich Stauffer has helped small businesses around Indiana build cloud-powered, WordPress web sites; and cloud-based email, document, and sales management. Erich Stauffer provides cloud technology consulting to help small businesses do more with cloud applications and platforms like WordPress, Google Apps, and Salesforce.com. Our services range from cloud marketing to cloud migration to cloud management. Cloud technology helps small businesses market their business, reduce spam, and be more productive all at a lower price point than traditional software.

  • WordPress Security

    After reading what Fusion Alliance wrote about Information Security and writing what I did about WordPress Security, I thought I’d write a bit more about how we keep our client’s WordPress web sites secure here at Erich Stauffer.

    WordPress Updates

    WordPress is updated regularly to address new security issues that may arise so we’re always updating our client’s to the latest version to keep them secure. Since version 2.7, WordPress has featured automatic updates and the WordPress Dashboard lets us know when the updates are available.

    WordPress Plugins

    One of the most common attacks against a WordPress web site is HTTP exploit payloads for specific vulnerabilities in outdated plugins. Plugins are add-on software that runs on top of WordPress. Think of WordPress as the operating system and plugins as the programs. If you’re not using a plugin, delete it from the system.

    WordPress Themes

    If your WordPress theme uses custom scripts to render thumbnails or other images they might be susceptible to being exploited. This happened to one of our web hosting clients who purchased a theme they were using on their WordPress web site. A hacker exploited the vulnerability and used our server to begin sending out spam before it was stopped.

    Secure FTP (SFTP)

    We use secure FTP (SFTP) to transmit files, which means we protect our server passwords while transmitting your files on the Internet. If you’re still using regular FTP, you’re sending your password via plain-text over the Internet, which is like using a post card to send your credit card information to someone.

    WordPress Backups

    In the event that all of these security steps still lead to a problem with our client’s site, we make local backups of all of our client’s sites and because we use two web hosts for our web hosting, we can restore those backups on another web host in order to keep your web site up in the event of a problem.

    If you’re looking for an experienced WordPress web designer and WordPress web host in the Indianapolis area, contact Erich Stauffer at 317-572-7521.