New web site for St Louis Engineering Company

Launched today is a brand new web site for St Louis engineering company, Zagros Engineering.

zagros engineering website

The site presents their company information and services though a clean design with easy to use navigation.  The Zagros .net developers will be adding future .net functionality to the site.

We first worked with Zagros on a redesign project for a shopping cart site  Zagros Robotics and are delighted for the opportunity to work with them again.

A Responsive Website for a Chicago Wedding Officiant

The website for a Chicago wedding officiant I gave a sneak peak to a few days ago is now live.

re designed website for chicago wedding officiant

 

This was a re-design project of an original site that had been created on Wix…an easy to use website creator but lacking in functionality and true  internet marketing (SEO) capabilities. Here is a quick snap shot of the site prior to redesign, note the mobile version looks completely different from the desktop version.

website wedding officiant chicago redeisgn

Client, Toni Maddi , was very keen to keep the ability to update the website herself but really wanted a site where she could have full control of SEO. WordPress was the natural answer and it was this platform we used to build a fully responsive website for her wedding officiant business.

We created a very clean looking template design and updated the color palette a little. Toni had lots of fabulous photographs of wedding ceremonies she had conducted and these were used liberally throughout the site. All the pages were optimized for the search engines and we built specific landing pages for the locations and areas she serves.

The template was coded to respond to whatever device was being used to view it giving the visitor a consistent experience regardless of device they were using.

Here it is on an ipad

responsive design chicago wedding minister

and again on an iphone

responsive design Chicago wedding minister
The site has been live for less than 24hrs but I have just heard from Toni that she has already received an inquiry through it!

Read more about this wedding officiant web site on our website design portfolio

Website for Engineering Company in Progress

Here is another website we currently have in the works for St Louis based Zagros Engineering.

 

engineering website design

Every web project we undertake follows a very methodical process

  • Define – where we put together a tactical plan of how to achieve the project goals
  • Design – the creation of the look and feel of the project
  • Develop – the design is coded and converted into a fully functional web site
  • Deploy – the site is tested and launched

The Zagros Engineering website is currently in the development stage, the framework of the site has been coded and we awaiting content from the client.

 

New Website in Progress for Chicago Wedding Officiant

I am currently working with Chicago Wedding Officiant, Toni Maddi, on the creation of a new website for her business Personalized Ceremonies.

wedding officiant web site

Toni is looking for a responsive website that will improve her rankings in the search engines. I am building on the WordPress platform..the site will be launched in the next few weeks.

Cyber Monday – FREE website evaluation

Cyber Monday is chocked full of deals to be had all over the internet and here at Indigo Image we are no exception.

Today we are offering a free evaluation of your website or blog.
cyber monday deal

We will give you feedback on

  • Your website design
  • Navigational structure
  • The usability of your site
  • How you are performing in the search engines

Send us a quick EMAIL to take advantage of this great FREE offer

Website Redesign: A Gallery of Before and Afters

There is something very satisfying about looking at before and after transformations regardless of the medium.  Think about the TV shows ” What not to Wear”,  HGTV’s  “Devine Design” and even “Hoarding-Burried Alive”  They are all about transformations – making something or someone look and feel better.

Now as a website designer I can’t make a site “feel” better but I can make the user experience more enjoyable and less fraught.

Amateurish to Professional

Site visitors will form an opinion of your site within the first 3 seconds of looking at it. It is important to make those seconds count with a professional look/feel.

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Drab to Fab

A simple shift in color palette and a few graphic tweaks can make a site go from drab to fab. This site was transformed into a more fresh and invigorating experience, which was much more appropriate for the products it promotes.

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Getting the visitor to do something

A call to action or getting a visitor to engage and do what you want them to,  in this case donate.

chicago_website_redesign_4 Content Reorganization

The bigger the site the more important it it to have a well thought out navigational system ensuring your site visitors can find what they are looking for quickly and with the minimum of effort.

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Don’t Make Me Think

If your visitors have to work too much when on your site, then you have a problem-they will be hitting that back button.   The same is true if they don’t understand what you are offering as was the case with the original Paper Shower web site.

 

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Redesigned Website for Paper Shower

We have  work with businesses all over the country on web and graphic design projects, but it is especially rewarding working with  businesses based in our local vicinity.  Our newest client, Paper Shower, is located right here in Lincolnshire IL .

Launched yesterday was a redesigned version of their web site papershower.com

paper shower body wipes web site redesign

Paper Shower offers a range of unique body wipes which combine a large wet wipe with a dry towelette and are great for active people who are looking to freshen up on the go – bikers, runners, while camping, hiking and traveling  or even on the golf course.

Why Redesign?

website redesign lincolnshire ilThere are several reasons for the need to redesign a web site and the old Paper Shower site fulfilled quite a few.

Firstly the site was making the visitors work too hard to understand the product, it was only after clicking through from the home page that the concept of the product having both a wet and dry towelette became obvious.

Secondly, almost no consideration had been made as to who the product was being marketed towards – it was too generic.

Lastly the site was not at all optimized for the search engines, the home page itself was a collection of images and as a whole had very little keyword rich copy.  Ranking in the search engines was poor and  traffic was minimal despite  great PR coverage the product has had over the last few years.

 

Our Web Re-Design Approach

Understanding the issues facing the old site helped us create a strategy for the  re-design and re-launch of the new site.

Competitive Analysis

Any SEO project needs to kick off with a through understanding of  the online competition. We took an in depth  look at other body wipe websites and our analysis  resulted in the compilation a list of favorable key phrases.

Web Content
We wanted to address several things with the web content

  • Communicate the uniqueness of the product in a simple format that did not require the user any effort
  • Engage with the target market of outdoorsy / active people
  • Add more call to actions to purchase product
  • Enrich it with target key words and phrase for SEO benefits

We started with the creation of a set of web banners that incorporated the product and an outdoor scenario or an occasion where the product would be useful. Each banner also carried the phrase Wash > Dry > Done, which was elaborated on with keyword rich copy underneath which quickly and easily explained the product.

paper shower body wipes golf
paper shower body wipes camping
paper shower body wipes travel
paper shower body wipes hiker
paper shower body wipes gym

The home page was updated to include more details of the product range and examples of who may find the product useful. We used video and client testimonials throughout the site for easily digestible communication.

For better engagement with the target audience we created a set of landing pages

and also added a blog

We are in the process of completing the internet marketing of the site but are confident that the  re design and optimization will result in increased traffic and sales.

Read more about Paper Shower in our web design portfolio.

© 2013 Chicago web designer

New Website for Heinzen Smith Properties

Client Margaret Smith, of  Heinzen Smith Properties, has a 150 year family history of building homes just north of Chicago. Each house is custom designed and blends beautifully with existing homes in the Wilmette area.

Margaret contacted us with lots of ideas for her web site and we have been able to translate those ideas into a site that perfectly captures what she wanted to achieve.

Home builder wilmette IL Chicago

After developing a color palette inspired by a slate roof with weathered copper gutters, we designed a home page which gives site visitor a quick glimpse of some of their most eye catching homes and focuses attention to New Homes for Sale.  We were spoiled for choice when it came time to select  photographs as the client provided so many stunning homes to pick from. Not wanting waste an opportunity to showcase them further, we carried them through to the inner pages of the site and cropped them to center on doors as a “welcoming” gesture.

chicago home builder website

The site was also designed and coded as one that is fully responsive – see here for an explanation of responsive web design

Here it is on a desktop

responsive web design chicago
On an ipad in portrait and landscape orientations
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And finally an iphone
responsive web design chicago

You can visit the site at heinzensmith.com

Three questions to consider for mobile friendly websites

How much traffic is my website getting from devices like ipads and smart phones?

While you may not know the answer, I can guarantee it is more than you were getting a few years ago.  A quick look at the statistics for our own web site shows a 100% increase in the amount of traffic we are getting from mobile devices in just the last 12 months. A personal site I write, creativeinchicago.com, derives 40% of it’s 35k monthly traffic from mobile devices. Numbers like these are difficult to ignore and there is no doubt that mobile access  is a growing trend that is here to stay.

What does my site look like on mobile devices?

There are quite a few online tools that have popped up that emulate how a site will look on a particular device and while they can’t guarantee how you site will behave on any given device they do provide a quick snap shot. You can test your site on a simple emulator HERE . It will show you what your site looks like in different window widths, which is a simple but effective simulation technique –  to see which window size corresponds to which device click on the device sizes button.

A responsive website will adjust itself depending on the size of the window (or type of device) as shown with our site. This means that the site will be easy to use and offer the user an optimum experience regardless of what type of device they are using to visit from.

reponsive web desig in chicago.

 

A site which is not responsive will not adjust as illustrated in the site below. The simulator will display horizontal scroll bars in this case.

unpresonsive website

Most tablets and smart phones will actually shrink the website down to fit their screen instead of making the user scroll horizontally so the simple simulator used above is not accurate in that respect.

A more rigorous  simulator to try is Mobile phone simulator .

Here are the same two websites plugged in.

responsive and unresponsive web sites

The responsive site has adjusted to offer the user and optimum viewing experience but the unresponsive site offers tiny text and  unreadable navigation. These can be magnified  of course but the site makes the user really have to work to see it.

Can my website be converted to a responsive web site?

To behave responsively a website needs to be coded in a unique way. In many cases the existing design can be used, as in the case of a recent responsive conversion we carried out for ruthellenhasser.com. We made almost no changes to the overall design of the site but completely revamped the code powering it

RESPONSIVE DESIGN CHICAGO responsive_design_chicago_2 responsive_design_chicago_3

I am ready to move forward with a mobile friendly website

If you are looking to move forward either building a new website that is mobile friendly or converting an existing web site to behave responsively we are here to help. Call 847 607 8679 to get started today.