DesignNpixels

23/07/2016

Another Awesome website completed by designNpixels! http://halelanistj.com

24/06/2016

Another successful website launch! http://morgansmango.com

23/06/2016

I manage quite a few Wordpress sites - some of these sites are on Godaddy wordpress managed hosting, which offers 0 email addresses, which is a problem if you want to use email to post to your wordpress blog!
FYI -If you want to use postie, the you must use an email address hosted by Godaddy in order to bypass the firewall, so that you and make postie work!

16/06/2016

We are proud to announce the launch of http://stjohnproperties.com Services included: Re-Branding, Site Concept, Design & Custom MLS Interface.

21/04/2016

Get With the Times: How to Implement Responsive Web Design
April 18, 2016

Get With the Times: How to Implement Responsive Web Design
Responsive Web Design (RWD) became an important trend as web professionals sought to provide a consistent user experience to the rising use of mobile devices and tablets.

Last year, we saw the tipping point for digital media where more time was spent on mobile devices (51 percent) than the desktop (42 percent).

This staggering change was anything but a surprise.

And the trends in mobile web use continue upward as evidenced by other statistics:

80 percent of Internet users own a smartphone
67 percent of consumers are willing to buy a product or use a service on a mobile-friendly site
89 percent of people admitted to searching for a local business on their smartphone once a week or more with 58 percent searching at least daily
U.S. adults spend an average of two hours and 51 minutes a day using mobile devices
40 percent of searchers will click another mobile result if a site’s not mobile friendly
So if that’s not enough reason, consider the fact that Google really likes responsive web design. According to Joe Ardeeser of Jordan Crown Web Design, “Google is penalizing website owners because their page isn't responsive. Some of the latest algorithm updates for the search engine are factoring in whether a website is mobile friendly and responsive. This has made a big impact, in our case actually helping us climb in rankings because some of our competitors’ websites aren't mobile friendly and have gone down on Google.”

Related Article: One Size Fits All: How Responsive Web Design Helps Get You More Conversions

It is evident that making your site mobile friendly is a must. Professional firms are working hard to ensure that their clients pick the best technology available and understand the importance of making your website responsive. Here are some of the ways you can implement responsive design:

Planning for RWD

Before you get to the actual design phase, it helps if you think of this process as making your website fluid to meet the different screen sizes that your visitors will use. So first, you need to decide on the breakpoints you will be designing for. Commonly, you are going to want to include a min-width and a max-width for:

Smartphones, both portrait and landscape (at least less than 480px)
Tablets, both portrait and landscape (at least less than 768px)
Common desktop screen resolutions (greater than 768px)
Once you determine the breakpoints you are designing for, it’s time to sketch out some wireframes. These visuals can help you determine where the different elements will fit in as the screen shrinks or expands. You want to see how it will look as three columns on a desktop flows into two on a tablet and then one on a smartphone.

Get Flexible

Media queries, defined by the breakpoints you established, detect the size of the browser a visitor is using. To make the website flexible, you need to rely on a layout for your site. Early on in responsive design the grid systems were fixed and divided into a set number of columns like 12 or 16 with the columns growing more narrow as more were added.

Related Article: Informative and Visually Appealing: 5 Important Website Design Considerations

Since screen sizes now range from a hand held device to a large screen television, more flexibility is needed so fluid grid systems are the way to go. Instead of a layout based solely on pixel size, the fluid grid has a set number of columns, but then each element of the site is designed with proportional widths and heights instead of pixel based dimensions.

While making your site flexible, it is important to make sure you don’t neglect any images. When creating your stylesheets, make sure to assign a max-width to any images in your design using: img {max-width:100 percent}. This snippet of CSS will resize the images to 100 percent of the width available in their parent elements so they will scale according to the size of the visitor’s screen.

In addition to the images, you want to include code to make sure that your visitors’ mobile devices don’t offer a zoomed out version of your site. If you don’t set the viewport to instruct the browser to display the site based on the screen size, not make an assumption as to what it should be.

This can be done by adding

31/03/2016

WHY HIRING A PROFFESIONAL WEB DESIGN FIRM IS A MUST!

A website plays an important role in the success of a business. Today, more than ever before, people are thronging the Internet, to search for products and services. This trend is only expected to grow stronger in the coming years. With a plethora of good websites online, you need to put in extra efforts to make your website stand out. Therefore, it is wise to leave the website designing work to professionals who will ensure the design captures all the important elements of a typical website and still stays different. Here are a few reasons why hiring a professional Web Design Agency like http://designNpixels.com is a great idea.

Strategy development

A website is more than an art. It involves collection of a whole set of varied components that talk in unison. For example, the layout, art, copywriting, typography are only some of the important elements of a website that should be fused together for a pleasant aesthetic. It is also necessary that the design facilitates easy access and communicates functionally. To combine all the above-mentioned elements and to get good results, you need to have a clear direction and focus, towards the goals.

A strategic design accommodates and fuses all your business goals with the design process. You are not just designing a website that looks good and is easy to access. It should also help you accomplish the organization’s objectives. One of the major reasons for hiring a professional in web design service is because of their ability to devise a strategic plan. They also know what kind of website is needed to stay on course to achieve the business goals and objectives.

Quality Website

The website is just a doorstep to your business. You need to take every step required to make a positive and strong impression on your visitors. With the introduction of e-commerce, today’s website is required to function as an e-shop and support different ecommerce integrations. It should also support other types of transactions that are useful to your business. According to web experts, the website should not only be dynamic, sophisticated, user-friendly and well planned but also serve the tastes and preferences of various clients who may visit the website. Professional web design services are well aware of these requirements and know different ways to create a result-driven website that is attractive, lively and one that offers a superior user experience.

Search Engine Optimization

It’s just not enough for a business to have an attractive website. The website should be optimized to increase its visibility in search engines. Simply put, some of your customers are going to search for information relevant to your business niche, on some search engines. Some websites will feature on the first search results page, while some on 2nd, 3rd or latter pages. Your website should be on the first page to be visible to your target market. Search engine optimization is not just focused on content; it also needs to be incorporated in the website design. Professional web design services are aware of the SEO tactics that need to be employed to get the highest rankings.

Unique Content Creation

Content is king in website design and development. The website cannot rank higher without unique content. Creating unique content is not a common skill and it may be hard to create captivating content on your own. Professional website design services have various teams working on different aspects of website development. They have a dedicated and experienced team of content writers that can provide quality, interesting and original content for your website.

Web Analytics

Web analytics is important to discover and rectify issues related to performance of your website. They are generally referred to as measurement, analysis and reporting of the Internet, needed to understand the performance of the website and take steps to optimize it. It gives better insights about your audience, their behavior and in-depth information about Internet traffic. The main reason that makes Web analytics important is that once you know the audience behavior, you can optimize the website to get better results. Professional website development service providers know the right metrics to track and analyze results of different tactics. They can make the necessary and important adjustments, to make your website more competitive.

Thus, you can see that hiring a professional web design service is a good decision to get good results from your website and stay ahead of the competition.

24/03/2016

Nielsen To Start Tracking Which Digital Media Players You're Streaming Content On.

The move will allow content providers to see if more people watch their show on an Apple TV or Google Chromecast.

Television ratings firm Nielsen will soon begin tracking which digital media players viewers are consuming specific content on, reports Variety. Currently Nielsen already tracks what percentage of viewing of a particular show takes place on digital media players, but come April 25th those metrics will become more refined. On that date, Nielsen will start tracking metrics based on specific digital media players.

"Starting April 25, 2016, Nielsen said it will make available brand-level TV connected device data for Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, Google Chromecast, Microsoft Xbox, Sony PlayStation and Nintendo Wii," Variety says. "In addition, it will add information based on device type such as media-streaming player, game console, Internet-enabled DVD player and smart TV."

This new "brand level" tracking will give content providers a much clearer picture of what kind of digital media player their content is most popular on. Content providers could then use that data to enhance viewership on a popular device for them, or work to make viewership higher on devices where their shows are less popular. For example, if HBO sees Game of Thrones is much more popular on the Apple TV it might consider released a dedicated app with exclusive content and cross merchandising to loop even more viewers in.

"The ability to know how many consumers use which brands of TV-connected devices, for how often and for how long, is critical for clients who need to make informed content decisions and understand their total audience," Sara Erichson, Nielsen exec VP of client solutions and audience insights, said in a statement.

Nielsen gets its data, including the new "brand level" digital media player metrics, from 40,000 households with more than 100,000 TV sets and 50,000 TV-connected devices.
http://designNpixels.com

24/03/2016

Millennial binge-watchers lead digital media revolution.

New research suggests nearly a third of all U.S. consumers 'binge-watch' streaming video at least once a week, and millennials not only stream more video than any other demographic, they also do as many four other things at the same time.

More people "binge-watch" online video, stream digital music and "cut the cord" today than ever before, as technology continues to reshape the consumption of digital media. Perhaps unsurprisingly, millennials, or adults born between 1981 and 1996, are driving this shift. Recent research from Deloitte indicates that nearly half of the U.S. population subscribes to at least one streaming service, and both teenagers and the youngest millennials now spend more time watching streaming video online than live TV.

Americans also watch streaming video in really big chunks; nearly a third of the consumers surveyed said they binge watch, or view three or more episodes in one sitting, at least once a week. And when consumers binge, they frequently watch as many as five episodes at a time. This number applies to most age groups, with the exception of people over 69, who Deloitte tactfully labeled "matures" and who binge watch much less frequently.

Multitasking while binge-watching

While Americans binge, they do much more than simply enjoy the programs in front of them; they multitask like crazy. According to Deloitte's research, 92 percent of consumers multitask while watching TV, and millennials often do four additional activities as they stream.

Despite all this streaming, the move away from traditional paid TV is ongoing. Deloitte predicts that only 1 percent of TV subscribers will cut the cord completely and move strictly to streaming this year. That number will increase slowly to 1.5 percent next year, and to about 2 percent in 2018, Deloitte says. So instead of cord cutting, it appears that many consumers are engaged in cord shaving, or cutting back on paid TV subscriptions while adding streaming alternatives.

Rise of the 'cord nevers,' downfall of music downloads

Another group should disturb traditional TV providers even more: the so-called "cord nevers," who don't subscribe to paid TV service at all. A survey referenced by Deloitte put the number of cord nevers at 11 percent of people between the ages of 18 and 34. In other words, the millennials. The number of people who make up older generations, who are more loyal to paid TV, will inevitably decrease, so the future of traditional TV doesn't look terribly bright.

It also turns out that digital music downloads are going the way of the CD. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) reports that streaming music now accounts for more revenue than any other music format. In 2015, streaming music revenue surpassed download revenue for the first time, and both digital formats dwarfed physical media, according to RIAA.
http://designNpixels.com

21/03/2016

Just launched another successful website for Webscale!
https://www.webscalenetworks.com

Forget what you know about E-Commerce infrastructureGet ready to think differently and spend less on your e-commerce website infrastructure. Introducing WEBSCALE, the world's first and only integrated web application delivery solution that provides infinite scalability, high performance, security an…

01/03/2016

We have launched our new web development site!
http://designnpixels.com

25/08/2015

I would like to welcome http://stbor.com , http://stjohnrealtorsvi.com and http://bigbendcoffee.com to the http://www.designnpixels.com family of clients! Thank you for letting me be your website designer!

The sale and purchase of a home is one of the most significant events that any person will experience in his or her lifetime. It is more than the simple purchase of housing, for it includes the hopes, dreams, aspirations, and economic destiny of those involved.

16/07/2015

http://insight.venturebeat.com/report/brands-mobile-advertising-how-win?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=cpc&utm_content=shocked-woman&utm_term=lookalike&utm_campaign=brands-mobile-report

Billions of smartphone users have downloaded 350 billion apps. We spent 76% more time on those phones in 2014, and even more in 2015 -- significantly more time than we spend watching TV.