Getting Started with WordPress development- The Ultimate Guide

WordPress development is one of the most popular trends of the website development world in recent time.  It's the ideal choice for two different groups of users. In the first group, we can consider the master developers, and in the other one, some people don’t have any particular coding experience.

To know how to get started with WordPress development Cape Town or that of any corner across the globe, keep reading this post!

The Basic of WordPress Development
If you want to get the most out of WP development, learning a few coding languages can significantly help. WordPress is developed on the most common programming languages like PHP, HTML and CSS.  Sometimes, you can also find a little utilization of JavaScript.

Besides, some other coding and languages like MySQL and more are involved. However, it’s not necessary to learn them all in detail as a beginner WP developer.

What Should You Know?
Well, learning PHP, CSS and HTML are necessary for WP development.

1. The Role of PHP
PHP is the controller of the internal interactions. It also monitors the way it connects with the database of MySQL.

To create the outstanding functionalism in WordPress, one should and must learn PHP!!

2. CSS- Drive the Style
CSS directs the style of the website. Using CSS, you can make your site different from the others on the web. Mastering CSS requires a considerable learning ability.

3. The Structure- HTML

The functions that you create by using PHP and the style you form with the help of CSS can be structured using PHP. You can learn this language easily; however, it’s more than vital to be aware of its applications.

To get the most out of a WP development, learning JavaScript will offer you added advantages.

What Are the Paths of Development that You Need to Recce
There are three different paths that you need to take for a comprehensive development process.  Let’s check them out here!!

1. Developing the Theme

This is the first step of WP development. Learning theme development will award you with a website that is aesthetically appealing as well as unique. Learning the languages mentioned above will help you with satisfactory theme development.

2. Building the Core
Let’s face it!! Developing software for WordPress demands a lot of skill. If you don’t have previous experience in PHP development, it’s better to not to proceed with the core development. It may produce a devastating result.

3. Developing the Plugins
The social networks, membership sites, different forums…all of them are the example of Plugin. Like the core development, this too needs some previous experience. It is directly related to the SEO parameters. So, instead of trying own skills, it's always a wise idea to leave this job on an adept SEO agency Cape Town or that of your area.

Apart from the steps mentioned above, a successful WP development requires learning sources like Codex and more. Besides, being a part of the WordPress community will be of great help. For the best results out of a WP development work, the most viable option is to count on a dedicated agency for the same. Search for the best one near to you and reach them today!

3 Important Website Design Factors You Should Consider

Building a website is hard, especially when you do not have professional knowledge and skills. Website design and development involve some technical skills, and this is why it is better to rely on professionals, rather than carrying out this task by yourself following DIY hacks.

When creating a business website with the help of professionals, you need to consider some important factors. Some of the major factors are mentioned below. Please dive into the below section now.

1. Your Target Audience
The first step towards designing a website is to identify the target audience and also to conduct thorough research on them. When researching, make sure you pay attention to the following factors - the demands of your potential customers, their preferences, and so on. Once you collect this information, you will be able to help your chosen experts who offer web development Cape Town services in the best way.

Website auditing is a vital step associated with web design. If you find this procedure bit challenging, you may hire professionals who will carry out this procedure on your behalf.

2. Content
A website without engaging and high-value content is nothing but merely a blank sheet of digital paper. When it comes to web design, content is one of the major factors that should be considered. Without informative and SEO friendly content, it is not possible to drive your potential customers towards your site.

One of the major reasons for making a site is to convey important messages to your visitors. Well, you will be able to attain this goal only when your site will be designed with catchy and error-free content. You might know that a lack of a clear message can be the biggest turn off for your customers.

3. Responsive Design
In the present era, most people prefer to use mobile and other devices when searching for information over the internet. With the rapid growth of smartphone users, creating a responsive website has become the foremost priority to businessmen.

A responsive website is the one that fits almost all devices, including mobile phones, tab, laptop and computer properly. Professionals who offer website design services in Cape Town and other places near you have the ability to build responsive websites.

Apart from this, page loading speed and SEO friendly design are two other important factors which cannot be ignored. As per studies, websites that load faster drive more visitors than slow-loading sites. Image optimization is a great way to boost your website’s speed.

SEO or search engine optimization is a great method that focuses on bringing specific websites on the top of the list in search engine result pages. Having an SEO friendly site enables you to drive web traffic quickly.

3 Best Reasons to Invest in Web Designing Services

In this era of digitalization, having an online presence is more than essential.  You can keep your first digital footsteps by designing a website.  A recent statistics say that your visitors spend around 15 minutes to check out the contents. Among them, 66% prefer to check out something comprehensive. An aesthetically pleasing website can help in generating more organic crowd to your site.

In this post, we’ll give you six best reasons to hire a dedicated agency web design in Cape Town. Check them out right away!!

Importance of Website designing

A comprehensive website is the virtual face of your business. There are a lot of reasons to design it carefully. Let's check out the most important ones out of them.

·         Your Website Builds up The First Impression of Your Business

When your target audience visits your website, they get introduced to your brand for the very first time. By visiting your site, they adopt an idea about the function of your business. They don’t invest much time to judge your brand.

In case your website looks less appealing, your visitors will carry a negative impression of your brand.  Naturally, it will lead to missing out on generating fruitful leads. They will leave your website and won't come back again. To avoid this, you need to contact a proficient web designer.

·         Serves the Purpose of SEO

Web designing has a direct connection with the SEO performance of your website. The way of publishing the contents, controlling the page loading speed, and more can help in matching with the SEO parameters. Besides, the coding should also be SEO friendly. 

While designing a perfect website, you must keep these facts in mind. This will serve your purpose of coming up to the top rankings of Search Engine Result Page.

·         Enhances the Brand Value by Developing Trust

As per the recent statistics, poorly designed websites can't develop the desired brand value. This is because it lacks when it comes to developing a significant relation of trust with their audience. Poor designing of a website conveys the message to their customers that the brand somehow lacks trustworthiness. 

Apart from that, a properly designed websites help your users to experience the desired level of satisfaction in terms of User experience. This naturally makes them stay for a longer time on your business webpage. Later, this enhances the chances of maturing more leads.

Hope this post helps! Now when you know the importance of designing a website, be a little careful while calling an agency for web development Johannesburg or in other areas.  Make sure that they are good designers too. Pick up your phone and make the final call to the best web development agency near you.

Debunking 7 Major Website Design Myths for Better Outcome

Website, a digital front door of modern-day business organizations, attracts traffic beyond geographical boundaries, escalates conversion rates, and enhances earnings. Apart from paying close attention to essential elements such as colour scheme, typography, navigation, etc., when designing, you must also ignore few associated myths, which unfortunately wreck all your efforts.  For example, more features mean better experience. In actuality, however, consumers prefer simplicity.

1.      Utilizing Flash Shows Many Great Visuals-

Specialists working for renowned digital marketing companies inJohannesburg said flash might look awesome, but it does not work on nearly any device nowadays, hence, deemed pretty useless. Google, Yahoo, Bing, and other major search engines have already rejected Flash.

2.      Relying upon Stock Photos-

Stock photos might seem like a viable option, but you must use your own images too. Doing so lets a website convey messages uniquely, thus, stay ahead of the curve. Make sure all pictures uploaded are of high resolution. Try customising them in accordance with varying requirements and expectations.

3.      Not Testing on Varied Devices-

Your website is responsive, hence, good enough, right? Wrong. Varied devices are readily available in the market, and each bears little or no resemblance to each other. If you cannot test your website on every gadget, at least catch hold of the common ones. Remember something might look good on a smartphone but not necessarily on a tablet.

4.      Believing Homepage is Most Important-

While the homepage is visited maximum number of times, never neglect other internal pages. Visitors planning on making a purchase will obviously visit the product page, and scan descriptions given. Some get an idea about a company by reading the about us page first and then think of collaborating.

5.      Thinking about Content Later­-

Content must come before design because it determines how and where everything else will be laid. Without blogs, articles, press releases, etc., you will simply end up changing the entire layout later.

6.      White Space Equals Wastage-

White space helps a website look impeccable, and texts or images stand out. If you want visitors to notice the call-to-action (CTAs), try placing them strategically out here. As per the latest studies, if used correctly, white space can increase readability up to approximately 20%.

7.      Considering Accessibility Inconsequential-

Top-notch professionals carrying out web design in Cape Town with acute precision defined accessibility as a process of eliminating barriers so that people suffering from disabilities such as vision or hearing impairment can operate site seamlessly.

Besides myths stated above, several contemporary entrepreneurs also failed to realize the significance of social media. Well, Facebook, Instagram, Google+, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc. effectually contribute to search engine rankings.

Rather than sharing content on each platform separately, you must incorporate social media buttons right on the website. They strengthen B2C (business-consumer) relationships. Now isn’t that great?

6 Major Mistakes to Avoid While Blogging on Website

Many modern-day business owners might not realize but adding blogs to the website have plenty of benefits. Apart from acting as a means to express opinions in a seamless manner, brands utilize them for reaching larger segments of population within a very short period. Well, in case you have been planning on blogging for quite a long time now, please seek third party assistance, thus, avoid mistakes specified below.   

1.      You Pay Attention to Ideas that Only Interest You

Top-notch professionals carrying out web design in Cape Town said when you start blogging, always choose ideas that interest everybody, regardless of gender, ethnicity, age, etc. because no matter how many times you go through a piece, you are not its only intended reader. Remember if you prefer something personally, it does not mean that it will be good for your company.

2.      You Digress

Even though you can let your personality shine through your writing, make sure never to misuse this privilege. It is one thing to be yourself, and a whole another thing to incorporate multiple personal experiences, thus, digress from actual subject matter. Too many anecdotes and analogies, unfortunately, compel readers to lose patience. 

3.      You Do Not Use Data as Proof

Claims and arguments are much more convincing when rooted in thorough research as well as substantial data. As marketers, you do not just need to persuade people to be on your side about a particular issue but also persuade them to take proper action against it. Studies have shown that data-driven content wins people’s trust quickly. 

4.      Your Content is Borderline Plagiarized

Plagiarism did not work in school, and it would surely do not work for an organization’s blog. However, few beginners think they can get away with classic copy and paste tactic. Readers and editors can tell if a piece is copied from somewhere else. Your tone would feel different, or you might end up using phrases incorrectly.  

5.      Your Style if Excessively Stiff

Writing blogs is different from writing a thesis paper. The style followed when writing latter is not what consumers will enjoy. Professionals offering services for WordPress web design Johannesburg as well as in other places for a reasonable price said instead of being stiff, adopt an interactive tone so that readers feel you are one of them. 

6.      You are Not Consistent

You must be consistent for driving abundant traffic, escalating conversion rate, and contributing to business prosperity. If you publish five posts in one week and then go MIA (missing in action) for a month, you will lose customers. Companies committed to publishing content regularly reap biggest rewards.

Each mistake specified above hampers business reputation to a great extent, so, you better hire a professional, who can write blogs on different topics, starting from health to fashion, without hassle. Apart from performing a comprehensive background check, look out for characteristics namely work ethic, social skills, industry knowledge, expansive network, clear understanding of search engine optimization (SEO), etc.

How to Create a Perfect Online Marketing Strategy?

Digital or online marketing is the process of using different digital technologies to promote businesses using the power of the internet. Perhaps this is the main reason for which digital marketing is also referred to internet marketing.

If you want to make the most of digitalization, first of all, you need to create a website. By performing a simple Google search, you will easily find plenty of web development companies in Johannesburg or in your preferred location. According to your preference, you can hire any of them and build the site. After the development process, you have to focus on its promotion.

In this post, we will take you through a complete guide and reveal the most effective digital marketing elements that you need to consider adding in your marketing mix while creating your strategy.

Facebook Ads

Facebook is the most influential social media site on the World Wide Web. By using its power, you can easily maximize your reach. Due to this reason, we always recommend businesses to invest in Facebook paid ads. It will help you to target more customers and enable you to generate more leads.

Instagram

You also need to create a business account on Instagram. It won’t just boost your reach, but in addition to that, it will also help you to build brand faster. There’s no point of investing in Instagram paid marketing at first. So start your journey with organic effort, and according to your marketing budget, you can consider investing in Instagram paid marketing in the future.

 SEO

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the search engine ranking of a site. By optimizing your website, you will be able to boost the search engine visibility of your website, which will help you to drive more traffic.

If you are not confident about your SEO skills, then you should consider hiring a professional company. Almost all the digital marketing companies in Johannesburg offer SEO services to their clients. You can hire one such company to boost the SEO ranking of your site.

Email Marketing

This is the most effective outbound digital marketing technique that helps businesses to target more customers. If you want to accelerate your sales, then email marketing is the best option that you should try.

Blogging

This is the secret weapon of digital marketing. Through better blogging, you will be able to educate your customers and promote your brand story. These two things will help you to generate more leads and enable you to boost your sales.

These are the five best digital marketing elements that you need to add in your marketing mix in order to reach more customers and generate more leads.

Insights on the Importance of 4 Vital Digital Marketing Channels

A large number of entrepreneurs from all across the globe are investing in digital marketing, which could be loosely defined as a procedure for promoting products and services over the internet.

Apart from driving huge traffic, it can also enhance conversion rates, pave the way for high revenues, builds brand reputation, and thus help any organization reach unimaginable heights of prosperity. 

Well, the following write-up has jotted down the names of six digital marketing channels, which gained immense importance in 2019. Peek into the discussion to check them out right now.

1.Website-

A website is considered a digital front door of businesses. Besides obviously being aesthetically appealing, or in other words, capable enough to captivate everybody’s attention, it must successfully represent your viewpoints. To increase effectiveness, carry out the steps stated below.

• Audit a website’s overall performance. Top-notch specialists working in web design company Durban and even in other places suggest that doing so detect even most minor errors.
• Test interface to see if consumers can find important pages such as ‘About Us,’ ‘Contact Us,’ etc. easily.
• Use analytics for assessing why a sales funnel is not working properly or why it requires improvement. 

2.mail-

Email marketing is perhaps the best way of interacting with the targeted audience or informing them about exclusive deals, discounts, product launches, etc. This tactic is complex, but when implemented with maximum caution, it escalates earnings to a great extent. Three things to keep in mind when sending emails are:

• Being personal always help. You should fabricate news about your business in a way that consumers are convinced quickly.
• Try not writing long monotonous paragraphs as, to be honest, no one has time to read them.
• Never neglect the subject line because it provides users a definite reason to click.

3.Social Media-

Social media plays a major role in the ever-expanding digital marketing landscape. Contemporary consumers depend upon platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, etc. when looking out for brands.

• Social medial also provides entrepreneurs the incredible opportunity to establish a powerful community or a customer base. Even though there is a lot to cover, few vital things to remember include:
• Instead of concentrating on sales, you must try building relationships. Talk with your targeted audience enthusiastically so that they can trust your business.
• Be as transparent as possible. Upload pictures of your workplace and team and handle criticisms calmly.
• Select a social media platform that can fulfill the specific needs of your business in a seamless manner.

4.Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Content-

Finally, yet importantly, post informative blogs, articles, press releases, etc., which can engross viewers for a prolonged period. Proper content marketing lets your business appear on the foremost pages of Google, Yahoo, Bing, and other major search engines, thus, reach larger segments of the population without any hassle. 

If an entrepreneur does not know how exactly he or she can take advantage of the channels stated above, seeking professional assistance seems mandatory. From among diverse options available, the digital marketing companies in Johannesburg are believed to be best.

Owing to treasuring skilled designers, developers, strategists, programmers, and writers, it has satisfied a wider base of clientele until now. However, before arriving at a final decision, make sure to conduct comprehensive research, and seek specialized recommendations.

4 Tips to Follow When Hiring an Online Marketing Agency

Be it business giants or small scale enterprise, most of the businesses rely upon online marketing agencies. The internet is the hotbed of competition. In this competitive world, it is almost intimidating to endure in the market without leveraging digital marketing solutions.

With the massive demand for online marketing services, thousands of companies have evolved all across the world. It gets extremely difficult to choose the best pick from the lot. Here are the tips you should follow before hiring an online marketing agency, Johannesburg, or your preferred location.

•    Think About Your Business Goals

Before proceeding further, you need to think about your business goals. Once you understand your goals, you will be able to tell the experts of digital marketing company about your expectations. Professionals can make online marketing strategies when they know about your business goals and expectations.

• Understand Your Target Audience

The internet is undoubtedly one of the biggest platforms. Online marketers use this platform to achieve their business goals. But they often fail because they either collapse to make unique strategies or they do not understand what their target audience wants. Experts in digital marketing companies help you to understand who your potential clients are and what they want.

• Get A Clear Idea Of Digital Marketing Services

From a reliable internet marketing company, you can expect the following services,

•        Website Design:

You need to build a fully functional and customized website which acts as a virtual spokesman. Consult the professionals who offer solutions regarding web design in Cape Town or your preferred location. Here are the things you need to consider when designing a website- page loading speed, SEO friendly, mobile-friendly, customized, and responsive.

·       SEO:

Search engine optimization is a process of bringing a certain website or webpages on the higher position of the list in search engine result pages. SEO professionals help you to drive web traffic by cutting edge SEO solutions. Local SEO helps to improve ranking based on local searches.

·     SMM:

Social media marketing strategies play a crucial role in acquiring a strong position in the social media platform. SMM services include finding the right platform, social media monitoring, and content development strategy.

·   PPC: Pay per click management is a unique process of creating and maintaining advertising campaigns. PPC aims to drive the maximum traffic to your website. 

•     Ask Them For A Framework

What is the marketing framework? It might sound difficult to understand the concept for a person with no knowledge about digital marketing. Marketing framework is all about making a strategic plan of action. Marketing framework involves the followings-

·         Making marketing goals

·         Deciding the tools which are going to be used

So, follow the given tips and experience business growth within a short time. Choose your digital marketing company wisely so that you get optimum services and customized solutions. Conduct thorough research and pick up the right one.

Hiring a Website Designer: Five Vital Characteristics to Consider

Even though it might seem easy, designing a fully functional website, which can impress viewers beyond geographical boundaries, escalate sales, and establish credibility of an organization in ever-expanding digital landscape, is quite challenging. While a few take things into their own hand, I personally feel seeking assistance from a professional to be more viable.

When hiring a website designer, you must carry out thorough research, rely on specialized recommendations, and look out for below-mentioned characteristics under all circumstances. Not doing so can unfortunately pave way for disastrous outcome, wasting your precious time as well as hard-earned money in the process.

•  Great Listeners

According to professionals working in a top SEOagency Johannesburg, there is nothing better than catching hold of somebody, who listens and clearly comprehends your business objectives. Even if an entrepreneur does not talk much, great designers would find out what they want or need by asking plenty questions.

•  Respect Client’s Ideas

Rather than imposing insights, an ideal website designer would hear out a client’s ideas, and try fabricating strategies accordingly. If you see a professional belittling your understanding and opposing whatever you have to say, do not select him or her at any cost. Without mutual respect and fellow feeling, desirable results are not possible.  

•  Expansive Portfolio

Top-notch experts working for website designcompanies in Durban have asked entrepreneurs to never put their reputation at stake by contacting an amateur. No matter how talented he or she is, experience in concerned industrial niche matters a lot.

Portfolios do not necessarily have to be flashy but they must clearly manifest names of clients with whom a designer has worked in past. It could also specify accolades received and positive reviews published. All of this would help you gauge levels of proficiency in absolutely no time.

• Profound Knowledge in Internet and Other Different Technologies

Best website designers obviously know exactly how internet can be used for a business’s advantage. They are also well-versed in executing multimedia, creating graphics, constructing layouts in CSS, and coding in HTML. Now isn’t that simply amazing? Thorough acquaintance with emerging trends such as three dimension illustration, iconoclastic styles, fluid/organic elements, retro aesthetic, etc. is also mandatory.

• Reasonable Contract

Well-known providers offering quality services of WordPressweb design Johannesburg has satisfied plenty clients probably because they drew up very reasonable contracts. Walk away from a professional right away if he or she asks you to sign an agreement, which does not stipulate payment, deadline, refund, contingencies during unforeseen problems, etc.

If a website designer possesses all five characteristics stated above, please schedule appointment with him or her unhesitatingly.

Top-Rated Reasons to Use WordPress for Business Websites

Most of the businesses and startups are not aware of the utility rather the power of WordPress. They are clueless about the fact why people enforce using WordPress for developing business websites. 

To add little information for the readers, more than 60.3% websites gets power from WordPress, and in total it accumulates 30.2% of all the websites available over the web.  

In case the testimonial was not enough, let me give another fact some of the leading brands in the world use WordPress. Facebook News, MTV, TechCrunch, Vogue are some to name a few. 

To know more about the efficacy of WordPress and why businesses should consider using the most popular and user-friendly CMS, you need to go through the post. 

• WP is Free

WordPress, the world’s leading and popular CMS system, is free and you can install it on any given website. When you choose for WordPress website design Cape Town or from other location, the overall process becomes cost-effective. The best thing is that the maintenance and upkeep are comparatively cheap as businesses can do it on their own whenever they need to update the content. 

• Ready for Search Engine Optimization

WP is SEO friendly. WP-powered sites have constant and simple codes that help them to turn out to be an ideal option for Google indexing. All the SEO components for different pages are easy to customise, and this helps to get full control for the pages you need to rank higher on the SERP. In other words, businesses can focus on their SEO campaigns, especially for high converting pages. 

• Responsive Web Design

With a tremendous rise in the mobile traffic that has already surpassed the normal desktop traffic, the necessity of responsive web design is no longer an option, but it is a must-have factor for every website. Using WP themes for web development Cape Town, users already have the perks of responsive web technology without developing separate websites for different devices. 

• Easy to Use

The user interface of WP is extremely intuitive and easy to use. In the beginning, it might feel little daunting as it doesn’t spend millions of dollars on marketing and advertising purposes. Moving beyond the sparingly designed interface, you will realize that WordPress is extremely easy to use.

The best thing is that users can have the access and can edit everything that needs to have from the WordPress CMS. Above all, it has got innumerable plugins that make it extremely easy for web developers to get things as per their convenience. 

With all such benefits, it remains no doubt that WordPress is an ideal choice for powering and creating business websites. Feel free to seek professional help from the large community of WordPress designers and developers to make the efforts worthy. 

5 Benefits of Using Wordpress for Your Website Design

Several blogging platforms have come and gone, but not the WordPress. Since, its inception from the year 2003, it has transformed itself from a simple blogging site to the most accepted open-source web development platform. It is the widely used CMS that is used in these days by most of the website developers and designers around the world. As per the Yoast data, it accounts about 30% of the newly built websites. 

The reputed publications like the New York Times and CNN, the popular music icons like the Jay-Z and Katy Perry to the top-notch companies like the UPS and the eBay use WordPress for designing and developing the website. Almost all the website designers providing the services of web design in Durban as well as in other places of the world suggest using WordPress for various reasons, like-

1. Wordpress Is Affordable

Thanks to WordPress, gone are the days where you have to spend all your bank balance to create a unique website for you. WordPress website design and development is quite affordable as compared to other CMS available. The maintenance cost is less too. You do not require calling the website designer every time you require updating your WordPress website. 

2. Search Engine Friendly

WordPress is SEO-friendly. The websites that are made on WordPress have simple coding that makes them best for the Google indexing. When designing your website on WordPress, you can able to customise your page that you want to index higher in search engines. 

3. Wordpress Helps in Making a Responsive Website

The mobile traffic had surpassed the normal desktop traffic from the year 2014, responsive website is not the option, but it is necessary. When you use WordPress for website designing, you can automatically make the website responsive, without the need to make different websites for different devices. 

4. Increased Site Security

There was a myth regarding WordPress is that it had poor security. However, the myth is debunked. As long you choose WordPress for designing and developing your website, you can fortify that your website is secured and it is hacking-proof. Though, the same cannot be said for the traditional websites. 

5. You Can Update Your Site Anywhere

If you want to include the new theme to your WordPress site, you can do it anytime and anywhere without the requirement of the professionals. You require having access to the internet. This is one of the reasons why the professionals prefer using WordPress web design in Johannesburg or anywhere around the world. 

These are some of the benefits of using the WordPress for developing and designing your website. If you are eager to make your site, you can also choose WordPress as it is the best CMS for far.