C.R.A.P. (terrible name, infinitely useful) is an initialism which stands for contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity. The term was coined by Robin Williams (author of The Non-Designer’s Design Book: Design and Typographic Principles for the Visual Novice) and has become a basic principle of design. Utilizing the C.R.A.P. principles allows even the most inexperienced amateur designers to avoid the dreaded wall of text and instead create dynamic and attractive web content.

The basics of the C.R.A.P. principles are:

Contrast – Elements that aren’t supposed to be the same should be very different. Making the only slightly different confuses the eye and causes … Continue Reading

I love taking a shower. Not only does the water on my head and body feel good, but it seems to be the ultimate stimulant for getting the brain to think about things I normally do not have time to consider. This morning, I found myself contemplating business relationships. We have spent the last 6 years building a company. Yet many people, who do business with us, consider the person they deal with the company.

A case in point, recently I read a Linked In recommendation … Continue Reading

We get asked this question a lot. Do I really need a website? Why do I need it? When writing up a proposal for a potential client, I found myself answering that very question. Although this argument was for a service based company, it holds true for any industry from retail to industrial.

Dollar for dollar when you consider any other advertising money you spend, an effective website will return more on your investment, but you have to have a web strategy in order to achieve this return. We (NSNA) can help you develop and manage that strategy.

The web … Continue Reading

The very words Trade Show make some small business owners shudder. A Trade Show can take a lot of time and most of the time that’s something a small business owner just doesn’t have. With some careful planning however, a trade show can not only be fun they can be profitable as well.

Here are 10 tips we’ve picked up from attending a lot of shows, not only as vendors but participants as well. They may be basic but the best tips usually are pretty basic.

1. … Continue Reading

Today I was following one of my favorite blogs, and came across an interesting video they did using Google Search Stories. Anyway, I felt that Net Solutions needs their own search story…to well…tell our story!

Social Media Self Test Sure there are more tests than you can shake a stick at, but give this one a shot.

• Is your facebook status updated?
• Have you tweeted today?
• Can you “Google” yourself?
• Can Ya “Digg” it?
• Viral means disease or success?

Chances are you if can answer one or more of those questions, you know a little something about social media. Which leads to the question, is their really such a thing as an un-googleable person? Furthermore, if and when there is…would you trust them?

Most business people … Continue Reading

Reasons to Use Domain Based email rather than FREE or ISP based email accounts for your business.

Most of the line items below have been pulled from other locations on the web. This post is designed to put all the nuggets of information we felt were valuable in one place. In some cases we took editorial liberty over the comment.

• With mass-market e-mail accounts, including MSN Hotmail, AOL! Email, Google GMail and Yahoo! Mail users share their e-mail domains (e.g., “@hotmail.com,” “@msn.com,” “@aol.com,” “@gmail,” “@comcast.com”, “@qwest.com”, “@verizon.com,” “@yahoo.com, ” etc.) with millions of other users, which makes it impossible to … Continue Reading
  

I get asked questions like this all the time. The simple answer is: “Maybe you don’t.” If you are comfortable doing what you are doing and your business is meeting it’s growth projections, you may not. But, consider this; if you are not growing or you are tired of advertising that is becoming less and less productive and more and more expensive, then a website is your most effective least expensive marketing vehicle next to a business card.

Let’s face it. If you do not have a business card and a business phone today. How serious are you really, about being … Continue Reading

Only a couple more hours until we teach our first Websites 401 class. I am really looking forward to this class tonight as it will get real people working on our applications. We’ll be able to see just how easy they really are to use and get good feedback from the public. It is going to be a small group tonight, probably only 6 or 7 attendees but that will allow us to give more personal attention to everyone there. I’ll post again after the class with feedback on how it goes.

Signing out for now.

Patrice

A Favicon (short for “favorites icon”) is a small 16×16 square icon that displays to the left of your URL in the internet browser window. Favicons are an important part of branding your website. A Favicon helps visually identify your site to new and returning users, and contributes to a sophisticated, professional look. A Favicon will also make your page stand out in a cluttered “favorites” folder. Your logo used as a Favicon will quickly become synonymous with your product.

The Favicon feature was developed by Microsoft and became a part of Internet Explorer from version 5.0 onward. Other … Continue Reading