Category: Help Us Build Your Site

Friday, 08 July 2011 15:42

We really like the Joomla templates that Rockettheme.com makes, so much so that we buy a yearly membership to their template club and use them in 99% of my projects.

If Cybersalt is working on developing a web site for you then you've probably been sent here to pick out a template to be used as a base template for your site.  Excellent!  Just keep one thing in mind: Rockettheme really loads up its demos with content to demonstrate the great number of module positions in their templates.  So if all the templates look way more busy or cluttered than you have in mind for your site don't worry.  Just concentrate on the colors and styling you are looking for.  From there we'll make it look as busy (or not) as you want it to.

Also, Rockettheme.com is developing some pretty awesome new features for their templates so the newer the template you go with the better!  Of course we'll do what we can with anything you pick out.

No worries!  Here are some basic instructions to help you in your quest.

• First go to the template demo section of the Rockethemes web site: http://demo.rockettheme.com

• Next, locate the drop down bar which is located in the middle top of the page.

• Click on the drop down bar and you'll see a list (by release month) of the available templates to preview.  By selecting any given month, that month's template will be displayed for preview.

• Remember that each Rockettheme Joomla template has a number of preset styles to check out.  Look under the Features menu for a link that will take you to where you can see the styles available.  Once the different styles are displayed you can click on each one for a better look at each.

Category: Help Us Build Your Site

Friday, 08 July 2011 15:41

Yes!

We use templates from RocketTheme for the Joomla sites we build for our clients (we have a membership that lets us do so).  Use the following link to go to their site and check them out and see which template you like the most for your site. Then, let us know which one it is and we'll customize it for you.

One note - the good folks at RocketTheme have their demo templates jam packed with something in every module position.  So don't worry if you think they all look really busy or cluttered.  Yours doesn't have to be that full.  Just look for the colors and basic graphics that you like the best.

Keep in mind too, that each template has a number of different color schemes with it.  You can view them under the "Features > Style Variations" link in each template.

To view the different templates, just use the "month/template name" drop-down at the top of the page at http://demo.rockettheme.com

Category: Help Us Build Your Site

Friday, 08 July 2011 15:41

An excellent question!  When Cybersalt is building a site for you we know how to build it, but there are some things that can only come from you to assist us in setting up a page that is ready for search engines to find your site and refer traffic to it.  Here are a bunch of them.

Site Title

In the very top left corner of your screen (as you read this) you will something that looks like:

Where you read "The Cybersalt Site - Clean Humor, Inspirational Writing, Web Design and Hosting" is where the site title of your site will appear.  Having your site title appear in that location is nice for aesthetics, but your site title plays an even bigger role for your web page.  It is one of the factors that some search engines use in determining whether or not to display your site to people searching for what your site has to offer. For that reason you want to have a title that contains some of the big things that your site is about.  We could have just put "The Cybersalt Site" but the better detail of what we do have means we are more likely to show up in some searches.

So we need you to tell us what your site title should be.  Don't make it too long (there are other things below that allow for more words) but do make a big punch with a few words.

Site Description

If you found coming up with a title was hard because you needed to keep it short, you'll feel better about coming up with your site's description because this time you get to write a whole paragraph.  The site description has become one of the major ways that some of the biggest search engines examine and categorize your site for matching up with the searches that their users are doing.

When you write the description of your site remember to use good grammer, proper capitalization and grammer, and try not to repeat the same words over and over.

For instance:

"The ABC Dog site is dedicated to providing current news and information to help dog lovers.  As loving pet owners, people who care for canines will appreciate our articles on healthy diets for puppy and adult dogs, the do's and don'ts of home grooming and pampering, the medical care of pets, as well as many other dog related topics.  We even have a gallery of funny dog pictures!"

is better than:

"ABC Dog site is about dogs and the stuff dog people want to know.  Laugh at our pictures."

You get the idea.  So, write a paragraph that describes your site and send it to us.

Site Keywords

If you were looking for the information on your site, what phrases would you type into a search engine?  Those words are your keywords.  So if you have a site that sells stuff to boaters in River City your key words might look like the following:

"boats River City British Columbia, River City BC boat repairs"

Again, you get the idea.  Notice that each keyword phrase is separated by a comma and a space.  Google is currently paying no attention to keywords but Bing still does - but only 2 phrases.

Page Description and Keywords

These are the same as their site equivalent above, but this time you are focusing on the content of each individual page on your site.

Get a Gmail.com Address

Gmail is Google's free e-mail site.  People with a gmail.com address have access to some webmaster tools that help Google know that their site exists and that Google should spider it (scan it) so people using Google can find their site.

If you already have a Gmail address, please tell us what it is and your password so we can log in and set your site up with Google.  If sending us your password creeps you out, or if you don't have a Gmail address yet, you can create a new address with Gmail at https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount.