Tag Archives: Website Design

Using Shopify Themes for Your Website Design

Shopify Website Design
Category: Tips and Tricks
January 31, 2019
In our previous post about Shopify we discussed how it’s popularity was due to the 3 main reasons being the following:
    • Shopify gives you the power to create and personally customize your own E-commerce store  
 
    • Shopify allows you the ability to sell your product/service online in many different areas whether it’s mobile, social media, web, pop-up shops etc… 
 
  • Shopify allows you to manage products, payments, shipping etc…
In this post on Shopify we will be placing a special focus in particular on Shopify Design and designing your website with a Shopify theme.  Shopify’s theme store contains hundreds of professional website designs to choose from when picking a theme for your new website. Many of Shopify’s themes have actually been previously designed by world renowned professional graphic designers. Choosing a Shopify web design theme means you can get a great visually beautiful web design without paying the higher price that a custom made bespoke web design would cost you. 2Cubed have experts who are experienced with working with Shopify’s web designs and themes and incorporating them into the end product of a great website design. As Shopify is such a designer friendly platform it allows our expert graphic designer the ability to have full uninhibited control over the complete visual look and feel of your website, this means that our graphic designer will be able to perfectly bring your vision to life as they have the freedom to do so thanks to Shopify. To find out more about getting your website designed through using a Shopify theme web design please Contact 2Cubed today! You can also contact us on 01 905 8114 or 051-440425, email hello@2cubed.ie Please feel free to follow and interact with us on the following profiles. facebook icon twitter icon linkedin icon Instagram icon Google+ icon

Shopify – Custom Design, Reskin & Templates

Shopify for Ecommerce Websites - website ecommerce design wexford
Category: Tips and Tricks
December 10, 2018
Shopify is a complete commerce platform that lets you start, grow, and manage a business. Shopify is completely cloud-based and hosted, which means you don’t have to worry about upgrading or maintaining software or web servers. This gives you the flexibility to access and run your business from anywhere with an internet connection. Shopify has become so popular due to 3 main reasons:
    1. It allows you the ability to Create and customize an online store 
    2. It gives you the opportunity to sell in multiple places, including web, mobile, social media, online marketplaces, brick-and-mortar locations, and pop-up shops 
    3. It allows you to manage products, inventory, payments, and shipping
In the past when websites wished to set up an ecommerce element they had no choice but to use the designs that the ecommerce software they were using offered unless they had the budget to hire a designer and a programmer to code to make the online shop look unique and stand out. As most businesses did not have this budget they were stuck with having a very visually restrictive and uniformed look that every other website had. Thankfully things have changed alot since those days and nowhere is this more prevalent than with Shopify. With Shopify you can choose from a whole library of unique themes that are well designed and contain beautiful pre-made design themes for your ecommerce website. You can rest assured that any theme that you select from Shopify’s theme store is of great quality. This is because all themes that are in shopify’s theme store are all rigorously evaluated firstly by the whole shopify team. Shopify themes are very flexible and customisable and are suitable for all budgets. This is what makes shopify so special as unlike the old days you no longer need a huge budget to have a unique and beautifully designed online shop on your website.   In terms of doing custom design and reskins on shopify there is a lot of debate on whether one should customise further or just use one of the existing shopify themes as they are so uniquely designed anyways that further customisation is not required to make it look visually unique and different from the rest. Three main reasons why you shouldn’t over customise your Shopify theme are the following:
  • It’s usually not necessary
Most times when users want to make changes that require customization it’s because they want to change a visual aspect on the website. While making little visual changes here and there may be nice to do the bottom line is that these types of little visual changes usually have very little if any real impact on the actual online shop when it comes to sales etc..
  • It’s expensive
While it’s true that Shopify is very affordable and offers themes that suit all budgets, when one starts to get in the customization end of things of their purchased theme they can see costs rise. Even simple customization can see costs inflate. The main reason Shopify was created was to provide to small and medium sized businesses with the opportunity to have a unique designed template for an online shop for their ecommerce website so that they can launch with a working website.
  • You can always customize later
The most important thing with any website is that it is actually successful, therefore if it’s an ecommerce website the main goal is obviously to sell as much products as possible to make the website and the business commercially sustainable. By first placing your focus and the majority of your efforts on ensuring that your online shop and website actually sells well rather than worrying about tweaking and fine tuning visual elements you will be much more likely to build a successful and sustainable ecommerce website. Only when your website is successful and running well should you begin to start looking at customization. The bottom line is that Shopify is an excellent commerce platform that lets you start, grow, and manage a business. If your business is small or medium sized or even just has a limited budget, then selecting one of the themes off of Shopify themes for the online store on your ecommerce website makes perfect sense for you. When you have got your website established and your shop is performing well then would be a good time to look at customization if you wish to have a visual overhaul of the website. To find out more about website design Contact 2Cubed today! You can also contact us on 01 905 8114 or 051-440425, email hello@2cubed.ie

Website Redesign or Website Reskin?

Website Redesign or Reskin
Category: Tips and Tricks
November 28, 2018
There comes a point for every website when they are faced with a crossroads. The website may have been around for awhile, it may have become outdated and stale or perhaps it simply just isn’t performing like it use to anymore. It’s at this point where you the website owner will have to make a decision on how to rejuvenate and breathe new life into your website so it will hopefully perform well again. It’s at this point where you will decide whether your website needs a reskin or a complete overall website redesign. Think of your website as a house, sometimes a house simply needs a fresh coat of paint to improve it however if the issues are deeper, simply painting over the cracks won’t solve the issues in the long term and thus a reconstruction would be required, your website acts much the same. A full website redesign refers to overhauling all, or nearly all, of the code and look of a website and would generally require a lot of programming work to give the website a brand new distinguishable look. Using the house metaphor from earlier, in this case, by doing a full website redesign we would be tearing down the old house and building a brand new improved one in its place. A website refresh (commonly known as a website reskin) is akin to as we mentioned before giving your house a fresh coat of paint to improve its overall look and make it more appealing. A website reskin is a way to change things on your website without doing a complete overhaul with the time and money involved in a website redesign. The huge difference between a website redesign and a website reskin is that a website reskin won’t necessarily change your website’s core functionality at all but it will give it a new look so with a reskin you are changing the external aspect of the website so visually it’s different but the internal remains the same whereas with a website redesign the external and the internal both change drastically. When you are deciding on whether you should have your website redesigned or re skinned there are a few factors in particular you should take into account such as:
  • Budget
A website reskin is generally always less expensive than a full website redesign as the time involved is less. Sometimes a website only needs a reskin instead of a complete redesign but this is something you need to be sure of because if you pay for a reskin and then a complete redesign 6 months later it was a waste as you should have just went straight for the redesign.
  • Time
The time involved in doing a full comprehensive website redesign would require a lot more time and effort than just a reskin therefore since a website redesign will take more time than a reskin it will come down to budget as more hours will equal more cost. If time and budget is too much of an issue for you then a reskin may be a more fitting option for you than a full redesign.
  • Security
As well as budget and time, the security of your website can also be a mitigating factor in your choice to do a reskin or redesign. When your security is poor on a website you can experience a whole host of issues such as slow load times, errors and even risk of viruses all which will drive customers away. Often these issues can be easily solved and rectified through correctly and efficiently òptimising the existing code and content and through the use of free tools and plugins such as malware scanning, setting up firewalls etc.. However if the actual platform that the website itself is running on is an insecure or unstable platform then in this case doing a full complete website redesign and enhancing or changing the website platform would be the best course of action. It is generally recommended that a website goes under a full website redesign every 2-3 years and a reskin or refresh every year or so. By implementing consistent website redesigns and reskins this will ensure that your website will always look modern, user friendly and will help increase success for your business. To find out more about getting your website redesigned or re-skinned Contact 2Cubed today! You can also contact us on 01 905 8114 or 051-440425, email hello@2cubed.ie Please feel free to follow and interact with us on the following profiles. facebook icon twitter icon linkedin icon Instagram icon Google+ icon

SEO Performance – How to tell if your SEO is working for you or against you

SEO Performance
Category: Tips and Tricks
September 25, 2018
In the aggressive and competitive online market of today, Effective SEO has often proven to be the deciding factor for whether a website becomes successful or not. With so much knowledge nowadays about SEO virtually all websites are employing it in one shape or another as gaining high ranking positions on the SERP (Search Engine Results Page) has become more competitive than ever before. However this being said not all SEO was created equal as many are not utilising it to its full potential either through laziness or simple ignorance of what is required from them to employ effective SEO optimisation throughout their respective websites. So how can someone who is doing SEO for their website know if they are doing it correctly or not you may ask? As for so many cases the proof is in the pudding!  A great way to figure out if your SEO work has been effective or ineffective is to gauge it off metrics which can often be found through channels and tools such as google analytics, Moz etc. Below are four great metrics to measure your SEO success or lack thereof against: Keyword Ranking Keyword Ranking is something you should always be tracking regularly. Keyword rankings let you know how your website is performing on the SERP on google and if its appearing high for key search phrases related to your business. By improving these rankings you will have an increased flow of traffic to your website which will increase your chances of getting more conversions on your website. There is no particular trick to ranking high for keywords as google’s algorithm is ever-evolving and as such this means that there is no exact way to predict how well your website will perform in the rankings. It is a case of constantly checking and amending your strategy as needed. Organic Search Traffic Organic Search Traffic is the amount of natural traffic you get to the website. Effective use of SEO can improve your SEO performance in many ways. Three particular ways to improve your organic traffic are as follows:
  • By improving your ranking position on the SERP, as such you will be viewed more and have more traffic to your website.
  • By improving meta titles and meta descriptions users will now be more likely to click and interact with your content thus increasing your organic traffic.
  • Creating more content means that not only will your website have fresh content being applied to it which shows it’s an active and very alive website but also having new content gives you the opportunity to target new keywords and opportunities to earn visibility.
Online Conversion Rate What’s considered a “healthy” Online Conversion Rate tends to vary wildly depending on the industry. Conversions should always be a measurable event that can be tied to revenue. The actual conversion rate itself is comprised of the percentage of website visitors that complete a conversion. Generally speaking a conversion rate of 1.5%-3% is considered quite good. Effective SEO will help to drive traffic to your website and from there your website should be optimized to be able to convert these visitors into leads and conversions. Effective SEO is half the battle, having an optimized responsive website is the second part. If you can do both of these things effectively you should be able to see the results in your improved conversion rate. Bounce Rate Bounce Rate is the percentage of traffic that leaves your website quickly after landing on it without looking at any other pages before they leave. Bounce Rate can be a useful barometer in which to gauge how effective or not your SEO is as bounce rate can indicate how accurate the page is targeted towards visitors who are interested in that type of content or indeed in your business and if a page has a high bounce rate it can usually be a signal that something is inherently wrong with that web page whether it’s the content or the design of the page that seems to be frustrating customers so much that they bounce. Some pages can actually be expected to have high bounce rates such as pages which act more as a general reference for information such as a calendar or blog post for example. Of course bounce rates for key pages such as a homepage or services page should be lower. A bounce rate of 35%-60% is considered the industry standard average. If your page has a high bounce rate and it’s a key page for you then it’s time for you to reevaluate the SEO on that page and possibly the design also to ensure you are delivering the best user experience possible. By using these four metrics to measure your SEO success you will have a good idea of just how effective your SEO efforts have been and whether they have borne fruit or not. The information gleaned from these metrics will help you to alter your SEO strategy accordingly to meet your goals. SEO is a constant battle, by doing well in these four metrics you will definitely be in a position to win the fight! 2Cubed work with clients on a monthly basis, content writing/management and marketing are two of the many services we offer. To improve SEO ranking through effective marketing and have produced excellent results for many businesses, we help clients to get them to number one for their specific keywords. To help provide the best SEO service, 2Cubed also has an in-house web content writer who will work with you to customize and optimize your content, making it fit your brand identity and corporate voice, as well as maximizing impact on search engines. We will ensure that your content is unique and tailored for search engines so that your website has the best possible chance of reaching and expanding your audience. We provide reports and strategic plans assessing search result performance, working diligently to improve your company’s search engine optimization so that it continues to climb Google rankings on a regular basis. To find out the right move and strategy to take when it comes to effective SEO please contact 2Cubed today! Please feel free to contact us also on 01 905 8114 or 051-440425, email hello@2cubed.ie Please feel free to follow and interact with us on the following profiles. facebook icon twitter icon linkedin icon Instagram icon Google+ icon

Why your website urgently needs an SSL Certificate now!

SSL Certificate
Category: News
July 16, 2018
Does your website have an SSL Certificate? If the answer to this question is no then the success of your website is at serious risk! Google will flag your website from next month (August 2018) if you have not gotten an SSL Certificate. At the start of 2018 Google announced in its Speed Update set to roll out in July, that it will mark all sites that have not migrated to HTTPS as “not secure.” This change has been brought in by google whose main goal is to ensure their users can safely and securely browse and purchase on the internet. As nowadays people turn to the internet for virtually everything ensuring that users can trust it to be safe is of paramount importance. Online security like having an SSL Certificate is no longer just a good option for a website to have, it’s a necessity. An SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) is the standard security technology for establishing an encrypted link between a web server and a browser. This link ensures that all data passed between the web server and browsers remain private and integral. If you don’t have the SSL certificate, a secure connection cannot be established, that means, your company information will not be digitally connected to a cryptographic key. When google made this announcement they made it clear and sent a stark warning that if your website does not have an SSL Certificate your website will be marked as not secure in the url bar when people access it. This will of course have a detrimental effect on any website who is branded as such as virtually no user will proceed onto the site as they have lost all trust and they certainly will not buy anything in fear of their card details being used and abused. Websites that have any kind of text input will need an SSL Certificate, If you are unsure whether your website needs an SSL Certificate (Chances are it does) just ask yourself the following two questions: Does your website have forms or functions that require text to be inputted such as: Contact forms, Search Bars, Logins etc..? Is your website on HTTP://? If your answer to these questions is a resounding yes then you need to install an SSL Certificate. If you don’t implement SSL soon, your visitors will see a “Not Secure” warning on visiting your site which will damage your sites reputation irrevocably and will also cause your business to suffer. To inquire about getting an SSL Certificate for your website to stop it being marked as non-secure please get in touch today! Please feel free to follow and interact with us on the following profiles. facebook icon twitter icon linkedin icon Instagram icon Google+ icon

Content may be King, but Marketing is the Queen

Website Content and Marketing
Category: Tips and Tricks
July 3, 2018
A common saying in SEO circles is “Content is king, but marketing is queen, and runs the household.” Just like any good couple one can’t survive without the other and both help each other to succeed. Without marketing your content no matter how good it may be will never be noticed. Likewise if you don’t have enough good quality content then what are you going to advertise and promote in your marketing? Content and Marketing are both equally as important as each other. It’s vital that anyone wishing to be successful makes sure that great content is paired with a great marketing strategy, never sacrifice or prioritize one over the other, both are equally important and should always be treated with this respect. Great content is king as people want to see something new that catches their attention when browsing the internet, Writing content in your own words with your own ideas ensures that your content is different and unique to you and this will be appreciated by users and the search engine itself when it comes to ranking. Also with great content you are more likely to get new and returning visitors to your site. While you’re producing great content be sure to optimize it efficiently so that it will see a jump in the rankings on the SERP (Search Engine Results Page), when optimizing it make sure that your priority is that it reads well for users and gives them a great user experience, this is key. I can’t stress enough to not make the mistake of trying to over optimize your page just for search engines and not have the user experience in mind, this can be called trying to use blackhat methods and it will not work, in fact it will have an adverse effect on your ranking and your content will suffer, do not abuse the system with things such as keyword stuffing etc… Marketing is queen because in today’s market you need both marketing and content working efficiently to be successful. While it’s of course great to have dozens of great quality well written articles, it isn’t enough in itself to rank highly, there is still another step required, which is of course the queen: Marketing. Some great marketing techniques that can be used are as follows:
  • Writing articles on blogs and making sure to link to your other content 
  • Be active on social media because you can funnel a huge amount of traffic from social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Google+ and Google My Business. 
  • Have back-links and anchor text throughout your site to encourage further navigation and increase average session duration
In this article we established the power couple that is the king of content and queen of marketing and how both are as equally important and provide the most success when both are utilized successfully. Just like a game of chess, the king and queen are the most important parts, while you won’t win the game in your first, second or third move, if you use both effectively and make the right strategic moves and be patient your chance will come and you will see positive results, every game starts with the first move, make sure yours is the right one! To find out the right move and strategy to take when it comes to content and/or marketing please contact 2Cubed today! 2Cubed work with clients on a monthly basis, content writing/management and marketing are two of the many services we offer. To improve SEO ranking through effective marketing and have produced excellent results for many businesses, we help clients to get them to number one for their specific keywords. To help provide the best SEO service, 2Cubed also has an in-house web content writer who will work with you to customize and optimize your content, making it fit your brand identity and corporate voice, as well as maximizing impact on search engines. We will ensure that your content is unique and tailored for search engines so that your website has the best possible chance of reaching and expanding your audience. We provide reports and strategic plans assessing search result performance, working diligently to improve your company’s search engine optimization so that it continues to climb Google rankings on a regular basis. Please feel free to follow and interact with us on the following profiles. facebook icon twitter icon linkedin icon Instagram icon Google+ icon

Local SEO

LOCAL SEO AGENCY WEXFORD
Category: Tips and Tricks
June 29, 2018
Local SEO is an element of SEO which differs quite a lot to the standard SEO process people think of. Local search results also change more rapidly than any other type. National, international etc… Before you start your targeting your local SEO campaign there is some prep work you should make sure you have done, by having this done beforehand it will maximise your chances for success and getting the best results possible so you will rank high within the local listings. There are six things in particular that you should have done before launching your local SEO campaign and they are the following: Have a working Google My Business Page Set Up It’s important that in order to have a strong presence on google that you have set up your Google My Business page. Once you have set it up, you should make sure it includes the following elements:
  • A long, unique description that’s formatted correctly and includes links.
  • Choose the correct and appropriate categories for your business.
  • Upload as many photos as possible onto your google my business page of your business
  • Add a local phone number
  • Add your business address that’s consistent with that on your website and local directories.
  • Upload a high-resolution profile image and cover photo.
  • Add your opening times/days
  • Have real reviews from customers
Optimize all of your landing pages with local keyword data Your landing page is the most important page on your website as it is the first impression a user gets of your website. You should make sure this page is optimized with the correct keywords. A good idea is to incorporate the page with some particular keywords which you think users will use to search with. Ensure your NAP listings remain consistently across the web NAP stands for Name, Address, and Phone Number. NAP is critical for businesses wishing to rank well in the local organic search results, because search engines like Google take the data into account when determining which companies to show for their searches. This becomes even more important for Local SEO. You need to ensure that you have your full NAP across your whole website (i.e. every page). Furthermore, you must use the exact same details/format when you mention your address on other websites (i.e. local citations). You should also use Schema.org markup on your NAP to give the search engines all they need to display your company information properly. Generate genuine reviews from your customers on Google and Yelp Local reviews will have a direct impact on your local search rankings, it’s pivotal that you try and gain as many real genuine ones as possible so you’ll want to spend some time acquiring them. Whilst there are many types of reviews from different platforms for now I would advise to focus on getting as many google reviews as possible. Optimize your search engine snippets Google Featured Snippets are very search friendly and they help users to get answers without having to click any pages. By making sure to optimize your search engine snippets you will increase your chances further for ranking as high as possible in the search rankings. Focus on localized link building When you are doing a local SEO campaign it is extremely important that you have done effective link building. Unlike traditional national SEO, Local SEO places a lot more importance on gaining links from other local websites that are relevant to your business and industry. National SEO places a greater importance on gaining as many links as possible from high authority websites and whilst of course that is still something to aim for, with Local SEO the links from websites local to you are what is the most important! Please feel free to follow and interact with us on the following profiles. facebook icon twitter icon linkedin icon Instagram icon Google+ icon

Do I Need a New Website?

Web Design UX - Web Design Wexford
Category: Tips and Tricks
February 20, 2018
The whole point of having a website is to inform site users about your product, brand or service while leading them down the sales funnel in the process. However, far too many companies fall into the trap of launching their website and subsequently ignoring it, failing to engage with site users, letting its content become stagnant and in some cases, harm their brand image. In its current guise, does your website generating sales and enquiries? If the answer is ‘No’ or, ‘I’m not sure’ then it’s time to take a look at redesigning your online presence. 2Cubed specialise in producing fully bespoke Web Designs for clients based in Dublin and beyond. Experts in WordPress & Magento Development, we take our clients ideas for their brands and make them an online reality.

Is your website mobile optimised?

Websites that have not been designed to effectively display on mobile devices should be consigned to the annals of history. Mobile traffic has seen double digit growth since 2009, rising to just over 50% in 2017 and any company that fails to adjust their online approach to accommodate this growth in traffic runs the risk of alienating more than half of their target market and being left in their competitors wake in the process.

Have You Switched From HTTP to HTTPS?

Https isn’t just for online shops anymore. This is due to the fact that Google have recently strengthened their stance on the importance of site security with the presence of HTTPS singling out a sites security level to Google’s ranking algorithm. Sites that fail to change over from http to https are being hit with reductions in their Google Search Result Page ranking as can be seen in the fact that more than 75% of results on page one of Google Search Results consist of HTTPS sites.

Is Your User Experience Up To Scratch?

User Experience, or UX is the invogue buzzword in contemporary web design. In the past few years we have become more and more accustomed to making use of the internet on a daily basis. As such, our expectations of functionality and user experience have increased and sites that don’t meet our expectations won’t be long seeing their traffic numbers fall. Does your current site take an eternity to fully load? Is a long winded sales journey causing you to hemorrhage potential customers? Are site users engaging with your content? Sites that experience a high level of engagement while providing a high standard of user experience (UX) will be similarly rewarded with an improvement in their SERP positioning. First and foremost, visitors must be able to find their desired product and complete a purchase in as few clicks as possible. Simplifying the customer journey will help reduce your bounce rate and help push site users down the sales funnel. Engaging, informative and targeted content helps minimise site bounce rate, gives your brand a sense of industry authority in the eyes of site users and is another of those all important signals of competency that Google’s Search Algorithm likes to reward.

Why Choose 2Cubed?

Updating your Web Design with 2Cubed will go a long way to rectifying any and all of these issues.Our in house Graphic Designer will make sure that your newly designed website is bespoke to your preferences and needs while our highly experienced team of developers will ensure that your site remains at the forefront of plug in and security updates. Don’t just take our word for it though, take a look at some of our recent Web Design work for Clients based in Dublin below and if you like what you see, get in touch with us today and take the first steps towards optimising your online presence.