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Clearing Up the Confusion E-Zine Vol 02 Issue 07
------- Clearing Up the Confusion E-Zine -------
Vol 2, Issue 7
As Spring steals over the land, many of us turn toward thoughts
of renewal. It's time to do the Spring cleaning, to open up the
gardens, and to get the lawn mower ready for another season.
Many people also take this time to upgrade materials for their
businesses as well. They make grandiose plans to update their
brochures, make new business cards and especially upgrade their
Web presence.
And that last one can be a real trick if you don't "own" your
website. We'll talk about this problem below.
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In This Issue...
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1. Article: Do You Own Your Website? Are You Sure?, Part 1
2. Blog Posts
3. Shameless Self-Promotion
4. The Fine Print
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1. Article: Do You Own Your Website? Are You Sure?, Part 1
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On more than one occasion I've been called in to chat with a
potential client about a project to upgrade their website.
They're all excited about putting in a new event calendar or
adding a blog feed to their front page. We're all ready to go
when suddenly a roadblock rears up in front of us.
They don't have control of their own website.
When I asked for their access information (username, password,
hosting service, etc) so I could take a look at the underlying
structure of their site, they got a sheepish look on their faces.
"Well, ya see, we have this problem..." -- and it is a problem.
Here are just a few reasons why:
1. You are locked in to one designer. This isn't necessarily a
bad thing. Your current web developer may be a creative person
and they may do a great job. Even the best, though, may not
be able to handle all of your needs. Are you comfortable
enough with your current web developer to tell them you want
to work with an outside source?
2. Worse than #1, you might be locked into the site as it is. If
no one has your access information, then how can you change
the site? This may sound far-fetched, but I've run into this
situation more than once. This usually happens when the
person in charge of the website moves on to other things
(whether they work for your company or not). They may or may
not send you an email with your website provider information
in it. In either case, the information eventually goes
missing and no one knows how to actually login to the server
anymore. This can lead to:
3. Loss of Web presence. For whatever reason, you no longer have
access to your web server. Maybe the information was lost in
a computer crash or staff turnover. Maybe you got into a
fight with your web designer and he is holding out on you.
For whatever reason, you can't make changes to the website any
longer. In this case, sometimes the only thing you can do is
start over again. This means that you might have to get a new
domain name and a new hosting service. You might be able to
retrieve the existing site, but if you've built up any kind of
complexity, you are very likely to lose those advanced
features. Oh, and all that effort you went through in order
to improve your search engine visibility? Gone.
Sounds like a potentially bad situation, right? It could be.
Next time I'll write about some warning signs that you might be
in for trouble in this area.
See you in two weeks!
Copyright 2008, Greg Peters
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2. Blog Posts
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Links to posts on the "Clearing Up the Confusion" Blog from the
last year:
Tuesday, March 04, 2008 -- Google 101
http://clearing-confusion.blogspot.com/2008/03/google-101.html
"I attended an exciting presentation this morning put on by
Google, Friends of CASA, and the NEW Center's npServ program. The
lecture focused on the many benefits of various Google
applications and services for nonprofit organizations. I'll go
into some of the details in a later post, but there were two
tools that I wanted to mention right away, just in case anyone
reading this might have use of them...."
Sunday, March 02, 2008 -- A View into Google Calendar
http://clearing-confusion.blogspot.com/2008/03/view-into-google-calendar.html
"Those crazy kids at Google have one-upped me. I guess I can't
blame them too much. After all, it's what they do. In this case,
though, they've come up with a relatively simple way to embed a
Google Calendar into a website (or blog, or whatever)...."
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3. Shameless Self-Promotion
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The "Clearing Up the Confusion" E-Zine is a production of Greg
Peters, owner, chief cook, and bottlewasher of Cyber Data
Solutions. CDS has been helping website designers develop better
web presence for their clients for more than a decade. Visit us
on the Web at www.cyberdatasolns.com to see how we can help your
webmaster.
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4. The Fine Print
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