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The First Impression is the Best Impression

by on Jun 19, 2009 (0) Comments

A visitor’s first impression of a website sets the tone for the visitor’s future interactions with the site and with the company.

According to a group of researchers in Canada, you’ve got as little as one twentieth of a second (50 milliseconds) to make a great first impression with your website.

People form their opinions quickly about sites they see, although young people see much more detail in the first brief exposure. Informational content isn’t as important, but those initial impressions last.

According to scientists, people want to be “right” about their initial impressions, so a phenomenon called the halo effect comes into play. Once they get that gut reaction, they look for things that confirm that impression. So when they return to the site, they’ll find things that validate their first feelings.

If they had a good feeling about the site, they’ll return again, find positive things, and will often translate those good feelings into sales.

So what do you need to do with the design to create those positive impressions rather than negative?

Speed: Make sure you site loads quickly and reliably.

Simplicity: People actually recognize and remember sketches more easily and quickly than realistic photos, for example.

Visual Cues: Interesting, good design, good color, good layout, imaginative – these are the words viewers used to describe the websites they found visually appealing.

So what’s the message for you and your business website? First, it doesn’t matter if you have the best product or services in your niche, if your usability is off the charts, or if your customer service is the best around.

A slow-loading or visually poor website can generate initial poor impressions that translate into lost sales. A clean looking, quick loading and professionally designed website, on the other hand, brings visitors in and helps turn them into customers.

Let the professionals at Webdatamation create that ideal website for you. Put their expertise to work and generate great first impressions with a high quality web site.

The new Steroid… for Android

by on Jun 15, 2009 (0) Comments

Let us all admit the fact that the Android is earning quick reps and rave reviews.  The mobile OS from Google is going through an open development phase, thereby making us wait in anticipation for its latest releases and fixes. However, its native file explorer still lacks some basic user friendly features that caught our attention. So we, at Webdatamation, decided to come up with an app that pumps in a lot of added features to the native file explorer of Android.

Meet the all new FileDroid 1.0.18. A file manager from Webdatamation, specifically designed to help you manage your files better, on the Android. With a great user friendly interface, FileDroid adds more value and a nifty set of features to your Android powered phone. Yes, FileDroid is our promise and a gesture of commitment from our development team to the Android fraternity, to develop value added apps for Android enthusiasts.

The first thing that you will notice about FileDroid is its ability to make file management simpler. Basic features like browsing, moving and renaming files that lacked in the native file explorer have been introduced in this app. Moreover, the UI of the native file explorer is not quite instinctive and is a bit unmanageable. We, at Webdatamation have come up with a very simple and friendly UI through this intuitive file manager for Android.

Did you just say, “Big Deal”?

If you are using the Android and you’ve just realized that searching for a file that you downloaded some time back is like finding a needle in a haystack, you would definitely give us brownie points the moment you start to use FileDroid’s search utility. If you would want to use this file more often, you can even place its shortcut on your desktop! You can also sort files by name, size, type and date modified…just suit yourself; we have given enough options!

FileDroid allows you to select multiple files and perform batch/group operations on them, display file extensions, install any application that has files with “.apk” extension stored on the SD Card and directly open general files whose types are associated with any installed application on the Android.

That’s not all! Let’s assume that you’ve just had a laugh over a hilarious video. Why wait to share it with your friends or loved ones? Send it as an email attachment instantly, through FileDroid. Set a ringtone or wallpaper directly while browsing for files, and with the thumbnail view mode, you get to preview a number of photos without individually opening them. You can also directly send xls and doc files by using this app. FileDroid also supports unzipping of basic zipped files (lets not talk about the encrypted files right now).  There’s also a provision in FileDroid that lets you incorporate bug fixes reported by existing users.

Whether the FileDroid has really worked out as a steroid, is what you have to decide. We would love to hear about this app that we have created for you. We, at Webdatamation have always ensured that you get the advantage when it comes to technology.

Think cutting-edge on the Android. Think FileDroid.

The Importance of Web Design

by on Jun 01, 2009 (2) Comments

Simply having a website is not enough in today’s competitive business world. Especially as resources become more limited, it’s important to invest in great web design to attract and keep customers.

Your online presentation is an important aspect of your business, and you want the appearance and functionality of your site to reflect your philosophy and your products in a way that is accessible and easy to use.

Build Trust

Your company website projects an image and an attitude. Really, the business website should be considered a part of your overall marketing campaign. The immediate impression that a visitor gets from your website tells them about your business.

If your site is well organized, well designed, and fully functional, then customers will trust your business and the products you offer. If the website looks amateur or filled with frivolous advertising unrelated to your products, they’ll likely have a negative impression and distrust your business.

Invest in great web design to create the image you want you business to portray.

Ease of Use

Great web designs are also easy to use. Make sure that there are plenty of links that connect customers with important information, and that they can easily get back to where they want to be on your site.

Today’s customers expect high quality, professional design on a website. They do respond to good marketing and great design, and want to be able to navigate around a site easily. They want to find the information, products and services that they need quickly and logically, or they’ll soon be off to find another site.

Functionality

Your website design also needs to be functional. Links need to be active, and the code needs to be complete. Simple coding errors can lead to “broken” websites that can’t be seen by viewers. Even simple things can prompt viewing errors. Not only does this deter customers, but your Google rankings drop with non-functional links.

You want to be sure your ecommerce solution is intuitive, security and functional so that your customers feel comfortable making purchases on your site. Any ease of use functions add to customer satisfaction, and that leads to repeat purchases.

Get Design Expertise

The web designers at Webdatamation know just how to design effective and creative websites that meet customers’ needs. Our designers can add any elements for interaction, information and commerce to make your site both highly attractive and highly functional.

Why Invest in a Website?

by on May 26, 2009 (2) Comments

It’s common to feel that a website isn’t an urgent issue in a business. Sometimes the website is even an afterthought – “Oh, and we ought to have a website, too.”

In today’s business world, however, a having a web presence is a primary consideration for any business of any size, and should be a top priority.

Cost Effective Advertising

By using good search engine optimized copy and a great graphic design, you can attract people to your site, and keep them there. If you have an informative, useful site, other sites will link to it, giving you more free advertising. You can utilize a variety of different online tools such as videos, graphics, interactive games, calculators and photo collections that will help your customers and those who happen upon your site get to know your company and your products.

Building Community Connections

An effective website will help you make connections, both in your online business community and your offline community. When people can find your site easily, quickly learn about your company and what you do, and find a way to contact you, you have made great strides toward becoming integrated into the lives and lifestyle of virtual and actual neighborhoods.

New Means of Communicating with Customers

With a website, you have a simple way to gather information about your clients, such as their email address. Through utilizing this resource, you can direct promotional emails to your clients, run “web only” sales, and send them informational e-newsletters that provide information and promote your products.

Control Over the Message

With a website, you are in complete control over what image your business presents. Particularly for online businesses, you are able to create and preserve and image of your own making in a way that is difficult to do with traditional print advertising. A traditional brick and mortar business can use a website to extend and expand the business image they have tried to form in their store. The consistency will attract and keep customers.

If you aren’t satisfied with your business’s online presence, contact Webdatamation for ideas to fully utilize the online advantage of a business website.

Apps for the Apple iPhone with the iPhone SDK

by on May 13, 2009 (3) Comments

Through thick and thin, patches and updates, Apple has indeed written a new success story for the iPhone. Taking advantage of the iPhone’s success, business organizations are adding their own value added services to its customers, by creating innovative and new iPhone applications. These third party applications have seamlessly integrated with the iPhone OS. In a nutshell, iPhone applications are taking the market by a storm. What is in for you? Well, to answer that, let’s start!

iPhone Dev Center is the place to get started if you are thinking to build your app for the iPhone. Well this news will dishearten you a bit if you have been developing applications on the windows environment. Yes, iPhone elegantly points you out during registration that the iPhone SDK would require an Intel-based Mac running Mac OS X Leopard as a primary technical requirement. So if you have addressed that technical feasibility, I guess the iPhone SDK is all yours for the taking!

Registration will be over after four easy steps. Well, easy almost. After the process is over and that you have logged in, the Dev Center will present you with the iPhone SDK for iPhone OS 2.2.1 (well, that was there when I last accessed. Don’t be surprised if you stumble upon a newer release!). The SDK includes the Xcode IDE (the integrated development environment to code and test your app), an iPhone simulator, including a set of exclusive tools to develop apps for the iPhone and the iPod touch.

The iPhone simulator is quite a handy tool for testing your iPhone app. The software emulates the iPhone on your Mac. Thus you can get a WYSIWYG visualization of the overall look and feel of the app. As far as getting started with developing your first iPhone app is concerned, the Dev Center boasts of a lot of organized resources and featured content that will help you get a hands-on on the coding guidelines to get your app live.

“…and there is nothing called free lunch!” Yes, if you want what Apple has coined as, “a complete process for developing and distributing iPhone or iPod touch applications”, or more commonly, the iPhone developer program, then you might land up paying $99 for a standard program and $299 for an enterprise program.

Power packed with end to end tools for complete development and deployment of applications on the iPhone, the iPhone developer program provides you with the iPhone SDK 3.0 and the iPhone OS 3.0 Beta, but at a price. So when you pay, you get a direct access to over 1000 new APIs that you can use to enhance the functionality of your applications.

Right through development, testing and distribution, the developer program is the right choice for you if you are more inclined towards building robust enterprise apps for the iPhone. If you are more into developing casual apps or widget like mid sized applications, the SDK would be more than sufficient. With the plethora of information already made available by Apple on the official website, you’ll develop your app within no time. Interested? Get started!

Android – Meet the new kid on the block!

by on May 06, 2009 (1) Comments

Google had captured the headlines once again when it announced its plans for Android, the new operating system for mobile phones. The company has already carved a niche for itself by doing things the “Google” way. The dominance of Google in the search engine fraternity is quite well pronounced and Google apps have already hit the internet by a storm. Probably, an unexplored avenue, Andriod is Google’s answer to the next generation of mobile computing.

The core of Andriod comprises of an operating system, key applications, add-ons and plugins as well as middleware. So it basically forms a complete software stack for mobile devices. It is build upon the open Linux Kernel and adds a custom virtual machine to it, that facilitates optimization of hardware and memory resources. This additionally makes Android an “open” development framework in its true sense. The direct advantage that Android promises is extensibility, and the architecture can be extended to accomodate any future technologies as they continue to emerge.

As an example, a developer writing a new app for the Android can directly invoke any of the phone’s core functionalities. Whether it is making calls, sending text messages, navigating through the underlying file system or using the camera, the rich set of APIs in the SDK will provide the developers with a very cohesive development experience.

The icing on the cake is that Android is open source. Developers can download the Andriod SDK and start developing custom software or plugins for devices that support the Andriod framework. Already, a huge number of applications have already gained popularity in the Android market, including our very own FileDroid.

Are you thinking about the competition from the existing mobile market? Well, for a quick take on that, we have to simply wait and watch. Android can be called the new kid on the block and it is likely to face tough competition from iPhone, Palm Pre, Windows Mobile and Symbian. The open handset alliance, owned by the company, has already 34 companies as its mutual members which include several handset manufacturers, mobile operators and chipmakers. An interesting observation however is the fact that the first launch of Android on HTC was not a grand success. I must say here, that when a new product rolls out into the market, and something that is as complex as an operating system, it has to go through a substantial amount of fixes and updates before being declared stable for all devices. I guess that is what the Android is going through right now. However, it is too early to draw a conclusion about either success or failure of Android. I think Android can get very popular, it just needs good hardware. The G1 doesnt do justice to the Android OS.

A liitle bit of Google is in all our lives, isint it? We have to wait for that little bit to get into our mobiles!

Popular Android Apps

by on May 04, 2009 (0) Comments

The top android application a few months ago should give a very plain message to developers – Namco’s PacMan (yes, the classic arcade game) was the top Android download.

Although android smartphones can be powerful web browsers and business tools, many users like to utilize them for gaming as much as anything else, so free games that collect customer data, promote your brand or give customers access to products for purchase are popular development solutions.

MySpace mobile is another highly popular android app, as is the Weather Channel. But what about non-proprietary kinds of apps, the kinds you can develop to promote your business?

Look at the Free Dictionary, another highly popular download, and consider what other similar services customers might like. Translation dictionaries and phrase translators are extremely useful and popular, for example. Provide G1 customers a quick service they can’t get somewhere else, or they can get better from you.

A version of the horoscope might be a winner, as the Daily Horoscope app is one of the top downloads for android, as is Ringdroid, that gives you the ability to create your own telephone ringtones.

Wallpaper and background programs are highly popular, as are shopping programs like Compare Everywhere and ShopSavvy.  Both allow you to use your phone as a barcode scanner, searching online and comparing local prices.

Games are the top download for all smartphones, android or Apple, and a version of a popular game or a new, “addictive” game may be just the development project for your business.

Popular downloads besides PacMan include solitaire versions, slide puzzles (easy to incorporate your logo and an addictive style of game), poker in various varieties, snake, puzzles and brain teasers, trivia, tic tac toe and chess.

Providing cool features and moves for your customized android game with win you downloads, revenue and potential customers.

For example, some of the chess games allow players to choose landscape or portrait orientation and to make moves using a trackball, the keyboard or the touchscreen. One game will take note of the piece you have selected and then highlight all possible moves by that piece, allowing the player to strategize. One will allow a reversal of several moves, so the player can go back and correct a mistake or poor move as well.

Innovative ideas will win recognition in this burgeoning market, where there are hundreds of thousands of downloads to G1 smartphones each day. For a platform that only opened in late October of 2008, the android app market is a huge one with lots of potential for any business.