September 2007

I’d like to wish Google a very happy 9th birthday and hope that their next nine years are as influential as the first.

It’s hard to believe that Google has only been in the game for 9 years, especially when you think about what they’ve accomplished and what kind of hold they have on the market. I don’t think that anyone could have guessed nine years ago what kind of reach a search engine could have. Congratulations!

I’m very excited to see what Google has in store for the next few years. If the past is any measure of the future, we’re in for a great nine years.

Templates don’t work. Plain and simple, but why? Templates are often times much less expensive than a custom design (if not free), and when you purchase a template, you see right away exactly what your dollar buys you. What’s more, templates usually look really cool. That sounds pretty good, right?Wrong. Ok, those things are true, but to what extent should they really influence your decision? When you pay for website design, you’re not paying for nice graphics, fancy JavaScript effects, or even a powerful backend - those things exist everywhere, often times for free.

What you are paying for is the knowhow to put all of those elements together into a finished product that truly reflects your business and capitalizes on technologies in a way to best serve your business and your clients. You may get lucky and find a script or a template that looks just the way you want it, or works exactly how you pictured it, but chances are you’re going to have to compromise at some point or another unless you have some professional guidance.

Disclaimer: We are a web design firm, so our opinion here is going to be slightly biased; however, still worthwhile.