We have recently been voted one of “Banker and Tradesman’s Best of 2009” with a Silver Award in Web Site Design Services. David Kelleher, president of CGI Interactive, said “We are very appreciative of the recognition this award brings. It is inspiring to know that so many people in New England feel our services provide the caliber of design and expertise that they look for in an agency.”

Banker & Tradesman is a leading publication in New England with a broad readership of the most influential people in the real estate, financial, and construction industries.

More than 6,000 readers responded to the annual Banker & Tradesman readers’ opinion poll, which has grown in recognition in the business community in Massachusetts. The survey measures the loyalty and satisfaction that the publication’s readers have had with service providers. It is an opportunity for the New England financial and real estate communities to speak up for those providers they believe are the best.

All winners were published in a special section of the July 27th issue of Banker & Tradesman.

Cynthia Shanahan, Greg Cheteauneuf, and Kara Hoisington at B&T Event

Several years ago I can recall when search engines lacked the ability to provide us with good quality results, but that has certainly changed. During the past few years search engines have dramatically enhanced their search capabilities, accuracy, speed and functionality. The top three search engines to date are Google, Yahoo and Bing (previously known as MSN/Live) which serve millions of searches every month on an unlimited number of subjects.

As a website or business owner, it’s in your best interest to carefully target your website with keywords that will help get you ranked high on these (and other) search engines. But how do you do this without the expertise? It can be somewhat time consuming but a modest attempt can do enough to make a difference in your search engine ranking.

To help you, I’d like to stress the following key points:

• Break down your website so you have each page targeting up to 3 related keywords. For example, if you have a page that is selling writing services, you can target copy writing, copy editing and website copy.
• In the website code, your ‘keywords’ meta data should list the same keywords you are targeting in your page. In the above example, copy writing, copy editing and website copy would be the keywords. There is no need to use more than 5 keywords here.
• Try to use the keywords (at LEAST one of them) in the <title> of the page. Again, this would be in the code as well.
• The meta description should use the keywords, all of them if possible. The keywords will show up as bold text in the results when someone does a search.
• Use internal links (to other pages on YOUR website) to related content/pages.

Those are basic necessities to using your website keywords properly for SEO purposes. You should also do some simple research to find out who your competition is for the keywords. Simply go to the three above listed search engines and perform searches for the keywords you want to target. You can see what they do on their website which may be helping to keep their rankings high. Additionally, you must realize that your website will not have an immediate effect to searches so give it a week or two to get indexed.

Update: Please read this update regarding choosing meta keywords

In the past drop shadows were king. Everyone wanted a drop shadow, and why not?! Drop shadows make things look like they occupy a real space. Add a drop shadow—BANG—that’s popping right off the page now, right?! Well, that was before Reflection came to town. Reflection showed up, and announced, “This is how real space gets occupied in the future, where things are sleek, solid and modern.” We nodded, we agreed, we bowed to the new king.

Reflection was made popular by Apple computers starting with OSX a few years ago. I’d wager to say it’s only been the past year in which reflection has started to contend head-to-head with its Apple trend sibling, Drop Shadow. Reflection has climbed that steep road from custom Photoshop mask effect, to default customization option. It takes a long time for a design element to reach rock star, heart throb status. Clients used to chant, “We want Drop Shadow!” I hear that less and less these days. It’s more likely they are swooning over Reflection. Do we love Reflection for it’s brain, or just for it’s dashing good looks? How often do trends we use really make sense when we use them?

Reflection stole the spotlight from Drop Shadow. Drop, already delving through a rough divorce with former sweetheart, Ms.Gradient, has been rumored to be drawing up plans for revolution. Sources say Drop Shadow was seen last week, blueprints in hand, accompanied by Small Caps. Unsubstantiated gossip or a tell of things to come?

You may be wondering what Gradient has been up to since her fame skyrocketed in the beginning of the personal computer age. She fondly remembers those days when people wanted to stretch type and put crazy ol’ Gradient inside it. These things are generally somewhat taboo for designers now. First commandment from the Typography bible: Thou shall not distort typefaces.

Hmm, or maybe it’s more like guidelines.
In lieu of Reflection’s new fame and the fall of Drop Shadow’s golden age, the gradient has made a legitimate come back. Gradient went out, got a make over, lost some weight and she’s looks great! I used to see Gradient around and think to myself, “Poor ol’ Gradient, she’s just so dated.” Gradient now has style and class. Specifically, Gradient doesn’t just rainbow from color to color anymore. She has left the early 90s behind her! Gradient comes in at radial angles and adds a little depth to a color by transitioning from a bright, to a darker hue or value of a similar color.

We see examples of this in the CS3 and CS4 Adobe Suite designs and icons. NBC’s branding revamp makes use of large color areas fading to darker color in their ad campaigns and TV bugs. 

Gradient knows how to work a crowd! Gradient has proven an ability to be timeless, morphing with the times. When Gradient is used, she’s the backdrop anchor of a design. People may not chant her name because she doesn’t come down the red carpet with Reflection, but that is because she is the red carpet and she’s fading from cadmium red to deep maroon.

Millions of people use Facebook as it has become a very popular way to communicate, connect and share. To some people it may seem like another distraction and to others it’s a communication tool.

Here at CGI, we want to connect with you. There are constantly newly completed projects (some we’re not allowed to share) we’d like to get your feedback on including flash, websites and powerpoint.

You can become a fan of CGI Interactive on Facebook if you have a Facebook account so we may stay connected with you. As well, you can give us feedback, write on our wall, leave comments, catch our updates, etc..

So, thanks for being a fan – we appreciate it!