Squarespace is my favorite website building platform. But when I was starting out, I took a look at Wix too. There was one quality that decide me against it.

A blog has many benefits for increasing traffic to your website and improving SEO. But if you don’t love writing, there are alternatives.

When you buy an RV, it’s customary to take it for a shakedown cruise to reveal anything that’s not working as expected. A new website undergoes a similar shakedown process before I consider it done.

Squarespace offers a special home page called a lock screen that you can use while you're designing your website. The lock screen appears when people go to your password-protected website. Use a lock screen to build excitement for your brand, get a head start on Google search results, and provide a preview option for reviewers.

Whenever I start working with a client, I ask the client to make one or two decisions to narrow down the design choices. The first decision I ask clients to make is to choose a large image that goes the full width of the page or choose a narrower image with some "breathing room" on either side. If they prefer a wide edge-to-edge image, there's a second decision. Do they want the navigation text to appear above the image or within the image? Making that second decision narrows down design template choices to just a few.

On December 1, 2017, Squarespace changed which features are included in its lowest-cost Personal plan. Many simple customization and third-party integration features are now classified as Premium features, only available with the Business and Commerce plans. I'll have to take this into consideration as I talk with new clients about their options.

Squarespace is the platform I recommend for new websites, especially if you want to update it on your own later. One of the features I love in Squarespace is the ability to exit without saving so you can dismiss all changes you've made to a page if you don't like them.

When I started my website design business, there was lots of room on the Portfolio page. When I took a look at that page some months later, I knew it was time to do a major redesign of the page because its overcrowded design no longer worked with the number of samples I had added throughout the last year. In that version of my website, I used a Squarespace 7.0 gallery pages to create a multi-page Portfolio that allowed for expansion.

Saying "no" has never been easy for me. As someone who likes people around me to be happy, saying "no," risking disappointment or inconvenience for others, is something I avoided in my younger years. I'm finally starting to get the hang of it though. Here’s to you finding your “no” too!

People have been asking me recently what they need to put on a new website. What pages do they need? What information do they need to include? It occurred to me that a website is like an old-fashioned bakery, like those I've seen in the North End section of Boston or in small European villages.

It's a pet peeve of mine. Website builders use the word "Submit" as the default button text on a form and I dislike seeing that word on a form I'm filling out. I might like to send you a message but I'm certainly not going to "submit" to anything. Do me, and the internet, a favor and change the default button text on your Contact forms to anything other than "Submit."

As I sit here this morning, no longer a motorhome owner, I feel a familiar feeling of being in an in-between time. I can tell you from experience though that when you let go of something that no longer serves you and use the in-between time to relax, dream, and follow your heart, the freedom and spaciousness of that time will allow something better to come into your life.

I read an article about a writer who resorted to renting a cabin in the woods for two days without internet service or a cell phone to reach his goal of writing 40,000 words for his upcoming book. I won't be renting a cabin in the woods anytime soon, but I think I'll take some inspiration from this article to think about unplugging at regular intervals to give myself some quiet time to allow creativity and new ideas room to grow.

A coat rack is a central location in your house where all the coats, hats, and scarves are kept. It's a meeting place for all of that outdoor apparel. A website is like a coat rack that organizes all the marketing apparel for your business: your About Me information, your Services descriptions, testimonials, photo galleries, product pages, blog posts, a contact form, and links to social media accounts. So what are you waiting for? Get that long-postponed website designed and launched. After all, your home (page) is where you hang your hat.

I use social media for my website design business to establish my expertise and promote my business, to get ideas from others in my field or related fields, and to inspire or share information with my potential or current small-business clients. I do my best to post on a few social media channels several times a week. I create original posts and I also share helpful posts from others in my industry. I researched where my potential customers are spending time online and now focus on posting in those locations. 

As a confirmed introvert, I've tended to favor online networking strategies rather than in-person networking events. That's why it was a stretch to go to a local Women's Business Networking event last night. Reflecting this morning on the evening, I'm really glad I donned my courage cape and took the chance at trying something new. I'm glad to be back in my den this morning, but if I hadn't popped my head out to check the weather "out there," I would have missed out on learning and networking opportunities that I couldn't have had any other way.