Jamaica Me Crazy restaurant and bar website design

We are delighted to announce another recently launched customer website: Jamaica Me Crazy.

Jamaica Me Crazy is a Caribbean buzzing restaurant and bar situated at the top end of vibrant Roodebloem Road in Woodstock, one of Cape Town’s oldest suburbs.

This was a challenging website because we had to recreate a grunge feel, a feel of the raw vibrancy of being in the Caribbean – with activity, people, fun and of course Bob Marley!

You decide if we achieved the goal set for us – view the website design below – just click the image to open it in a new window…

 

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Engineering website design

This is an exciting design which we just finished. It has to be seen for you to truly appreciate it’s appeal.

We have used a jQuery Carousel in the feature area. The client sells pumps, so we loaded several images of pumps into a carousel which rotates the images. The carousel is interactive and clicking any of the images will bring it to the front.

The client is an engineering firm, so we chose a rugged steel color for his design.

View the site here:
http://www.vacuum-pumps.co.za/

View the top most part of the website here…

Engineering Company Website Design

Or view the whole thumbnail here…

Design

View this for a description of the SEO and design features…

Engineering Website Design

Jewellery website designs

Just in case you get the impression that I only do B&B designs, here is a more recent client who sells custom made and perosnalized jewellery online.

Forget Me Not Jewellery
http://www.forgetmenots.co.za

Forget Me Not Jewellery

This is a fantastic jewellery idea and the feedback from the client and from the visitors to the site is that the design is superb.

Design and SEO considerations:

• In the feature area (the green band across the top) is a lovely image of a “forget me not” flower. That sets the tone for the emotional mood of the site.
• As they say: a picture is worth a thousand words… therefore I show three picture examples of the actual jewellery prominently so that potential custmers can see immediately what kind of jewellery is being described.
• This site has been registered with Google Webmaster Tools, Google Analytics, Bing Webmaster, Yahoo SiteExplorer and other related services.

B&B website designs

In my last post I share two success stories. Today I will share another design which had a very good reception by the customer.

This is Pine Cottage B&B:
http://www.pinecottage.co.za

Pine Cottage B&B

I love the “friendly” nature of this page.

Design and SEO considerations:

• In the feature area (the green band across the top) has three images which show the accommodation clearly. This means customers don’t have to hunt around the site but immediately get to see what they searched for. These images are neatly feathered alongside each other and the blue band draws the visitors eyes to this feature area. The image at the bottom of the page also gives the site an “African” feel.
• On the left in the menu bar area we provide instant and basic information about the B&B. More detailed information is provided on other pages. This overview is provided so that visitors can begin to make a snap decision.
• When the visitor is ready to make an enquiry the email and telephone number is always available in the top-right hand corner of all of the pages.
• The use of three flowers creates a “friendly” atmosphere for the visitor with one of the flowers “peeking out” from behind the feature area.
• This site has been registered with Google Webmaster Tools, Google Analytics, Bing Webmaster, Yahoo SiteExplorer and other related services.

Keep your contact details easy to find on all pages

Let’s say you have a great website design. You’ve done all the basics well and now the customer has the impulse to place an order with you. Are your contact details right there and unmissable?

In your website design make sure you have a highly visible location for your contact details. I usually reserve the top right hand corner for this purpose. You can see a good example of this below…

Use free graphic design templates to get you started

I enjoy hearing my client’s oohs and aaah’s when they see their finished site for the first time.

How do I make such lovely designs? I use free templates as a basic starter design. After finding a template that suits the needs of the client, I then edit the graphics and the CSS to match the corporate color scheme. Usually almost every aspect of the template gets changed (rollover images, icons, background colors and shading), but it helps having something well designed to start from.

Use graphics design to convey visual messages

This client runs a bed and breakfast. They have several rooms and they are near to desirable tourism areas.

All of these things must be communicated rapidly to the visitors, because (on average) research shows you have only 15 seconds to get the visitors attention. A picture is worth a thousand words… therefore good graphic design is the key to communicating to visitors.