Your website represents you to the world. An understanding of the web development cycle will enable you to work efficiently with web developers to achieve a prominent online presence.
As a businessman, you have to put in a lot of effort and planning in setting up your business, as well as your website and online presence on various social networks. That is why hiring website developers to help you build your website is getting more popular. From identifying the feature you need for your website to going live, the whole process is known as Web Development Life Cycle. Normally, this process goes through 6 stages, namely:

• Analyzing
• Planning
• Design
• Development
• Testing and Delivery
• Maintenance

Analyzing

This a crucial stage of the development cycle. This is the stage where you have to analyze the core values and functions of your company. You should have a clear understanding of your business goals and how you will need the web to attain these goals.

In order to analyze your goals in detail, you can break them down in parts and define those. First of all, consider what the purpose of the site will be; whether it will be used to promote a service, provide information, or to sell a product.  Once you have a clear purpose, you need to define the target audience next. Think of the ‘ideal’ person that you would want as the visitor; knowing their age, sex, interests etc. will help in determining the best design for the site. Now that you know your target audience, you can analyze what kind of content they’ll be looking for on your website.

Planning
After a thorough analysis, you can move on to the next stage of the web development cycle, and start planning. It is at this stage that the site map is developed.
A sitemap is the basic outline model of your website. It lists all the main areas of the site, as well as their subdivisions. This will help you to decide what type of content will be on your site. The type of technical tools to be implemented are also decided at this stage. The target audience is to be kept in mind, as you need the user interface to be such that it is not only easy but also fun and engaging for them to navigate through the web site.

Design
Now is the time to design the layout of the website. The site will look different for different target groups as per their interests. It is also important to strengthen the identity of your company on the website. You can do that by incorporating the company logo or its colors into the design. Here are a few of the current website layout trends which you can go through for the layout of your website.

The web designer will send you several prototypes. You can either view mockups, or the designer can give you access to view the work in progress. This is done so that you are able to view the design and development stages, and are able to give feedback. This is necessary as the website needs to match your needs and tastes. You should also decide what type of Content Management System (CMS)  to use at this stage of the development cycle. Constant communication is ultimately necessary in this stage.

Development
In the cycle, the development stage is where the actual, functional website is created by using the graphic elements of the prototype. No matter what CMS you will use, it is best to start with a generic HTML and CSS . This involves writing valid HTML / CSS code that complies with current web standards, maximizing functionality, as well as accessibility for as large an audience as possible.

The home page is the first page to be developed. After that, a template is created for the content pages, which contains the main navigational structure of the website. In this, the developer distributes the content in their appropriate areas. All the other technical features are made functional in this phase.

Testing and Delivery
Websites function as a multi-user and multi-tier system with bandwidth limitations. Consequently, tests for complete functionality and compatibility are done at this stage. Both automated testing and manual testing should be done without fail. Implement analytics tools so that you will be able to track your website’s statistics before, during, and after the website launch.

Once the final output is approved, website owners then perform a final run-through to confirm that everything was uploaded correctly and is functional.  The site can then go live.

Maintenance
The web development cycle doesn’t stop at the site’s launch.  With a lot of online competitors vying for your target customers, the real battle has just started. As a website owner, you will have to make sure that your website is updated with the current trends as well as stuffed with content that matters to your target audience.   Aside from regularly updating the content of the site, you should also be looking at regular site backups, additional plugin installations, tools and plugin upgrades.

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Outsourcing has become one of the most important success strategies for small businesses. Years ago, this process was not fully understood and adopted by smaller businesses and entrepreneurs due to fear, and it were only huge corporations that used outsourced work.

These days, you will find more and more SMEs and individual entrepreneurs using outsourcing as a means of meeting business goals and accomplishing more tasks as their businesses grow. If you are thinking of outsourcing for the first time and still not seeing it as a strategy on a business standpoint, here are some of the main reasons why you should go for it.

1. You can save a lot of time. As business owner, focusing and spending time on core business tasks should be your priority, instead of doing tedious ones that can be delegated. Let's face it; there are tasks that eat up a ton of our time even if they are not directly impacting our business as a whole. Multi-tasking is often the solution that others think of, when it's time to speed things up. But studies show that multi-tasking decreases productivity and increases stress.

At the end of the day, it's about completing specific tasks that you should not be doing yourself. If you take on all of the tasks, you might not finish all of them within the day. So why not hire someone who has the skill to do it instead? This way, you can focus on your customers and key responsibilities while your outsourced staff takes care of completing other tasks that are also crucial to your business.

2. Hire experts. When you are running your own small business, it’s impossible to be an expert in every facet of the business. Why not hire people who are? Someone who specializes in the task you want done can not only do it better, they can often do it faster and cheaper as well.

3. Get a fresh, outside perspective. Hiring an outsourced professional can also bring in a fresh new outlook to your business and strategies. You can get new ideas that you wouldn't have thought of yourself and make use of them to improve the way you market your business, for example.

These perspectives come from different experiences, skill level, and involvement of the outsourced individual. When you give this person a chance to collaborate with your in-house team, they can share what they know and learn from each other's insights. Collectively, these insights can bring in fresh new ideas, solutions, and strategies that can help your business in the long run.

4. Leverage expertise on a global basis. If you don’t outsource, you are limited to the local labor pool for human resources. Multinational companies have long enjoyed the benefits of a worldwide knowledge base and teams of professional experts. You don't have to be a huge company to tap and leverage into world-class capabilities. You simply provide the platform and the tasks or projects for your global staff, and let them collaborate with your in-house teams.

5. Reduce stress and improve productivity. Delegating tasks which can free you up is more productive and efficient, rather than doing everything yourself. To some, it is an added expense because adding people into your company means paying extra heads for tasks done. However, in the long run, you will realize that things can only be accomplished sooner if there are a few experts helping out. And instead of spending time finishing tasks, you could use those extra hours in making more sales and getting more customers.

6. Increase your agility and flexibility. It is difficult to juggle tasks and responsibilities as a business owner. But with an outsourced team of skilled professionals, it is easier to keep up with the fast-changing business landscape and improve your business reach.

7. Gain access to specific technologies. When you hire outsourced professionals, it's not surprising to find that many of them are either familiar or using some of today's latest tools and apps. This can be the result of having to work with various companies in different industries which provided them access to the latest tools they use. This can help you in discovering and using whatever latest technology is out there that can specifically benefit your projects and company overall.

8. Save money. Lower operational cost is among the major concerns and goals of SMEs. You don't need a big office in a city's high-rise building and paying for operational costs when you hire skilled professionals from all over the globe. And when properly executed, outsourcing skilled and experienced people has its crucial impact on your business's revenue and savings.

9. Minimize risk. Businesses carry certain amount risks. Competition, financial conditions, markets, technologies, and government policies change quite rapidly. Outsourcing professionals assume and manage these risks for the businesses they partner with, and generally, they make better decisions on how to avoid risks in their areas of expertise.

10. Facilitate fast growth. Outsourcing specific functions of your business to a specialty skilled professional is a strategic decision which can bring savings, improves process efficiencies, and enhances the quality of information, facilitating better decision-making, while alleviating the bottlenecks related to business growth.

Are you outsourcing some of your business functions?

What benefits have you enjoyed so far?

Agile methodology is a set of tools, skills, and knowledge that is considered (collectively) as an alternative method to conventional product management and development. It is often used in software development wherein teams act and decide in response to unpredictability through iterative work sprints.

The Origin of Agile

The 1970 publication by Dr. Winston Royce entitled "Managing the Development of Large Software Systems" criticized the sequential process involved in product development.

Dr. Royce emphasized that software should not be developed like a product on an assembly line where each component is added in sequential phases, and where each phase must be completed before starting the next phase – the so-called “waterfall” approach. He opposed this phase-based approach wherein developers first gather all of the requirements, complete all of the architecture and design elements, write all the code, do all testing, and so on. Dr. Royce specifically opposed this style of process because of the lack of communication between the specific groups which complete every phase.

In waterfall methodology, teams only have a single chance to get things right. It is also not an optimized method compared to the concept of agile. Waterfall method assumes that each requirement can be identified prior to the design and coding processes. Could you tell your developers all they need to know (requirements and all elements) to include in the software before it is up and running? Or would it be easier to illustrate your idea to the development team if you could give feedback on functional software?

Why Go the Agile Way?

Using agile technology provides opportunities for your team to assess the direction of your project during the development process. This is attained through regular iterations, at the end of which, teams should present the resulting product increment. This method is described as 'incremental' and 'iterative' due to the process of repetitive shortened work cycles and the functional product they produce.
 
There are different types of agile methods that use the original principle stated in the agile manifesto. The most popular types are the following:

Scrum

Scrum specifically focuses on how to manage tasks within a team-based development setting. It is the most widely implemented agile method possibly because it is easier for IT development teams to understand and follow. Scrum is not repressive and doesn't demand loads of technical discipline unlike well-defined Agile methods. It lets the development team decide what to do and how to do it; as well as get up to speed and begin doing Agile swiftly and cost-effectively.

Scrum certification helps fulfill the objective of the Agile manifesto by encouraging collaboration, productivity, and accomplishment among team members.      

Dynamic Systems Delivery Method (DSDM)
Possibly the original agile method, DSDM was already in existence even before the term 'agile' was used and adapted in software development.  DSDM fixes cost, time and quality at the outset and uses prioritization scope into “musts”, “shoulds”, “coulds”, and “won’t haves”.

Extreme Programming (XP)

Extreme Programming or XP is a more thorough type of agile method which focuses on process analysis, development, and test phases through frequent releases in short development cycles intended to improve productivity and introduce checkpoints to accommodate new customer requirements.

Among the three popular types, DSDM is possibly the most comprehensive agile method, while Scrum and XP are a lot easier to implement and complementary since they deal with various aspects of software development projects and both are established on very similar concepts.

In the last decade, many industries have seen the benefits of using agile technology. Media, marketing, technology, large corporations, as well as government sectors have seen a dramatic improvement in their IT development projects and team efforts, which also provides that much-needed competitive edge.

In agile product development, project management is a little different as it relies more on the team leader's skills in coordination, communication, and facilitation with less emphasis on planning and control. However, not all projects go well with this method and it is not always the key to instant success. The key is to understand many techniques from different agile and waterfall methodologies, and pick out the best approaches that will suit a specific situation.

Agile technology, with a combination of your team's skill and experience, can help you have a more flexible approach and less documentation, more collaboration and visibility that allows for a more rewarding team experience and better products as a result.

Building your online business using Power Site is the most convenient way of putting your brand out there. Leaving the coding part to Power Site's web developers frees you from doing such meticulous task. So you can focus on other important aspects of your business.

By taking a look at the features of your Power Site, you will be able to determine which areas can be easily optimized on your own. Optimizing your site increases its Search Engine Ranking Position (SERP). Ranking high usually means more visibility online, and thus, bigger chances of gaining more leads.

Here are a few ways to optimize your Power Site:

(1) On-page Optimization

Your Power Site's on-page content optimization may include the following strategies:

• Proper keyword optimization without keyword stuffing - Your primary keywords should be used on page titles, headings, sub-headings, page body/content, product descriptions and tags, image file names and alt texts, meta title and description , page URLs.
• Improve internal link building - You can link your most-linked web pages to your homepage and new SEO-targeted pages to harness link equity.
• Video sitemap - Create a video sitemap if you have numerous video promotions.
• User friendly landing pages - Improve user experience by having clear calls to action, properly constructed website navigation, and properly tagged product images.
• Mobile device compatibility - Make sure that you have a mobile version of your website for customers who use mobile devices when browsing the internet.
• Social media integration - Integrate social media to allow sharing of your content, highlight customer feedback, use as social-based commenting, show trending products/services to your social media followers.

(2) Blogging

Power Site's content management system allows you to easily manage your site's blog. Maximize these blogging features which will enable you to create properly optimized posts:

• Set up categories to organize blog content to help visitors find the topics they are looking for.
• Use primary and long tail keywords on your posts.
• Include related images and links to reliable resources on your posts.
• Include shareable images  you own. Make sure their file names are relevant to the content. Add alt tags when you insert the images on your posts.

(3) Link Building

• Build relationships with other website/blog owners and get backlinks through guest posting.
• Send request letters to manufacturers/suppliers for backlinks on their websites.
• Find and interview influencers in your industry.
• Create shareable infographics.
• Write how-to guides for your target audience.
• Answer questions on platforms like Quora, Yahoo Answers, and other Q&A sites.
• Curate a 'weekly roundup' of best posts within your industry.

(4) Enlisting your Power Site to local directories

• List down all of your business information such as website URL, physical address, telephone number/s, email address, as well as several product images you use on your website. These are required by local directory listings and will appear on a page once your account/submission is approved.
• To find where your competitors are listed, you can use Whitespark's Local Citation Finder.
• Submit your Power Site's URL to all relevant local directories.

(5) Other Best Practices

• Always stick with high quality content for your website and/or blog posts. Apply the same principle in writing services or product descriptions.
• If you do sell products on your Power Site, do not copy the manufacturer's description. Instead, write your own optimized product descriptions your customers can relate to.
• Write long form blog posts particularly for new products you are promoting.
• Many free PR sites are quite dubious. Have a budget set for press releases and make sure the site/s you will choose are highly reputable and known to produce good results.
• Avoid mass submissions to various directories. Pick only relevant authority directories to submit to.
•  Do not submit your website to Google using submission sites and tools. Use Google URL submission page.

The ease of having a Power Site for your business does not stop at the completed website itself. There is always room for improvement and there are basic steps you can take as website owner in order to optimize your website further.