making a small business website work

making a small business website work

Improving and updating my web-site

The week before last I had the chance to visit some close personal friends in the north of England for a week of rest and contemplation. I had been severely limited by one and all to only two hours a day of work, which for me offered a real challenge of what would I do while I was there.

They had all insisted that I spend some real and meaningful time with the people that I love and care about and I have to admit they did have a point as I invariably soon find myself getting absorbed by what ever it is that I'm doing at the time and as a result don't spend the sort of time I should with my kids or friends.

Chilling out, reading, walking on the beach, chatting, seeing a live rock band, driving in the beautiful North Yorkshire moors and visiting local attractions all did me a good deal of help after the recent period of intensive work and the resulting stress and pressure's that come into our daily lives reducing our time and energy to be truly creative and adventurous in the endeavours we take on.

Resting and relaxing as did I had the chance for the first time in what felt like an life time to really find the time to think and explore ideas in a refreshed manor, free from the restraints that I had forced upon myself I was able to make a number of important decisions that I knew needed to be made but had avoided for the most part for the wrong reasons.

Despite buzzing with all the new images, ideas and excitement that are struggling to free themselves onto the canvas that is constantly in my minds eye I realised that my web-site was in desperate need of improvement and a new lease of life which is long overdue and is one of the decisions that I had the chance to make during that wonderful restful week away.

After a few days of planing and thought I have finally started to create a temporary web-site while the new pages and layout are being constructed and fully developed making it essayer and more interesting for my visitor's to get the most from the contemporary art and modern abstract painting that characterise my painting style and I will be making regular posts so that every one will have the chance to be kept fully up to date with my progress.

What do i find....?

This blog is all about art or that's what i believed but even I have a sense of humor especially when I pop onto the blog to make a quick post about what I have been up to lately and find a Google advert in the sidebar promoting Laser Vision Surgery which I just found so amusing considering my last post "Discovering myself again" which concentrated on an injury I had to my eye! well we are all entitled to a giggle once in awhile.

Discovering myself again

Its been some time since I had the chance to write anything for this blog which I have found very difficult from a personal point of view. It forced me to review a number of aspects of my day to day life and all the feelings that are associated with that. The simple fact is that I injured my eye and also had to weather the recent financial storm that threatened to overwhelm me.

The injury to my left eye has left a permanent scar on my retainer along with a 2mm cataract which has affected my depth perception and light tolerance making it hard for me to focus for prolonged periods resulting in a deep sense of frustration and self doubts that I have struggled with.

As an artist I fully except that financial security will always be a challenge however I found that the recent extreme financial climate forced me to go out and find a job just to keep the wolves (banks) form the door for a short while but even part time employment drained me of enthusiasm and inner energy that any creative activity and self motivation demands.

As I became accustomed to the fuzzy and blur of my eyesight and have driven the monsters from my door I was approached by a friend seeking to exploit my skill and knowledge of internet and design to create and develop a website for their new business venture. She was putting together a cleaning business and after showing me the numbers and business plan I quickly got involved in this enterprise as the marketing Director.

The resulting web-site www.dkm-cleaning.co.uk has for me proved an enormous success in creativity, design and confidence offering as it does the chance for its clients to improve the quality of life and huge time saving benefits that such a simple act of cleaning someone's home really has to offer. I personally am delighted to say that even with my limited knowledge of the internet I have managed to create a web-site that is ranked on Google and achieves good placement (page 4) on Google and (page 1) on Yahoo which is already winning customers for this growing domestic cleaning company.

Now I feel that all my trials and tribulations in creating a unique artist website to promote my work, paintings and artistic beliefs is an accomplishment that I can truly be proud of as a creative process in its own right.

Little Pink bunnies

Along with a group of others this local property investor I know walked us through to a conservatory. What I saw amazed me. In the large open space the floor was covered in a patchwork of green, felt and baize over which where hundreds of little pink bunnies hopping about. You know the sort of thing you would find on a market stall, small no bigger than your hand, stuffed with batteries and all fluffy, shocking day-glow pink, hopping about and making an awful racket of mechanical sounds and squeaks. She was stood there pleased as punch with herself, in a sexy little nightie that left little to the imagination and to be honest with you even I have never thought of her in that way. She fielded the barrage of questions with ease but no one asked Why? Art it is, but she is not an artist why had she done this I had to know. "Because she could", "Why not" and "It seamed like a good idea at the time" where some of the responses that she gave to my question. Finally she admitted that she "I Just like It" and went on to add, "The funny thing however is that all the bunnies can hop anywhere, but they don't, they stay in their own little area or territory within their own groups and if they do stray into another area they get knocked over you don't see it, it just happens. Each tribe of bunnies keep to themselves they don't mix or anything its weird. I did not plan it, it just happened that way". I found myself saying, that in all the studies, test and computer models that have been carried out over the years that I have herd about the same thing happens, larger groups sub-divide and define territories for themselves its one of the great mysteries of life, we then got on to discussing its merits as art.

I woke with a start, the cold still, darkness itself seamed to be shaking me awake, It was a dream thank god for that. But more likely It was a nightmare, all these little pink bunnies hopping about in my head it could not be anything else but a nightmare could it? I lay there awake for what seamed like an age trying to understand, Why Pink Fluffy Bunnies? Art for me is the study of the human state and the little pink bunnies is just a reflection of that, most of us spend our whole lives desperately trying to fit in to our chosen group we even put other things in what we decide is the group that they belong to, I mean who said that Picasso is a cubist painter! the fact is that his cubist period only lasted for a few brief years of his long and productive life and yet we still class him as a cubist painter . Why? The truth is that my vision of the bunnies represents great art and my investor friend is stood on the very edge of an automated society both fascinated and involved yet aloof from the whole is as equally a part of this fantastic piece of artwork. I am not a great fan of instillations however this is certainly something that I would one day like to undertake, but perhaps something other than little pink bunnies would be called for, for my own sanity.

Essentially the creative process follows two courses, the first and perhaps most common is that of the route of discovery and exploration steadily heading towards an unknown goal, tentatively feeling your way forward through each stage ultimately to a finished work . The other is the top down approach as I call it, Here starting with completed or near completed piece and unravelling or exposing the layers in an attempt to comprehend the hidden values and meanings that relate to any given idea. I am intrigued by the Pink bunnies idea as although it is a finished work all be it in my own head it still requires both methods of this creative processes in its completion and the involvement of my scantily clad property invertors friend giving it a greater dimension and depth that is necessary in such a piece.

Believing we can.

Hear we are again another leap year is almost upon us, how did that creep up on me I only noticed when someone told me during the week. What will you do with an extra day ? Mmmm I think I will paint. Paint what ? Dose it matter I don't think so I do really get so much out of standing in front of a canvas and bashing at it with a brush. Sounds dreadful doesn't it! I almost feel guilty about saying it like that but it dose seam to be like that. bashing out Ideas, bashing at the canvas just letting myself go, letting the Ideas flow exploring, questioning desperately trying to understand the whole process and finding myself. all the answers are hidden inside, all I have to do is let them out. That's what painting is to me , just letting it happen or shutting my eyes and paint, that's what I call it. Sounds easy don't it but its one of the hardest thing there is and the reason is that we spend so much of our time believing what we are told. Believing we cant, believing that its not allowed, believing that" NO "is a good word, believing what the teachers said at school (god that was a long time ago) believing what the papers say, believing what someone else thinks and it all clouds our own thoughts it stops us from doing anything. It stops us from trying.

When did all this start? at school, while we are children, Who knows. but it is up to us when we stop. Stop telling ourselves we cant and start doing. Believing we can. Believing that "NO "is a bad word, Believing The only good thing on the TV is the punch line from the Nike adverts "Just do it". Painting has allowed me to see this, it allowed me to know that there is no right or wrong. just dose it work! and I love it I love the way my life is. Its not always easy, but it is always worth it and now when someone tells me I cant, I know I can. I might have to do it some other way but." I can" I just have to find a way because I believe I can and what's more "I do". I also believe that anyone can, its not just something that is hidden from us, its a choice we all have. We just need to take action and the whole world opens up to us. I have art to thank for that and I am so thankful for that.

I am very proud of my website

At long last My website www.mjo-art.com is up and running. Creating a web site from scratch is not always as simple as it sounds and at times this has seemed to be a mammoth task that I have often wished that I had not started in the first place. But I am so glad that I persevered. I have gained so much more than I could have believed possible. So why did I develop this web site? I was completely computer illiterate and a techno-phobic on top of that Dyslexia has over the years given my confidence a good bashing or that's what I told myself. However as an Artist I needed a platform to promote my self and my work, so despite my fears I decided to bite the bullet and just get on and do it. After all of this hard work I'm greatly delighted with the result and I'm sure if you visit my website you will feel the same.

To create my website from scratch I had to do a good deal of research. One of the questions I asked myself was what is a website?. Another question I asked myself was How do they work?. From this began a long journey of exploration about the internet. First you should decide what you want your website to do and draw a simple diagram with all the links from your home page to all the other pages in your site. Once you have chosen the programme you wish to use of which their are many available like Microsoft office, Dreamweaver or Serif web plus. Try them out and make sure you are comfortable with them. I had buy one I was comfortable with. Decide on a theme its important to have the same style throughout with the navigation in the same place on all your pages. You can then start fleshing out you pages, don't be afraid to chop and change things or even start all over again and try and see it from a visitors point of view point. Try and use the same common easy to read type face throughout with a font size of 12 or more if possible and use high contrasts as this will make it easier to read.

So what makes a good web site? Well its content, a few pictures, short snappy paragraphs with catchy titles. Good copy is essential, all of this will get and keep your visitors interest, not only do the search engines like it, so do visitors and if you get it right they will keep coming back time after time. One way to test this is to get as many people as possible, friends and family to explore your web pages and listen carefully. On one occasion I got some friends to look at my site and pretended to be busy with something else while I listened to what they said about my site.


Finally there is Hosting and domain names. As for your domain names, do you want Dot.com, Dot.org or Dot.co.uk, also It is best to get them sorted out early on and think about other ways to spell them too, as you might need to own more than one. We all make mistakes and that's the one I made, Ah well. Hosting for me was the real challenge. Don't just go for a cheep hosting, you get what you pay for in all things and hosting is no different. Try and find out as much as you can about them first, do they have an office, are they on the phone, what sort of customers and services do they offer and send an email to test how good they are at responding to there customers. I was stunned at how few even sent an automated message let alone a response to my enquiries, (only one). Don't they need my custom? In the end my perseverance paid off and I finally found a hosting company I am happy with and I can contact them.

I have realized the web is a lot like painting it requires all the things that make art so interesting. Colour texture, stories, shape and form to list but a few, but unlike painting the web is a constantly evolving creation that the internet is and your views will greatly enhance and develop my website. Please feel free to take a look at my web site www.mjo-art.com and let me know what you think as I would be very interested in your opinions.