If you are looking for a Logo Design agency and have been requesting quotations you might be quite shocked at how expensive purchasing a logo for your business initially seems.

It is true that online businesses usually charge less for their services due to the huge amount of competition on the web and the need to be competitive on price when other websites are only a few clicks away.

But why do logo design prices sometimes seem higher than expected?

You may think that the best thing to do would be to find the cheapest UK based logo design company on the web. For example some companies offer Business Logos of around £25! Now lets see how much time a designer could possible spend on a logo at that price. An experienced logo designer in the UK would probably want a minimum of £20 an hour. Plus a designer / agency will need to pay for licensed software, a good computer and the advertising / costs of ensuring that you can find them online through the search engines or other advertising platform. This all has to be added into the cost and so the cost of a designers wage alone would not cover the cost as business overheads would have to be considered.

So either you will receive a logo that is designed by a professional  UK designer who spent about 30 minutes on your logo or somebody who is not really educated / experienced in the design industry will be creating your Logo. So the real question must be is my company logo, the face of my Business worth more than £25 or 30 minutes!

It takes time and experience with company logos and an understanding of the Corporate Identity Design industry to create a logo that will really work for your Company. In truth it will take a well trained logo designer a minimum of a good day to create impressive and original initial logo concepts. You will then want to have the opportunity of revisions so that you can see any alterations that you might like at at no additional hidden extra cost.

If a designer says that they can provide you with a logo within 24 hours, then unless they are willing to drop all their other clients projects just for your logo, you are probably getting a rushed job. It takes time to develop an original identity and their is no short cut to this process.

So how much should I spend on a logo?

So as a guide as to how much should be spent on logo design services in the UK, a minimum of £250 to £450 for smaller businesses and somewhere between £350 – £1000 for a medium to corporate sized company would be about right. Some of the very large companies will spend thousands on their logo but this is not necessary for most corporate sized organisations unless they have huge available budgets with requirements for global branding research, etc.

There is of course no exact guide as services cannot be valued in the same way that products can be due to the value of customer service, level of professionalism, etc but the above would provide reasonable and realistic budgets for most designers to work with in order to provide a solution that a business can be proud of.

The packages are suited for small business, medium sized businesses and corporate sized organisations in search of Corporate Identity Design services at a competitive price.

The first package offers a professional and affordable solution for smaller businesses whilst the second logo package offers a greater variety of concepts and artwork files more suited to a medium sized company. The third corporate logo package includes corporate identity guidelines which is not something smaller businesses would usually require but such guidelines can be essential for larger organisations of a corporate size.

Before jumping in headfirst and handing in your notice at your existing job to become a Web Designer though, it is important to understand that there are a few technical things you will need to know and understand. Have a look through this top five list; if your level of expertise is lacking in any one area then now is the time to get researching and practicing.

1. HTML

Chances are you’ve heard of HTML if you are interested in web design. This programming language is one of the most important things that you will need to learn as a web designer, as it will give you an insight into how websites really work.

2. CSS

CSS is another language used on the internet, this time for the purpose of styling the individual pages on your website. Without knowledge of CSS you will struggle to put together coherent, attractive and modern websites.

3. PHP & Other Web Languages

There are a whole host of web languages in existence today, from Perl to C++, Java to PHP. You don’t need to know them all to be a successful web designer, or at least not at the outset, but a knowledge of PHP will stand you in good stead for developing effective websites.

4. JavaScript

Have you ever noticed interactivity on websites? This often stems from the use of JavaScript, or Ajax (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML). You don’t need to know JavaScript to be successful as a web designer, but it is an optional extra that will help to move your development to the next level.

5. Content Management Systems

The internet is a constantly changing entity, and recently Content Management Systems have become the big thing, allowing relative novices to keep their own websites up to date. The big three systems are WordPress, Joomla and Drupal, with WordPress being generally the most favoured for its ease of use.

These five technical skills are just the start of all that you will need to know to become a Web Designer. A certain level of design ability, and an awareness of search engine optimisation (SEO), successful website navigation and the foibles of all of the favourite internet browsers are also essential for your success. You don’t need to know everything all at once though, so why not start working your way through the list now by introducing yourself first to HTML.

If you enjoyed reading the above, you may like to read more articles like this in our Articles For Web Designers category.

So first things first, what is HTML?

Well as already mentioned, HTML stands for HyperText Markup Language. Markup languages are not the same as programming languages such as C or Java; instead they are made up from a selection of markup tags. Within HTML these markup tags effectively describe how a website looks and operates. They are the building blocks that make up your web pages.

Tags within HTML fall between angled brackets, for example <html>, and usually occur in pairs with a matching start and end tag such as <h2> and </h2>. It is in between these start and end tags that you will place the content of your website, so as an example:

<h2>This is a title</h2>

The above piece of markup code would display the heading, ‘This is a title’ on your website.

There are many different tags that you as a Web Designer can incorporate into your web pages to achieve the functionality and aesthetic appeal that you desire; however it is not essential to learn them by heart instantly. There are many different guides for web designers and lists of tags online that will allow you to look up tags as and when you need them, though you will soon find yourself becoming familiar with those fundamental elements that occur on the majority of pages. This makes HTML a very easy web language to learn.

Although HTML is certainly the first language that any web designer / developer should get to grips with, it is not an infallible technology. HTML works the most successfully when teamed with other languages, such as CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). This CSS code can work with your fundamental HTML to style the pages of your website beautifully. JavaScript is another language that can add additional power to your pages when teamed with HTML.

If you are just starting out on your path to becoming a web designer don’t panic! It is not essential to know all of these technologies at once, as it is certainly possible to put together your very first web pages with some rudimentary HTML knowledge, but to become a fully-fledged web designer, learning HTML is the best place to start.

Click here for a basic tutorial in creating your first HTML Web Page.

If you enjoyed reading the above, you may like to read more articles like this in our Articles For Web Designers category.

Enter CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). These sheets, saved as .css files, are specifically designed to manage how a website written in a markup language is displayed. The sheets are saved externally to the rest of your HTML code, and correspond to every page on the website. Essentially that means that when a web designer wants to alter the style of all of the headings on a large website featuring many different pages, they only need to edit the .css file and not every individual page.

CSS is something that every Web Designer needs to know, particularly as it is now supported by every internet browser. The style sheets you create can control the fonts that you use, the colours and backgrounds of your website, the positioning of elements on your pages, your margins, lines, heights, widths and much, much more. There is currently no more precise and accurate way to organise and control the layout of your website, and with a multitude of sophisticated techniques included, CSS can be the tool to make each and every one of your web pages look stunning.

How does CSS work?

Every element that a web designer wishes to style using CSS must come complete with a specific rule in a .css file. This rule is made up of two distinct parts, a Selector, and a number of Declarations. Let’s stick with our example and think about changing how a heading looks on each of our 100 web pages:

h1 {

color:red;

font-size:14px;

}

In this example, h1 is your Selector; it determines the element you are actually styling. The clauses within the brackets are the two Declarations in this instance, defining the colour and size of the text. If you decided that you wanted to change the size of this heading on every page on your website you could simply change it here, and watch the alteration be propagated to every <h1> HTML tag within your website.

This has been a very simplistic look at the power of CSS, but hopefully it has raised your awareness as to how important this skill is for a web designer. There are many tutorials online that can help you to get started with developing and using CSS and there are also many excellent books available that many web designers will find very useful as a handy reference.

If you enjoyed reading the above, you may like to read more articles like this in our Articles For Web Designers category.

PHP is a scripting language and the code is executed on the side of the server. That means if you look at a website featuring PHP the instructions within the code are implemented on the computer that hosts the website, not on your own computer. There are other scripting languages out there such as ASP and Perl, but as PHP is undeniably the most popular this is where you should start on your journey to becoming a Web Designer.

Why Bother with PHP?

HTML is a fantastic markup language for putting together some simple sites, but if you want to include anything more complicated within your website such as forums, picture galleries, surveys, secure logins and much, much more, you’ll need a scripting language. PHP is loaded with benefits such as the following:

• It’s completely free! PHP is an open-source technology so you can download and use it with no cost to you, the web designer.

• It’s compatible across a number of platforms, including Windows, Unix and Linux.

• It supports the use of a range of databases, such as the popular MySQL and others including Oracle, Informix, Solid and many more.

• It really is ideal for both the smallest and the largest website development projects, so no matter what you have in mind PHP will work for you.

• You don’t need to spend a lifetime learning to master the basics of PHP; as scripting languages go it’s quite simple to pick up.

All of these benefits and more make PHP a great language for website developers.

The Basics of PHP Coding

PHP files are usually saved with the extension .php, and the files include a combination of sections of script code, HTML tags and text. The script code itself will be sandwiched between <?php and ?> tags. Displaying the text, ‘This is my first PHP website.’ on your screen is as simple as this:

<html>

<body>

<?php echo “This is my first PHP website.”

?>

</body>

</html>

If you enjoyed reading the above, you may like to read more articles like this in our Articles For Web Designers category.

You may not have noticed it, but you will have encountered JavaScript on many a website as you’ve made your way around the internet. Perhaps you’ve seen a new window pop up based on some action of yours, or seen a text field automatically highlighted in red after you’ve input an incorrect value. Chances are, the functionality in place for those instances was created through some JavaScript code.

Do You Need to Learn JavaScript?

One of the great things about JavaScript is that many web designers have allowed their script-code to be used by the developing community. There’s a good likelihood that someone has already written a piece of code that will enable your web page to function in exactly the way you want it to. These pre-made sections of script can simply be plugged into your own code, but you must always ensure that you have the permission to use them.

Of course, even when using someone else’s JavaScript code, it is still a good idea to have at least a basic understanding of the technology. You may need to make some alterations to suit your own site, or even just be aware of how to slip the code into your own web pages to make it function.

When it does come to editing JavaScript you don’t need any fancy technology; any basic text editor will do. In many instances the script code itself will be slotted straight into a HTML file, but it is better practice, particularly for long sections of script, to create separate files with .js extensions. The functions within these external files can then simply be called from your HTML, improving the performance of your pages and allowing you to use the same technology on every page of your web site with relative ease.

A Web Designer should be aware of many different and useful technologies available for the improvement of their websites. JavaScript is just such a technology, so if you already have some familiarity with HTML and CSS this could be a great next language for you to start studying.

If you enjoyed reading the above, you may like to read more articles like this in our Articles For Web Designers category.

Enter WordPress!

WordPress is a Content Management System (CMS); a system that allows a user to make changes to the content on the pages or posts of a website without needing to alter any HTML code. Although it is technically possible for anyone to put together their own simple WordPress website, many individuals will still look for a Web Designer to set things up for them so that they may have something more unique for their business which will help to strengthen the identity for a company or the brand of a particular product.

Although the completely free and open source WordPress was initially created as a platform for bloggers, the system has developed far beyond this humble beginning. Nowadays many powerful, attractive and highly functional web pages can be developed on WordPress, packed with these many benefits:

• Anyone can download WordPress for no cost whatsoever; this is a free framework that you can upload straight onto your website hosting to have this content management system up and running in no time at all. Many web hosting packages even include one-click installation programs that will install WordPress for you in literally just a couple of minutes. This installation usually also creates the necessary MySQL database to function with your WordPress website.

• After installing WordPress on a particular domain you can easily access the admin panel by visiting the address http://www.YourDomainHere.com/wp-admin. This admin panel is incredibly simple to understand and to use, with the ability to update pages and posts as easily as in a piece of word processing software.

• A lot of web designers around the globe take advantage of the WordPress system, and as such there is a useful and active community offering advice and suggestions for your own WordPress website.

• The look, feel and functionality of your WordPress website is governed by its theme; usually a combination of PHP, CSS and JavaScript files. There are thousands of themes either for free or a fee online that you can insert directly into your installation of WordPress. Many of these themes include a range of customisation options, from inserting your logo to altering the colour scheme to changing the layout of each individual page.

• Another great strength of WordPress is the vast multitude of plugins that can be added in to increase the functionality of your website. Want to incorporate a picture gallery or a survey? Want to improve your website’s Search Engine Optimisation or prevent spam comments on your blog? Plugins for all of these tasks and more are freely available for WordPress developers.

If you enjoyed reading the above, you may like to read more articles like this in our Articles For Web Designers category.

There are several reasons that MySQL has become the predominant database structure for information on websites around the globe. Amongst these reasons is the fact that the technology is completely free and open source, and that it is also supported by the vast majority of website hosting accounts. As long as your hosting provider can support MySQL and PHP you are good to go! There isn’t an attractive graphical user interface as in the case of the Microsoft Access program when using MySQL, instead you’ll need to learn a variety of SQL statements to input and extract data, but don’t let that put you off. Particularly as a Web Designer can easily create websites using MySQL databases, without ever touching the tables filled with the information.

How is that possible? It’s done through the use of content management systems such as WordPress. Instead of manually inputting SQL statements to let your database know of the data that is required for a particular web page, you can simply have WordPress, or your CMS of choice, do the hard work for you.

So how does this actually work? Well let’s think of your MySQL database as a real thing; a filing cabinet filled to the brim with individual files relating to the different elements on your website. Let’s say you, the visitor to the website, want to access one particular piece of information, one particular file. As you head to the page in question the database is sent a PHP query asking for the relevant piece of information. In our filing cabinet example, this PHP request would essentially be your hand as you reach for the right record within the cabinet. Once the file is retrieved you can read it, gleaning the information that you require; once the PHP query is executed, the website will update with the information from the correct table and field of the database.

Essentially this all means that you, the web designer, doesn’t actually need to understand the finer details of SQL statements and the inner workings of MySQL as your CMS of choice can handle the requests for you. Despite that, it is still always worth grasping the basics of any technology that manipulates the workings of your website, on the off chance that something should ever go wrong.

If you enjoyed reading the above, you may like to read more articles like this in our Articles For Web Designers category.

Simple HTML Styling

The first port of call of many web designers is to do some simple text styling using HTML. It is easy to make text bold, for example, by enclosing it within <b> or <strong> tags as in this example:

<strong>This text is bold.</strong>

Likewise you can easily italicise text with <em> tags, or underline it with <u>:

<em>But this text is in italics!</em>

<u>And this is underlined!</u>

This simple formatting can certainly help to spice up any web designer’s pages, but what if you want to do something fancier such as changing the size of the text or altering its colour?

Text Styling with HTML & CSS

Before the days of CSS, the best way for a Web Designer to style the font on their web pages was with the little HTML tag <font>. This tag could be used in the following way to define the typeface, size and colour of a piece of content on your website:

<p>

<font color=”blue” size=”2″ face=”arial”>

This text has been styled.

</font>

</p>

Although it is still possible to use the <font> tag within your own web programming, it is highly recommended today that you incorporate some simple CSS to handle the styling of your text for you. Why? Because CSS can be used to style all of your web pages, which saves you having to copy and paste your font information for each and every piece of text on each and every page of HTML.

Let’s say that you would like all of the headings on your website to be coloured in blue, whereas the bulk of the text itself you would prefer in black. This quick and easy section of CSS styling would achieve that effect, without needing to keep reminding the web browser of your stylistic choices:

<html>

<head>

<style type=”text/css”>

h1 {color:blue;}

p {color:black;}

</style>

</head>

<body>

…

Why not take some time to practice styling the text within your initial website; you might be pleasantly surprised at how simply you can alter the words that appear on screen to make your web pages really stand out.

If you enjoyed reading the above, you may like to read more articles like this in our Articles For Web Designers category.