JimFerguson.me

Changes Coming Soon

Jim — Mon, 08 Oct 2012 14:22:30 +0000

Wow…I’ve let the dust get about an inch thick on my blog, with the last post being over a year ago. Fear not! A fresh look and a website that I plan on updating on a more regular basis are on the way before the end of the year.

Thanks to flickr user emilykneeter for the photo.

Changes Coming Soon is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.

Downtown Dental

Jim — Wed, 23 May 2012 18:34:11 +0000

I recently launched a website for Dr. Trey Kenna’s new dental practice, Downtown Dental, which is opening next month. Dr. Kenna wanted a dental website that was modern and would reflect the vibe of his downtown Greenville, SC office – a uniqueness that so many dental websites in particular lack. To go along with this effort to give the website a personal touch, we included some hand-drawn icons in the navigation menu. I shot some interior photography of the office construction as well as a few head shots of Dr. Kenna to go on the homepage. I’ll be going back for a second shoot once the office is complete.

In addition to the website, Dr. Kenna asked me to design a banner (see the second thumbnail below) to hang on the large windows in front of the office, so patients could be directed to the website or get the office phone number after hours. We are currently working on designing a brochure to inform new patients about the practice and the services they provide.

Downtown Dental is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.

SC Native Plant Society

Jim — Fri, 04 May 2012 20:55:11 +0000

The redesign for the South Carolina Native Plant Society website went live this afternoon. The SCNPS website includes a calendar of events, the ability for visitors to join, renew and donate to the organization, and a recent news section for updates from chapters around the state. Both the calendar of events and the recent news section are categorized by region, so visitors can see what is going in their area or state-wide. There is also an area of the site where visitors can submit a plant identification request and view past identified plants. The new website is built on the WordPress content management system, which will allow several select members to log into an administrative panel and easily add and update their information.

Visit website

SC Native Plant Society is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.

Prevailing Multiple Employer Plan

Jim — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 16:00:57 +0000

Prevailing Multiple Employer Plan provides versatile retirement solutions that fit the unique needs of each of their clients. The Prevailing MEP website includes plan features, a list of service providers, a frequently asked questions section, an area for recent news updates and a risk tolerance questionnaire.

Prevailing Multiple Employer Plan is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.

Novus Advisors

Jim — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 16:00:32 +0000

Novus Advisors is an investment advising group that wanted an ultra-clean look and feel to their website. This site also includes a risk tolerance questionnaire, which will show investors a recommended model based on their input.

Novus Advisors is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.

SEMCO

Jim — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 15:51:00 +0000

SEMCO is an energy management company that helps reduce utility costs in commercial buildings across the southeast United States. The scope of this project included a logo & business card design, along with the design and development of their website.

Visit SEMCO »

SEMCO is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.

Back on Assignment

Jim — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 14:46:21 +0000

Here’s a quick update to let everyone know that I have joined on to begin contributing to the local photoblog Greenville Daily Photo. The authors of the blog, Denton and Connie, have been regularly been posting photos since 2005 to document living in the downtown area. Now that work has them relocating to Charlotte, several other local photographers will be contributing to keep things running. I always enjoyed documenting campus life for The Tiger Newspaper when I was a student at Clemson and I have to say that I’m pretty excited to have an ongoing commitment to shooting this style of photography again.

My first shots will start rolling through in the next couple days, so head over to Greenville Daily Photo to check them out and be sure to bookmark the site or subscribe to the RSS feed so you can be sure to see the latest pictures of our awesome city!

Back on Assignment is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.

Brochure & Tradeshow Graphic Design

Jim — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 17:31:59 +0000

Jenks Inc. Realty recently approached me to create several items featuring one of their properties, The Territories. Located in Greenwood, SC, The Territories is unique in that it is split into two parcels by the Saluda River in – on one side of the river is a residential area and on the other is a preserve for hunting, fishing, shooting sports clays and other outdoors-related activities. These activities played heavily into the design of 1) a refined logo design 2) a brochure with an updated property map and 3) two trade show display panels.

Brochure & Tradeshow Graphic Design is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.

RJ Rockers and the Carolina Panthers

Jim — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 20:28:52 +0000

With football season (finally) upon us, I thought I would share a project I recently worked on for RJ Rockers Brewery in Spartanburg. If you’re heading to Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte to catch a Carolina Panthers game this season, RJ Rockers is going to have stations set up at section 125 or 546 with Bell Ringer Ale and Son of a Peach for sale. I created the sign to the left for each station using the Panthers blue, large images of the bottles and a line of scrimmage background.

RJ Rockers and the Carolina Panthers is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.

Web Basics: Domain Names

Jim — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 14:24:38 +0000

I’m starting off a series of posts about “web basics,” where I talk through a topic to help clear up some of the questions I routinely receive when working through a web design project. First up, I’m going to be talking about domain names – your home on the world wide web.

Domain Names

Domain names, also called your URL, are very similar to the address of your brick and mortar building – you give your web address out to your customers so they know where your business or organization can be located on the web. More specifically, your domain name is the address that you type in to be directed to a particular website.

Domains are usually reserved on a per-year basis from a service like GoDaddy* for between $7.50 (you can usually find coupons online to get this lower price) and $12 a year. There are also some select domains that the powers that be have deemed to be “premium” and can be very expensive to purchase – you’ll know pretty quickly if you run across one of those when searching for a domain.

Typically .com, .net and .org domains are the most commonly used and recognized, but there are many other extensions that can be used. Take this website for example, which is JimFerguson.me – I get a lot of funny looks when telling people my URL. But I like the .me extension for a portfolio website for an individual, because the website is specifically about that person and the services they offer. For me, it’s different, easy to remember and describes what the website is about. These alternate extensions can also be considered when the .com version of a domain has been taken. Some alternate extensions have certain requirements that must be met in order to purchase, such as .gov websites must be affiliated with the government or certain country-specific extensions require that you have an address in that country. Wikipedia has a complete list of available domain extensions.

From a search engine standpoint, I often get asked if owning an exact phrase match would help a company show up better in searches. In short, the answer is yes, they can – but for the time being. Recent studies have shown that this factor has started to slip in importance when search engines consider rankings. So if it came down to owning the domain for name of your brand or owning the exact phrase match of what you do, I would almost always recommend going with your brand name.

Another question that comes up is whether or not you should own several versions of a domain and redirect them to the primary URL. The answer here would be that it really depends. If you are concerned with protecting your brand name, then I would say go ahead and buy them up. Otherwise, don’t worry about it. Some companies go to a bit of an extreme here and also register variants and misspellings of their brand name. Registering a domain name and redirecting it to point to your primary URL does not help with searches though, so buying and redirecting the domain greenvillescwebdesignbyjimferguson.com or jimfergusonisthebomb.com wouldn’t help me out much.

So that’s a pretty good top-level overview on domain names. If you’ve got additional questions or comments on domains, leave them in the comments section and I’ll follow up. Or if you’d like some help in choosing a domain name, let me know and we’ll work through it together.

*I’m not endorsing GoDaddy here, they’re just one of the largest and most well-known domain registrars.

Web Basics: Domain Names is a post from JimFerguson.me - . Jim Ferguson, based out of Greenville, SC, offers web design, graphic design and photography services.