Ten years ago, If you had a website for your business which explained who you were and what you had to offer, it was enough.  Five years ago, you needed to pique the users’ interest, whether this was through some animated graphics, or by providing updated content like tips, in order to give the user a reason to come back, and a reason to remember you.

So what’s important on the World Wide Web now? With well over 30 billion pages online, that’s a lot of competition to have a user remember your website, and even more competition for your website to convince them that you are the best choice for them. There is more focus for stronger copy, decreased load times, and better visual presentation, not to mention SEO.

Where ten years ago you just needed to worry about putting up a simple informative website, these days you need to stand out, you need to have visuals that grab the users’ attention without turning them off. You need to interact with them and provide them with new and useful information (which Is just one of the reasons blog use has exploded), you need strong copy to keep them interested as well as to come up in search engines, and you need to have it all load “Right Now!”, or as close as you can get to it.

Web Design in 2009 has seen a shift into newer, more modern, informative, and intuitive styles, not just visually, but all around. Designing around the popular CMS systems out there such as Wordpress and Joomla has been a great deal of fun for me.  It has really taught me a lot, and has given me an opportunity to move into new realms of design, one with fewer limitations, and the ability to create stunning and practical websites, blogs, and more.

With so many people on the net, a website serves as so much more than just a source of information, but as a “sales tool” for the global or local market. It helps promote your business whether you are hard at work or finally getting some rest and sleeping, your website is working for you. So make sure that it’s working hard, and doing the job right.

One of the greatest things of owing a business is when you reach what feels like some sort of milestone. It can be making it through 3 months, 6, a year or your first three years. It can be finishing a big job, or meeting a financial goal. It’s different for everyone. The best thing to learn is that as long as it’s a goal for you, then it’s worth acknowledging. For me, we’ve got several going on all at once. We’ve just been given the go ahead to launch the new Ottawa Chamber of Commerce website (which I’m very happy with), we’ve just passed the third anniversary of the date of our incorporation and we finally have enough money around the office to keep spare ink cartridges for the printers in stock!

Those first two are pretty big it’s true, but i find what I really like are the little things. enough ink, not worrying if there’s enough cash in the account to buy gas, or knowing that you’ve got some working funds for jobs in progress. I’ve heard from various clients the little victories and the defeats they’ve had as their business grows, changes, and slows down. The one thing that’s consistent and I urge you all to keep in mind:

Starting a business is an act many people cannot do. The fact that you have is your first victory. For each ink cartridge, each overdue bill finally paid and each day that passes, you have won yet again. When you feel down, and you ask yourself ‘Why?”.. look back on your victories, look now upon the person in the mirror, grown and better than the person before.

Each little step is a step of success, of blazing a trail. It’s tough, but through all the hard work, you have the first chance at freedom.

So it’s once again been almost two weeks but I can still hear wind rushing around me and still feel the moment of panic as I let myself fall out of an airplane that was 9000 feet above the ground.

For many years I’ve wanted to do this and on a fine, sunny Saturday I was strapped into a harness and climbed into a plane big enough for the pilot and perhaps 5 others, if we were sitting on top of one another. The plane had a roll top door in the side, something like a garage door and was noisy as we sped along the runway, finally leaving the ground. There was a moment of rush as we did that, as I thought to myself ‘crap, no getting back out now’… of course, getting out of the plane was exactly what I was there to do! through a 25 minute flight we circled higher and higher, the views of the Gananoque region stunning below us. I saw the Rideau lakes, the St. Lawrence and the airport below in tiny little detail. The ride itself was really quite beautiful and then the question came “Are you ready to skydive??!!” what else was there to do but scream “YEAH!”…

The roll top door opens easily and myself and the instructor I’m attached to shuffle across the small floorspace to the door. I look out and down. Clouds surround us, above and below. As I swing my legs out the door I’m told to grab my harness and a moment of panic sets in. Here I am, 9000 feet in the air, holding on to nothing, feet dangling in the air, no parachute on myself and leaning out the door of an airplane! what the heck am I doing??!!

And then we were out. Falling through the clouds and I lost track of everything. It was the most free I’d ever felt. The screams I had joked about coming out of my mouth before leaving the ground came out as “WOOOHOOO”. 30 seconds of freefall, hurtling toward the ground with arms and legs fluttering wildly. We traveled over a mile in 30 seconds. That’s about 200 km/h… Then suddenly the chute popped and we were floating, everything safe, still so high up I could see the curvature of the earth. My instructor said behind me “ok good, the chute worked”… Isn’t that nice? . I saw the airport as it grew and my family’s camping trailer, over 40 feet long, looking about the size of a pencil eraser on the ground far below. As we floated down, we did a few stunts, wild turns and circles, each one an amazing rush. We floated down the rest of the way, as people become the right size again and I took pictures of the scenery around us. We landed right on target, safe and sound (and laughing like an idiot).

Sometimes, when you want something, scary as it might sometimes seem.. you’ve just gotta jump.

P.S. My great thanks to everyone at Skydive Gananoque (http://www.skydivegan.com), and to Will, the guy I knew for little more than an hour before I trusted him with my life. I appreciate getting back to the ground alive and can’t wait to try it again!