A New Website for the New Year
When the business launched in 2008, I created my own logo quickly using photoshop. I assumed a logo needed to be in cursive because it looked “cool”. I have an Information Systems degree and reasonable web programming knowledge, so I built my first site completely from scratch. I thought my site just plain rocked 🙂 My website blasted obnoxious music upon entry, was very basic, and included a hodge podge of images I had taken from buildings to flowers to autumn leaves to weddings to children…you get the idea. The website was a nightmare to maintain and was only updated a couple times.
In 2010, I noticed my site lacked cool looking animations and such so I invested in flash based site. At the time, I loved it, it seemed hip and cool with photos moving and fading. However, I quickly began noticing the drawbacks of a flash site…it was error-prone and crashed easily. It was difficult for Search Engine Optimization (SEO), so I was forced to put a landing page on my site. In 2010, I began to notice increased web traffic from mobile devices (about 3% of web traffic). At the start of 2012, I began seeing about 10% mobile device traffic to my site. This was a problem because my flash site did not play nice with mobile devices. I knew my new site had to accommodate for these devices.
Nearly two long years have passed since launching the old website and blog. At that time, I thought my site would be with me for a very long time, but the truth is that site hobbled along for the past two years. I wanted a clean slate…something fresh. In January 2012, I began my hunt again for a designer to help me develop a logo and branding that was clean, simple, and memorable. I worked with Natalie Christensen, a graphic designer, in Kansas City. We spent months drafting and drafting some more. The process wasn’t easy, but it was worth it! On Monday, I launched the new site and the initial branding. This new site is fully compatible with mobile devices (iPad, iPhone, Android, etc.) and looks great on a computer as well. Clocking more than 50+ hours on compiling (nearly all after-hour time of taking care of my 2 year old), updating, launching the new site left me sleep deprived and exhausted and I’m sooo glad I can breathe easier now. I was pleased to see nearly 800 unique visitors from all over the world visit the new site on Monday. I was amazed to see 41% of that traffic came from a mobile device. I’m thinking a mobile friendly site was a step in the right direction 🙂 Please take a look around the new site and enjoy! Below is the evolution of www.johnsharpephotography.com
Launch January 2013
Launch May 2010 – Retired January 2013
Launch July 2008 – Retired May 2010
