A client emailed us to today and said:

"Just added some content. This is going to be a lot easier than I thought. Tasty CMS is very similar to the CMS I’ve been using just a LOT EASIER and just like you guys say, that other Content Management Systems come with so many more options than we need!"

Well, after a ton of hard work and a lot of late nights, we’re so excited to announce the launch of our new web-based service, My Condo Alliance.

A division of Tasty CMS, My Condo Alliance is designed to provide a collaborative way for Housing Associations (HOAs) and Property Managers to communicate with residents and board members. Our easy-to-update Content Management System (CMS) offers up a centralized, online hub to store important information and funnel it to the right people, which saves everyone involved time and effort.

Some of our unique features and benefits include:

• A Residents Only Intranet: Ensure all residents can access essential information with this password protect intranet.
• Document module: Store important documents in one centralized space so members can find everything they need in just a few easy clicks. This also means fewer requests flooding your inbox!
• An engaged community: Encourage resident involvement by posting ongoing tasks of the association and allowing them to see active, completed and future projects, including contracts and bids online.
• More transparency: The ability to publish meeting minutes, bylaws, rules and regulations, move in/ move out procedures, financials and more can help residents feel more in the loop!

Visit our newly launched website to learn more about our time-saving resources and how we can help you successfully manage your association.

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Metroworks Tile & Stone recently approached us for a website design and development project for a brand new website.

Because Metroworks Tile & Stone provides professional installations for both residential and commercial properties, the layout of the homepage focused on displaying high quality pictures of their work. We built a homepage slide show module so that our client has the ability of updating the homepage pictures as new projects are being completed.

We made it easy for website visitors to contact our client by adding a "Request a Site Visit" form in the footer of their website. By placing the form in the footer, this form appears on every page of the website.

The About page has a special layout in that this page is full width and we used a picture of Shawn as the background of the entire page. The text area is floating above the picture on a translucent white background. The white background helps to bring contrast between the text and background so that the content is readable.

For the portfolio section of the website, instead of using our standard Photo Gallery Module that comes with our CMS we installed a custom Multiple Image Uploader Module which will allow our client to upload large batches of photos with just a few simple clicks.

We invite you to visit their website, take a look around and tell us what you think!

If you're a fan of Apple then you've probably owned a few of the products that they have produced since 1976. To add a bit of nostalgia, the fine folks over at Pop Chart lab are offering up the following graphic in poster form.

This woud look great on any wall.

**Unfortunately, any true Apple fan will quickly see a number of problems with this poster beginning with the fact that it starts in 1983 completely ignoring the very first product, the Apple I, which premiered in 1976 (not to mention the Apple II is also absent). There's a lot of other important products missing such as the servers and Apple TV. A few of the graphics aren't associated with the right products which adds to the confusion. So while this would look great on any wall, I don't think I'll be hanging it on mine.

Author Tim Prosch recently approached us for a website design and development project for The other Talk.

Because the homepage required teasers for the 6 catalyst stories, we implemented a text slide show which can be navigated by the users clicking on the arrow buttons. We also designed a nice bold hover affect when users place their mouse over certain Call to Action boxes such as the "Sign Up Get the 1st Chapter Free!" button on the homepage. Tim wanted the book title "The other Talk" to always stand out in the text area so we added a special class to a feature in the CMS text editor. This way as pages are added to the website, our client has the ability to make the title stand out without having to contact us for this special request.

The website design has a simplistic modern feel to it that we just love. We invite you to visit their website, take a look around and tell us what you think!

When we talk about Search Engine Optimization (SEO) we're literally talking about hundreds of different little things that when looked at individually can seem insignificant. But as a whole they combine to hopefully increase your website's search ranking which should help with increased relevant traffic.

One post regarding everything having to do with SEO would be too much to read. Many websites, businesses and so called "SEO Experts" have created an entire industry around getting websites to rank higher. We'll focus on a few elements that every website have. Since all websites have these elements available to them this post should help a lot of people jump in without getting in over their head.

Meta Keywords

Let's get one thing out of the way right away. First, Meta Keywords are comma separated words that describe the context of a web page in short one or two word phrases.

Code Sample

Secondly, they do nothing for SEO. Absolutely. Nothing. A couple of years ago Google came right out and announced that they do not use keywords when considering your website's ranking in search results. We wrote a blog post about this back in September 2009 entitled Better META: When Google speaks it's important to listen Just know that it's safe to ignore and move past Meta Keywords.

Meta Description

The Meta Description is similar to Meta Keywords in many ways. For one, it's an element that is added to the head tag. Second, the content should describe the information that is on an individual web page. And third, it does nothing for SEO.

Code Sample

But, unlike Meta Keywords, you do not want to ignore this element. According to SEOmoz, the Meta Description is a great place to write compelling ad copy.

The meta description tag serves the function of advertising copy, drawing readers to a website from the results and thus, is an extremely important part of search marketing. Crafting a readable, compelling description using important keywords can draw a much higher click-through rate of searchers to the given web page. To maximize click-through rates on search engine result pages, it's important to note that Google and other search engines bold keywords in the description when they match search queries.

Source: http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/meta-description

The Meta Description appears in search results when someone does a direct search on your business' name. For example, a search for "Tasty CMS" has a Google result of:

The context is the Meta Description for the home page.

Actual Meta Description

So, while the Meta Description in and of itself will not have a direct influence on your page's search engine ranking, if searchers find the content compelling enough it could increase click through rates. While it's a topic for another day, click through rates do have an impact on SEO.

Title Tag

By now you might be wondering if anything in your control impacts SEO. Unlike the Meta Keywords and Meta Description the Title Tag plays a very important role in SEO.

Code Sample

According to SEOmoz, aside from the actual content on a webpage, the Title Tag is the single most important element on a page.

Creating a descriptive, keyword-laden title tag is important for increasing rankings in search engines. The screen shot below comes from SEOmoz's survey of 37 influential thought leaders in the SEO industry on the search engine ranking factors. In that survey, 35 of the 37 participants said that keyword usage in the title tag was the most important place to use keywords to achieve high rankings.

Source: http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/title-tag

Naturally, title tags show up in search results. When a user does a search for specific keywords that are in your title tag they will be bolded. This helps garner a greater visibility and a higher click-through rate.

Best Practices

At Tasty CMS, we developed a solution where the title tag is constructed from 3 separate pieces that our clients can control:

Page Title - Company Name - Meta Description

Generally speaking, a Page Title should contain relevant keywords since it accurately describes the content on a page. Additionally, we append the Meta Description at the end to provide even more context. Therefore, it makes a lot of sense to fill the Meta Description with SEO keywords and phrases. We recommend writing the Meta Description for the home page in more of a sentence-like format since it appears in results when someone does a search for your business; on other pages we recommend writing the Meta Description almost like you would write Meta Keywords by peppering in highly targeted keywords.

Actual Title Tag For This Page

This is just the tip of the SEO iceberg but it should provide a simple explanation to some often asked questions that keep you in control.