Sarasota Web Design, 3d Animation, Video, Audio

Click Here to see how I eliminate automated spam on my website forms.

I recently received the following email from one of my web design clients:
“I get 4-5 of these form submissions a week from my website”, writes the client. “Why am I receiving these? Is this something I should be concerned about? Here is a typical sample of the email submission I have been receiving from my website form:

name: ybgsitiei
parent name: ybgsitiei
phone: OZxmqCguQkhdkgZdFY
email: eozrph@wymoxu.com
referred by: JlyXYYFqZqvkenaO

I responded to this client by explaining to them what the emails were, who was sending them and what could be done to eliminate them.

Unwanted email submissions from your website form are usually spam. Spam is unsolicited, invasive advertising that can be compared to a telemarketer calling your home at 6pm on a week night and interrupting your family while eating dinner. If you use email on a regular basis, then you are most likely no stranger to email spam.

For website owners, spam can be received via the forms on their website and any email addresses that are posted on the website. It’s easy to resolve the latter. Just don’t post live email addresses on your website. Webbots called ‘email harvesters’ scan the Internet searching for live email addresses, then save the email addresses they find to a database. The webbot’s programmer then sells the email database to spammers as mail lists. That is why most websites use contact forms in place of posting live email addresses.

But spammers have grown increasingly effective at spamming website forms. Website forms spam can be submitted by humans and by webbots. There is nothing you can do to eliminate human submitted spam, except for removing your website form.

Website forms can be protected from webbots. The first step a website designer can take is restricting webbots from seeing the form page with the robots.txt file. The robots.txt file is a website script located in the root of the website directory that tells search engine spiders and webbots what files and directories they are allowed to access. Disallowing a website’s form pages in the robots.txt file will prevent search engine webbots and other Internet webbots scanning programs from reading the website form pages. Search engines will sometimes crawl website forms, submitting an email to the owner with random letters that look like jibberish. By disallowing the website forms with the robots.txt file, you can eliminate some of your websites form spam.

However, persistent spammers will not be stopped by a robots.txt file. The solution for eliminating automated spam submissions in website forms can be acheived by installing a CAPTCHA solution in the website form.

Click Here to see how I eliminate automated spam on my website forms with CAPTCHA

CAPTCHA, is an acronym for “Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart”.  CAPTCHA is a type of challenge-response test used on Internet website forms to ensure that the form submission is not generated by an automated software program, or webbot. The CAPTCHA process asks a user to complete a simple test which the website forms software is able to generate and grade. A common type of CAPTCHA requires that the user type letters or digits from a distorted image that appears on the screen. Because Internet webbots are unable to read a distorted image and solve the CAPTCHA, any user entering a correct solution is presumed to be human. CAPTCHA was developed by staff at Carnegie Mellon University and IBM in 2000.

CAPTCHA has become increasingly more common on Internet website forms, and savvy Internet users have become accustomed to completing the CAPTCHA tests on website forms. CAPTCHA use on website forms will continue to increase until the day that webbot software evolve to the point that they can solve the CAPTCHA solution. Only the most sophisticated spammers will utilize such webbot software, so CAPTCHA should be able to protect your website forms for some time.

Michael Rassel is the Owner of Razworks Web Design, a freelance website design company in Sarasota, FL.

To contact Razworks call 941-685-8851

or email Razworks using the contact form by clicking here.

Visit Razworks Website by Clicking Here >>

Your small business needs a website, and Razworks Sarasota web site design looks like the best deal you’ve seen. So how do you get started?

To can email Razworks questions Click Here. Be sure to include descriptions about the website you want so Razworks can get started right away. Email any questions prior to ordering. You can mail a check to Razworks at 935 N. Beneva Rd., Sarasota, FL 34232

Alternatively you can call Razworks at 941-685-8851. Phone orders still get the low Internet advertised prices and we will get started on your website right away. You can mail a check to Razworks at 935 N. Beneva Rd., Sarasota, FL 34232.

Planning your website:

A Razworks website production is comprised of the following:

1. Administration
   • Domain registration and setup – Client input
   • Hosting subscription and setup
   • Email subscription and setup – Client input
   • Software installation and setup
2. Design
   • Research of client’s industry and trends – Client input
   • Select page layout – Client input
   • Create visual design – Client input
   • Customize layout to visual design
   • Install website
3. Content
   • Determine main navigation – Client input
   • Setup left sidebar content – Client input
   • Setup right sidebar content – Client input
   • Publish client content on four web pages and one blog post. (5 pages total) – Client input
   • Create temporary content when none is supplied.
4. Marketing
   • Install Google Sitemap Generator for search engine optimization
   • Setup Google Adwords account (client submits credit card and $5 fee to activate.) – Client input

Choosing a domain name is the first step to producing a website.

Is there a trick to selecting a domain name?

If search engine results ranking is important to you, then choose a domain name that has your product or services search keywords within the domain name. For example, www.SarasotaHurricaneProducts.com is not the name of the small business that contracted the website development. But the company’s target market is Sarasota, FL and it’s product keyword is hurricane products. Using this keyword optimized domain name helped thrust Sarasota Hurricane Products.com to #4 on Google within two months of first being posted.

Email Accounts

Determine how many email accounts you will need and what the usernames and passwords will be.

Client Research

Prepare a list of competitor websites and/or web design examples that you would like to emulate.

Web Page Layout

A Web 2.0 web page layout uses what is termed as a “Box Model”, where sections of the web page are divided into boxes and columns into which headers, navigation, content, sidebar content and footers are inserted.

Columns describe the vertical areas of the page in which content is displayed. The 3 column website design layout is the most common, providing a left sidebar area for site navigation, a center area for the content body and a right sidebar for a shopping cart, links, blogs, etc.

The 3 Column web page layout

The most common web page layout is the 3 column with header and horizontal navigation. Nine out of ten websites use this layout. It maximizes screen space to display more information on the web page and allows users to easily select from multiple subjects.

The 2 Column web page layout

A smaller page size can help focus attention on the content area while still displaying a side bar for links and secondary information. This layout is popular with blog websites.

The 1 Column web page layout

A one column minimizes the overall page size emphasizes the content area by eliminating side bar content. This layout is popular with blog websites.

Variations of each web page layout

3 column web page without header

2 column web page without header

1 column web page without header

3 column vertical web page layout

2 column vertical web page layout

Background

Background colors and images create visual appeal and brand awareness. Elements used to produce various visual design themes are:

• photos
• gradients
• colors
• textures

Studies have shown that web visitors will judge your website on it’s visual appeal within the first few seconds of viewing your home page.

If your website has a professional looking visual web design, the user will usually stay on your website and continue viewing your content. If your website has an unattractive or unprofessional looking design, the user will often click back to where they came from and visit another website.

Hence, expensive looking visual web design will often help improve visitor retention. The longer you can keep a consumer on your website, the better your chances of them becoming your customer.

Page Subjects

5 web pages are included in most sarasota website design packages

A typical five page website has the following web pages:

• Home
• Products and Services
• Contact Us
• About Us
• News

One of the five pages will be your blog page, which I typically title “News”

The other four pages can have anything you want, but the page subjects listed above are common with most websites and help to establish identity. Identity pages foster consumer confidence and help make the visitor more comfortable with your web presence. Most Internet users expect to see these pages and the content presented can often pursued a customer choose to do business with you. With the Do-It-Yourself web page editor you can easily add new pages your self.