Successfull Mastery of Dreamweaver

The Heading 2 (h2) Tag

2011-11-17T12:41:00.001-08:00

I want to start out with a reminder that CONTENT IS KING to the three major searchengines and that means pages for the search engines have well-structured text.

The search engines look at these top three tags in thefollowing manner:

1 – Title tag (title)

2 – Heading 1 tag (h1)

3 – Heading 2 tag (h2)

Your (title) tag should support your main keywords for thepage followed by the (h1) tag then the (h2) tag.

The Heading 2 tag (h2)

The (h2) tag is a structure tag that creates sub divisionsof the (h1) tag. Think the (h1) as achapter title of a book and the (h2) as the subheadings throughout thechapter.

In best structure practice, the (h2) always follows an (h1).

Remember the goal is to bring the keywords of the (title)tag into the (h1) and (h2)

Example of (title)

Successful Mastery | Dreamweaver Training in Marin |Dreamweaver Training in Sonoma

Example of (h1)

Dreamweaver Training in Marin

Example of (h2)

Dreamweaver Training in Marin at Redwood High School

Successful Mastery Web Site

Next Comes the h1 (heading 1) tag

2011-09-22T14:16:00.000-07:00

The important thing to remember -- CONTENT is king to the major search engines. The content I amtalking about is text. The search enginespiders read the text and tags of your site through the markup language. The first tag the spiders read is title tag.

Next it looks at the text and the tags that give the textstructure. The first important structuretag is the h1 heading tag. The heading 1tag is like the chapter title of a book. It identifies the purpose of the page. It should also be a match with the title tag. If your title tag content states yourkeywords are Dreamweaver Training Marin -- make sure your h1 tag has thosekeywords in it.

Here would be an example of the h1:

You Deserve Dreamweaver Training
that is professional, understandable, and fun
Dreamweaver Training in Marin

Take Away – Your page h1 needs to have the same keywords listed inthe title tag.

Next article will be the other heading tags.

Check out Web Design Classes I amteaching at Redwood High School for Adults

The Almighty Title Tag

2011-09-01T18:11:00.000-07:00

You may have heard the importance of Meta Keyword tags – forget it if you are designing for Google, Yahoo, and Bing (Top Three Search Engines). These search engines use the title tag is where you know put your keywords. Here are some excellent tips for keywords:

1. Use the Title tag to place your keywords. Make your keywords more specific than general. You have a better chance of positioning higher with specific keywords than General in most search categories.

Example - Dreamweaver Training Marin instead of Dreamweaver Training

2. Break up keyword groups with the pipe (| )

Example - Dreamweaver Training Marin | Dreamweaver Training Sonoma

3. Make sure your keywords are well positioned in the Web page with the Title tag. This will be address in
future blogs.

4. Don’t spam keywords in your Web pages. One of the two ways you can spam is to place keywords in your Title tag that isn’t found in text of the Web page. The other is to use the same your Title tag within many of your Web pages. Make sure each Web page has its own unique Title tag.

Check out Web Design Classes I am teaching at Redwood High School for Adults

SEO – Search Engine Optimization for Your Web Site 2

2011-08-01T10:21:00.000-07:00

The goal is to have your site show on the first page of search results and be within the first five unpaid results. Let’s take a look at the keywords: - Adobe Dreamweaver Training Marin. Notice that Successful Mastery is in the first two positions for the regular search results, right under the paid ads. This is area we will focus on in this series – “SEO – Search Engine Optimization for Your Web Site”.

To achieve a high position in search results, your site must be more than simply recognizable by a search engine crawler. It must satisfy a set of criteria that not only gets the site cataloged, but can also get it cataloged above most (if not all) of the other sites that fall into that category or topic. This is no easy task.
By accident or luck, your site will surely land in a search engine; and it's likely to rank within the first few thousand results without any effort from you. A crawler will eventually find the site and bury it somewhere in the results with every other web site on the same topic. The good news this takes very little time on your part. The bad news – the chance of someone finding your site is very low through the search engines. Let’s be honest – being ranked on page 2 will limit your chance of being found. How many times do you click on the second page? We want to work towards the top 5 position on page 1. Remember – You have to start somewhere.

To achieve the top position in search results, your site must be more than simply recognizable by a search engine crawler. It must optimized for the keywords and have great text structure. Yes, I said text. Good text content and its structure is very important to good search engine positioning. Design is important and great – but it will not help you with your positioning in search engines.

Here is an example of Google, Yahoo, and bing.

TRY THIS – What is the main key words for your index page. Do a search in the top three search engines and check out were your site is position. Remember you have to start somewhere.

Get great Dreamweaver Training, Coaching, and Consulting

SEO – Search Engine Optimization for Your Web Site

2011-07-22T14:23:00.000-07:00

SEO is customizing page elements of your web site to achieve the best possible position in a search engine for your important keywords. Elements (HTML tags) within your Web pages and external to your Web pages effect the position of your Web pages within the top three search engines: Google, Bing, and Yahoo.

Three major external factors for your position in the top three search engines are:

1. Links to your Web site: This factor only can help propel you very high in search engine ranking. But I am not talking about my site linking to yours. I am a small player in the Web site world, but everything helps. I am talking about bigger, popular sites like Adobe, Microsoft, Craig’s list, and CNN. Stay away from link promotion sites; they tend to do more harm than good.

2. Longevity: The longer your site is an active and viable site on the Web. Also, the longer your site shows up on the top three search engines.

3. Search Engine Webmaster Tools: Setting direct links to the Web site with the big three search engines.

This series will focus on the internal factor of elements within your Web page. How to optimize your Web pages so that the Search engines look at your Web pages and position your page in a favorable position. This blog is going to focus on these very important concepts for the rest of the summer.

Successful Mastery

Designing your CSS Font Style Visually

2011-04-13T08:46:00.000-07:00

When choosing the right combinations of fonts for your Web pages in Dreamweaver it is hard to see all the fonts in your font series for the browser.

I found a great Web site that helps you visually see the fonts on line, thus makes matching up the combination more easy. If you go to csstypeset.com, you can add your own text, and use the JavaScript interface to apply different CSS properties.

Once you have the look you want you can copy the code in the "View CSS" window on the right and paste it into the desired CSS selector in your CSS file.

The only downside is the limited fonts. The good news is that all the fonts are the best for viewing text online.

Coming up on April 18 and the 20 is the Level one Dreamweaver class at Redwood High in Marin. Starts at 6 pm and ends at 9. For More Info...

How to Add Pictures to Dreamweaver CS5

2011-03-19T16:25:00.000-07:00

I want more than just text on my website – How do I add an Image to my page? The first step is to create or get your image or graphic and store it in a folder on your computer. Then do the following:

1. Place the Insertion point were you want your image.

2. Click on the Image: Image button on the Insertion panel on the right side of Dreamweaver.

3. Browse to find the image you want to place within the Web page. Click the OK button.

4. If you did not define your default folder when you Defined Your Site, you will need to tell Dreamweaver were to put a copy of the image. Click the YES button.

5. Find the folder were you want the Image stored. Click the SAVE button.

Here is the Image in the page.

For Classes on Dreamweaver, XHTML, HTML, CSS

Define Your Site in CS5 Tutorial

2011-03-06T09:17:00.000-08:00

I have created a online tutorial on How to Define your site in Dreamweaver CS5. click here to view it.

In Marin - Classes starting in Web Design at the end of March

New Location for Classes in Marin

2011-02-09T20:20:00.000-08:00

My Marin Web Design classes start again at a new location. We are leaving Drake High school for Redwood High school campus. Redwood High was able to upgrade their computer labs to the Adobe CS5 (the newest version),and I am busy writing the new courseware for the classes.

This move is a new beginning. I have taught Web Design at Drake for over 14 years. There is a newness and excitment about moving to the new campus. The latest software by Adobe, heat in the winter time. The campus is just off highway 101.

will be a good deal all the way around. I think we will be leaving behind the cold computer room in the winter with no heat or hot room in the summer. The no location is not far from the 191 freeway.

We will start with XHTML, HTML, and Css at the end of March and move through the Dreamweaver classes for the spring quarter..

Go to my Marin Web Design Class page for more information.

While you are there check out the opposition to get a free hour one on one tutoring.

Create a Custom Submit Button For Your Form

2010-10-28T08:25:00.000-07:00

Here is your standard Submit button:

Here is the graphic I want to turn into a Submit button.

Follow the steps below:

Step 1: Change the Insert Panel to Form tab.

Step 2: Click Image Field and select the image for your button.

Step 3: Type submit for the ID name and no label tag. Click the OK button.

Now you have a Submit button for your form.

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3 New Features I Like About Adobe Dreamweaver CS5

2010-09-19T11:13:00.000-07:00

1. Small upgrade from Dreamweaver CS4. Most screens and the panels are the same as CS4. So if you have CS4 there really isn't any need to upgrade, unless you really need a new feature such as the ability to work with database sites like WordPress.

2. Updated the Define Site component of Dreamweaver. You now don't have to choose between basic wizard or Advance. Now just add the site name and were the files will be stored and save. So much easier.

3. Whats this Widget thing. Widgets are combinations of HTML, CSS, and Java Script. The good news are others have created them. Like creating new CS3 gradients. Using actually colors and not an image, or adding a Google map with a widget, and more. You can download them into your Dreamweaver and create them from the Widget browser into your page. It is found under Insert Panel>>>Widget.

Click the Widget icon. Select the Widget you want to Add. (I have already downloaded these widgets. in the next installment, I will show you how to get Widgets.)

Here is the results of adding a Widget.

Check out the Special for Tutoring and Coaching in Marin and Sonoma County:

Successful Mastery Special

Another Version of Dreamweaver CS5 -- REALLY

2010-08-23T16:15:00.000-07:00

It seems like I just get comfortable with the last upgrade of Dreamweaver and a new version is out. If you don't own Dreamweaver and are going to buy new you will end up buying CS5. But, if you own CS4, most likely you don't need CS5, unless you need one of the new features, like:

PHP-based content management systems such as WordPress, Joomla!, or Drupal.
Adobe Browser Labs - Check your page in different browsers without having to install them.
Integration with the new Adobe Business Catalyst - Easily develop business Websites.
Design with powerful CSS inspection tools
other changes big and small.

More to come

For classes go to Successful Mastery

Using the Acronym/abbreviation Tags

2010-06-28T15:57:00.000-07:00

If you are using acronyms or abbreviations in your Web page, I highly recommend you add the or tags to give the search engines and text readers the full text for each acronym or abbreviation on the page. This will provide the full text meaning for acronyms or abbreviations, plus a bonus if they are keywords for your page.

Example - < title="Hypertext Markup Language"> HTML or CA

How to (Done is CS4):

Step 1: Select the acronym or abbreviation.

Step 2: Click the abbr abbreviation or the W3C acronym button on the text pane in the Insert panel.

Step 3: Type the text in the Full text field.

Step 4: Press the OK button.

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Making Images More Accessible

2010-06-08T08:51:00.000-07:00

Here is how to add or update the text for each image.

Step 1: Select the image.

Step 2: Go to the Property Panel. You should see that the image is selected by the word Image in the top left hand corner of the Properties Panel.

Step 3: Click into the Alt text box and type the text for the image. (I have type Text here to show you were you will type the text.)

Check the Updated Class Schedules for Marin and San Jose.

Classes in Marin

Classes in San Jose

Making Images Friendlier to Search Engines

2010-05-31T16:49:00.000-07:00

Watch those Images

Any text that is important to your site or that helps Search Engines position your site should never be placed inside an image. Search Engine spiders can’t read images. You may go DA! But I have seen this mistake made time and again. So to the Search Engines – Image with text is just a image.

Anytime you are dealing with text that is important to the positioning of your Web page, don’t use images – make it plan ole text and nothing but text.

Empower Those Images

You can make the image friendlier to Search Engines. Do the following:

1. Use Search Engine friendly file names. Name the file with a name that will help describe the image in relation to your Web page. Make sure you have no spaces in your image name. Use a dash in place if a space. Like succefful_mastery_logo.png.

2. Make sure the Image tag has text in the alt attribute that describe the image in relation to your Web page. Like “Successful Mastery logo | Learn Adobe Dreamweaver” on the Adobe Dreamweaver Training page.

Check out Successful Mastery

Make it Strong and Emphasis those Words

2010-05-09T17:18:00.000-07:00

The use of both the strong tag and the emphasis tag can help in your search engines optimization. When search engine crawlers encounter these tags, they know to pay specially attention to the word or words that are contained between these tags.

Applying Strong and Emphasis to Text

Step 1: Select the word or words in your document window.

Step 2: Select the HTML button if you are using CS4 or CS5, if not selected.
Step 3: Click on either the strong or emphasis button in the Property Panel.
Outcome
Learn About Adobe Dreamweaver Classes in Marin, California
Learn About Adobe Dreamweaver Classes in San Jose, CA

Now Comes the Heading 1 & Heading 2

2010-04-28T14:49:00.000-07:00

The important points to remember is that the Title tag is the first place the major search engines look for those important keywords for the search engine. That having great content makes your site valuable and will not only help your search results, but will bring people back to your site.

The next important two tags for the search engines are the Heading 1 and the heading 2 tags.
The heading one tag introduces the content appearing in the Web page. Think of it as very similar to a chapter title. The Heading 1 can be similar to the Title tag. The Heading 1 is third in important to search engine friendliness.

The Heading 2 tag is a subtitle to the Heading 1 title for the content. Think of it as a subheading to the chapter title of a book. Well-structured content will have one or more Heading 2’s. Two Heading 2’s seems to help in search engine friendliness.

To set Heading 1 and Heading 2 -- select the text and then click on Heading 1 or Heading 2 in the property Panel.

Check out This Great Search Engine Friendly Menu Bar Tool

Title is King and Text Content is the Queen

2010-04-11T12:31:00.000-07:00

In the April 6 post we talked about the Title tag has replaced the Meta Keywords tag. The title tag is very important for search engine optimization. Next, you want to have good text content on your search engine friendly page. Google says that if you have content people want, they will come. Your page content should support your Title tag or the Title tag should support your text content.

The content on the index page should address the need or the problem of the poeple who come to your site. Tell them how you will help them with their need or problem. Make it easy for them to find what they are looking for at your site.

The next important step is to have well structured text content.

Check out our Search Engine friendly Menu bar for your site

Successful Mastery of Keywords - Title Tag

2010-04-06T07:40:00.000-07:00

Everything you heard about meta keywords as being important -- Just Forget.

The Alpha Dog of search engine -- Google and the pack of three -- Yahoo, Bing, and, Ask ignore the Meta Keyword tag. They look for the page keywords in the Title Tag. The Title Tag is now the King for page keywords.

Don't Forget - As you are working on your Web page in Dreamweaver -- Write a Title for every page that is unique for that page and list your important keywords for that page. Go to the Document toolbar and place your keywords in your Title text box.

The Successful Mastery of your keywords start with the Title Tag in Dreamweaver.

More to come on the importance of the Page Title.

Visit my website: Successfulmastery.com

Adding Last Updated to a Web Page

2010-01-20T09:02:00.000-08:00

You can add a date to your Web page that shows when that page was last updated. Here is how you do it.

Step 1: Type your text Last Updated:

Step 2: Place your cursor to the right of the text you just added and choose Insert...Date on the Menu bar.

Step 3: Select the desired date format and "Update automatically on save". Click the OK button.

Visit my website: Successfulmastery.com

Using a Image Placeholder

2009-11-27T07:44:00.000-08:00

There will be times when you will need to design your Web page before your images are ready. You can create image placeholders, which will reserve the space within a page for a specific image without having to place dummy images within the page. To create your placeholder:

Step 1: Select the location within the page were you want the image.

Step 2: Click the Image Placeholder button from the Insert Panel…Common.

Step 3: Set the following for the Image Placeholder:

· Name of the Image Placeholder

· Width and Height of the Placeholder

· Color

· Alternate text

Step 3: Click the OK button.

2009-10-04T14:19:00.000-07:00

The history panel records the steps you take in your active document during a work session. Each document has its own history record.

To turn on the History Panel, Click on Window...History Panel on the Menu bar.

As you make changes to the open document, you will see the record of each action you make. Each action in your document creates a new action in the panel. You can go back in time and undo a step. Just slide the slider back to undo an action. To redo the undo, just click the Replay button.

Check Out - Successful Mastery For Dreamweaver Training

and

Take a Class at Tam

Live View - New to CS4

2009-09-17T14:27:00.000-07:00

Live View is new to Dreamweaver CS4. It allows you to realistic view your Web document in Sesign view as if you are in the browser.

Live view makes you content non-edirable, but activates Cascading Style Sheets, JavaScriot and some database functionality. You will have to turn-off Live View before you can edit your content.

Example of Normal Design View

Turn-On Live View

Example of Live View

Train with Bob One-on_One

The Importance of the Page Title

2009-07-28T09:13:00.000-07:00

The page title is one of the important tags in your Web Page. It is used by the search engines to find keywords for the page. It is also the name assigned to a bookmark and a favorite in the browsers.

Make sure your site name is in your title tag and it has words that explain the content of the page. Focus on no more than three keywords the title. No want to make sure the keywords are in the page text.

Example - Successful Masstery provides Web design training and Dreamweaver training.

In Dreamweaver go to the Document toolbar and in the Title text box type your title.

Click out of the text box and Save.

Google, MSN, Yahoo Webmaster Tool

2009-07-10T09:46:00.000-07:00

If you are using Google, MSN, or, Yahoo Webmaster tools, you will want the Google Sitemap generator extension for Dreamweaver. Creating XML sitemaps and connecting with the Webmaster tools will help your Web site get crawled by the search engines more often and more consistently.

Click Here to Download

Successful Mastery

Create Your Local Folder for Your Site

2009-07-08T06:58:00.000-07:00

You are excited to start creating the Web pages for your site that you have been thinking about or you have a site and you want to start making changes to the pages.

Don’t Create or Open that Web Page Yet!

Before you start creating your Web pages you must do some preparation work on your computer and in Dreamweaver.

The Local Folder - Your Master Folder for all your Web Site Content

The “Local” folder is a single folder that acts as the storage place for all other folders and files for your Web site. It usually resides on your computer, but can reside on a network. This is the folder from which you develop your Web site and is not accessible through the Web. The local folder can have any name and should reflect the site it represents.

There is two ways you can create your Local folder:

1. Using your computer file management system
2. Using Dreamweaver when you define your site

Create your Master site folder before you do anything else.