What's Happening
at Dumas Web Design
March 2009 |
|
|
|
|
|
| Greetings! |
 Dumas Web Design is celebrating 10 years in business in 2009! With this milestone, I am reorganizing to elevate my customer service to the next level. By streamlining my business practices, clients will be receiving quicker service and more web design and marketing options to help you grow your business.
Please read on to see what's new! |
|
|
|
 Changes in Business Practices
|
Contracts:
I've been in business for 10 years and have not required contracts with any clients. I believe it is in the best interest of Dumas Web Design and my clients to enter into a formal contact to protect us both. Look for a contract to be sent to you in the next month or so! With that being said, if you are not happy with some aspect of my services, I will help you move to a new web server that better meets your needs without any hassles. I want you to be happy!
Billing:
- Timely billing has been extremely difficult to stay on top of. In order for me to maximize the web services I give to you, billing needs to be streamlined. I'm in the process of creating a billing schedule.
- Web hosting, domain registration, premium traffic analysis and premium e-mail accounts will be billed annually.
- Web maintenance and updates will be billed quarterly at a rate of $60 an hour. This may be a slight increase for some of my long-time clients. Please know that there is no time minimum. If I make an update that only takes 5 minutes, I will only log 5 minutes. I also will never log time taken on any mistakes I have inadvertently made and need to rectify.
- Invoices will be due in 30 days. Delinquent bills will be assessed a $10 late fee if payment is not received within 10 days of the due date. If an amount remains delinquent 30 days after its due date, an additional 5% penalty will be added for each month of delinquency. Dumas Web Design reserves the right to remove web pages from viewing on the Internet until your account is no longer delinquent. It's essential that invoices be paid in a timely manner as all customer services are billed to a credit card and when a client's payments are late, the credit card payment is late thereby accruing interest. Invoices will be sent out via pdf to your e-mail account. If you desire a paper bill, please let me know. If you are having problem paying your balance in full, please contact me and we can work out a payment schedule.
- E-mail is my preferred method of contact because I have your desires in writing and am able to schedule them in a timely manner. Please e-mail me initially with any updates and follow up by phone with specifics if you wish to discuss the matter with more detail. In the future, I am planning on creating an easy online form you will be able to use to send me your site's updates or changes. Look for that in the near future!
- If you prefer to pay your invoice with a credit card through PayPal, you may do so for an additional 2% of your invoice amount. You don't need to have a PayPal account to utilize this feature. Send an e-mail to Kim@DumasWebDesign.com requesting this service and an adjusted invoice will be sent to you.
|
| Web Related Services |
Did you know that Dumas Web Design offers much more than just web design and hosting?
Domain Registration:
Domain Registration is offered at very competitive rates. Most domains are just $10 a year! Network Solutions and Register.com will charge up to double or triple that and most laypeople have trouble sifting through all the confusing web offerings. Make life easier! Keep all your web-related services in one place with a small business you can trust. Let Dumas Web Design worry about the nitty-gritty details and you just worry about running your business.
E-Mail Marketing Blasts:
Dumas Web Design has partnered with a reputable and easy-to-use e-mail blast service through Constant Contact, one of the largest e-mail marketing programs available. They have an excellent reputation and are very user friendly. This newsletter and e-mail were created using this great new service! You have the choice to either create your own e-mail blast yourself or Dumas Web Design can create one for you, which is a new service offered. Please refer to the Basic Rate Schedule on my web site for package pricing. Why subscribe? Most Internet service providers limit how many e-mails you can send out at one time. Large e-mail groupings are designated as spam and your e-mail could get blacklisted, meaning your clients will not receive e-mails from you. Constant Contact will help maximize your time by allowing you to "blast" your message to your marketing-contact list in one fell swoop without being thrown into your client's junk mail! It's remarkably affordable and will help you keep clients up to date on your services, allow you to send out specials and discounts with ease, help grow your leads database and create online surveys. If you are interested in this great marketing tool and would like to try a free 60-day trial, please click on the link above and you can get started on your free trial!
Traffic Analysis:All of our sites include standard web statistics. However, they are very basic, hard to read and lack beneficial features. A subscription to Premium Traffic Analysis with Dumas Web Design will allow you to track the most popular pages, see which engines are providing you the most traffic, what search terms are being used to find your site and it will also give you the ability to create reports through Excel or pdf. You will know definitively if your website is working for you and if not, you will easily be able to see where it's lacking. If interested in a Premium Traffic Analysis upgrade, please e-mail Kim@DumasWebDesign.com. Also offered:
Premium E-mail Accounts with unlimited storage
Online File Folder is a secure remote storage for your important files
Basic Search Engine Optimization
|
|
I want to thank you so much for your continued patronage. Also, thank you for your patience! Hopefully, with these new business practices in place, your service wait time will be improved.
Best Regards,
|
|
Kim Dumas
Dumas Web Design
|
|
| Save $30! New Referral Incentive! |
|
|
Many of you have been so kind as to refer your friends and colleagues to Dumas Web Design. I would now like to offer a referral incentive with my thanks. For each new web design account referred by you, I will offer three free months of hosting, a value of $30. |
|
|
