At WRIS, we think all our clients are special.  However, there is one client that definitely sizzles more than the rest.  And by sizzles, we mean it in a very flammable way.

Ted Batchelor, a WRIS web hosting client, is the Guinness World Record Holder for "Longest Full-Body Burn with No Oxygen".  You read that right – he sets himself on fire on purpose!

A former stuntman, Ted performed his first fire stunt in 1976 and has been doing them ever since for scores of admiring (and astonished) audiences.

This past weekend Ted added a new Guinness World Record title to his belt – "Most People Simultaneously  Engulfed in Flames".  Ted led a team of 16 volunteers who practiced for months for the culminating moment, being ablaze for 43.9 seconds.  The video footage of this feat is breathtaking.

Among the flaming volunteers was Mark Simone, father of WRIS engineer Nick Simone.

Congrats to Ted, Mark and the rest of the World Record crew!

For more information on Ted’s stunts, visit tedbatchelor.com.  Also, the Cleveland Plain Dealer published a great article about the latest record.

We're excited to announce that the Beachwood Schools website, with web design and development by WRIS, has won a Standard of Excellence award in the Web Marketing Association's thirteenth annual WebAward Competition.  The website (www.beachwoodschools.org), won in the School category.  To date, WRIS has won thirteen WebAwards with 2009 marking the seventh consecutive year of wins.

The website WRIS developed for Beachwood Schools was launched in February of 2009 after several months of careful planning and programming.  Located in an east side suburb of Cleveland, Ohio, The Beachwood City School District has approximately 1,600 students enrolled in four separate school buildings. In an effort to streamline communication, the newly designed website includes updateable news and announcements on the home page and a powerful school-wide calendar sortable by school campus and category. All of the site's content, including photographs, is updateable through a password-protected Content Manager managed entirely by school staff.  The mission of the new Beachwood Schools website is to make it easy for prospective families to gather information about the school district, and provide valuable information to existing members of the school community including students, parents, faculty & staff and alumni.

The Beachwood School's website scored well above the industry average for design, content, technology, copywriting and ease of use. Judges from the WebAward competition said, "This site is a great first step toward providing better school websites." Another judge commented that the site was "well laid out and easy to navigate."

Founded by the Web Marketing Association in 1997, the WebAwards is the standards-defining competition that sets industry benchmarks based on the seven criteria of a successful website: design, innovation, content, technology, interactivity, copywriting, and ease of use. Thousands of sites were adjudicated in 96 industry categories during this year's competition. The competition was judged by a team of independent Internet professionals representing a variety of relevant disciplines of Web site development. Judges included members of the media, advertising executives, site designers, corporate marketing executives, content providers and webmasters.

The goal of the WebAwards is to provide a forum to recognize the people and organizations responsible for developing some of the most effective websites on the Internet today. Beyond validation, entrants benefit from a website assessment by a professional judging panel, which provides specific feedback on how each site ranks against standards of excellence.

With millions of web hosting providers available, it can be difficult to determine the best option for your business.  To complicate matters even further, there is a glut of biased hosting reviews on the Internet – all promising the best possible service at rock-bottom prices.

While it might be tempting to select a hosting provider based on price alone, there are a number of other factors worth considering.  Here are four important questions that can help you make an objective and informed decision for your business:

1.) What type of customer support do they provide? If you experience a problem with your web hosting service, will you be able to talk to a real person – or will you have to submit a support ticket and wait for someone to get back to you? If you have to wait, what is the average time frame from ticket submission to resolution? What impact will it have on your business if your site is down for an extended period of time while you wait for customer service to contact you?

2.) How long have they been in business? Do they have a solid track record of reliable service to a stable and growing customer base – or are they a relative newcomer to the field? A hosting provider that has been around for awhile offers some added credibility, especially if they are able to provide customer testimonials with actual contact names and live links back to their web sites (vs. a static generic testimonial). Even if you never contact these customers for their feedback, knowing that you could if you wanted to adds a level of trust and reliability to the hosting provider’s claims.

3.) How comprehensive are their hosting services?  Are their service offerings broad enough to accommodate your needs not only today, but also as your business grows?  Do they offer a limited variety of one-size-fits-all packages or are they able to customize their offerings to suit your individual needs? Your business (and the Internet) will change significantly over time, so it is important to select a hosting provider that can anticipate and meet those changing needs and conditions.

4.) How much does it cost?  Without question, there are many low-cost hosting companies out there. In many cases, you may find that you get exactly what you pay for as “low cost” often translates into slow or non-existent customer support and limited service offerings.  Discount hosting might not be the best solution for your business when you consider all that is at stake if something goes wrong or you outgrow your provider’s service offerings. Even so, the prices being offered should be realistic and in line with current market conditions. 

Of course, the goal is to find a web hosting provider that offers the best balance of support, services and peace of mind at a fair price. Incorporating these 4 questions into your decision-making process should help you make the best choice for your business.

A standard bearer award-winning school district, Orange City Schools recently upgraded their web site to reflect the mission of their schools and serve as an informative and useful tool for the community which they serve. The new and improved website includes a fresh, new design interface, a multimedia section full of slideshows and videos, and a more powerful Content Manager that enables Orange administrators to update the entire site. 

A combination of the WRIS Content Manager and Macromedia Contribute make the entire website updateable by Orange Schools faculty and staff. This means important information and announcements can be posted on a timely basis. In addition, correspondence and schedules originally distributed via regular mail can now be sent via the WRIS Email Engine, allowing Orange to easily expand their audience, increase the frequency of communication and reduce postage expenses.