Terry Young is always busy learning something new. Keeping abreast of the latest developments in an industry is nothing out of the ordinary for most professionals, but as the CEO of Internet Marketing and Design, Terry works in an industry that continually evolves at lightning speed.

"There are always new technologies and innovations being introduced," says the British native as he takes a seat in his Chesapeake office. "We spend a good 20 percent of our time learning new things."

To say that the internet has changed the world dramatically would be an understatement. It has revolutionized the way people socialize, document their lives, access entertainment, make purchases, educate themselves and build their businesses. It has changed the way in which nations interact with one another, pursue political agendas, mount campaigns and conduct warfare. The pace of these changes has caused the heads of some to spin, while many of a certain age are left figuratively scratching their heads and wondering what in the world has happened.

Terry is even more cognizant of the change's fast pace. "In this business, when we talk about the way things were done in "the old days,' we're usually referring to about a year-and-half ago," he quips with a grin.

Terry started Internet Marketing and Design in England in 1997- when the internet was in its infancy, and the world, by and large, was unaware of the changes in store. Terry, however, with a clear eye on the future, not only realized the web's potential, but was also uniquely qualified to develop it.

"I was in a unique position to start the company, I had been a programer since the early 1980's," Terry explains. "but also, in the 1990's, I attended the University of Portsmouth [England] where I studied art and design in film and TV. Early on, I realized that web design unified my previous experiences."

Over the past 20 years, Internet Marketing and Design has grown and prospered, due largely to customer satisfaction, but also because of Terry's ability to stay ahead of the curve and adapt to rapidly changing technologies.

In the late 1990s, Terry was introduced to publisher Jean  Loxley-Barnard, who needed a new web designer for The Shopper's website.

"Terry is a geniusâ€"one of a kind,"Jean enthuses. "I hired this wonderful Englishman in 1998 to develop our website. As we grew, so did our needs- and so did his business. We told our clients about Terry, and they asked him to do their websites as well. Now we all constitute a mutual admiration society that sings the praises of this web guru- I can't imagine my business without him."

Terry probably would have a hard time imagining his life without that fortunate turn of events.

"For almost four years I would travel back and forth between Hampton Roads and England," he recalls.  In late 2001, Terry relocated permanently to Chesapeake, and married his wife, Nikki. An avid sailor, Terry now loves spending his free time with Nikki, boating along the region's waterways.

Twenty years has not dampened his passion for internet development. Terry understands that many business owners- even those who have had an online presence for years- still may not fully appreciate how a custom-designed website can help them.

"We were long overdue to bring our website into the 21st century," Rick Spink of Built to Last Furniture attests. "Terry and his team revamped our site in a very thorough and timely manner, and we experienced noticeable positive results almost immediately. We are a seasonal business, and it was as if spring arrived very early this year!"

"Successful business owners regard their website as being just as important as their physical office or store," Terry insists. "The purpose of an online business is to be visible when people search, and to entice those who see it to come inside and do business with you. Too many businesses owners seldom, if ever, check on their websites or update them. No one would dare neglect their storefront window in this way, and yet a website has the potential of attracting much more traffic than a storefront ever could. An ineffective website can cost a business thousands of dollars a month in lost revenue."

Many businesses create their websites using open source software- free, one-size-fits-all templates available for anyone to download.

"But no two businesses are the same," Terry explains. "Because open source is so generic, there is nothing to make one business stand out, especially in the search results"

"There are also security concerns with open source software," he continues. "If your site crashes or is hacked, the site will have to be shut down while your designer goes back to where they downloaded it from, to see if the issue has a fix. If you are unlucky enough to have your site hacked, there are more long-term consequences besides inconvenience or loss of money. If hackers use your site to send out mass spam emails, chances are your email addresses will be added to a global spammer blacklist, and you will have difficulty sending out legitimate emails. If your site is used to distribute viruses, you will be blocked by the searches as a malware site and, if not banned completely, have to fight to regain any search results."

Internet Marketing and Design  gives each client a unique, one-of-a-kind website that is designed for their specific needs. Each is coded for that particular type of business, which makes the site easier for people to find when they are doing web searches. This code also guards against hackers, blocking them from the server immediately.

"Internet Marketing and Design has built me amazing websites for over ten years, that have consistently ranked me number one in Google Searches, and have brought us enormous success," Don Shipley of Extreme SEAL Experience declares. "Terry Young has never failed to answer the phone or to sit down with us in all those years for support. Exceptionally rare customer support and quality work in this day and age."

"The websites we design are very user-friendly," Terry insists. "Making changes is simply a case of filling in the blanks. If a business has just received a great letter from a satisfied customer, they can put it online in literally a matter of seconds- and our websites are now so smart, that they know when they have been changed, and they resubmit that information to the search engine. Our sites also know if they are being viewed on a phone or a laptop computer, and they automatically change their format to fit the  screen of the device being used. Our clients can easily check their traffic stats: they can see who's visiting their site and when, as well as what keywords are being used in the searches that lead those visitors to the site."

Terry is convinced that such information will help businesses use their websites more effectively.
"I've always believed that knowledge is power," he says. "That's certainly true in our business. There's always something new to learn, but I wouldn't want it any other way. I woudn't want to stagnate because the work would stop being so much fun."