Boagworld

Do aesthetics need to be compromised for the sake of usability?

Paul Boag — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:36:41 +0000

As you will know if you have followed me for any length of time, I have great respect for usability expert Gerry McGovern. We work on similar projects and share a similar view of the web.

However, this week I parted company with Mr McGovern over his most recent post “Why web links are calls to action.”

In it he wrote:

It’s hard to read what Dustin writes on this black background; gave me a bit of a headache actually. But that’s okay. I had a great overall experience of the page because its black background communicated an important emotional, aesthetic thing to me.

Seriously, it’s a bit of a pity Dustin makes it so hard to read his stuff because what he has to say is quite interesting.

Later he went on to attack designers for their dislike of underlines.

Isn’t it amazing how many designers hate underline? They think it’s ugly, that it takes away from the look of the page.

Finally he reached the crux of his argument:

Have you read any grey books recently? I mean, have you read any books that use grey text or that have black backgrounds? Or, for that matter, have you read any print newspapers or magazines that use grey text? It’s well documented that it’s harder to read on a screen than in print. So why do designers deliberately create webpages that make reading even harder? Simple, really. Many web designers are more concerned with how the page looks than how it reads and functions.

In essence Gerry seems to be arguing that aesthetics should always take second place to usability. I disagree with this. It depends on the type of site. On some sites it is important to communicate more than information. Some websites are about conveying emotion and feeling too.

As for particularly targeting black backgrounds and underlined links, this is entirely unjustified.

Black backgrounds can (if done right) actually aid usability. Contrast is the issue here, not the colour of the background. As long as there is sufficient contrast a black background can actually reduce eye strain caused by white light, aiding on screen reading.

As for underlined links, I again disagree. Although I think it is important to underline links I tend to use border-bottom rather than text-decoration:underline. The problem with the latter is that the line intersects descenders making words hard to read, especially for those with cognitive disabilities. Not using underlines in their traditional sense actually aids readability.

The idea that most designers do not care about usability is incorrect. We care passionately. However, we do not always solve these problems in the way that usability consultants would prefer. Instead we try to balance aesthetic considerations with usability. We care both for how the page looks and how it functions.

So what do you think? Do you believe that designers care more about aesthetics than usability? Post your thoughts in the comments.

The biggest ecommerce lies and how to avoid them

Paul Boag — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 11:35:11 +0000

Of all the sites I am involved in at Headscape it is the ecommerce sites that excite me the most.

How can you not get excited about working on a website where the fruits of your labour are so visible and direct? Do a good job and the website makes more money, screw up and profits decline. There is something wonderfully black and white about it.

With such a measurable and obvious success criteria, you would have thought best practice would be well established and generally accepted. Bad advice would be quickly exposed for what it is and successful techniques would rise to the top.

However, it would appear that is not the case. I am amazed at how bad some of the advice is and how much bad practice exists.

In this post I want to focus on five of the worst offenders, beginning with the belief that you can never give users too much information.

1. You can never give the user too much [Wrong!]

Only recently I was reading an article about ecommerce that actively argued for providing users with as much information as possible.

On the face of it, this sounds like a good idea. The more information you provide, the better informed their decision becomes. However, in reality too much information can be overwhelming and lead to choice paralysis.

Compare for example the experience of buying a computer. For you and me this is a purchasing decision we are very comfortable with. However, for the majority of consumers it can be an intimidating experience. It is a minefield because there are too many choices and options.

Recently I bought a Dell netbook. Even as an experienced computer users this was a harrowing decision. I knew I wanted a low end, cheap netbook, so immediately ignored the plethora of laptops and desktops that could have confused my purchasing decision. However, that didn’t make the purchasing process easier. I still had to choice between the Dell Mini 9, 10 and 10v. I had to wade through technical specs outlining the differences, most of which I found unintelligible.

Once I had made my choice, I was presented with even more details and options. I had to select colour, type of hard drive, size of hard drive, operating system and on and on and on. In fact it even made me approve options where I had no alternative choice!

When compared to the limited and clearly defined line up of Apple computers, the contrast could not be more apparent.

More is not always better. If you want to encourage users to buy, then you need to make their choice a simple one. Remove everything but the most important information and minimise the number of choices available. This is something that has been understood for some time in traditional retailing, but has not filtered through to the web.

One retail technique that has transferred to the web is up-selling. However, you should thing twice about how to implement this technique.

2. Never miss an opportunity to cross-sell [Wrong!]

We all know supermarkets do it. You are queuing at the checkout surrounded by chocolate, magazines and other extras. They hope we will be tempted to pick up something on the way out. You go in for a loaf of bread and come out with a basket full of chocolates and a magazine on interior design. Any marketeer will tell you how effective this technique is.

Many successful websites also use this approach very effectively. Amazon is always looking for opportunities to cross-sell, based on its extensive knowledge of your buying habits and those of other users. However, even though it is obvious we will buy items on the spur of the moment, Amazon does not always up-sell.

Amazon recognises that the web is not the same as the real world. Unlike supermarkets, Amazon will not up-sell once users reach the checkout. In fact they are careful to avoid any distractions.

When the competition is only a click away you do not have the luxury of asking users to stand in line at the checkout, while you present them with additional products. Unlike the supermarket checkout there is no person to guide you through the process. It is user driven and so has to be as easy, focused and fast as possible.

Yes, it is important to up-sell. However, do it before the checkout process begins. Once the user makes a decision to buy, you need to ensure nothing gets in the way of that transaction. Some opportunities to cross-sell are worth missing.

Of course, there is no reason you cannot encourage users to buy again after the transaction is complete. That is where we need to look beyond the website.

3. Its all about your site [Wrong!]

Web designers want to sell you web site design services. It is therefore unsurprising that they concentrate their attention and advice on the website. However, the website is only one small part of a successful ecommerce business. The heart of successful ecommerce lies in service, not the website.

Don’t become so fixated on tweaking and improving your website that you neglect other areas of the user experience. Good customer service extends well beyond the users interactions with the website. It also includes vital components such as:

Email notifications - Do you keep the customer informed about the progress of their order?
Telephone support – Do you allow customers to speak to you directly?
Returns policy – How easy is it for customers to return an item if they do not like it?
Fulfilment – Are you in a position where you can fulfil orders quickly and dispatch them immediately?
Complaints handling – How well do you handle customer complaints? Do you go the extra mile?
Ongoing communication – Do you regularly keep in touch with customers? Do you offer them special deals and discounts? Is it easy for customers to opt out of these communications?

Customers who receive superb service are considerably more likely to make a second purchase and even more likely to recommend you to friends and family.

Visit Bruce’s blog Now

It is even possible to substantially reduce your marketing spend if you make customer service a priority. Instead your reputation will spread through word of mouth.

Do not misunderstand, I still believe that getting your website right is extremely important. Small things can make a big difference in the eyes of your users. Take for example security.

4. Users care about security… badges [Wrong!]

There is no doubt that users care about online security. In fact there is still a large proportion of people who are unwilling to buy online for fear of credit card fraud. The media has done an excellent job at ensuring the public are suspicious of online transactions, even though they are willing to hand over their credit card in a restaurant.

Whether the users concerns are justified or not, we need to take them seriously if we want people to buy.

Many ecommerce businesses spend a lot of money ensuring their sites are secure. How then do they choose to communicate this massive investment to their users in order to reassure them? – They slap a badge on their website!

Adding a small Verisign or Mcafee badge to your checkout page is not enough to alleviate users fears. At best they are free advertising for the companies involved. At worst they are entirely ignored because they look like banners.

A better approach is to tackle the problem head on. Add copy to your website addressing this issue and the steps you have taken to ensure the customers security. Do not rely on a single graphic to say all that needs to be said.

5. Amazon is the template we should all follow [Wrong!]

This final lie is probably the most widely held of all. There is a belief that because Amazon is so successful, all ecommerce websites should follow their example.

There is however a number of flaws in this argument:

They don’t get everything right (nobody can).
They are partially successful because they were one of the first ecommerce websites to market.
Their reputation and brand recognition allows them to get away with a lot.
Users are familiar with their site and its eccentricities.

In short, what works for them will not necessarily work for you. Too many website owners blindly copy Amazon because they are seen as the leader in ecommerce. Not only is that flawed for the reasons I gave above, it also removes the possibility of you ever being better than Amazon or innovating in anyway.

Don’t get me wrong – I believe there is a lot that can be learnt from Amazon. However, I do not believe it is in anybodies interest to blindly follow their lead.

Bonus lie: Ecommerce is easy

Probably the biggest lie of all is that ecommerce is easy. Admittedly off the shelf solutions such as Shopify make it extremely easy to build ecommerce websites. However, building the site is only the beginning. The real challenge comes in:

focusing your site,
deciding on when to up-sell,
providing great customer service,
communicating clearly
and learning from others.

Creating a successful ecommerce business is a long term commitment and you will need to continually evolve both your website and strategy.

So, what about you? What ecommerce lies have you heard? What great advice would you like to pass on? Post in the comments below.

190. Become a branding Ninja

Paul Boag — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 11:40:46 +0000

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News

Offline inspiration

It has been a while since we have featured a Smashing Magazine post on the show so thought it was about time.

Shocking though this will be, it is not a top 10 list. Instead it is an excellent post on finding inspiration offline.

The post argues that using online sources such as CSS galleries for inspiration is not enough. As designers we need to be taking a walk, visiting a museum or spending time sketching. We need to consider these an essential part of our job description.

The post examines eight areas of inspiration:

Nature
Museums
Sketching
Hobbies
Music
Photography
Traditional art
Our own imaginations

It then discusses what can be found in these areas of inspiration. In particular the post looks at:

Texture
Color
Shapes
Changing our perspective
Discovering themes

The problem is that we don’t feel like visiting a museum is work and even if we do our bosses certainly do not! However, this is eloquently addressed to:

The trick is to consider alternative inspiration an an essential part of the job. While it feels more like play than work at first, finding true inspiration should mean more than browsing through the same material over and over. And we should know that in a creative industry, having fun is okay; it doesn’t mean we’re being unproductive.

Image source

Some of the best design work I ever did came from offline sources. I just wish I prioritised this kind of research more.

All you need to know about CSS3

Mr Stanton discovered a great new site this week – CSS3.info. With CSS 2.1. becoming increasingly supported and integrated into our work, it is time to look ahead at what CSS 3 has in store.

CSS3 has got some really interesting new features that are already supported in some browsers. From advanced selectors such as attribute selection through to multiple column layouts, there is a host of goodies we can start to play with.

What is more, by using graded browser support we don’t need to worry too much about IE’s lack of support.

CSS3.info is a great starting point if you want to begin using some of these advanced CSS features. It provides examples of each new feature and tells you what browsers support it. It also provides a selector check so you can see what advanced selectors work in different browsers. Finally, it also provides up-to-date information on how the new specification is progressing.

I really would encourage you to take a look at CSS3. Its got some really exciting features that you can start using now.

Preparing and planning for a redesign

Although I am generally against the principle of redesigning sites from the ground up, there is no doubt that every site needs a refresh once in a while.

Knowing when and how to go about redesigning your website can be a tricky process. Fortunately Web Designers Depot has a post that might help. Entitled “Preparing and planning for a redesign” it provides some valuable advice for any website owners thinking of redesigning.

The post starts by looking at how you know it is time to redesign. Contributing factors include:

Out of date technologies and techniques
The age of a design
The lack of a CMS
Search engine ranking problems
Under performance
Your competition

It then goes on to look at what needs to be done in preparation for a redesign. This includes:

Identifying what works
Being clear on what doesn’t
Looking at what can be removed, combined or added
Knowing what motivates your users
Whether a complete redesign is even necessary

Finally, the article concludes by looking at some potential dangers in redesigning. These include dealing with repeat users and avoiding broken links.

Although I don’t agree with everything in this post, it is a useful article if you are considering a redesign. Check it out.

Confusing menus and links: the web’s biggest challenge

I want to conclude with a post that might make you rethink your sites navigation. It is by Gerry McGovern and is entitled “Confusing menus and links: the web’s biggest challenge.”

Gerry applies his task focused approach to information architecture. He argues that too many organisations are more concerned with organising their content into an IA, than meeting the needs of users.

He suggests that to make a truly effective information architecture we need to start thinking like our users, who are focused on the task at hand.

To demonstrate his point he refers to the BBC sports site as a good example:

If you visit the BBC homepage and choose “Sport” you are brought to a page about sport. Just sport. The critical first screen is all about sport. No links to news or weather or business. Just sport. If you click on Football you arrive at a page that’s just about Football. Just Football. Not cricket. Not rugby. Not golf. Just football. If you click on “Premier League” you get to a page dedicated to the Premier League.

This is not web design. It’s web management. It’s about eliminating all choices that are not connected with the customer’s current task, which in the above example might be: Find out the latest news about the Premier League.

Too often as website owners we clutter our navigation with other content that users “might want” or which we want them to look at. Although there are times when we want to cross link or promote other content, we need to be careful not to distract users from achieving their primary aim. If they become overwhelmed by links and fail to complete their task easily, they will leave.

He ends with a radical suggestion:

Menus and links need to be designed in the context of the task the customer is trying to complete. That means stripping away higher-level options and creating links that point forward based on the task at hand.

Stripping away top level navigation is not always a good idea, but this post should make us sit up and think.

Interview: Alex Hunter discusses developing an online brand

Ryan: OK, joining us today is Alex Hunter and we’ve just listened to you do a talk on… what was the talk title, I’ve forgotten?

Stanton: It was kind of “Managing Your Brand”.

Ryan: “Managing Your … Marketing Your Web App and Future Brands Online” – it was really good talk; really fascinating.

Alex: Thank you.

Ryan: So, would you like to tell us a little bit about yourself Alex?

Alex: Yeah. Sure. I’m an independent, kind of, brand ninja if you will. I’ve worked with some of the biggest brands in the world – on both sides of the pond. I live here in the UK but am originally from California.

Ryan: OK. And your talk was focused around making yourself your brand; putting your reputation on the line, in a way. It was really interesting – do you want to tell us a little bit about that?

Alex: Absolutely, yeah. Brand is one of those things that falls by the wayside, especially when it’s a developer-centred organisation. Developers are creating amazing technologies, incredible platforms but while they’ve been doing that they’ve actually been completely changing the game; they’ve been fundamentally changing the way marketing and branding works. It’s amazing, because they’ve create apps and platforms (i.e. social networking) that allow consumers to connect with brands for the very first time. Before, it was just send a letter out, watch a billboard, very mono-directional. But now we have these tools to connect with brands, and the irony is that the people that created that conversation aren’t responding to the fact that they need to have their brands intact.

Ryan: Right, OK.

Stanton: You gave a couple of examples of companies that you respect and that do this kind of thing really well. Can you give us a run through those?

Alex: Sure. I think Digg has put a lot of time and effort into their brand over their, what is, five-year or six-year existence. They’ve done a lot of little things really, really well and it was nice to hear Kevin Rose allude to them yesterday. Things like their blog – I think they’ve got the best corporate blog in the world because it’s not just the Vice-President of PR doing the blogging. It’s not even just Kevin or Jay (the founder and CEO respectively). It’s the developers, the designers, the DB admins, the receptionists, the community managers i.e. the faces and the names of the people that created and curate the community that we as the “Digg Community” have invested so much time and energy into. We can connect with those people now because it’s a name and a face of a real person. And so what they do whenever they roll out a new piece of technology or a new development, they say “Hey, I’m the guy that did this. Here’s why and here’s how (in excrutiating detail). What do you think?”. And that’s kind of revolutionary.

Stanton: So you would encourage people – especially working in small teams – not to be scared of just talking about what they’re doing and just waiting for “Let’s just wrap it up in a press release” or something and just talk about it naturally and be precious and passionate.

Alex: The being “precious” about it, I think, is a very, very big risk. That transparency is really beautiful because it brings people into the journey – especially when you’re creating something brand new – when it’s just an idea. You’re creating a new product and you’re updating people on it. It’s why reality TV is such a painful hit, I mean. It’s because people are looking into this thing and, Lord knows, the dev cycle is dramatic and painful and “4 o’clock in the morning” caffeine-induced frenzies. But also, it’s like when things go wrong, hold your hands up – be transparent, human. Don’t hide behind a brand name or a product name. And people will engage with that.

Ryan: So, how should people be doing this really? How should people be developing their brand and associating themselves towards the brand and then putting it out there. What techniques should they be using?

Alex: It’s a great question. I think that there’s – especially with Twitter, interestingly – there’s this real blurring of the line between personal brand and corporate brand. A lot of the big names that we know in technology embody their brand; Kevin Rose is Digg, Gary Veynerchuk is Wine Library TV, Tony Hsieh is Zappos – they’re all completely interconnected; there’s no separating them. They’ve invested themselves emotionally in what they do and that shows in the brand. And I think they’re defined by what they want to be. Gary has always been very clear about what his values are, Digg is very clear about what their values are. Apple are very clear about what their values are, and I think, trite as it may sound, going through and identifying your values – and it was really refreshing because as I came off the stage some dude came up to me and say “Hey, thank you. We’ve been labouring over this for years and we finally sat down – or I stopped sitting down with myself and brought the whole team in – and we defined our values” and it’s just gone up exponentially through that. And so I think it’s just define the values, creating an identity out of that and then saying “What are we now and what are we going to be, well, indefinitely really”.

Ryan: So do you think that’s got to be one of the first stages when you release it – you’ve got to be thinking about where you’re going to take it and how you’re going to present it to the world.

Alex: Absolutely

Ryan: That’s vitally important.

Stanton: So you talked about brand consistency and not to be scared of it or precious of it again. You should be willing to put it out there and how other people in your company – just use it and get it out there.

Alex: It’s… consistency is a funny one. People always say “The more people you give the message to the more watered down it becomes and the less consistent the message is”. Big brands are really scared of losing the refinement of their message. Realistically, they’ve been doing it for the last 30 years because the person who answers the phone in the call centre is the first point of contact that a user has with your brand. They are representing your brand. The receptionist is representing your brand. So giving someone an account on Twitter to do the same is no different, it’s just a little bit more of a public stage. But, on the flip side, that’s a good thing because people can see you responding to positive comments and negative comments and reacting and helping people in a very public forum. That’s why things like Get Satisfaction and applications like that – and actually in South Africa there’s a really popular one called Hello Peter which businesses are all into trying to respond and react to. So I think it’s a good thing and people shouldn’t be scared of consistency.

Ryan: Some brands, and we’re talking here quite a bit about people being associated to the brand and being kind of interchangeable. You say Steve Jobs, you say Apple, you always think of the two. For brands like, you mentioned, Diet Coke – being that you were invested into that brand – there’s no person that you can think of associated to that but you see that brand and you’re committed to it. McDonalds, things like that. What differences are there between the two? How do you promote? It’s kind of a logo you’re promoting in a way, isn’t it.

Alex: It’s a really good question. Diet Coke – the Coke/Pepsi thing is a fascinating brand battle and one of the few where it’s really only a two-horse race, especially in the consumer arena. I mean you’ve got Boeing and Airbus but they don’t really have to advertise because, well, I don’t have $100 billion lying around. Coke and Pepsi, I think, play off the fact that they are rivals and you are either one or the other. I think the more you consume of it the more passionate you become about it. So, if you are a regular Diet Coke drinker – like my wife won’t go to restaurants that serve Pepsi, she’ll leave because she can’t stand the taste of it. I’m sure it’s psychological because as Dave Chapelle said in that video, “It’s all the same”. It’s sugared water in a tin can! But they’ve managed to kind of feed off each other to an extent that has developed this rivalry and therefore developed this passion within its user base.

Ryan: I suppose then there’s so many different avenues that you can take to compete and get your brand out there. Is there any more that particularly stand out; having a direct competitor is one way of developing your brand or having a figurehead or any other ways you can go about it?

Alex: Absolutely, absolutely – especially for small – or reasonably small – brands. I think there’s a couple of things that are really important. In kind of extending the reach of the brand and the application with content like blogs – like the Digg example is a great one – but also engagement, both in the physical world and in the digital world. There are a lot of web companies that are getting really good at hosting real world events where users meet up and are rewarded both on a macro-like Digg or a Yelp on a micro level like some companies here in Europe like Qype that I mentioned during my talk that are introducing users to each other and to the people that either administrator or are the, kind of, power users within the community. Kevin Rose mentioned that again yesterday as a really good way; launch parties, regular user meetups, get people talking, get people connected. That really breeds loyalty. It’s astounding what that can do in terms of the competitive.

Ryan: I think Digg is an excellent example because they have so many methods of getting their message out there, don’t they. They’ve got the blog and the meetups and everything else.

Stanton: It’s like that with the bigger companies that come out. They can release different products that might not be wildly different but there’s the kind of umbrella brand that’s so strong that you can pick up that product and you know it’s new and you know the quality of it.

Alex: It’s really interesting. The web has actually fundamentally changed the way brand is perceived because we have these, like, loyalty mechanisms built in. Let’s look at, like, re-branding an acquisition. If my local supermarket gets bought by another supermarket, I don’t care. As long as it’s still there and has food in it – whatever! When Yahoo! bought Flickr they kind of didn’t know what to do with the brand. Do you keep it Flickr or do you make it Yahoo! Photos? And they’ve been kind of to-ing and fro-ing. But you can’t because that loyalty that’s in the Flickr community, that has built it up to where it is, would be PISSED OFF. So now, the compromise that just did recently was “Flickr by Yahoo!”.

Ryan: And people don’t seem to like it!

Alex: Exactly! Can you imagine what would happen if they rebranded it to just Yahoo! Photos? I mean, of course you’d get over it eventually but it’d take a lot longer and you’d lose a lot of customers.

Stanton: That kind of touches on one of the key things I took away from your talk. You said “Look after your users best interests, not yours”.

Alex: Absolutely. It’s hard because you gotta pay the bills. But that reputation will put you head and shoulders above anybody else. The Amazing Tunes example that I used. There are other unsigned artists sites out there, but not that give 70% of the profits back to the user and not that have a DAB radio station that you can get featured on. That’s looking after users. That’s the definition of an ethical web company.

Stanton: So for anyone starting out or building a company or a start-up or something, are there any common mistakes or pitfalls that you see all the time, or that you’d encourage people to watch out for or avoid.

Alex: Absolutely. There’s the ever-present “If you build it, they will come” mentality. If a build a solid app, no matter how ugly it is, people will come. They will not because they’ll never hear about it. And there are competitive apps to almost everything, and if there isn’t one today, there will be one tomorrow, and they will have looked at what you’ve done and they will have started an outreach, they will have started a Twitter account, they will have started a blog, they will have networked it physically and they will have networked it digitally, they will have thought about the presence, the UI. And I think that siloing and kind of compartmentalising and just saying “I’m going to iterate my app” is not going to work. There are exceptions to that rule. TweetDeck – he developed it to solve a personal problem, it just happened to be really well solved, and so it’s kind of growing on its own. But that is the exception to the rule. I think that hiding under a bushel, expecting it to develop on its own, it’s just not going to happen.

Ryan: With regards to cost of developing your brand, it can be the chicken and the egg sometimes. You need to develop an app and get it out there to make some return to put some investment into marketing it. What initial steps can be used to build yourself up before you can plough some money into it and doing it properly.

Alex: It’s kind of interesting. I think, yeah – you’ve got to have a concept obviously and some basic stuff done but I think one of the things that I’ve always found that worked, and it was really interesting to hear someone talk about it yesterday – I’m not sure who it was – but this kind of closed beta invite only concept seems to work really well at generating buzz. And if you just get one or two people saying “What the heck is this?”. You get these precious invites – which really aren’t that precious – Spotify’s a great example; actually Spotify’s a great example on two levels: 1) it was invite only for the longest time and 2) our pals in America couldn’t have it and they wanted it so badly that they were spoofing IP addresses and whatever they had to do to actually be able to use it. That kind of sense of exclusivity is a free way of generating that kind of buzz, if you can just get enough people to talk about it and it’s just an occasional whisper in the air, a Moo Card dropped somewhere with an invite code on it – that will just start to get people excited about it. But you have to make sure the product doesn’t suck on the back of it, because that will also spread pretty quickly as well.

Stanton: A lot of the talks I’ve sat in on today are starting to tie in. Yesterday it was “If you’re going to release something, release it early”. Do one or two things but do them really well, don’t try and do everything at once because you won’t be able to. And then see how things get – see how your users react to it and then build. I guess that’s reacting with the branding people that engage with the brand and then you’re building it and they feel invested.

Alex: That focus is really important as well, and I think that’s why APIs are so important in the early stage because you can get people developing iPhone apps and other integrations without taking your eye off the ball and doing those one or two things really well and going “Oh crap we’ve got to go home and develop the iPhone app”. It’s really interesting the way that it’s evolved – product development.

Ryan: Do you have any predictions of how things are going to change in the future. At the minute we’ve got these big companies that are doing it really well, everyone’s kind of imitating and doing similiar things to try and push their brands as well, and inevitably, things will change again. Any predictions about where things might be going?

Alex: I think it will become even more democratic. I think that the users will become even more powerful because the time to reaction is so fast.

Ryan: Yeah

Alex: But I also think loyalty will get even stronger and if you’re going to develop a competing app to an incumbant you’re going to have to work 10 times harder to get people off of what they’re using. As people start to use even more social currency, more points systems, giving more “value” to a user, it’ll be harder and harder to bring them over. I also think it’s going to be harder for people to acquire web brands, especially the big companies – the Yahoo!s the AOLs of the world to acquire small web brands without alienating those kind of fervently loyal people that are already their user base.

Ryan: You did mention people coming up with all this sort of cutesy names and stuff, mispellings and things like that. The market just seems to be saturated with it. How should people be thinking about deciding on a good brand and what fundamental things should they be thinking about when they’re making those decisions

Alex: I think that’s a great question. It’s less about the name – like you said it’s really easy just to misspell something or drop a consonant; that’s really lazy – you’ve got to look at it much more as a value-driven. What are our values? What is our product like? What is our team made of? Where are we in the world? And then use that to feed in the name to something obviously catchy, obviously when you can get the domain for a reasonable price – those are practical things that you need to take into consideration. But it’s got to be catchy; it’s got to be engaging, it’s got to mean something. And I think people have started to catch onto the whole “if you can make it a verb”. Digg and Google have become verbs (by the fact that they’re just ubiquitous), but I think people are now starting to say (at least, I’ve heard people around London say) “I’m going to Qype that” and it means “I’m going to check what this place is like” in terms of reviewing a restaurant before I go into it or whip out their Qype Radar iPhone app and check it out before they walk into it. So I think that that’s a really interesting revolution.

Stanton: You’ve got to work hard to get to that place, don’t you?

Alex: You really do.

Stanton: Then it appears in the dictionary!

Alex: That’s when you know it’s all over. You’ve won!

Ryan: OK, well, thank you very much for your time. I really enjoyed your talk and I think listeners will find that really useful. Thank you so much.

Thanks goes to Sam Kirkpatrick for transcribing this interview

Listeners feedback: Give yourself a speed boost!

Normally the listener section of the show focuses on me answering listener questions. However, this week on twitter and the forum it has been the other way around.

You may have noticed that boagworld has been running slow for sometime. Well, I finally decided it was time to fix the problem. However, my knowledge on the subject was fairly limited. That was why I turned to the Boagworld community and boy did they help!

I thought it was only fair that I share the top 5 things I learn from them.

Read 5 Ways To Give Your Site A Speed Boost In Less Than 30 Minutes.

Don’t reduce your designers and developers to stereotypes

Rob Borley — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 13:08:53 +0000

At Headscape I have the privilege of working with a group of very talented people. Both our development team and our design team are on top of their game and it makes my job of Project Managing a little more straight forward because of it. A big part of my job is getting the most out of both of these teams by facilitating them working together in the most effective way. I’m often asked questions like, “Who do you prefer to work with; designers or developers?” and “how does working with developers differ from working with designers?” So here is my inside track on this age old tussle. Designers or Developers?

Your stereotypical developer is a rather pale individual (as they are afraid of the outdoors) with no social skills. They come in two sizes; 9 stone weakling or 30 stone monster. They spent their childhood playing Dungeons and Dragons and have now matured to a level 70 paladin in World of Warcraft (usually playing as a member of the opposite sex). They were always picked last for any kind of sport and have spent every waking hour since they were twelve in front of a screen, in a room with no natural light, talking to their ‘friends’; online. 99% of all developers die a virgin. 1% are scared of the question, curl up into a ball, and cry.

Image credit: JawboneRadio

Your stereotypical designer on the other hand is a charismatic, in your face, individual. Both confident and creative; a dangerous combination. They have lots of real world friends but are secretly hated by most of them. Constantly seeking inspiration they bore easily and become irritable as result. All designers, without exception suffer from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.

A recipe for disaster

Putting these two groups together is not a good cocktail. Fortunately, these caricatures, in my experience, are not entirely accurate.

I’m actually loathe to put either designers or developers into boxes. From what I can tell they don’t seem to follow any discernible pattern in character traits. Some developers are quite introverted while others are quite the opposite. Some designers are sporty while others couldn’t catch a cold. Some developers enjoy the great outdoors while some designers find their inspiration in Second Life. In trying to manage the team I need to gather an understanding of them as individuals.

It’s important to understand how your team works. One individual will work most effectively when set a whole stream of tasks with a distant deadline and left to get on with it. While another will be more efficient given bite sized chunks and offered more consistent interaction and faster feedback.One member of your team will thrive on pressure and enjoy short timescales while another will need shielding from the realities of your deadlines and coaxing gentling into delivering on time. You may have an individual that needs to go for a walk regularly to be at peak productivity while another works most effectively if they get their head down and charge for 6 hours straight.

As a PM your goals are always the same. You need to deliver your project on time. However your route to your goal is dependant on the resources that you have available. Your number one resource is your team. Trying to force team members to all work the same way is counter productive and, while you may enjoy some success, is not sustainable.

The best route to goal

Get to know your team. Discover their quirks and eccentricities and use these to get the most out of them. I enjoy my role as a PM because, more than anything else, it’s a job about people. I guess this means that the answer to the question is that I really have no preference over designers or developers. I enjoy getting to know my team and discovering the best way to work with them as individuals.

I believe that this is the most effective way of getting the job done. And hopefully it makes for a better experience for all involved.

What about you?

So what about you? How do you work with designers and developers? What has experience taught you?

Maybe you are a designer or a developer? How have you been treated by clients and project managers? Have you been reduced to a stereotype that you resent?

10 problems your content management system will not solve and how to overcome them

Paul Boag — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:53:02 +0000

So many website owners hate their content management system. This is often because it has failed to live up to their unrealistic expectations.

Many organisations purchased their CMS hoping to solve a wide range of issues surrounding content production and delivery. In reality, a CMS is only capable of overcoming relatively few. In fact often a content management system will solve one set of problems only to create more. It is these new problems that I wish to address here.

What follows is a list of 10 issues that are either directly created by content management systems or that a CMS will fail to solve.

1. A lack of editorial control

One of the primary reasons organisations purchase a content management system is to de-centralise control of content and therefore remove the bottlenecks that surround posting content to the web.

The consequence of this approach is a lack of central control to ensure the quality and accuracy of copy produced. This can lead to contradictions and varying styles of writing across the site.

Although many content management systems provide the tools for central editorial control, they are not always used and require somebody with the editorial experience.

The Solution: Get an editor

Unfortunately this is one problem that technology cannot solve. What is required is a content editor. Somebody who checks what is being produced and ensures it communicates a consistent message in a consistent tone.

Ideally this should be somebody who has experience in writing and editing online copy. However, the most important thing is that this person feels confident in editing copy, and has the authority to remove inappropriate material.

This person will also require a vision for the site and in particular what personality it should be projecting.

2. A lack of personality

Many websites lack real personality. They either ooze marketing BS or come across as singularly bland. This is largely due to the fact that they have been written by people more interested in communicating facts or selling stuff, than wishing to engage with users.

Websites with great copy that is full of personality, stand out from the crowd. They do more than convey information. They actively seek to make a connection with users in much the same way people do face to face.

Unfortunately the distributed nature of content production through the use of a CMS undermines that.

The solution: Decide on your sites personality

The first step towards overcoming this problem is to define who you are. If your website was a person what type of person would it be? What words best describe your sites character? Is it playful, serious, enthusiastic, or friendly?

Next put together a content style guide. This will include examples of writing styles that should be used on your website. It will also include guidelines in terms of tone and wording. This document should then be distributed to your content providers.

Producing an effective content style guide is not an easy task. You might wish to consider employing a freelance web copy writer if you do not have somebody in house. However once it has been produced, it should provide everything your content providers need to add some
personality into your copy.

Of course that does still require your content providers to be committed to the cause.

3. Uncommitted contributors

One of the great selling points of having a content management system is that they allow anybody to post to your website. Unfortunately, just because your staff can edit the site, does not mean they will.

It is not unusual to find that content management systems go unused except for by a few individuals. The belief that content management can be easily decentralised is false. There are two primary reasons for this.

Firstly, some people do not see it as their responsibility to provide web content. They see the website as a marketing or sales tool and so should be managed by marketeers.

The second reason is that most people do not have the time. Writing web content is often seen as a low priority and constantly gets pushed out by “real work.”

The solution: Recognise the importance of the web

The solution to this problem has to come from senior management.

The website needs to be seen as a critical business tool and job descriptions must reflect this by making site maintenance a key component of people’s job. This should include website duties being apart of employee assessment.

There is however another reason people do not using the CMS – they don’t know how to use it.

4. Poorly trained authors

When an organisation rolls out a new content management system they almost always offer some form of training. However, in many cases it is not enough.

Normally training consists of an intimidating manual and one off training session. For the few people who are updating the website regularly this is probably enough. However for more infrequent content providers, this is inadequate.

The trouble with one off initial training sessions is that by the time the content provider comes to update the website, they have forgotten what they learnt. Admittedly the information they need may well be contained in the manual, but who reads those?

This can easily lead to only a few people capable of making updates to the site, thereby undermining the very reason for having a CMS in the first place.

The solution: Provide video training material

The combination of occasional users and new employees, means that most organisations need a long term strategy for training people in the use of their content management systems.

We have found that a series of short video tutorials covering key functionality works much better than training sessions or intimidating manuals.

We still run training sessions for frequent users. However, the video tutorials allow users to work through the material at their own pace. Also, unlike a training course they can learn only the parts of the system they actually need.

However, training in the technology is only half the battle. Content contributors also need to know how to write compelling copy.

5. Bad copywriting

The harsh truth is that not everybody can write good web copy. Even somebody who writes brilliantly in print, does not necessarily write well for the web.

There is an art and science to writing good web copy that many people are unaware of. Copy written by content providers is often verbose, un-engaging and hard to scan.

The solution: Provide a structure for content production

The solution is three fold:

First, the introduction of an editor means that content providers do not have to worry about writing perfect copy. It should be the job of the editor to take the raw copy they provide and re-write it for the web.
Second, the training provided with a content management system should extend beyond the functionality and also include advice on writing good web copy.
Finally, by producing a basic template for content providers you can help them focus their writing. A content template should ask questions such as who is the audience, what is the key message for this page and what is the call to action?

However, the problem is not just limited to the quality of content but also the quantity.

6. Bloated websites

Much like this post, most websites end up far too bloated. This is a problem that content management systems only serve to exaggerate.

By removing the barriers to putting content online, you encourage people to add more. However, more is not always better.

Content providers often approach the website with entirely the wrong mentality. They look at the content they have or can easily produce, and decide to put it online because “somebody will find it useful.” They are driven by what content is available, rather than user’s need.

The problem is that the more they put online, the harder it is for users to find the content they want. It is like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

The solution: Focus on users and remove

The best solution is to prevent this from occurring in the first place. This is done by fixating on user needs. Before putting anything online ask two questions:

Is the content aimed at your primary audience?
Is the content essential for helping those users complete their objectives?

If you cannot answer yes to both questions, then seriously consider whether putting the content on your website will cause more harm than good.

Of course, you may already have a bloated website. If this is the case then you need to review each page of your site and apply the principles above. If a page fails to cater for a specific use case of your primary audience, then it maybe time for it to be removed.

The problem is that most organisations have people responsible for adding content to their websites. However, few have somebody charged with removing it. This is an important role and one your web editor should have the power and time to do.

However, user needs is not the only criteria for judging the worth of content. There are also calls to action.

7. No clear calls to action

As I have already said, most content providers are focusing on conveying information rather than meeting users needs. However, they are also neglecting the business needs too.

With the exception of marketeers and sales people, few content providers are thinking about calls to action. What is it that you want users to do next? How do you wish them to respond?

Even when content providers are thinking about calls to action, they are focusing on the big actions such as “contact us.” Until the user is ready to take those major steps they are left to wander around the website.

The solution: Always guide the user to the next action

It is important to consider the main calls to action for the entire site. Typically they consist of one or two major actions such as buying a product or completing a contact form.

However, there is also a need to think about the calls to action of each page. Avoid leaving your user with no obvious next step.

Take for example this page. Directly below this article you can take three actions:

Leave a comment
Provide feedback – That leads to videos offering a number of next steps
Read a related post

At no stage is the user left without a next action.

A big source of next actions is your information architecture. Unfortunately most navigation is not focused on users needs, let alone business objectives.

8. An organisational focused IA

An unfortunate side effect of running a content management system is that it encourages information architecture built around organisational structure rather than users needs.

If you look at most organisations CMS driven websites, their information architecture closely mirrors their internal structures. This is because it is easier to divide up responsibility for updating various parts of the site if it is structured along departmental lines.

The problem with this approach is that users do not think in terms of organisational structure. They are task focused and so often an organisational IA is entirely inappropriate. It leads to confusion and frustration among users.

The solution: Focus on user tasks

The only solution to this problem is to stop structuring sites around organisations and start focusing them on users.

Although it is easier in most content management systems to allocate permissions based on a per section basis, there is not normally a specific need to do so. It is just as feasible to give access on a per page basis making it unnecessary to organise around internal structure.

Ultimately your site should be about your users and that includes your IA. However, it does not stop there. The community you build around your site is important too.

9. No sense of community

Increasingly content management systems come with some great community tools. They have forums, comments and integrate with everything from Facebook to Twitter. However, great technology does not build great communities.

Many organisations implement these community features on their site and are disappointed when they are not used.

Worst still some organisations launch these features but moderate so heavily that users respond negatively. Eventually the functionality is removed entirely.

The solution: Build relationship not functionality

It is important to realise that online communities are about relationships and not technology. If you want to build a successful community around your website, you need to actively and regularly engage with users.

This involves having people within your organisation who are constantly talk to users, asking and answering questions, and getting to know people through open and honest relationship.

Of course, the problem here is the same as content production. This is not seen as an official role. Instead it often falls to enthusiastic individuals. If you want your community to succeed you are going to require passionate people who have the time and resources to sink into that community.

And it is a lack of resources that leads us to our final problem that content management systems cannot solve – single language content.

10. Single language content

The majority of invitations to tender Headscape receive for content management builds, request multi-lingual support.

In the end few of the sites we build actually make use of that functionality. In effect they are paying money for something they will never actually implement.

There are two many reasons for this.

The first is aspirational. Many organisations request multi-lingual support because they have dreams of expanding in the future and unfortunately those dreams do not come true. I can at least respect this viewpoint. There is nothing wrong with planning for functionality you might need at some point in the future.

However, the second reason is not so admirable. A lot of sites fail to implement their multi-lingual support because they have not fully thought through what that involves.

Implementing a CMS with multi-lingual support is easy. Creating a multi-lingual website is hard. You have to decide what content is going to be translated. You need to find a translator and then you also need to maintain that content over the long term.

The solution: Think twice before requesting multi-lingual support

There has to be a good business case for implementing a multi-lingual website. Unless you are sure that you are going to make money from a foreign market, it is probably not worth investing in language support.

If you aren’t serious about supporting other languages do not add it to your ITT, at least not as a primary requirement. There is no reason to rule out a CMS for not supporting multiple languages unless you are sure you are going to use that functionality.

Conclusions

You could interpret this post as a criticism of content management systems. That is not the case. I believe content management systems are a valuable addition to most websites. However, as I said at the beginning they are not the silver bullet may perceive them to be.

The success of your CMS is largely reliant on you being aware of its limitations and being prepared to deal with these restrictions. If you do then a CMS could be the best investment you ever make.

189. How to keep up with web innovations

Paul Boag — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 12:28:31 +0000

Download this show.

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News

Web design match making

Finding a web designer can be tough. Equally, if you are a web designer (especially if you are just starting out) finding clients can be hard. Much like in love, finding the perfect partnership is difficult.

37 Signals feel they have the answer. To accompany their already successful jobs board, they have now launched Haystack.

Haystack, allows web designers to upload a brief description of their agency for free or a more detailed portfolio for $99 per month.

Clients can then browse this directory in attempt to find the perfect agency.

And there in lies the problem. Although Haystack is beautifully designed it is actually incredibly limited from a clients perspective. They are only given three choices.

Search through hundreds of listings manually
Filter by city
Filter by budget

These filters are both extremely limited and are not enough for narrowing down such a large number of designers.

Filter by city allows you to select from a handful of US cities, while dumping all other locations into a catch all of ‘other cities.’ This might possibly be acceptable if there was an option to search by country, region or city. Unfortunately there is not.

Filter by budget is equally flawed. As a web designer you have to select a price range that you normally work within. This effectively excludes you from smaller or larger projects. In reality things are rarely that black and white.

Finally I would argue that there are many other characteristics clients look for in an agency. There are no options to filter by technology, skill set or sector experience. The tools available are simply too blunt for making an effective decision.

My guess is that 37 Signals have been caught off guard by the instant popularity of the app. The current application has been built with a small number of agencies in mind. In such circumstances it would be perfectly adequate.

I am sure that they are already working on upgrades to the app which will handle the large number of agencies much more elegantly. These guys do good work and there is no doubt that an app like this is much needed.

Client relations

There seems to be a lot of posts around this week looking at the working relationship between clients and web designers.

There is a sitepoint post that focuses on fine tuning your persuasive techniques, a smashing magazine post on dealing with difficult characters and A List Apart post on when to walk away. There is even an article teaching us how to deal with things like scope creep and unhelpful design feedback.

Although it is good to see posts tackling client management, I do fear they all have a negative tone.

Last friday I ran a workshop on client relationships and although we discussed dealing with problematic relationships, I tried to make the overall theme a positive one.

Too many web designers go into new projects seeing the client as either the enemy or as a hinderance to the projects success. Articles like those I have mentioned are in danger of reinforcing this viewpoint.

It is important to remember that our clients are extremely knowledgeable in their own fields and that both designer and client wants the same thing – a successful website.

I also worry that too many web designers are perceived as negative. Instead we need to be positive and stop saying no to our clients.

Myths of usability testing

Two posts have been published recently that challenge some of our preconceptions about usability testing.

The first is a post by A List Apart entitled “The Myth of Usability Testing” and is a response to some fairly shocking research.

The research monitored a number of usability tests run by different agencies on the same site. The result was that although all of the agencies found many problems, only 30% of those problems were common to more than one agency. In other words the agencies could not agree on where the problems lay.

The article goes on to examine the discrepancy focusing in particular on the questions asked and the people tested. It also explains that context is vital to the interpretation of results.

The second post is one that challenges the role of eye tracking. The post looks at the pros and cons of the approach and in my opinion is a balanced assessment.

The post ends with the following conclusions:

Some have concluded that the benefits of eyetracking are not worth the high cost, effort, and complexity it adds to usability testing. On the other hand, some eyetracking vendors and consultants have promoted the idea that you cannot conduct usability testing effectively without eyetracking.

The truth lies somewhere between these extremes. If you know how to use eyetracking effectively, it can provide additional insights to usability testing that can help you find problems and answer questions about user behavior. Eyetracking is not essential to usability testing, but if you can afford it and have the time to learn how to use it effectively, it is definitely worth it.

Personally, we have never recommended eye tracking to our clients and this post has done nothing to persuade me to start. For the type of clients we work for the expenditure is hard to justify.

jQuery for designers

I am a huge fan of jQuery. I have said this more than once in the past. The thing I love most about jQuery is that it is aimed squarely at designers. If you can understand HTML and CSS, then you can wrap your head around jQuery. What is more, it lets you do some really cool things very easily.

Imagine my delight when this week I discovered jQuery For Designers. Apparently the site has been around for a while but I seem to have missed it entirely. In case you have missed it too I thought I would give it a quick mention.

The site contains dozens of screencasts and examples of various cool functionality that can be built with jQuery. Just some of the tutorials include:

Tabs
Slider galleries
Carousels
iPhone sliding headings
Fixing floating elements

Best of all, you can subscribe to these screencasts on itunes enabling you to view them as a podcast.

This is just one of the many excellent tutorials on jQuery for Designers.

Feature: 10 secrets to staying informed about web design

Keeping up in the world of web design is tough. Things move fast and its hard to stay informed. In this post I share 10 ways that RSS can come to the rescue.

Read 10 secrets to staying informed about web design

Ad: Win a Macbook Pro or iPod Touch

Webvanta are running a superb contest that I wanted to quickly mention.

There is an opportunity to win a Macbook Pro or one of three iPod Touch.

To be in with a chance of winning, you need to build a great looking, effective website on the Webvanta CMS.

Don’t worry if you are not an existing Webvanta user. They are going to give you a Webvanta premium account for the duration of the contest.

The panel of judges (that includes our own Ryan Taylor) will pick a winner on the 1st February so get designing.

For more details on how to enter visit Webvanta.com/Contest.

Listeners feedback:

Recording the podcast

I had the following tweet from @david_o_connell:

@marcus67 could you guys do a spot on the tech setup for recording the podcast please (didn’t ask Paul as he muffs the audio :) )

Thinking about this I realised that I have never covered this riveting subject so after nearly 200 shows it was probably about time!

It’s worth noting that we are set up to record and edit things as quickly as possible. We have recorded a weekly show for years so we have to get it down and get it out the door. I’m sure there are other ways of doing things and I expect my history of working in expensive recording studios potentially means that I overcomplicate things… but, this is how I do it.

Hardware

Ok, this is a list of all the stuff we use:

AKG C 2000B microphone (x3) – these are ‘mid’ quality mics that need phantom powering. ‘Decent’ quality mics are a must otherwise you will end up with a thin and probably noisy result. Built-in laptop mics are a total no-no!
Angled mic stand (x2) – these are recent addition that mean we can comfortably use our laptops while recording the show.
Straight mic stand – we use this for any guests we have on the show.
Pop shield (x3) – again, a recent addition to the setup. Vital in avoiding pops and bangs on words that begin with ‘p’ or ‘b’.
XLR to XLR (balanced) mic leads (x3)
Behringer mixing desk – our mixing desk has 4 ‘proper’ mic channels and 4 stereo channels, 2 sub groups and phantom powering to power the mics. On a standard show, I take a feed from sub the group outputs to the input on the Mac. When we’re recording a live show things are little more complex as we need to get the audio to two places at the same time (my Mac recording the show and Paul’s that is broadcasting live). I also need to hear the audio from the intro videos so we’re taking an out from Paul’s Mac for the videos and a feed from the desk master outs to his line input… you need to see it really!
Technics closed-ear headphones – these are my ‘old faithfuls’ that I have used for years. It is imperative that one person monitors voice levels throughout the recording. I plug them into the headphone input on my Mac. Closed ear are best because they do not ‘spill’ into the mic.

I don’t use any external compressors or limiters. That gets taken care of in the software.

Software

In my current setup I use Logic Pro to record all of the audio. This is a bit over the top for podcast recording but I also use it to record music and it does both jobs beautifully.
For the voice tracks I use the setting Voice > Speech > Male Radio that adds a compressor, de-esser (to stop sibilance) and EQ.

However, if you’ve got a Mac then Garageband will do the job admirably. It even has ‘podcast’ settings that you can assign prior to recording.

Back in my PC days I used to use Sony Soundforge to record the audio tracks which I would then edit together using Propaganda. I still use Soundforge to bounce down to MP3 (Logic is unreliable at this).

Recording tips

Here’s a bunch of tips to :

As I’ve already mentioned, use headphones while recording the show to avoid anyone going ‘off mic’. Usually, pointing at them, then their mic gets the message home!
When recording 2 people pan the input channels hard left and hard right. This means that if you have to boost any part of a recording it’s easy to locate the specific part. The absolute ideal here would be to have some sort of multi-input box into the computer thereby allowing multitrack recording i.e. I am recorded onto one track while Paul is recorded on to another simultaneously. Thinking about it, I could probably do this right now (for max 2 channels) by separating the inputs and recording 2 mono channels instead of one stereo. But, to be honest, it’s really not worth doing as, mentioned earlier, time is of the essence.
Record a quick levels test prior to any recording (because you really don’t want to have to go back in and fiddle with the levels afterwards unless you absolutely have to).
Record each section of the podcast on a separate track. Don’t do one long recording as this is much harder to edit later and add in music and audio dividers. If you record each section separately then you should only have to top and tail it which takes no time at all.
Once all the voice recording is done, I will add in the intro and outro music, the section dividers and any interviews or questions that are part of the show.
Once I’m happy with result, I bounce to Wav format which I then open in Soundforge and save out as 64Kbps 44.1 kHz mono MP3 format which is tagged and FTP’d to our hosts.

Here’s a screenshot of a final ‘mix’ in Logic before the bounce down (v zoomed out).

Building Findable Websites

My name is Nora Brown; I’m a freelance web designer in Boston.

I’d like to give you and Boagworld listeners a recommendation for a book I recently read, called “Building Findable Websites”, by Aarron Walter. Though I finished reading it a month or so ago, I find I’ve been referring back to it constantly ever since.

In this book, Aarron Walter views SEO as just one aspect of, and in some ways almost a side effect of, improving a website’s “findability” — which is defined on page 2 as:

“The quality of being located or navigated, the degree to which an object or piece of data can be located, and the degree to which a system supports navigation and retrieval.”

The goals of findability are listed as:

Help people find your website.
Help people find what they are looking for once they arrive at your site.
Bring your audience back to your website.

Notice there is no mention of Google or any other search engine, because obviously the ultimate goal is to help *people* find and use your website, not search bots.

To that end, Walter provides straightforward advice for improving findability at all levels of site development:

Front-end markup strategies
Server-side strategies
Content generation

Though not every technique will be right for every site, as someone who builds small business and portfolio websites, I found the majority of the recommendations to be practical and implementable. Furthermore, nothing in the book represents SEO for SEO’s sake — all the techniques have other benefits, primarily improving the user experience.

Aarron Walter manages to fit an amazing amount of useful, actionable information into this slim volume, but if it’s not enough, there are even five bonus chapters which you can download for free at buildingfindablewebsites.com.

I hope you and your listeners take a look at this excellent book.

I also think the author Aarron Wlater would make a great candidate for a Boagworld interview.

Thanks and keep up the wonderful podcast.

Make your website go viral

Paul Boag — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 12:04:45 +0000

Recently I keep hearing about this Firefox Plugin. Not because it is an amazing plugin. The reason everybody is talking about it is because the website for the plugin uses some gorgeous CSS and Javascript.

This demonstrates perfectly the point I was making in ‘3 Ways To Make Your Site Stand Out From The Crowd.’

View the Firefox Plugin

Read 3 Ways To Make Your Site Stand Out From The Crowd

How moodboards can save time, money and your sanity!

Paul Boag — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 10:15:27 +0000

Headscape has been using mood boards as part of our design methodology for some time. We believe they are an invaluable tool that helps both the client and the designer.

However, before you can understand the benefits of mood boards, it is important to acknowledge where the traditional design process falls down.

Where the traditional web design process fails

Obviously everybody approaches the design process slightly differently so it is unfair to refer to a traditional approach. However it would appear that many agencies and freelancers follow roughly this process:

Ask the client a bit about what they want from the design
Ask the client to identify some websites they like.
Produce 3 design comps in Fireworks or Photoshop.
Ask the client to choose a design from the comps presented.
Iterate until the client is happy.

This was certainly the approach we used until we realised it was not working.

We identified the following problems:

When asked what they wanted from their design, most clients focused on personal preference rather than business or user needs.
Clients often referred to sites that were either inappropriate for their audience or were selected based on content rather than design.
Producing multiple design concepts was time consuming for the designer and expensive for the client.
Multiple concepts led to frankenstein design, where the client would try to combine the ‘best bits’ from each comp.
The designs went through a lot of iterations because the designer did not have a full understanding of the clients requirements.

We utilised several approaches to overcome these problems. However, the most successful component was mood boards.

What is a mood board?

A mood board is basically a collection of graphical elements that set the tone for your design. Typically these include examples of:

Typography
Imagery
Colour
Layout
Style

Often these elements are lifted from other sites or even from sources such as magazines.

They are not meant to represent the final design, but rather provide an indication of how the site may feel.

When you first start producing mood boards it is difficult. You may have a strong sense of how the site should look, and so it can be hard producing alternative approaches.

Increasingly we produce four mood boards:

One that is our initial gut reaction.
One that is a more conservative version of the initial board.
One that is more extreme.
One completely ‘out there’ approach that is probably inappropriate.

Admittedly you could get away with the first three, but the fourth enables the designer to be more creative and potentially discover a completely different approach.

How mood boards can help

The reason mood boards made such a difference to our process was three fold:

They put us in control - Previously it was the client who was making design suggestions and selecting inspirational sites. By using mood boards we were the ones setting the tone and suggesting the direction. After all that is what the client is paying us for!
They are quick and easy to create – Developing design comps is time consuming and expensive, especially for something that may ultimately be discarded. Mood boards can be produced relatively easily, which means they are viewed as disposable. As a result the designer is not overly committed to a particular path and the client can see multiple revisions.
The client focuses on design, not content – We found that when clients looked at a design comp they were more concerned with the content than the design. Because mood boards do not contain real content, this problem is avoided and the client can focus on typography, imagery and colour.

The introduction of mood boards made an enormous difference to the running of our design projects. However, over time we have made some mistakes that have reduced the effectiveness of mood boards.

Mistakes when designing with mood boards

If used correctly mood boards are an extremely powerful tool. However, it is also easy to fallback into old habits. If you are going to use mood boards, be careful to avoid the following mistakes:

Designing a website and not a mood board

One problem we encountered was that we were so conditioned to build websites that it was hard not to. Every time we produced a mood board it ended up looking like an actual site.

The solution

The way we are resolving this issue is by changing the format. Instead of designing on a 1024 by 768 canvas, we have switched to creating A4 mood boards. In fact we also try to minimise web elements such as navigation or search boxes.

Making them too finished

An associated problem was that clients were getting confused. The mood boards were looking so polished that they were no longer sure what they were looking at. Was this a mood board or a design comp? What were they supposed to be providing feedback on?

The solution

We are still battling this problem. However, one approach I have adopted is setting constraints on the designer. Typically this involves limiting what Photoshop tools they can use.

When all the designer can do is copy and paste elements they have found elsewhere, the mood boards cannot become overly designed. The emphasis shifts from designing detail to looking for inspiration and setting the mood.

Spending too long on a mood board

Of course, the final problem relating to overworked mood boards is time. As our mood boards started to become more and more like design comps, they took longer to produce.

This had two consequences. Firstly it cut into our profit margins. Secondly, the designer became increasingly attached to the mood boards and find it hard when the client don’t like them.

The solution

The solution to this one is simple. We are beginning to set time limits on mood board production. We are now asking designers to spend no more than one hour on a single mood board. Most of that time is spent sourcing elements rather than doing design work.

By taking this approach we can afford to produce multiple iterations of mood boards and experiment with many different directions.

Conclusions

I am aware that we are in a minority by using mood boards. However, I would suggest that every designer should consider them as a tool.

If you design multiple comps then this could be a real cost saver.

If you pursue a single approach, this will enable you to explore other avenues with minimal effort.

So, what do you think? Do you use mood boards already, or do you think it is an outdated tool that has no place on the web? Whatever your thoughts I would love to hear them in the comments below.

188. Clearscape or Headleft?

Paul Boag — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 10:30:53 +0000

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Every once in a while it is good to do something different. This show is one of those occasions.

This week Andy, Richard and Jeremy from Clearleft came to the Barn to hang out with Headscape. While they were there we decided to record a podcast.

The show is largely unscripted and it seemed unfair to ask our team of volunteers to transcribe an hour long 5 way conversation! As a result, I am afraid we are lacking our normal show notes. I hope you understand.

That said, I can tell you we covered the following topics:

The differences between the working practices of Clearleft and Headscape
The beginnings of the two companies
The pros and cons of being a total service company like Headscape or specialising like Clearleft
The importance of passion in what we do
Deciding when to adopt new innovations
Whether locations affects success
Our plans for the future

We really hope you enjoy the show and we would love to hear your thoughts on the subjects discussed. Please make use of the comments below.

5 ways to give your site a speed boost in less than 30 minutes.

Paul Boag — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 12:30:07 +0000

In this age of broadband, users are unlikely to leave your site for being too slow. However, if you want to create a feeling of satisfaction and a pleasant user experience you need to keep download times to a minimum.

In a recent interview usability expert Jacob Nielsen wrote:

One of the main guidelines is to show the next state (e.g., the next page) with one second of the user’s action (e.g., click) in order for users to experience the feeling of a freely-flowing interaction, as opposed to a sensation of delays.

The problem is that speed optimisation can often sound intimidating. Very clever people with very large beards throw around phrases like gzip, compression and caching. However, it doesn’t need to be complicated.

I have just tweaked Boagworld to make it slightly more responsive (yes I know it is not perfect) and I needed little technical knowledge and it took less than 30 minutes. Here is how:

1. Install YSlow for Firebug

Firebug is a Firefox plugin that is essential for any web designer. YSlow is a plugin to this plugin (confusing I know!) that allows you to carry out all kinds of speed tests on your site.

YSlow will grade the performance of your site, provide advice on how to improve things and even suggest some tools which might help.

2. If you are using Wordpress install Super Cache

If like me you use Wordpress as your content management system then be sure to install the Super Cache plugin.

This plugin generates static html files from your dynamic WordPress blog. After the first visitor views a page on your blog, an HTML copy is created and served to all future visitors. This means that the server does not have to continually recreate pages. This will significantly speed up your site especially when you are receiving a lot of simultaneous users.

3. Compress your images

Images are a significant proportion of most webpages download. However, Photoshop does not always do a very good job at compressing images. Sure, there are other tools out there but most of us do not have the time or inclination to use them.

In addition, if we are trying to speed up an existing site we are unlikely to download and recompress an entire website worth of images.

Fortunately, Smushit comes to the rescue with an online image compressor. Best of all it integrates with YSlow to find all the images on a particular webpage and provide a report of the savings it could make.

Once it has run, all you have to do is download the recompressed images and upload them to your webserver. It even saves the directory structure!

4. Compress your Javascript

Increasingly websites are using more and more Javascript. These files can become very large, especially when using Javascript libraries and plugins. Fortunately it is possible to significantly reduce javascript files by removing formatting and comments.

There are a number of tools that will do this for you:

YSlow, which has this functionality built in.
Minifyme, which is an AIR application that runs locally.
Online minimizers, which allow you to copy and paste Javascript.
A number of coding applications that also have this functionality built in.

Whatever approach you take, make sure you keep an uncompressed version of the file because it is very hard to read and edit minimized Javascript.

5. Compress your CSS

Finally, as well as compressing your Javascript you can also do the same with CSS. Minifyme not only compresses Javascript, but also does then same for CSS. However, I tend to use CSS Compressor because it provides me with more control over the level of compression.

These CSS compressors remove spaces, line breaks and comments in order to make the file as small as possible.

As with Javascript remember to keep an uncompressed version. That, or reduced the level to which you compress the files.

What else?

What I like about the approaches above is that they require no server side configuration or technical knowledge. They are fast, powerful and easy. There is no reason not to follow this advice.

However, there is a lot more that can be done. Perhaps you would be willing to share some of your speed optimisation tricks in the comments below.

Introducing compelling content

Paul Boag — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 18:59:16 +0000

As part of my role at AK Designs I am responsible for all the copy on the “home sites” as well as the copy on many client websites. In this role with clients I often face issues (and from some staff who think the same way) … On of the biggest issues that occurs on a regular basis is simply that the website owners or the company investors seem to turn around with ideas of what the copy should be, and I have always found (so far) that all they want to do is convince the end user.

Now don’t get me wrong, sometimes this fits the site and the audience you are trying to get to understand something, but most the time it isn’t.

The battle generally means I turn around and compromise, I mention AB testing of the copy to see what will produce the best results. They agree to the testing and 95% of the tests end to come back in my favour. So to help everyone get to grips with this idea I’ve created 5 directives of writing compelling copy.

5 Directives to Write Compelling Copy

Know Your Audience

Think of each page or email newsletter as being read by a single person, a person from your target audience. Give him or her a name, an age, a relationship status & maybe a background story. Now write you copy for this person alone, you are not wanting to convince her of anything but rather to feel compelled to visit again, tell a friend or even better to follow your call to action… if your audience feel preached too or spoken down too then they will switch off… where as if you can engage on a one-2-one basis then you will get some real business.

Use a present tense and Positive subject line

Imagine reading “10 websites were developed” … sounds boring and doesn’t attract your attention really, you don’t feel compelled to click and read it… now think about the line “We developed 10 New websites” notice it draws your attention it was us (we) the company and they are “new” so this implies a sense of importance, improvement and excitement. Other good words include “exciting”, “exclusive” and “introducing”.

Avoid sitting on the fence – it gets you no where

If your wanting to sell something, wanting to compel them to take an a particular action, be definitive. you are the “expert” otherwise they wouldn’t be visiting your site! So don’t use words such as “should”, “could”, “maybe” or “possibly” they have negative implications on most audiences, they make them question you and your product or site.

Be Concise

Don’t ramble on endlessly, get to your point quickly and clearly. Cut the rubbish and the jargon, no one wants to hear it or see it … it confuses the average person which is why there are so many sites claiming to be jargon busters or having jargon busters built in… save you and your customer sometime.

Connect

Connecting with your audience will never be easy, it will never be 100% successful even if you’ve got everything right on your site. What you need to think is that your customers will have something else on their mind, maybe someone is in hospital, maybe someone just knocked on the door or maybe they are hungry… a tiny little thing can distract and you will loose a sale (or however you call to action is built). So connect, make the user think positive thoughts, so even if they are distracted they will feel compelled to return.
I know these tips will help many of the website owners I know, and I know it will help your site be a success.

Image provided by The Trial

About the Author

Andy is director & chief designer @ AK Designs. Addicted to SEO, Designing, Twitter, His Googie (G1) and all things tech in general. AK Designs (andy kinsey designs) has worked with clients of all sizes from small local charities to larger national fiscal companies and a number of large multi-national organisations. Andy’s motto in life is simple, ”To under-promise and Over-Deliver” something continued into the AK Designs mission. The AK Designs website is also the home of Andy’s SEO articles.

10 secrets to staying informed about web design

Paul Boag — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 20:16:46 +0000

Whether you are a designer, developer or website owner there is an immense pressure to keep up with the latest web innovations. With the web moving so fast what is best practice one day is out of date the next.

Worse still, we are so busy building and running websites, that we rarely have the time to keep informed. However, it is not impossible and the answer lies in the clever use of RSS.

Below are 10 secrets I have discovered that allow me to get a broad overview of the industry without wasting hours of my time everyday.

1. Get a great RSS reader

It goes without saying, but the first thing you need is a great RSS reader.

The key thing you are looking for, is a reader that allows you to identify which content is most likely to be of interest to you. There are two ways this can be achieved.

One approach is to use folders. This is the approach I take. I use Google reader and organise the different feeds into folders that help me prioritise. I talk more about how I organise things below.

The second approach is to use an RSS reader that does this prioritisation for you. One example of this kind of reader is Fever. Fever reads your feeds and picks out the most frequently talked about links. What is great about this approach is the more feeds you add, the better fever gets at identifying important content.

Whatever approach you use, you must be able to quickly identify important stories and avoid feeling swamped by posts.

2. Organise your feeds

If you choose a more traditional feed reader such as Google Reader it is important to organise your feeds well. If you don’t then great content can get lost among high frequency feeds such as Techcrunch.

Everybody will organise their feeds in a slightly different way and I myself have tried several approaches. However, the one that seems to be working best for me is to have the following folders:

Must Read – This is where I place feeds that consistently produce great content and I cannot afford to miss a post.
Quantity Feeds – These are feeds from sites that post regularly. Sites like the BBC may produce great content, but there is so much of it that it can overwhelm other feeds. By isolating them I can ensure I don’t miss anything important.
Links – I subscribe to several feeds that are just collections of links from people I respect (I will talk about this more later). Because these contain no actual content in themselves, I keep them separate for a time when I can hunt through the list for any gems.
The rest – These are less valuable, low volume feeds that I read when additional time is available.

Of course just because this approach works for me does not mean it will for you. You need to find the best folder structure that suits the content you subscribe to.

3. Be mobile

I do most of my RSS reading away from my computer. It is amazing how much content I can get through by utilising the spare moments I have waiting for the wife or sitting on a train.

Therefore I need a great mobile RSS reader. The mobile reader I have is called News Stand and it syncs seamlessly with Google Reader. This is the primary reason I use Google Reader rather than Fever.

What is more News Stand has some useful features worth noting. From News Stand I can…

Tweet a story
Add it to Delicious
Send it to Instapaper for reading later
Email it

I regularly email myself posts if they contain some new tool that I might want to look at in more depth later. I can even add these posts directly to my task list using Omnifocus.

4. Scan, file and read

How you read your feeds is as important as the tools you use.

With so much great content out there you will inevitably end up with a lot of feeds. There is just not enough time in the day to read them all. The emphasis has to be on finding the really good content fast and then reading it later when you have time.

Normally when I launch my feed reader I am pushed for time. I don’t have the opportunity to trawl through each post and read it in detail. The main objective is to scan headlines and see if anything jumps out.

If I spot something I like the look of I add it to instapaper. This will reformat it in a more readable way and save it offline on my phone for later consumption.

An alternative approach would be to simply star it in Google Reader. However, personally I prefer the accessibility and formatting of instapaper.

Then once I have my list of preferred reading, I use longer blocks of time to read through this list. Train journeys and sitting in bed are ideal opportunities.

However, I have also discovered that even driving in the car or working out at the gym (not that I have personal experience of the latter) are ideal times to work through my reading list. The way I achieve this is using a service on the mac that converts text into an MP3 file. The voice isn’t great but it is a very useful way of getting through a big reading list.

So you have a process in place. The next question is what feeds to follow.

5. Follow the big players

As a web designer you need a broad overview of not just the web design world but also the tech world. It is therefore important to follow a number of big players who post regularly and will provide the majority of posts in your feed reader.

My personal suggestions are:

Smashing Magazine provides easily digestible content that either inspires or provides practical advice.
The Web Designers Depot is similar to Smashing Magazine but seems to focus more heavily on inspiration.
Sitepoint provides both blog posts and detailed articles on every aspect of web design. A great all round publication.
Techcrunch will provide a broader perspective on the tech world. However, it can be a little focused on ‘the Valley’ for my tastes.
Mashable provides some great articles social media and is definitely worth subscribing to.

The problem with the sites above is that they post frequently. Be sure to isolate them so they do not dominate your feed reader.

6. Track the specialist sites

In addition to the big players there are also a large number of specialist web design sites that are worth your attention. These include, but are not limited to:

A List Apart was originally the homepage of web standards but is now broadening its articles to tackle a variety of user experience related issues.
Adaptive Path is a company who produce some excellent posts on the latest thinking in the world of UX design.
Boxes and Arrows is a blog dedicated to information architecture.
Ideas on Ideas is a collection of essays regarding design, brand and experience.
Customer experience matters tackles as you might expect from the title, customer experience issues both online and off.
Konigi is a research community for user experience designers.

Obviously this is a list of my favourites, and so is biased towards my personal areas of interest. However, if you are starting from scratch these are as good a place to begin as any.

7. Remember the individuals

So far we have focused exclusively on web design / tech publications and ignored the blogs of individuals. There are literally thousands of these, but it is important that a good selection can be found in your RSS reader.

The individual bloggers tend to post less regularly but this is where a lot of cutting edge thinking happens. An idea bounced around in somebodies personal blog can quickly turn into best practice promoted by sites like A List Apart.

My personal favourites are…

Jeremy Keith, who writes a lot about HTML5, Javascript and Microformats.
Roger Johansson, who covers a variety of topics from accessibility to web standards.
Bruce Lawson, who focuses mainly on HTML5 and accessibility.
Richard Rutter, who will tell you all you need to know about web typography.
Sam Barnes, who shares his personal perspective on web project management.

Over time you will build up your own list of personal bloggers. However, always try and keep an open mind to new people. You should always be adding and removing feeds to keep your list current and relevant.

8. Use bookmarking feeds

The same people who have good web design blogs are often extremely well read themselves. Many of them share the content they find on social bookmarking websites such as delicious. It is well worth subscribing to their feeds on these sites.

A few of the many such feeds I subscribe to include:

Subscribing to other people’s feed is an easy way of exposing yourself to content that you might not otherwise have found.

9. Leverage twitter

Of course, increasingly people are not saving links to services like delicious. Instead they are posting them to Twitter.

There are a couple of ways of leveraging twitter for great web design content. One way is to use Twitter search. By searching for web design keywords such as “usability,” “web design” or “accessibility” combined with “http://” you will return all links that match those keywords. You can then subscribe to an RSS feed of that result.

Although this is a good way of discovering new content there is no guarantee as to the quality of those links. They could have been posted by anybody including spambots.

A better approach would be to search for links submitted only by the people you follow. Unfortunately Twitter search does not provide that ability. Fortunately a service called Microplaza does.

The service allows you to see all of the links tweeted by those you follow either organised by date or popularity. You can also see exactly who tweeted the link. However, best of all you call subscribe to an RSS feed so it appears in your feed reader of choice.

10. Signup to aggregators

With a good system, reading your RSS feeds does not need to take long. However you may conclude that this is not something you have time to setup.

If that is the case you could get somebody else to do the hard work for you. There are a number of news aggregators out there, which collect the best of web design news and feed it to your news reader. For example Boagworld runs its own news aggregation service that you can either follow on Twitter or subscribe to via RSS.

Conclusions

As I said at the start, we work in an extremely fast moving industry. There are new innovations on a daily basis and what is best practice today might be replaced tomorrow. It is important to stay up-to-date. However, finding the time can be difficult.

This post demonstrates how I have solved the problem. However, that is just my personal experience.

What about you? How do you stay on top of web design news? How do you remain current and do you think RSS is the answer or has it be surpassed by Twitter? Post your thoughts in the comments.

187. Jedi Mind Tricks

Paul Boag — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 12:28:59 +0000

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Housekeeping

Although we promised you ClearLeft on this week’s show we have had to postpone it until next week. However, that gives you a whole extra week to submit questions via the comments on our blog.

News

A web designers time is precious

We are all too busy, period. However, life can be particularly intense if you work as a web designer or developer. The pace of change is so fast it can be hard to find the time to keep up.

Fortunately there are some great articles around that provide time savings tips. Take for example Sitepont’s post this week “How to take control of your time.” It provides some excellent advice including the importance of prioritising, the need to leave adequate time and learning to say no.

Smashing Magazine has a post of their own entitled “20 time saving tips to improve designers workflow.” This includes ways to customise your work environment and better work with tools like Photoshop.

Speaking of Photoshop there is a great cheatsheet that contains all of the keyboard shortcuts you need to speed up your workflow in Photoshop. When combined with the IE6 cheatsheet for solving common IE6 bugs you will find yourself saving considerable time.

The answer to overload is not to work longer hours. It is to work smarter and that is what these posts enable you to do.

15 common ecommerce mistakes

I love working on ecommerce sites. They are by far my favourite. The reason – you get to see an obvious return on your work, because they have an obvious call to action. Conversion either increases or decreases. Profits either rise or fall. You are in no doubt as to whether you have made a difference or not.

However, the other reason I love working on ecommerce sites is because so many of them are terrible. Often when you start working on an ecommerce site there are loads of quick wins that make an instant difference to revenue.

People make the same mistakes again and again. In fact these mistakes are often so predictable that you could write a top 10 list of them… and guess what… that is exactly what Smashing Magazine has done: “15 common mistakes in ecommerce design and how to avoid them“.

Some of my personal favourite mistakes include:

Hiding contact information
Long winded checkout
Poor customer service
Not highlighting related products or otherwise upselling
Hiding the cost of delivery

If you are designing or running an ecommerce site then you really should check this post out. You will be surprised just how many of these mistakes you make.

The benefits of inline form validation

I have said it before and I will say it again: “forms are the most important feature on most websites.” Most often a sites call to action requires the completion of a form. Get the form wrong and you frustrate users potentially driving them away.

Nobody likes filling in forms. Whether it is a contact form, site registration or just a simple login form. It is therefore vital that we make the process as painless as possible.

There is a post on a List Apart which I have only just gotten around to reading. “Inline Validation in Web Forms” does not sound like the most exciting read but it does provide some invaluable best practice for dealing with forms. However, it doesn’t just provide somebodies opinion on best practice, instead it backs those views up with valuable testing.

The post takes a typical signup form and trials different forms of inline validation with real users. They didn’t just monitor success/failure rates. They also looked at errors made, satisfaction rates and completion time. They even did some eye tracking.

Although the results are not surprising, it is nice to have some numbers to put against what we have known to be true. For example, it was obvious that inline validation makes an enormous difference to both actual success and perceived success. Just validating a form on the client side increased success rates by 22% and satisfaction by 31%. Those numbers went even higher when the user is given feedback as they completed each field.

A valuable post, worth reading.

Innocent smoothies: A case study into corporate communication

When you speak at as many conferences as I do, you often find yourself referring to the same examples of good or bad practice. Whether it is comparing Google and Yahoo or fawning over Apple’s great UX design, the same names keep coming up.

One of the names I often reference is Innocent Smoothies. I love them. They just ‘get the web’. Actually, that is a lie. They get people. They know how to communicate and they know themselves. They have a distinctive voice that makes people warm to them and that is carried through to their website.

This week Anna Debenham has written an excellent case study on Innocent Smoothies looking in detail at what makes them successful online. In particular she looks at their blog and mailing list.

As Anna says at the start of her post:

A lot of the clients I work with who have just set up a web presence for their company think it’s a good idea to start a mailing list and a blog. Everyone else is doing it, so why shouldn’t they? The problem is, so few companies get it right and very few people will bother to read them.

So what makes Innocent different? Anna gives 6 reasons:

They show you the real people behind the business
They make their copy fun
They don’t just talk about their products
They are generous
They provide useful information
They make good use of imagery

Anna’s post is packed full of examples, so be sure to check it out. There is a lot most corporate bloggers could learn from Innocent.

Feature: How to persuade your users, boss or client

Whether you are trying to get signoff for a site’s design or persuade a user to complete a call to action. We all need to know how to be convincing. This week, we look at how to present our message

Read Jedi Mind Tricks: How To Persuade Your Users, Boss, Or Clients

Listeners feedback:

Email masking

One of the more popular suggestions for topics was how to mask your email address so it doesn’t get harvested by spammers.

This is something that everybody worries about from designers to website owners. However, unfortunately there is no good solution. In my opinion you need to just put your email out there and deal with the spam.

Sure there are a number of possible solutions but none of them are acceptable. They either require the user to be running Javascript (which creates accessibility problems) or they place extra burden on the user. Giving users the ability to contact you is a fundamental part of almost all websites and, so you do not want to make it hard.

There are however two ways of minimising the impact.

First, you could choose not to publish your email address, but instead offer a contact form. Although spammers can spam these too, it is harder and there are ways of minimising spam without putting an added burden on users. However if you do use a contact form, send a copy to the user so they have a record.

Second, you can fall back on good spam filters. Use a site specific email address and make sure it is guarded by a good quality filter. I personally find Google Mails spam filter particularly good, so you might want to consider routing enquiries via that.

However, at the end of the day if a spammer is determined to spam you there is very little you can do to stop them. Unfortunately, this the price of being online.

Jedi mind tricks: How to persuade your users, boss, or clients

Paul Boag — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 12:24:55 +0000

Like many in the web design industry I have a strange job. I am part sales man, part consultant and part user experience designer. One day I could be pitching a new idea to a board of directors, the next I might be designing an ecommerce purchase process.

There is however a common theme – I spend most of my time trying to persuade people.

As web designers we often have to nudge people in the direction we want them to go. It is a vital skills that we all have to learn.

I am not talking about manipulation. I don’t believe in using underhand techniques and I certainly do not believe in lying. However, there are ways of presenting yourself and your argument in such a way that people are more receptive.

The first and probably most important way is to empathise.

Empathise

The worse thing you can do is go into a meeting or begin designing a user interface with a personal agenda.

If your goal is to push the other party into agreeing with you, they will resist. However, if you seek to understand their needs and respond to these, you will find them more cooperative.

Start by listening

To achieve this you must really listen. It is not enough to pay to pay lip service to the idea of listening. You need to hear what they have to say and look for ‘points of pain’ where your ideas might actually help them.

Tailor the way you communicate your agenda

The idea is to tailor the presentation of your ideas so that it can be seen to benefit the other party, rather than forcing them to reluctantly agree. This involves some creative thinking but is possible if you really understand their needs.

Show the other party what benefits you can offer them

Remember it is not enough to explain how your ideas will help you or even others. You have to demonstrate how it helps the person you are speaking to.

For example do not say to your client:

Users are going to love this new feature.

Instead say:

This new feature will keep users coming back and that will dramatically improve the number of leads you receive.

Once you understand the other party and are thinking about their needs, the next step to form a relationship with them.

Be personable

If you have a good relationship with your users, boss or client they are more likely to follow your suggestions.

Obviously the kind of relationship you build is dependant on who the other party is. Your relationship with website users is different from your relationship with the boss. However, there are certain approaches you should always consider:

Get them nodding

It’s a silly little thing but when I go to pitches I try and get people nodding. If they start nodding it is a good sign. However, more than that it put them in a positive mood.

I normally achieve this by repeating back to them (in different language) a point they themselves have already made. This is obviously something they can agree with, but also demonstrates that I was listening and that we are on the same wavelength.

The same approach can be used online. For example if I am writing a post aimed at web designers, I know that berating IE6 will start them nodding in agreement. I have succeeded in making a connection.

Be enthusiastic

Enthusiasm is such an important tool. Clients want to know you care about their project. Bosses want to know that you are motivated to work and users want to know you care about the service you provide.

However, so many people lack enthusiasm when communicating their message. They either come across as defeated before they start or as overly aggressive.

A better approach is to go in with overwhelming enthusiasm. People get caught up in enthusiasm. It is infectious. However, most importantly it is hard to say no to somebody who is exuding enthusiasm and excitement from ever pore. It would be like kicking a puppy :-)

Mirror them

You have all heard how mirroring somebodies body language helps establish a positive connection. Whatever you do, do not do it! If it is done as a conscious action it just comes across as creepy! It will happen naturally, so do not worry about it.

That said it is a useful indication of whether a face to face meeting is going well. If the other party is mirroring your body language, then the chances are they like you.

What is more interesting is that you can mirror people’s language.

Try and use the same terminology as the other party. If your boss or client talks about return on investment or success criteria, ensure you do too. Equally if your user is not familiar with certain language, make sure you avoid it.

The way we speak associates us with a certain ‘tribe’. If we share the same language we are more likely to build a rapport.

Make them smile

A final trick I use for building relationship is to inject some humour into proceedings. If you can make the other party smile, you are a long way to breaking down any barriers that may exist.

Of course, this has to be used with some care. Overdo it and you look like the fool. However, even the most miserable looking board of directors are human beings and like to smile.

Although all of these approaches are great for building relationship there is one that trumps them all – openness.

Be open

You maybe reading this thinking “this guy is mad, what if his clients read this stuff. Won’t they feel manipulated?” My answer is no. I am being open and honest about what I do. I would be entirely happy for any one of my clients to read this because there is nothing manipulative or hidden here. People hate being deceived and so if anything the honesty in this article will build my relationships, not undermine it.

I believe there are two key components in building open relationships that lead to a receptive audience.

Disarming honesty

Many times the best approach is to diffuse potential conflict with disarming honesty. For example I regularly acknowledge in sales situations that I am there to sell and that they should take anything I say with a pitch of salt.

The client would obviously know this already. However, admittedly it verbally is the kind of honesty people rarely encounter.

When designing a website it is important to be upfront with users too. For example if you are asking for somebodies telephone number on the website, do them the courtesy of admitting that it is because you want to contact them.

A willingness to show weakness

We can sometimes be so desperate to make our point that we become unwilling to admit even the slightest weakness in our argument. However, ultimately we come across as pig headed and inflexible.

People respond well when you admit that you are wrong or if you are unsure of an answer. Be willing to say I do not know or I have messed up if appropriate. People will respect you for it.

One of the best examples of this is Flickr’s blog post “Sometimes We Suck” in which they apologised for performance problems. By taking this approach they demonstrated their integrity and completely defused the anger of those complaining.

Of course, being willing to show weakness takes a lot of confidence and that is a trait desperately needed if you are going to convince others.

Be confident

As humans we are drawn to confident leaders. We follow those who have a clear vision and who walk that path with confidence.

It is therefore important to communicate your message with confidence. Establish yourself as an expert and talk with authority. People will respond to this.

However, confidence is not the same thing as arrogance.

Confidence not arrogance

Being confident also involves having the confidence to admit when you are wrong. A truly confident leader does not claim to have all of the answers all of the time. Conceding points and being willing to allow others to express their views is a key component of confidence. Only those who lack confidence fear an opposing view being expressed.

You do not need to always win

Pick your battles. It is okay to concede some points to achieve your greater aim. It does not undermine your position to give ground. Sometimes you need to play a submissive role to get people on board.

Don’t allow your ego to get in the way. If it makes somebody feel good that they have won an argument then they are more likely to be consolatory when you suggest an alternative.

Some degree of compromise is okay. It is certainly better than being negative and constantly rejecting counter proposals.

Be positive

Whether dealing with your boss, a difficult client or your users, you need to impress them with your attitude and service.

You should always remain helpful and keen to leave a positive impression. Sometimes that involves going the extra mile in customer service. Other times it means finding some positive aspect in your bosses latest mad scheme.

Whatever the situation, the worse thing that can happen is you get a reputation as somebody who is unhelpful and negative.

Conclusions

You will probably have gathered by now that my title is somewhat misleading. There are no Jedi mind tricks here. At the end of the day the secret to persuading others is to show them respect, listen to their opinions and seek ways of presenting your vision in language that they can understand and benefits them.

186. Mobile Web

Paul Boag — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 06:18:53 +0000

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Win Pitches, Charm Clients and Get Signoff

Being a great designer or developer is only half the battle. You also need to be able to promote and sell your services. Unfortunately many web designers and freelancers struggle to engage with clients.

The problem appears to be so big and I get so many questions on the subject that I have teamed up with the guys at Carsonified to run a full days workshop on the subject.

It takes place on the 23rd of October in London. If you book soon the price is £375 although if you quote the code CWPB_09 you can get an additional 15% off.

Book Your Place Now!

News

Sign up, Log in

Everybody hates signing up for new services. We also hate having to log in especially when we have ticked that little ‘remember me’ checkbox (or at least we think we did).

There is so much that can go wrong with sign up and log in, from lost passwords to mistyping. It is therefore vital that the usability of these forms is as good as possible.

This week I have come across two posts that might help.

The first is a post by Jeremy Keith in which he challenges two current practices for sign up and log in forms. The first is the practice of requiring users to enter an email address or password twice. The second is the default on ‘remember me’ buttons, which generally seems to be unchecked.

The second post I wanted to mention is a brief review by Techcrunch of the new Facebook Connect Wizard.

In case you haven’t come across the Facebook Connect Wizard, it is an easy way for anybody to add Facebook Connect to their website even if you have no coding knowledge. The wizard seems to consist of three simple steps that take a matter of minutes. Once complete users can log in to your site using Facebook. One less username and password for people to remember.

Search results design

Smashing Magazine has released a post that looks at how a large cross section of websites deal with search design. This follows on well from the recent A List Apart edition that dealt with search and we mentioned on last weeks show.

The Smashing Magazine post analysis’s the search design for a whole range of sites from Google to Walmart, and draws some interesting conclusions. These include some great advice such as:

Visited links should be indicated
Where possible, results pages should have RSS feeds or “subscribe” options
To monitor future improvements, request feedback from users after searches are conducted
If results span different sections of the site, indicate this by sub-headings or other dividers
Should allow re-sorting or filtering of results

Of course, just because a lot of websites have a certain approach to search, does not mean it is best practice. I have often seen bad practice copied from one site to another. That said, the list of recommendations seem solid. To read the complete list of suggestions check out the post on their site.

Is Windows 7 about to make our lives easier?

I was reading a post on Sitepoint this week entitled ‘Why Windows 7 Will Revolutionize Your Browser Testing‘ and it has started me thinking.

The part of the post that particularly caught my eye was XP Mode. This allows users to run IE6 for specific web applications under Windows 7. However, their default browser will still be IE8.

This will change everything. As I have said numerous times before, the reason IE6 survives is because of legacy systems within large corporates. In a single move this will overcome the problem. If they can use IE6 for these systems and IE8 for everything else then life is rosy.

There is a lot of positive buzz around Windows 7, and I know many large organisations who skipped Vista entirely are now serious considering upgrading. If that is the case we should see the number of instances of people running IE6 fall through the floor over the next year.

Finally we can move on!

CSS: From beginners to advanced

With the increasing buzz around CSS3 it appears CSS is having a renaissance. There are a growing number of articles which focus on emerging CSS support and browser manufacturers are falling over themselves to add new features.

This week Firefox 3.6 Alpha has been released adding support for a number of interesting new CSS features.

Sitepoint’s post ‘CSS3: To Infinity and Beyond‘ catalogues some of these additions and looks at how wide browser support for these now are.

The list of new features include:

Background resizing
Multiple background images
CSS gradients

Of course, unsurprisingly IE support is scares. However, with the proper application of graded browser support this should not be a major issue.

If you are starting out with CSS all of this talk of CSS3 may seem overwhelming. However, there is still some great advice being posted for you guys too.

One post you might want to check out is ‘30 CSS best practices for beginners‘. As the name suggests this should get you up and running fairly quickly and ensure you are building sites in the right way.

However, one word of warning. A few of these best practices are not so much… best practice. In fact some of the advice is down right bad! But do not let that put you off of reading the post. The editor has actually responded to the bad advice explaining why he believes it to be wrong. As long as you read his comments too you will be fine.

Interview: Brian Suda talks mobile

Paul: so joining me on the show today is Brian Suda. who is on to talk about mobile web, good to have you on Brian.

Brian: Thank you very much.

Paul: Thank you so much for coming on, I think a good place to start would be if you tell the listeners a little about yourself and why the mobile web, and why we are talking to you about that in particular.

Brian: My background is originally in programming and software systems. I did my undergrad in massuri US, from there i moved on to the uk and Scotland, where I studied more about infomatics. So im really interestedin the background aspects, all the technical issues. But alot of the things iv developed when i started working on sites is more the front end and the usability, the way people think about mobile. Recently I’ve been working on lots of little mobile sites here and there as a freelancer all these new kind of mobile. Its getting much bigger and i think now is about the time the customer should be looking into it and the right time for them put their feet into the water or take what they have and maybe take it to the next step.

Paul: hmmmm, i mean one thing that’s knocking around a lot that people talk about when it comes to the web is the one site fits all mentality. Which raises the question of do we need to be doing things specifically for mobile devices or if we build out websites right can we avoid the whole problem.

Brian: It’s a very interesting question. Because the W3C does push this concept of the one web and there are definite pros and cons to it. The definite pro is maintenance costs, if your only dealing with one website you don’t have to worry about updating and keeping things in sync with data and things on a constant basis. But at the same time there are certainly different aspect to the way people use the site. One of the things that we really try to do is keep the one web in mind and really that means all the same information is available. It doesn’t have too look exactly the same or being the exact same format, it just needs to be available to the end customer.
So one of the things we’ve been stressing is that we don’t like the words “mobile web”, were trying to find a better term for that. Mainly because “mobile web” infers that your using a mobile phone or some sort of mobile device but thats not necessarily the case i mean the way we picture the mobile web is its about mobility. I think they’ve got mobile as a noun and it should be mobile as a verb. You are moving, your mobile. So really the same kind of site doesn’t always work. A good example of this is if you have a fancy iphone or ipod touch and your at home sitting on the couch you have no quarms about viewing the full bbc website. Your on wifi nice fast connection no big deal. But if your out on the move, want to catch the tube, or your late for the bus you want the mobile version of the site. Because you want it quick, you might be on GPRS or edge, you don’t have the time or the energy to download the full bbc website. So its not really about the device, its more about the situation.

Paul: Thats quite interesting that you raise, obviously the iphone is going to come up in the conversation when we talk about the mobile web as does android and the various other new operating systems that are emerging. The one kind of trait all these have is they have this rich browser experience, you know quite powerful browsers and again the other question i guess people are saying is the idea of designing for mobile devices going to disappear because the browsers are so capable. But i guess this issue of environment and situation applies whether or not the browser is sophisticated.

Brian: theres also going to be situations where even if you have a very robust browser, form input is always going to be a pain. So even though you may basically have safari replicated for the iphone it maybe easier to just have a phone number. I mean you have a device in your hand designed for making phone calls, thats what it’s number one purpose is. To force someone to fill out a form can just become a ridiculous pain, it disappears into the web somewhere and maybe someone will answer in 48 hours, but you maybe sat in an airport having lost your luggage. You know you want to talk to a real person immediately, not fill out a form. So i think there is always going to be situations where the medium or the situation is going to define what you want to do.

Paul: i guess also you were mentioning there about whatever mobile device your going to be using its difficult to fill out a form. I mean that brings up the whole issue of the user interface, that mobile devices are very different in terms of it’s not a mouse and a keyboard theres lots of different interfaces and i’m guessing thats problematic as well.

Brian: certainly, i mean navigating either between tab, the opera browser will do it one way where the down button will scroll through the page through the links, where the iphone everything is done with your fingers. So yeh its going to be different interfaces means different ways of doing things. Some flyout menus when you do on hover just don’t work on some devices. And i guess that comes back to basic web 101 accessibility and progressive enhancement. You know, make sure it works without javascript, without a mouse, just a keyboard and then start layering the information on top of that.

Paul: does that mean that there is going to need to be a lot of device sniffing to identify your on an iphone there for you have a touch interface, your using an older mobile device there for your using a keyboard or whatever else. Or is there another way of doing that?

Brian: unfortunately yeh, browser sniffing is one of those things that everyone says you shouldn’t do and it technically usually its done in a bad way i mean we all experience browser sniffing when we go to out banking website and the website says “sorry you must have firefox2 or higher” and you know you’ve got version 3, you scratch your head and figure they can’t do the math. Its usually because they browser sniff and then restrict what you can do. Where you should do it the other way around and say heres a working website, we are going to try and determine what browser you have and then layer extra functionality on top of it. And again this is one of those things you can skim the surface or you can spend working on it and tweaking your site, and its going to really depend on your audience. So with someone like the bbc who might have loads and loads of resources might want to go through and wrap loads of if statements around all different parts of their website. But then it becomes a trade of between maintenance and usability vs how much of a good experience your customers get.

Paul: I mean you eluded earlier to this issue of context, the environment and surroundings that people are in and i heard Cameron mold* SP speak on a similar subject. I’m just interested in your take on that an you know what kind of elements come into it. I know we’ve talked about user interface but what other element of context are important to consider.

Brian: can you give an example?

Paul: well, the one that springs to mind i guess is environment. You talked about being at the bus stop is an issue, there are other things like that.

Brian: sure, Google a few years aog did some really deep research into all of their properties Gmail, docs and everything like that and they realised that their mobile user base fell into 1 of 3 categories. There was a sort of “bored now” – people saying ok i’m waiting for coffee, i’m waiting for a friend i’ve got 10 minutes to kill I want to go do something, just to keep me occupied. And youtube does a good job of this, they say “we know you just want to waste some time so heres the top 10 most interesting videos”. So its not so much browsing and searching its just keep me occupied. Another category is the “urgent now” – so theres been an accident outside or the powers been cut. Thats good example of because if your power is cut your internet connection and regular computer might also be down, but you want the phone number of the electric company to report the outage or see how long this is going to take, maybe the only way to do this is through the mobile interface. This si one of thing you want to bubble up, if your the clientele your expecting this kind of information your wanting to bubble this information upto the top. We did some work for some airlines and we realised this is one of the categories “have i missed my flight” don’t burry this information 5 levels deep. The last category is “repetitive now” people who want to check their stock, the weather and they are done. They’re not here to browse necessarily or spend 30 minutes looking at the website, they are looking for one key piece of information and they are done. So depending that your customer base is these will kind of lead or guide your design decisions and usability and how you layout your website.

Paul: thats really interesting in terms of the different kind of content that you bubble up depending on the kind of device your on and the situation your in. I mean i guess that leads on to a more question in that there are a lot of website owners that are listening to the show, you said at the beginning that people need to be thinking about the mobile web, how do you go about deciding whether your content and what you provide as a website owner is relevant for a mobile device or ifits not. And then what out of your content is worth taking across to the mobile site, and whats not relevant.

Brian: sure, you can probably ask that same question of a regular website. The guy on the corner who is a corner, does he need a website and does he even need a mobile website. Maybe he needs a mobile website more than he needs a real website. Again its so easy to get started in the mobile area because you don’t need to learn anything new, you can do it with all the existing html and web standards now that you already have. Its just a matter a repurposing it or thinking in the context of a mobile device. A lot of that is just realising screen width, bandwidth information you can cram on a page, there is a few things to learn, but its not that difficult to get you feet wet and i would argue that its best to get started on the cheap and easy and see if it works. Try early and fail fast. From there you will kind of learn what your customers want, one of the things we kind of keep in mind is we don’t like the term mobile website so what we’ve tried to come up with a new term. We tried to think of sugar free or fat free. So we kind of framed the situation as the traditional desktop website we call that either full flavour or full fat, and then what people call the mobile web we call the sugar free or fat free. People understand fat free and full fat, everyone understands those concepts. So because its about the situation we might say ok im at my desk and im getting a million phone calls about x y z. sometimes its easier for me to look at the mobile website on the desktop computer because there is no ads and there no company history or anything. It’s just the raw information i need. So if you start think about it in the terms of fat free of full fat its other side consequence is if you are developing a mobile site and you boss may say we need this this and this. Your like ok its mobile site we can just add another navigation item, but if you start talking about things in terms of fat free when your boss comes to you and says we need this, you can say well is you site still fat free if we are adding more and more navigation links? And its a way to argue against feature creep.
P. yeh, that sounds very sensible. You said something very interesting there, you said its very easy to get started on the mobile web. And i can’t remember where i heard this, it may have been from you but someone once said something like as web designers you get really annoyed when a print agency turns around and says we can do the web as well. And yet web designer oh yeh we can deliver the mobile web. So i’m just interested in your perspective as to whether web designer should even be trying to do this kind of development or whether its really down to a new breed of mobile web specialists because there are different element involved in it. So is its something web designers should be doing and should websites owners be looking to them to do it, or should they be looking elsewhere?

Brian: thats very good question. I like the analogy of print design, because there will be loads of people who’ve bought a computer and get on indesign and all of a sudden think they are a print house. I think form a technical point of view there is nothing greatly different between a mobile and normal website. Its the same html, same knowledge, same standards and code. The bigger difference is the usability and the way people use the device, how you lay it out. You can probably make the same argument between web designers doing websites, like business card websites and web apps. There is still a lot of design element and design ideologies that transfer between both of them. Maybe in another year or two there will be a bigger niche for someone who specialises in mobile websites and usability. It’s one of these things people are hammering on the door mobile is the next best thing, for 5 or 6 years now and it’s always next year. Maybe it will be the same with specialist, but maybe again it’s a chicken and the egg and we need specialists before we get mobile websites. It’s a good question i don’t know.

Paul: ok, fairenough. I mean you talk there about technically its relatively straight forward to get going maybe you could kind of give us some ideas of where to start. There are web designers here that want to kind of explore it from a technical point of view, what are the common mistakes and what do they need to be aware of?

Brian: erm, well there’s a few of them i guess. Depending on the audience, that’s the first slice you need to taste. Who am i developing the site for? Sometimes it maybe internal to a company and sometimes it maybe very high profile and you realise most these people aren’t going to have iphone they will have blackberry or something similar. You need to figure out what your audience will mostly be using. This is just base line. The bbc would have a different set of rules, but this will get you started. Find out what their device is and what they are capable of. Most of the newer devices have a decent web browser, maybe running webkit or some other new browser that can handle html and xhtml. And then you can code up your sites like you do normally. Some older browsers and phones don’t necessarily handle all the css or everything in the same way, and then people argue its like coding for the web cerc 1999. You need to get back to tables etc it’s not pretty. Again it’s all down to how far and how deep you want to go. For things to get start there lots of good resources out there i know dev.opera put a few article up about introducing / getting into the mobile web. Theres lots of stuff on the web as you said Cameron mold *sp. I could send you some links for the show notes.

Paul: yeh that would be really useful people are always keen to take these in and move on with them.

Brian: i think it’s also a bit of stigma that everyone kind of assumes its quite difficult because they here these buzz words like 3G and WAP when in reality a lot of it has past now because the phones of today are capable of rendering html. I think people are just a little gun nshy of where to get started. I think it’s not as mystic of an area as people assume.

Paul: ok so, presuming then that the technology side isn’t too bad, let’s talk about the design side, the layout and the usability that kind of thing. Which is a different environment that we have been used to designing desktop applications. Tell us about some of the common issues and mistakes.

Brian: certainly, the biggest one is probably realising the vast variety of phones and browsers outhere. The physical device itself varies in just screen width and colours and what each is capable of. Where on a desktop it’s probably ranges from 800 to 1600 pixels and we have all these grid designs. Really in the mobile world it breaks down to screen from anywhere such as 88px to 120px all the way to the iphone at 480 in landscape. So how do you design for this, most of the time it ends up being a stack, where you stack them on top of each other, much like the iphone navigation. That at the moment seems to be what is falling into place. It’s probably like the rules of the web in 1999 when you have navigation in your left and then header and body area. As things develop trend and design of how things will flow evolve as well. Design wise things like the iphone handle lots of css just fine, some phones don’t. This kind of forces you to all the little tips and tricks with css where you put in h1 then indent text with negative marging and replace with background image. But it doesn’t always work when you get to mobile, maybe it won’t show background images. Maybe the blackberry doesn’t display images at all due to bandwidth. So there are always little catches here and there, it’s just a matter of testing, its going to come into alot of time on device. People assume testing, you’ve got to buy an iphone.

Paul: I was about to ask that.

Brian: the simplest way is you probably look around the office, maybe now everyone has an iphone. You code it up, you go around everyone and look at everyones phone. You go around and spot any issues. There a few other companies out there who you can buy time. I think device anywhere who will rent time on their server farm, you load a little java app…basically a webcam and you can see the phone in front of you. And you can say no i want to try on this and this phone. It allows you to get a quick grasp of what’s going on. Again nothing is ever going to be pixel perfect but once you realise, ok background images don’t work you have to do it this way. You get into a rhythm after one or two go around of what does and doesn’t work. if your a freelancder or do it for your company, you build up a nice little template and test suite so you know what works and doesn’t. So next time you pull out your template and your pretty much there already.

Paul: you mentioned there about what everybody in the office is going to have an iphone. I’m picking up a kind of trend that everybody within the web design community are excited about the iphone or love the iphone. It’s got a very capable browser that can do a lot and they know there is a good audience there and they are just going building application or websites that are optimise for the iphone. Do you think it’s a mistake, should we be looking to produce web content for a broader range of devices or is it ok just to target one or 2 deivces.

Brian: i would personally say that it’s a bad idea because I’m more of the thought that it should build a baseline set that works everywhere and build on it. That being said google said that 505 or more of its traffic is coming from the iphone so it’s a massive player in the audience that you can’t ignore. If those are your customers and your trying to sell something and you want to give them the best experience possible you may have to spend a bit more time and optimise for the iphone. Again whoever is the main one in the market, the iphone at the moment, the competition is going to build to that spec. So if you optimise for what’s in the lead and the other ones will come along to meet it. Again it’s not a great philosophy, again you at the click here for IE click here for netscape type thing. Best viewed in iphone browser. Which i prefer to avoid but it seems not be the way its going right now.

Paul: i guess you also need to take into account how people are using those phones. For example we know there are phones out there that are more popular than the iphone but iphone users are the ones accessing the web so it’s the number of people using the web using the device rather than number of handsets out there i guess.

Brian: yeh, the most famous kind of quote number against it are nokia 1100 phone little candybar phone, for everyone 1 iphone out there, there are 14 of these nokia phones, but they are the old green screen doing sms and that’s about it. Like you said the iphone isn’t a high percentage of the phones out there but it is a high percentage of those who are using the web.

Paul: its ultimately ROI that if you’ve got limited budget for this your better of concentrating on the device which the users are actually using the web. I guess to some degree that you also know iphone users are relevantly affluent if you’re selling something. If its an ecommerce site then that’s worse considering too i guess.

Brian: very true, very true.

Paul: so just to kind of wrap up here, where should people start where should they go from here. They’ve herad this interview, maybe they are a website owner or designer what should those 2 audiences next step be in investigating the mobile web be?

Brian: from a technical point of the easiest thing to is to make a few mock ups, that’s probably low cost to just get your feet wet. Test it on a phone or two and then show it to a boss or the rest of the team and say hi look, this took me an afternoon, i’ve learnt something new look how great it is. From that you don’t need to make it public, some of the sites we have done in the past have stayed within the company for 6 months maybe a year, sometimes even never launched. Just to kind of get internally the feel of is this we want is this what we want the public face to be. Can we actually release because this it has less features. So t’s not a huge commitment you don’t have to announce it to the world, i guess that’s one view of developer. From a design perspective i guess it’s just how and the usability works, what you can and can’t do. A lot of css doesn’t work, understanding that will give you a leg up when you want to develop a real website. If you developing a traditional website you may use x hours in photoshop and x to cut it up, if you quote the same thing for a mobile website you will probably be well of, a lot of going back and forth. So learning some of this early on is probably going to help you alter on when you want to pick up and quote on a job or you want tp pitch something. Your going to be more realistic and it will certainly take more hours. Some skills will transfer but it will be a bit of learning curve.

Paul: ok thats really great thanks for coming on the show and we will include those links if you send them over. Thanks very much for your time.

Thanks goes to Andy Kinsey for transcribing this interview.

Listeners feedback:

We have been collecting some subject suggestions via Skribit. Some of the suggestions do not justify an entire blog post so we thought we would respond to a couple here.

If you want to submit an idea, use the Skribit widget in the right hand column of this blog.

Responding to email enquiries

When we receive an email asking for a quote how do we follow it up?

Well, the honest answer is… it depends! People get in touch in a number of ways and with varying levels of detail in their enquiry emails. Blunt honesty is usually the best policy so I will say that the first thing I am trying to gauge on any enquiry is whether or not we are a good fit financially with the prospective client and whether or not we can deliver whatever ‘it’ is within the requested timescales.

I have talked about this in the past so won’t dwell on it too long but, I have been bitten too many times not to consider it important. Only a few months back I spent nearly a week putting together a proposal for a prospective client that was dismissed out of hand because it was too expensive. What an utter waste of my time and, please note, a fairly large waste of this particular client’s time too. It takes a fair amount of time to wade through a hundred page document and, if they had provided budget information I would probably have passed thereby leaving the way for another agency who may well have been their first choice. Grrrr…..

Calm… calm…

So, before getting into any serious detail about a project I will ask people about their budget. If they don’t know then I will talk about the kind of prices associated with a particular type of project. If the figures seem to fit reasonably with expectations then I will ask about delivery deadlines (and why they exist). Often deadlines exist because people think they should have one but equally there may be a flagship conference or similar that the ’site’ must be completed by.If we can reach a rough agreement on budget and timescales then the next thing is usually for us to put together some kind of quote or create a proposal.

For pretty much any job I will ask the client for a brief describing the work. In fact, most enquiries have some sort of brief attached to them (for those who don’t I often direct people to a questionnaire on the Headscape site that asks for the kind of information we need to put together a proposal). But often, briefs are extremely well written and can therefore easily be interpreted into a project. Often they’re not and require a lot of discussion to get to the bottom of what a client is looking for. Usually this will be done via the phone and email but often for larger more complex projects we will want to meet face-to-face prior to creating a proposal. Geography can be a big factor on whether that happens though!

All in all, it’s a balancing act. I have to carefully judge whether something coming is a good fit with us. This usually means being quite direct with a potential client (I’ve learned that beating around the bush doesn’t work!) but, of course, I really don’t want to upset anyone or give an arrogant or aloof impression which is possible if you’re trying to tell someone that they can’t afford you!!

It’s so hard being me. Please send more jokes to cheer me up.

Boagworld

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