Interactive Web Technology

Traditional SEO is dead with intelligent search results

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 18:26:00 +0000

Just saw this video interview on YouTube with Bruce Clay. With the growth of smart and targeted search results based on user behavior and site history keywords and rankings will be a thing of the past. Google, Microsoft and Yahoo have already begun to introducing smart search results technology with localized search, but results based on your behavior will change everything. In fact Bruce use's the term "ranking is dead". This will have a huge effect of the SEO industry and the role of web marketers in site optimization. Essentially the rule book we need to be rewritten. Check it out:

Quotes to live by when building any web application

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 11:38:00 +0000

I've talked before about the importance of a vision or guiding principles to any major web initiative. Adding to that here is a Dilbert comic and some some great quotes by:

"Good Design at Apple comes from saying No to 1,000 things to make sure we don’t get on the wrong track or try to do too much"
Steve Jobs, CEO, Apple

"Simple things should be simple, and complex things should be possible"
Alan Kay, Disney Fellow and VP of R&D, The Walt Disney
Company

"Great Design, It's that ineffable quality that certain incredibly successful products have that makes people fall in love with them despite their flaws."
Joel Spolsky, Great Design

"Launch early and often, but not too early (the first time)"
Carl Sjogreen, Product Manager, Google

I hope you find these useful on your next web project! :)

BBC goes iGoogle.. Personalized homepages become main stream!

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 02:52:00 +0000

With the modern wonders of RSS I’ve been syndicating the BBC's news feed and not actually visiting their site. The other day I logged on and noticed and significant overhaul. BBC's homepage now offers a completely customized experience. The page real estate is made up of customizable gadgets with feeds of tops news headlines and other information (weather etc) much like iGoogle or My MSN.

This approach now brings gadgets and personalization into the mainstream with the various types of users and different demographics that visit the BBC site everyday. It is a truly remarkable design, and one I encourage you to check out.

Picture of the day

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 01:54:00 +0000

Wow, Comcast buys Plaxo

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Tue, 20 May 2008 02:19:00 +0000

Just recieved and email from Plaxo. Apparently they've been acquired by Comcast. Check out the press release here.

Before Business Requirments you need a Vision statement

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Mon, 19 May 2008 11:30:00 +0000

This past week I sat down with a co-worker who took over an hour to describe a feature of an application we are building. After the download I was really impressed, this feature was the "killer app" and a high priority item in a product we were building. But I realized something was missing. We needed a way to distill his 40+ page document (filled with loose business requirements and wish list items) and his required 1 hour explanation to something more easily digested. What was missing was the Vision! I've talked about this process in the past and used the term "Definition statement". I was first turned onto this approach at Apple Tech Talk conference that discussed building applications for the iPhone.

The process was at times frustrating but it really forces you to step back and think about what you want to build, which features are important and where you need to make compromises. Our end game was to develop a one page definition or elevator speech that described our feature to the project team. The vision would guide development of this feature and serve as a mission statement or something to hold ourselves accountable to. Interestingly I just finished reading a blog around user experience, which referenced this approach was employed by the team developing Google Calendar (see screenshot above). Creating a Vision statement can be painful, but overall it is a really rewarding process that helps to get everyone on the same page.

BrightKite: New location based Social Networking site

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Tue, 13 May 2008 13:34:00 +0000

This morning I was checking my iGoogle and came across the following blog post that reviews a new social networking application called BrightKite. What separates Brightkite from many other social networking apps is that every activity and or event is based around your location which is really cool idea. After watching a video review it also seems to integrate with Google Maps so events and activities are visually plotted out using Google’s Maps API. Sites with this kind of intelligence are definitely the future. And fit into the roadmap of what the semantic web is all about; an internet that offers targeted content centered around what the user wants versus the one size fits all mentality. I've signed up to try the app and look forward to sharing some insights.

The mobile web.... slow adoption

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 01 May 2008 18:28:00 +0000

This week I finally entered the Smartphone world with a Blackberry curve. It seems everywhere I look these days people are using Smartphone’s. Whether iPhone or Blackberry I notice a large amount of people's heads buried in these devices at meetings, lunch, out to dinner, cafes or even bars. So I was quite amazed to see the slow adoption of the "mobile web" has been in a recent emarketer article on mobile media advertising.

I can attest that despite liking the access to email and calendaring on my Blackberry the web experience, which is a combination of WML and basic HTML for me was fairly disappointing in this day and age. So I am probably another contributor to the statistic of someone who has a smartphone but isn’t embracing the “mobile web” just yet.

Web evolution

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 17:20:00 +0000

Check out my latest post over at the Hanson Dodge blog titled "Semantic Web – what is it, and how did we get here?". I give a brief history of web evolution from 1.0 to 2.0 and delve into the next evolution into the semantic web. A term being used to describe the next generation of the web as it becomes smarter. Enjoy!

Walmart down for "maintenance"?

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 01:26:00 +0000

Wow this is the second time in just over a week I’ve stumbled across a big name dot com that is down for "maintenance". Having worked in this field for a while I’ve used “maintenance” pages like this on sites big and small as a more graceful application error page or during an upgrade or deployment.

I’ve always thought that when you’re a multibillion dollar retailer like Wallmart or a big name social networking site like LinkedIn it puts you in a different league where you have uber redundancy and 99.9% uptime. Seeing unexpected maintenance pages like this especially on Wallmart (a site that generates a lot of revenue from ecommerce) validates that my above mentioned approach is still used for websites of all shapes and sizes!

Great new book on social media for corporations

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:35:00 +0000

Last week I attended a webinar title "Join the Groundswell in Enterprise Social Software" hosted by Lithium and authors of a new Forrester book titled "Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies ".

It focused on successful examples of using social media to enhance a company’s dialog with its customers online. The reoccurring theme was that people are already talking about your brand online whether it is on blogs, discussion boards or portals. And the recommendation was to embrace this medium and participate in the discussion versus becoming a spectator. Ultimately doing this will give you a deeper understand of your customers and help to retain and recruit new brand advocates.

There was some great advice for things to consider before adding a community and social networking feature to your site. If you’re currently wrangling with community and social media ideas and want somewhere to start I would suggest doing what I did and ordering the book.

LinkedIn down... even the pros have problems

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 17:27:00 +0000

I went to log in to LinkedIn today on my lunch break today and I was confronted with an error message "LinkedIn Will Be Back Soon". Its reminder that even the pro's with lots of money and uber server architecture experience occassional technical issues with their web applications too!

Useful Web 2.0 directorys

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 21:08:00 +0000

It seems like every other day there is a new cool web 2.0 application startup. I've got to be honest even for an enthusiast like myself it’s hard to keep up to date.

Below some sites and useful directorys I use to keep up to date with the latest and greatest web 2.0 sites:

Go2Web20.net - The complete Web 2.0 directory:
http://www.go2web20.net/
Webware Cool Web 2.0 apps for everyone:
http://www.webware.com/
And lastly my old faithful, Techcrunch:
http://www.techcrunch.com/

I hope you find them useful.

You've bought a web application, now maintain and enhance it!

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 13:53:00 +0000

Maintenance and updates of web sites never really seemed to be a big problem in days gone by. Once in a while you would add a new press release, update the company page or tweak something here or there. However with the shift from web sites (static) to web applications (dynamic + data driven) and the move from web 1.0 functionality (1 way communication) to web 2.0 (bi-directional communication) the modern web application requires much more attention.

A Web application with Web 2.0 functioanlity can do much more for your business than its Web 1.0 cousin:

It will connect you with new and existing customers
Sell your product
Reduce your support costs
Increase your brands awareness
Build community

However with all these new features it is unrealistic to think you can buy a Ferrari without maintaining it! The amount of upkeep is often challenging to communicate and sell to clients. Most of them are used to spending a portion of their marketing budget on the build with a few yearly updates and not a lot of additional promotion of their site. Therefore it is our job to educate then what has changed in the last 2-3 years since their last website redesign.

Modern sites and the content on them can be driven by any number systems including:

Content management (CMS)
Ecommerce
Community and social media
User generated content
Rich media engine
Analytics

Add to that traffic building and emarketing programs and frequent updates are a reality of doing business online. Investing in a dynamic sites means a commitment of time and cost to keep your web application up to date. Not only by adding fresh content, but by adding new features and refining your application to give users a reason to return.

As the web evolves and new features come along you should constantly be thinking about how to leverage them to improve and enhance the user experience, adding engaging content and providing tools that encourage interaction. Critical Mass have coined the term "Always in Beta" and developed a concept around that theme. And I think this idea of Beta pretty much sums up my feelings on the modern web application. It will never be done, and nor should it be. Make sure that you allocate budget and earmark time for adding to and embrace the rewards of going Web 2.0!

Web 2.0... another bubble?

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 14:00:00 +0000

I found the folllowing video title "Here Comes Another Bubble v1.1 - The Richter Scales” which chronicles the rise and fall of some prominent Web 2.0 companies among other things. And it sparked my interest and got me thinking, are we headed for a dark place in 08?

The web is a fast moving place where one thing is guaranteed .... change! What was the status quo in 2007 won't be in 2008. Techcrunch has an article that discusses a possible Web 2.0 crash in 2008.

Companies will come and go. But one thing is certain, last time the web crashed in the dotcom era it seemed your website was an optional expense, something that could be cut from the budget. Now things have shifted, a companys website is mission critical, so to are the services offered by many websites! The web is the first place people most people go to find things. So your website is as important if not more than your bricks and mortar establishment, especially when its got an ecommerce component attached :)

So without further ado heres the video, see you in 2008.

The Web comes to the Wii

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 17:26:00 +0000

Due to the depressing winter weather conditions here is Wisconsin I decided it was time to relax on the couch and play with my new toy, my much loved Nintendo Wii. To be honest i've been out of gaming for quite some time, the Wii got me excited about gaming again. Up until now the Wii has had wireless internet connectivity through Wifi that really hasn't been leveraged. Updating the system and downloading the weather were all it could really accomplish.

Today I check out the Wii shopping channel and noticed you can now get Opera browser for the Wii! Being a web enthusiast I downloaded it right away and i've got to admit its quite impressive.

Opera is added under the "Internet Channel" from the Wii menu. Browsing with the Wii remote is simple and easy, and use the Wii controller directional arrows, A for selecting, B for back and zoom in (+) and zoom out (-). Your menu is simple:

Enter WWW address

Back / Forward

Search: Via Google or Yahoo

Reload page

Forward link via email

Unfortunately Opera on the Wii does not support browser plug-ins or downloads, however it does support Flash 7 . So it is much like the light weight Safari browser that ships with the Iphone. Regardless this is a really solid release for the Wii which can only help Nintendo boost the Wii's popularity. Just like the Iphone, with 10 million Wii consoles out there its another platform developers need to consider when building websites.

Update on the Target and accessibility on Techcrunch

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Mon, 29 Oct 2007 16:26:00 +0000

At the beginning of the month I weighed in on my feelings on the Target accessibility class action law suit. Now it seems others are doing the same in a heated way on comments in Techcrunch blog on the subject. This debate definitely is gathering momentum, ultimately I think the days of building websites that are inaccessible are over.

Amazon secures patent for SEO friendly URL's... What?

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 11:41:00 +0000

Wow this truly floored me. The US Patent Office (USPTO) has granted a patent for placing a "search string at the end of a URL without any special formatting.". See the diagram left that helped them seal the deal with the USPTO.

A popular technique known as URL aliasing and URL rewriting evolved which allowed developers to move away from non friendly URL's like this:

http://www.domain.com/index.aspx?id=63304&mode=wide

To friendly URL's like this:

http://www.domain.com/vacation packages wisconsin

URL Aliasing been around for many years, and was popularized by Google's search engine. Using this URL format is beneficial in two ways, it's ultra search engine friendly give the pages ranking a boost, and its more user friendly.

On doing some research on this the subject the USPTO is meant to granted patents for something that aren't obvious. Also unless you can prove you were using this technology prior to Amazon filing this patent in 2004 you could be in trouble. This is pure madness! It would seem that this technique utilized by hundreds of millions of data driven websites and blogs are now in breach of Amazon's patent?

Accessibility, Standards and Targets class action lawsuit

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 22:16:00 +0000

The other night I was talking at length to my brother in law Steve about his field of engineering and its various certifications and standards and comparing it to my field of web development. This isn't the first time i've thought about this issue, In a previous blog of mine I went hunting for professional organizations for web development.... there weren't many.

He argued that "no one is going to die if a website doesn't work in Firefox, however in my field if a wall collapses and kills someone we got a problem. Thus we have standards, rules and regulations to make sure that doesn't happen". I agree that no one is going to die if a website doesn't render right but as more mission critical services move online web standards become more important.

Steve is a member of an independent professional organization for engineers known as Ashrae which develops standards among other things for the field of engineering. In the web world we have the W3C which is independent and then corporations like Adobe, Google and Microsoft who play a part in helping to innovate and drive web standards. However nothing is really enforced unless your designing for government who demand section 508 compliance.

He said that engineering has been around for thousands of years, and web development is a new field of expertise and standards and enforcement of those will take time. So it was funny today when stumbled across two separate articles:

http://ajaxian.com/archives/two-rulings-that-could-improve-web-accessibility

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071003-lawsuit-over-website-accessibility-for-the-blind-becomes-class-action.html

Both talk about Targets class action lawsuit for not being 100% accessible to the blind? I shouldn't need to state it, but I will for clarification, Target is a corporation not a government body so no standards apply right? I guess not!

My point to my brother in law is that as more services move online, whether its shopping, banking, bill payment or yellow pages there need to be standards enforced to ensure everyone, young and old, 56k or broadband, iphone or pc can access your site. The lawsuit against Target could prove to be a big factor in enforcement of standards online..... Time will tell but this will be an interesting case to watch!

The website development process told by Lego :)

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 11:10:00 +0000

This article is both informational, and humorous! :)

http://www.pingmag.jp/2005/12/09/the-website-development-process/

Create collection of articles on "Planning, Managing Web Sites and Web Site Projects"

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 18:28:00 +0000

Today I was looking for some example document for a web content plan. I have a structured approach i've used for years, but I always want to keep abreast of things and see what others in the industry are doing. I didn't really find anything concrete howevers on my Google hunt I stumbled across the following page that had a great collection of articles on "Planning, Managing Web Sites and Web Site Projects". Definately worth a look if you need help.

Agile isn't an excuse for sloppy project management or development

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 13:00:00 +0000

Those who have read 37Signals book: "Getting Real" should be well versed in what Agile Development is all about. Basically the theory you can do more with less is the easiest description I have of what Agile Development boils down to. I am warming up to the idea of a development process that is less linear, and more pliable to the demands of a fast paced on demand "Web 2.0" world.

That being said in a recent Dr Dobb's newsletter I read this article on the disciplines of development using Agile methodology.

Google to take on Facebook by more open API

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 15:46:00 +0000

It was only a matter of time before one of the top three: Google, Yahoo or MSN did something with respect to Facebook.

Google is apparently working on opening up its API's for existing services even more than Facebook. See this article for more detail.

Ditch your news section or press room and build a blog!

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 11:09:00 +0000

It still amazes me to see sites launching with a news or press room. This seems like one of the legacy web 1.0 items thats still makes its way into most corporate domains.

Granted if you are a fortune 500 company perhaps you still need your official new release section. However for most small to mid size companys this seems like serious overkill. The "one to many" broadcast approach is clearly over with the rise of social media, web 2.0 and functionality that allows for your users to engage in a conversation with you!

Some blog facts:

Blogs are hip
Authentic
Let you engage with your user = two way conversation!
Let your users identify with a personality along with your news
Build Community: They create repeat visits (stickyness) by users
Content can be syndicated via RSS and email subscriptions
Build Traffic: Ultra SEO friendly helping to get you found
They create conversation on other blogs = Online PR +Seeding!
Cross Sell: Generally they create a lot of referrals back to your corporate site

Recent validation of Linkedin - networking 2.0

noreply@blogger.com (James Davidson) — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 17:27:00 +0000

I recently had a situation in my day job where more work than we could handle. I needed a qualified group of five internet developers with varied skill sets such as: XHTML/CSS, Flash, .NET, PHP and we needed them quickly.

Formally we would try two things:

Mine existing freelance resources
Go to a local staffing firm that specializes in interactive to find the desired candidate(s)

We tried option one, and everyone we knew was committed. Option two takes time and we were under the gun with tight deadlines.

So what do you where you in a bind and need to recruit in a vacuum? Networking 2.0 utilizing your social networks!

Within a few hours of identifying the need I hit my LinkedIn network. By the end of the day I had answers and people lined up to do the work. It was instant validation to me of the power of social networking tools like LinkedIn, and putting my network that i'd built overtime to work for me.