While we have used everything from blank paper to grid paper at my design firm, I always felt there had to be a better way to do it. Something just didn't feel right, especially when it came to understanding how your concept was going to look in a browser window or on a monitor.

Our Concept, The Web Design Sketchbook

So at 3.7 DESIGNS we spent some time coming up with an affordable, flexible and easy to use sketchbook specifically for web designers. After using it for months to perfect it we found that not only did it help us brainstorm ideas for design layouts and concepts, but it also doubles as a great way to generate storyboards and plan workflows.

The book is equipped four five different types of pages ranging from thumbnails, mid-sized browser windows, detailed windows to note taking pages. We incorporated all of the details we found ourselves wanting as we planned and worked on several projects including:

• An area to rate each concept
• A description and date for each project
• Plenty of areas to take notes and write down ideas

Free Giveaway

To get feedback on the product (as we certainly will be evolving it over time) we are excited to be giving away 5 initial copies. To enter for the give away simply leave a comment letting us know one of the following:

• Your thoughts of the product (conceptually)
• How you usually go about designing your sites (paper, photoshop, etc...)
• Any suggestion or ideas

We will randomly select five people to get a free copy two weeks from today (December 3rd). Best of luck and you can learn more or order the product here.

Because we are forced to use a select few typefaces we are limited in not only our creativity, but also in how we can best represent a brand that dares select a corporate font that falls outside of the 15 - 20 "safe" fonts to use on their website.

Now don't get me wrong, there are some work around methods out there. Hell some of them are even pretty good, but none of them are great. They almost all rely on some form of javascript or server side processing and it never works as well as actual web text.

Then there was @font-face

For a long time this has looked like the best solution to our typographic toils. Now we can embed fonts into our websites and if users don't have them it simply gets downloaded to their computer, brilliant! What a huge advance in web technology! It may shock you that it has been supported by IE of all browsers since version 5.5. Yes, yes, we have actually been waiting for so called "modern" browsers to adopt the technology before we got to the point we could use it.

Poking fun at browsers aside we can now use @font-face safely and expect that a majority of our users will be able to experience the new fonts. Only there is another problem, a problem that actually was a part of @font-face's solution.

Downloading fonts onto a users computer that doesn't hasn't purchased the rights to them? Whoops, that is a copyright violation.

So we can't use commercial fonts?

A nice selection of fonts to chose from

As it stands we can't use commercial fonts and typefaces using this method. There is no license that I am aware of that allows you to freely distribute a font after purchase. So we are limited to using freely distributed fonts. As desperate as this situation may sound it is actually OK because there are some pretty good free typefaces ones out there (thank you dedicated type designers, I love your work).

What actually becomes the challenge is finding these quality typefaces. Beyond finding them there is some effort in converting the typefaces for IE, hosting them and integrating them into your CSS.

How TypeKit Solves These Problems

Typekit aims to free us of the restrictive "web safe fonts" as well as make the process easy and effortless. Sure there are some sites out there that list @font-face safe fonts but typekit takes it not just one step further, but four. How do they make it four steps further you ask?

• With a large selection of fonts (approximately 75 for the trial account) and an easy way to sort and narrow down the available fonts finding one you need take minutes
• Rather than downloading the font, converting it and hosting it TypeKit keeps all of the fonts on their servers saving time, effort and bandwidth
• Rather than dealing with @font-face CSS files you simply include a javascript file and add which selectors you want to have the fonts embeded
• Font not quite the best fit? Rebranding? Redesigning? You can change the font used on a dime

Easy to integrate into your website

Price points

The trial account is just that, a trial. You can use two fonts on a single website and don't have access to the full library. However the upgraded accounts are really quite inexpensive ranging from $24 - $250 per year ($20 a month isn't so bad). With upgrades you get to use the kit on additional websites and have access to a larger font library.

My only complaint would be that there is no "unlimited" option. For those of us who run agencies it is conceivable that over time we would need to use the service on more than 40 sites and purchasing multiple accounts could get messy.

The product is a solid concept and is well executed. The extra effort to make it more than a repository of free licensed fonts goes a long way.

What are Your Thoughts?

Let us know if you think the service is something you would use and pay for, or what you would improve about it.

In this case we are going to use the text-shadow property that is currently supported by Firefox, Opera and Safari to create the appearance of inset text. Inset text being text that has been pushed into the background, almost like a reverse embossed effect.

The Effect We Are Going To Create

If you look at this image and text treatment you will see what we are trying to achieve. Through color and slight shading it creates the appearance that the text has been pushed inward into the background. Previously we would have had to create this effect in an image, however now we can do it simply by using the text-shadow property (despite its primary use being designed for creating a relief effect).

Step 1. Primary Text Color

The first step is to make the text we are working with a darker shade of the the background that it will be sitting on. This will make it look further away to users and shadowed from the light, how dark it should be will depend on the colors you are using. I recommend mocking up your text in photoshop to get the right shade and tone.

Step 2. Ridge Color

To really get the inset 3D effect we need to have a thin line of shading around our text to create the illusion of a ridge. By having it below the text where it normally will be a shadow, it will create the illusion of depth. The color should be lighter shade of the background, but not too much lighter. This is another situation where picking the right color is critical, if it is too light it looks strange and if it is too dark you won't be able to see it. You may want to use photoshop to try mockup up the text in order to pick the right color.

Step 3. The Code

     .inset-text {
          font-size: 32px;
          color: #344251;
          text-shadow: 1px 1px 0px #bad3ed;
          font-weight: bold;
     }

The code is very simple, we are just using the text-shadow property to put a 1 pixel line on the text 1 pixel below it, and 1 pixel to the right.

The Result

Here is an example of the result. If a user doesn't have a browser that supports the text-shadow property they still see and can read the text with no issues!

Here Is Some Inset Text

If we are to look at the percentage of people who potentially have one accessibility need or more, you can get a pretty clear picture that not only is it a good idea for the betterment of the web -- but also it makes good business sense.

The Rundown:

The following is the percentage of web users I have found with a specific accessibility need (please note that these statistics are gathered from reports specifically in America - however I would expect similar results in other major areas of the world).

• Users with visual, motor, cognitive or hearing disabilities - 10%
• Users with an outdated browser (pre IE6) - 1%
• Users who have javascript disabled - 5%
• Users running on a low resolution (800 x 600 or lower) - 4%
• Users on dial-up or a slow internet connection - 10%

This means that up to 30% of users surfing the web can be effected by accessibility issues on a website (there could be overlap in some of the different categories, so I say up to). This is a strikingly high number of users that could be effected and should be reason to wake up and smell the coffee. You wouldn't turn 3 out of every 10 people away from your store front, why are you turning them away from your website?

How to Test

Testing your site for accessibility usually requires a handful of methods and techniques. The best method of course is doing actual testing with users who have accessibility needs. However if you are not able to do so there are plenty of ways to test your site by yourself.

Turn Elements Off

One of the easiest and best ways to start testing your site for accessibility is simply to start browsing under different situations.

• Browse in all text
• Turn off images
• Turn off javascript
• Shrink your web browser

This can easily be done with tools such as the web developers toolbar.

Try Using a Screen Reader

There are a handful of ways to test your site using a screen reader with out spending large sums of cash.

• JAWS free trial
• FireVox Firefox screen reader plugin

Test Internet Speeds

Using a tool like Internet Speed Simulator you can actually limit your bandwidth to see how your site will perform under dial up or slow speed connection situations.

Accessibility Effects More People Than You Think

Ultimately you need to remember that accessibility effects a lot more people than you may think. It is way to easy to dismiss accessibility because you don't see your users having accessibility needs, however that simply is not the case. There are plenty of more common accessibility concerns that you may not have in mind that could be keeping users from accessing your site.

One of the great perks regarding this technique is that in the event that a user doesn't have a browser that supports the CSS that we will be using, they will still see a nice beveled button - it simply won't look quite as nice.

What We are Going To Do

To create a nice button we have a few major components:

• A nice background gradient
• Rounder corners
• Some nice borders to give it a 3D effect
• A drop shadow
• A text shadow (for a nice touch)

In the end we will have a button that looks just like this, only with out using any images behind a few pixel background gradient (and when CSS gradients are supported we can even remove that!).

The HTML

<p><a href="#">Example Button</a></p>
<p><a href="#">Example Button</a></p>
<p><a href="#">Example Button</a></p>

As you can see the HTML is very basic, we essentially just need an anchor tag and text. The paragraph is there just to be semantic.

The CSS

.css3button a {
     background: url(background.gif) bottom repeat-x #9eabb3;
     padding: 5px 10px 5px 10px;
     text-align: center;
     font-weight: bold;
     color: #fff;
     text-decoration: none; border: 1px inset #aaa;
     -webkit-border-radius: 8px; width: auto; -moz-border-radius: 8px;  -khtml-border-radius: 8px;  border-radius: 8px;
     -moz-box-shadow: 1px 1px 1px #666;  -webkit-box-shadow: 1px 1px 1px #666;  box-shadow: 1px 1px 1px #666;
     text-shadow: rgba(0,0,0, .5) 0px -1px 0px;
      border-top: inset 1px #ccc; border-left: inset 1px #ccc; border-bottom: solid 1px solid #000; border-right: 1px solid #666;
}

.css3button a:hover  {
     background: #999;
     text-shadow: rgba(0,0,0, .5) 0px 1px 0px;
}

The CSS is a bit more complicated, but still fairly simple. We are really just adding a repeating background image, adding some rounded corners, as well as box and text shadows. The borders add a bit more depth / shading and ensures that if the CSS properties are not supported that the element still retains a beveled appearance.

The background image is simple gradient to give the button some depth, in this case I used the following image:

That Simple

That is how easy it is. If you want to play around with the borders you can end up with some pretty nice effects as well.

Examples

Example Button

Example Button

Example Button

Example Button

If you have a huge advertising budget getting targeted traffic is not that difficult. There are countless tools available for identifying the right markets and you can simply write checks to your hearts desire. However most of us are placed in situations where we (or our clients) simply can not afford to spend tens of thousands of dollars on internet advertising.

Luckily, if you know the right strategies you can get plenty of targeted traffic with out spending any hard cash.

1. Build an E-mail List

Building an e-mail list is something that many of us have seemed to have forgotten about. It may be due to the association with spam, or that it has been around so long, or maybe social media and RSS seem like a better option. E-mail offers a very unique difference and advantage however. First you have the ability to send specific e-mails and messages to specific groups and segments of your audience (where RSS is an all or nothing approach), but additionally you tend to have a more captive audience which results in higher response and conversion rates.

RESOURCES

• Lyrus E-mail Marketing
• How do you build your e-mail list?
• Entrepreneur.com on building your e-mail list

2. Focus on Organic Search

Organic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) has the capability to pull in large amounts of traffic with out having to spend a dime (in theory). Organic search is simply the unpaid listing of websites that show up when someone performs an internet search on a site such as Google, Yahoo or Bing. With 80% of all transactions starting with an internet search, not only do you have an audience that is ready to buy... it has the potential to bring in more traffic that almost any other approach available.

While we would all like to get more organic traffic it often is easier said than done. It is important to keep in mind that there is no way to trick your way to good rankings. The best practice is always to create high quality valuable content and ensure your website is built in a way that is search engine friendly.

RESOURCES

• SEO Basics
• The SEO Book
• SEO For Wordpress Guide

3. Social Media

Social Media is the use of employing sites and media that allow you to connect with other people on a social level. The common examples would be Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and Linkedin. These sites let you connect and converse with other users who have similar interests as you. Because all websites have some overarching theme or topic, you can connect with people who are also interested in the topic. This gives you the opportunity to build awareness of your site/product/service with your audience on a personal level which is much more effective than on a push media level.

An important note about social media. Make sure anything you do, publish or say on these networks is done in a way that actually adds value to someones day. If you are simply signing up to spam links to your site you are likely to have sub-par results.

RESOURCES

• Mashable Social Media 101
• Example Social Media Policies
• The Social Media Bible

4. Develop Some Public Relations

With so much focus on digital media public relations has lost a lot of the attention that it used to hold. Public relations is a valuable part of any marketing mix and it is an approach to building awareness and traffic that shouldn't be ignored. Especially considering it can be a low cost (or no cost) solution. There really are two areas in which we can benefit from public relations, through traditional forms of media and new forms of media.

While there are many different facets of PR, where you stand to gain a lot of new traffic is by having stories and articles written about your website.

Offline

Back before the internet became what it is today, companies would send a small one page write up with "news worthy" content regarding their company to any relevant media sources. These went out to newspapers, magazines, journals, etc... This write up was called a "press release" and simply covered the "who, what, when, why and how" of the story. Despite the fact that the internet is changing the way people consume news, it is still an effective way of building awareness about your website and/or company.

There have been plenty of studies and reports that show a direct correlation between traditional media mentions and website traffic. Even if your website isn't listed in the article you will find more branded searches for your website (and thus more traffic). If you know that you are going to be covered you can also try and capitalize on the increase in traffic and offer special discounts or personalized messages.

The process is fairly simple. Round up any related publications and look for the news contacts, almost every publication will have an e-mail where you can submit news. Write up a short press release and distribute it to the list you created previously. Don't be afraid to call up the media and pitch the story to them a few days after you have sent the release.

Online

This process doesn't have to be limited to offline publications. There are lots of industry blogs and websites that regularly post content and news to an audience consisting of your target market. While the concept is similar (get an online publication or blog to talk about you, your product, your company, etc..) it tends to be slightly different in approach. In most cases getting articles and news published can be a bit trickier as you are not always working with professional journalists who always need that next story.

When pitching stories to bloggers or online publications you may need to spend more time developing a relationship with the authors first. Additionally finding a list of relevant blogs can be a bit more tricky and require more searching. The more open and honest you are about the situation the better your results will be. It is unnecessary to write a formal press release (and ineffective), focus on starting a conversation with the author instead.

RESOURCES

• How to write a press release
• How to pitch to bloggers
• Blogger Relations 101
• How to pitch

5. Add Value to Other Sites

Ok "Web 2.0" might be a cliche term, but there are a countless websites that thrive on user participation and contribution. I assure you that there are some related to your industry or that consist of your target market, as people naturally want to connect and discuss things that are important to them. Some industries and topics may be harder to find than others, but if you are listening there are people talking.

Once you have found these types of sites, take a little bit of time every week to add value to them through participation. Over time the users will begin to become familiar with you and trust you. By offering your knowledge you will build awareness, good will and trust for your company/website/profession. Additionally most of these sites will even let you have a profile or signature that can contain a link (or several) to your website so you don't have to be so direct about your motives.

The more you participate and the more you contribute the more you will get out of this technique.

6. Get Others Involved

Sometimes the best way to build awareness and traffic is through word of mouth. Word of mouth is actually one of the most effective forms of marketing online and off. Not far behind word of mouth in terms of effectiveness is celebrity endorsement. This method can drive traffic to your website by using both of these proven techniques. When you get other people involved in your website (either as guest bloggers, giving them an interview, etc...) you are doing two very powerful things. First you are actually giving people a small portion of ownership in what you are doing. When they invest the time to contribute and assist the site they buying into the idea that it is worth their time and effort. Because of this they are going to be much more likely to want your website to succeed and thus tell other people. If nothing else they will likely link to their contribution and tell people about it.

Additionally by having a well known figure contributing to your website you are getting their endorsement and it can boost your credibility significantly (even to the point of matching their own). This subconsciously will resonate with users and put the site at a higher status than they would previously, making them much more likely to share your site, contribute to the site and return for future visits.

7. Syndicate Your Content

Chances are if you are looking for more traffic there are at least a handful of other sites on the web that cover the same (or similar) subjects that you are. By creating high quality content you can offer a win/win situation. Approach popular websites and offer to publish (or syndicate) your articles on their site. They win by providing relevant content to their readers with out having to perform the work of creating it and you can build awareness / traffic to your site through an article byline.

If you can't find any websites that will bite you could always submit your articles to article directory sites. They often have huge mailing lists on various topics and tend to rank fairly well themselves.

• Technorati
• Top Article Directories
• Syndicate your blog through social media

8. Contests For Your Services

Contests have always been a great way to build awareness and interest. After all who doesn't like wining something for free? Since we are talking about free ways to generate traffic purchasing an item to give away is out of the picture. Sure you might be able to find something you already have to give away but how likely is that? Instead offer up your expertise. Chances are you have skills or knowledge that is valuable to other people or companies. By offering a contest for the services you don't have to spend any additional capital and build awareness for all of those people who previously didn't know about your expertise but could use your help.

This is a perfect time to build your e-mail list. Ask those who are signing up for your contest if they would like to be entered into your newsletter for future opportunities and giveaways.

If you don't want to do a contest you could also do a free seminar or webinar, both of which can drive a lot of traffic and attention to your site as well.

9. Be Remarkable

Supreme marketing guru Seth Godin often talks about the importance of being remarkable. The idea is that if you are "the best in the world" at something it will naturally market for you. An important part of achieving this status is picking a very specific and narrow niche or specialty. If you have a content focused website, what very specific topic can you cover that you can do better than anyone else in the marketplace? If you run a service company, what very narrow and specific niche can you server better than any of the other companies in the market?

By focusing your attention on becoming the best at this narrow specialty you will become remarkable and an expert. Your demand will increase dramatically and people will start finding your site naturally. This actually is more effective and will generate more traffic than if you were to try and be "good" in a market that is already saturated with those who can do a better job than you.

RESOURCES

• Seth Godin: The Dip

10. Start a Group or Organization

Through out human history we have always desired a sense of belonging and community.It doesn't take much looking to find a group of people who are interested in the same things that you are. Start a weekly meet up, tweet up, chat up (if it is virtual), forum, digest, etc... that gets the group of people together to talk and discuss the issues. You would be surprised at how quickly a group like that can grow. As the founder and head of the group or organization you will receive a lot of notoriety and interest. It will also give you great opportunities to have links and advertisements for your company or website through out areas in which members interact.

Conclusion

There are lots of different ways to drive traffic to your website with out spending much (or any) money. Sometimes they are more effective than paid methods. The general rule of thumb though is that traffic tends to be high involvement and low cost, or low involvement and high cost. Search Marketing is a good example of this - where pay per click can get you traffic very quickly and with out much in terms of time investment, organic rankings can take significantly more work and take much longer but at a much lower cost.

It is important to understand what techniques, tactics and strategies are going to be most effective for any given situation. Blindly trying them all is not going to work very well, take the time to think through and plan your approach in building traffic.

In this situation where the primary focus are the pages the dashboard provides little value and the first action is always going to be clicking on the "Pages > Edit" navigational item. While not hard to learn or really time consuming, it is far from optimal. What would make much more sense is to have the dashboard focused on the tasks in which a client would perform 80% of the time.

So 3.7 DESIGNS whipped up a quick plugin that adds a dashboard widget listing all of the pages allowing for easy editing, deleting and management of content pages.

It is compatible with wordpress 2.7+ and simply needs to be activated, no configuration required.

You can download version 1.1 here

A website that isn't persuasive will fail to convince users they should spend the time to perform what actions are required to convert. At some point they will lose interest and find a different site that is more effective at convincing them it is worth their time and money and you will be left scratching your head as to why they left when they did.

We put endless amounts of emphasis on design, clean code, standards, interactivity, functionality and even sometimes well written copy. However none of these elements necessarily mean that the website will end up being persuasive.

There are countless ways to be persuasive online. Psychological studies have identified common patterns and situations in which outcomes and actions of other people become predictable. By incorporating the findings of these articles we can develop sites that are more effective and have higher conversion rates.

1. Admit Minor Faults

Social psychologist Kip Williamns performed a study on the perception of lawyers and cases as seen by jurors. In situations in which the lawyer had mentioned a weakness in his own case before the opposing attorney mentioned it they trusted and liked the lawyer more.

By admitting small faults and weaknesses it actually increased the perceived trustworthiness of the lawyer. We can learn from this example by admitting minor faults and weaknesses in order to increase the trust in our claims of strengths and selling points. You can be sure that your customers and clients are doing their research to find out what your competitors offer that you don't. By admitting it first you will increase the amount that those potential customers trust you and your messaging.

2. Have Someone Else Boast For You

Many company websites are hesitant to sing their own praise for fear of sounding boastful and conceded. What we end up with are sites that sound vanilla and don't highlight any differentiating factors at all.

This is not an unfounded practice, we tend to take any praise with a grain of salt when the one giving it is tied to the company or product being described.

The solution is to get someone else to do it for you. Even if the person has something to gain from giving your praise, studies have shown that people do not discount the information nearly as much as they should. This means that you should find someone of credible nature (even if they work for you or the same company!) to introduce or talk about you, your product or the product engineer. Because it is being said by someone else it immediately increases the credibility and how much the user will take the information to heart.

Why do you think so many websites take advantage of client and customer testimonials?

In a case where a real estate agency changed introductions from "You should speak to Sheldon" to "You should speak to our condominium expert, Sheldon" they saw significant increases in new clients and sales.

3. Encourage the User To Be Consistent

Let's face it, your users are smart, savvy and educated individuals. You should be glad they are taking the time to visit your site and you should complement them for it!

This may seem like a wide step away from anything to do with consistency, but bare with me. It has been proven that people often accept compliments as truth even when the compliments are not really accurate. In addition, by accepting the compliment (even if it is just a mental note) they have made a decision that they are what ever that compliment was.

By nature we strive to be consistent. We see ourselves in a very specific way and it is difficult for us to challenge that viewpoint. So with this combination we can persuade a user to perform actions by complementing them and then challenging them to stay consistent.

In a study in which researches monitored the behavior of potential voters, 25% more of those surveyed voted if they were first asked if they would vote on election day.

We can use this by first giving the user a complement such as "You are smart when it comes to business and always make smart decisions." Later on the page by asking the user to make a smart decision you will essentially ask for the user to be consistent with what they already agreed that they were (a smart business person).

4. Focus on Fear Rather than Gain

Research has demonstrated that people are much more likely to act on fear rather than gain. This concept sounds simple, we are programmed by nature to try and reduce and avoid threats before we start considering ways to improve our lives. However it doesn't stop there, with out careful and detailed directions of how to correct or avoid the danger we may simply block out the message or deny that it applies to us. This is often referred to the "fear than relief" method.

A typical example of this would be inexperienced investors. Inexperienced investors are very likely to sell stocks too early because they are afraid of losing what they have already gained. Additionally they are also less likely to sell stocks that have gone down as this would be an absolute loss compared to where they had started.

We can use this on our websites by focusing on what could be lost by not using a given product or service as well as what can be done to avoid the lose. This is often used in advertising that informs customers of real-world threats that a good or service can prevent or alleviate all together. In these cases they always use very clear and specific instructions on how to reduce those threats.

5. Utilize Authority

We have been programed since birth to respect those who have authority over us. From police men to school teachers, those people who have authority command a lot higher trust and respect than the average voice. There are ways to short cut your way to being seen as an authoritative figure. Why do you think that doctors put their diplomas on the walls or why so there are so many professions with uniforms?

The principal of authority has been described  by the following, "we believe we will be better off if we follow the lead of legitimate experts, because they have greater knowledge and expertise in a certain domain than we do."

It is a common mistake to neglect communicating credentials and elements that establish oneself as an authority figure because we are taught that it is rude to brag. However this is actually passing up a great opportunity to be persuasive. If you feel uncomfortable describing credentials and expertise in your copy think about using method #2 and have someone else establish you as an authority for you.

Take any opportunity to establish yourself as an authority. This could be clients who by or use your product, write ups in publications, groups and organizations your company is part of, etc... All of these things establish you or your company as an authority. Users are much more likely to act if they feel there is authority and expertise backing up your messaging, product or service.

Now we even have great opportunities to use Wordpress as an internal communication and back office tool. With these assortments of plug-ins we can use our favorite open source software to improve our businesses, efficiency and offer more solutions to our clients.

Billing

If you are a freelancer or a small company you know how much time can be sucked up by managing your billing. This is a bit of a shame because the billing part of the job should be the most fun, it's how you get paid! There are a lot of available paid solutions for billing, but they are all hosted on different websites and applications and are not as nice and neatly integrated as doing it through Wordpress. Luckily we have WP-Invoice, a full invoice creation and tracking system that integrates with Wordpress directly.

It features:

• E-mail invoices to clients
• Save client data
• Payment processing options such as Authorize.net, Paypal, etc...
• Archived invoices
• Secure connection for viewing invoices

Download WP-Invoice

Contact Relationship Management

As your business grows the amount of clients, leads and strategic partners you have will also grow. It is time to throw out the Rolodex, get rid of your piles of business cards, there are better ways to manage your contacts. The newest solution would be using a Contact Relationship Management system or CRM. There are a wide range of different CRM solutions available (salesforce.com, highrise, etc...) however Wordpress can function as one with the simple installation of a plug-in!

WP-CRM features:

• Associate an image with each contact.
• Assign each contact to a company… or don’t.
• Create a note history for each contact.
• Clickable email and website links.
• Google map contacts address.
• Dial a phone number (works on cell phones with internet browsers).
• Fully hcard / vcard compatible.

Download WP-CRM

Project Management

Still using a pen and paper to manage your projects? You might as well be using a sundial to check the time! Using software to manage and track your projects is a lot easier and more sophisticated. While there are plenty of good commercial solutions available, why not integrate it into Wordpress? That way it is easy to use, customizable and open source. With the simple installation of a plug-in you can:

• Track clients
• Track projects by client
• Track tasks by project
• Track time per task with dynamic timer like Harvest

Download WP-Project

Office Communication

Sometimes proper and adequate communication is the most important and most difficult aspects of running a larger company. There are all sorts of tools that attempt to correct and fix this problem, some of them more effective than others. The Wordpress team themselves encountered this issue and sought to find a solution that integrated into their beautiful piece of software. Hence Prologue was born - a twitter like tool that can run off of your web server.

Download Prologue

Newsletter & Notifications

Need to send news and updates to your employees? Maybe you want to do some e-mail marketing for your company? Rather than pay monthly or per e-mail using an overpriced and underachieving e-mail marketing solution just integrate it with Wordpress. There is a simple, effective and easy to use newsletter tool that will do everything you need and more.

Download the Newsletter Plugin

Calendar

Keep track of all the events and important milestones going on with your business by using a simple and easy to use calendar system. There are a handful of Wordpress plug-ins that let you create and manage calendars, I have had the best luck with WP-Calendar. If you want to get very fancy you could also have a members only calendar so that only employees and those with a login can see it.

Download the Calendar Plugin

We as a community and as an industry have become very good at most aspects of building websites. Just looking through a few CSS Galleries clearly shows the quality of design that is being produced and how much it has improved in just a few years. If you look a layer deeper and view the source of these websites you will see beautiful and semantic XHTML/CSS. It seems the days of table based layouts is finally gone.

The amount of functionality and rich experience that sites have now day are creative, impressive and engaging. Powerful javascript libraries such as jQuery, MooTools and prototype make it easy to produce these experiences rapidly and effortlessly.

But a website is more than the design, code and effects/functionality. Sometimes we have to rethink our approach and find out what is really important. What are the sites objectives and what are our users objectives? More often than not you will find that you could improve the following areas of your websites:

1. Web forms

While they are far from the sexiest part of web design, web forms are arguably one of the most important. In almost all cases a web form also functions as a conversion point (a point where a user performs an action that accomplishes a site objective).

Here a user is going to enter in some of their personal information so that they can get something in return. This establishes interest and provides the site owner with some valuable information.

Web forms are often neglected in two ways:

1. There is not enough attention in making them usable. This could be poor validation, improper labeling of required fields, making them too long or poor form layout.
2. There is not enough attention to what information is asked from the user.

You have a real opportunity to learn more about the people who use your website. That information can not only help you build a better website but also a better business. This marketing information could easily lead to R&D improvements and better products.

Do some research and learn how you can make more effective forms. Your clients, bosses and website owners will thank you many times over.

Resources

• Web Form Design: Filling in the Blanks
• Web form eye tracking studies

2. The Content

Content is king. In a recent study 25% of users noted that the number one reason they were to leave a website was due to "weak web copy." The only reason anyone ever goes to any website is because of the content, yet so many website owners neglect the content. Despite it's importance content becomes an afterthought. Appearance, search rankings and conversions tend to be the focal point of most web design projects. What we may forget is that with out great content you still have a poor appearance, you won't rank high and no one will convert.

Rather than trying to write all of the content yourself, hire someone. It will be worth it, I promise you. If nothing else write the bulk of the copy and hire someone to make it consistent with the proper voice and tone.

Resources

• The Web Content Style Guide: The Essential Reference for Online Writers, Editors and Managers
• Quality Web Content

3. The Footer

With a little thought it becomes painfully obvious, most website footers are absolutely useless. A user takes the time and effort to read (or scan) through an entire page, and when they reach the bottom they are rewarded with links that don't fit anywhere else, a copyright notice and maybe an address and phone number.

The point where page content ends is a very high action zone. That means that users who get to that point have a high probability of clicking on any link that comes below it. Rather than some meaningless legal links and an address create a footer that gives the user a place to find additional content that may interest them.

This could be:

• Related pages / articles / posts
• Links to rich media
• Latest news / updates
• Previously viewed pages
• A contact form
• Ways to save / share the page
• Newsletter sign up

Resources

• Footers in modern web design
• Footers with great usability

4. The Print Version

Many designers fail to realize how many people still prefer to print off websites rather than try and read them on screen. There are two significant benefits to paying attention to the print version.

The most obvious benefit is that it can improve the user experience of the site. Users who visit your site and print it out will actually read the content and are more likely to revisit the site and make an action (or conversion). If the printed version is difficult to read and work with they are highly likely to simply recycle the paper and forget they ever visited your site in the first place.

The second benefit is it could be a real competitive advantage. If a user prints off two web sites, and yours clearly has more attention to detail in the print version, they are much more likely to use your product/services over the competitors.

You can improve the print version simply by:

• Turning off unnecessary items such as the header, footer, navigation, search box etc...
• Changing the font to serif, increase the font size and space out the line height to make the print version more legible
• Adjust the columns or remove sidebars so that only the primary content prints out

Resources

• Print style sheets, a definitive guide
• Pro CSS Techniques

5. Analytics

How users behave and use a website is one of the most important factors you could possibly focus on. Despite this fact it is so commonly neglected by both website owners and website designers. Businesses need to spend more money on the analysis of user behavior and web design companies need to promote the service more heavily.

Even a website that is built using an effective strategy, user testing and best practices is a best guess at what will be most effective.

If you actually pay attention to how users behave and analyize that behavior you can discover countless ways to continually improve your website.

• Are users leaving a specific page more than others? Maybe they are not finding what they are looking for and that page can bet altered
• Do you have a page where a lot of people are entering the site other than the homepage? You need to start thinking of those pages as landing pages
• Are there important pages that don't get a lot of traffic? Figure out how you can make those pages more prominent

Resources

• Web Analytics: An Hour a Day
• Occam's Razor - web analytics blog