All Posts, Web Design
A term that many website owners may not be familiar with now, but a vital asset to monitor on your website. The definition according to Google Analytics is “the percentage of single-page visits or visits in which the person left your site from the entrance (landing) page.” Other sites and designers may consider visitors who come to you home page, but don’t visit other pages on your site – not just those who come and then leave. I’d also like to mention that a website with a lot of traffic but a low turn-over rate when it comes to leads is still not a fully functioning website.
We use our hosting company 1and1 and they’re Website Statistics tool via the control panel. It shows stats on all files accessed on your site and not just the pages. An easier tool is Google Analytics which is free from Google. All you need is a Google account which takes a few minutes to setup. If you’re hosting company doesn’t offer site statistics this is a great option for you. This tool show you your links to your site, hits, time on each page, traffic sources, browsers, and of course bounce rates.
Read below for some tips on how to improve your website bounce rate.
- Have an attractive call to action. Some calls to action items include free give-aways, analysis, downloads, contest, etc.
- Short talking points that link to other pages of your site that have more information to read in-depth.
- Relevant content to what your site is about. This one is a bit tricky because when someone lands on your page from searching or a specific topic or key words; they’re hoping to get those questions answered when they “land” on your site. Whether that information is on your home page, or another specific landing page.
- Headlines. Especially in bold or big letter font.
- Forms. Not just any type of form, but a simple and quick to fill out form that gathers visitor email, name, phone, and if possible social media handles.
- Browser compatibility. I’m not just talking about Firefox vs IE. Think about Google Chrome, Opera, and mobile browsers like Safari too.
Though these are just a few simple key items to focus on, they are big when it comes to your website’s ROI. Also consider they ease reading the content of your website. Reading the details or articles on your pages should be easy. I’ve read in some blogs that eighth grade vocabulary is a good level for the text on your site. Personally, I feel that it should be easy to read and directly to the point. If I want to read more, I’ll click the “read more” link or follow on to another page that seems to have more information about a particular topic or details. If you have more questions about this topic, or how your own website’s bounce rate is feel free to give us a call (1-888.603.1090) or send us an email. Here at Design Theory we provide free consultations to understand your needs and provide solid options to choose from.
All Posts, Web Design
From around the internet I’ve found some cool infographics that I wanted to put together to show you. I think they’re getting more popular lately, and they’re easy on the eyes to view while providing great informative content.3
The Internet’s Undersea World
What People are doing on the internet
The life of an article on the web
Largest bankruptcies in history
16 Million Colors – For real!
SEO Check List
All Posts, Web Design
Fellow web designers, I know we’ve all been there. Had a great prospective client meeting. They loved your portfolio of work. Contacted you from a referral of a previous client. So you’re feeling great about this project going into it. You make a draft, show it to them, and it all starts going downhill from there. They want more revisions, the logo needs to be changed, content can’t be agreed upon, and more and more. Originally you quoted a certain amount and now your billable hours have almost tripled and the site isn’t even half way done. You ask yourself, who’s really at fault here? Without getting into any formalities, lets keep most of the blame with the client.
When I first started out, I used a contract with my first client. Ironically, it saved me from an issue once the site was completed. They wanted the workup files and my contract specifically said they’re not included. After some phone calls, emails, and threats from their family members, I stuck to my guns and referred back to the contract that was signed. Could have been worse had I not had that agreement setup from jump right? Well, this type of story is all too common on this side of the fence.
Contracts don’t necessarily have to be only for the protection of one person. The current contract I have and use now actually is quite easy to read to not hard on the eyes for my clients. Really want a contract does is protect the property of each binding party and set rules and understandings of work or a relationship.
Below are some general categories you’ll want to use in your own contract if you don’t have one already:
- Authorization
- Agreement
- Scope of Work
- Payment Schedule
- Confidentiality
- Hosting
- Terms
- Project Guidelines
- Files and Ownership
If your a freelancer doing jobs here and there, a typical surface level contract should do. However if you’re working as a subcontractor or with bigger businesses that are outsourcing work to you, a contract written or reviewed by your lawyer may be your best option. It would be a wise investment in the beginning that may save you thousands in the future.
Have some tips on contracts? Let us know in the comments below.
All Posts, Web Design
Its no secret that most web designers and developers loath Internet Explorer. From IE version 9 back to the still popular IE version 6. I recently had dinner with a bunch of other industry friends of mine and one thing we all could agree on was our feelings of Microsoft’s infamous browser. For those of you who may not understand or know why we feel the way we do about this browser, continue to read on.
- Lack of support – CSS Rounded Edges
- Slow page loading times
- Spacing and Padding issues – Hours can be lost trying to align images
- Security – ActiveX controllers
- CSS Standards – Options that work in most other browsers EXCEPT Internet Explorer
- PNG Support – Limited transparency and ugly shadows that normally wouldn’t show up but in IE
Sure there are a host of more complaints that may never get resolved due to the basis on how with each new version of IE is the same as the last. Just a few user interface (UI) updates to give the wrapping a fresh look. I think in part Microsoft wants to impose their own set of standards for website viewing, and we have very little choice but to code and recode one of the most widely and corporately used browsers in the game.
I’ve found some tools to use to help:
Firebug
Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of web development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page.
Debugbar
DebugBar Development features:
– View HTML DOM Tree
– View original ad interpreted source code
– View tab attributes
– Edit tab attributes
– View HTTP and HTTPS headers
– View page cookies
– Validate html code for main page and frames/iframes
– List all javascript functions
– View javascript function code
– Execute javascript code in the currently loaded page
– Get information about currently loaded page
Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar
The Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar provides several features for exploring and understanding Web pages. These features enable you to:
- Explore and modify the document object model (DOM) of a Web page.
- Locate and select specific elements on a Web page through a variety of techniques.
- Selectively disable Internet Explorer settings.
- View HTML object class names, ID’s, and details such as link paths, tab index values, and access keys.
- Outline tables, table cells, images, or selected tags.
- Validate HTML, CSS, WAI, and RSS web feed links.
- Display image dimensions, file sizes, path information, and alternate (ALT) text.
- Immediately resize the browser window to a new resolution.
- Selectively clear the browser cache and saved cookies. Choose from all objects or those associated with a given domain.
- Display a fully featured design ruler to help accurately align and measure objects on your pages.
- Find the style rules used to set specific style values on an element.
- View the formatted and syntax colored source of HTML and CSS.
.png "SuperPreview")
Expression Web SuperPreview for Internet Explorer is a stand-alone visual debugging tool that makes it faster and easier to migrate your sites from Internet Explorer 6 to Internet Explorer 7 or 8. With Expression Web SuperPreview for Internet Explorer, you can ensure that your Web sites work correctly in Internet Explorer 8 while also maintaining compatibility with earlier versions of Internet Explorer.
Via a small plug-in, this tool offers multiple browser testing live in Safari, Chrome, IE, Firefox.
This usually is a hot button for most, so I’d love to hear your thoughts on dealing with IE; good or bad.
****UPDATE**** I wanted to add that this is also a reason why the price for web design or web programming is what it is. Due to the many users of IE, our sites are most likely going to be viewed more by them than Chrome, Firefox, and the others. So we could have a site done but then have another 10+ hours of going back to make each page, each image, each element look “right” in Internet Explorer. Maybe in a sense this is a good thing for us designers because we pass this cost on to our clients. For clients we know how important this is to you and you should know that this isn’t something that can be done with the flip of a switch.
All Posts, Web Design
All Posts, Web Design
As a designer, either in graphics, coding, programming, or in web, we tend to get totally involved in our projects. A lot of times we juggle more than two projects at a time without our clients even knowing, but still providing full support and service. Over time we get used to this type of multi-tasking without even thinking about it, scheduling time to plug in updates, billing, and more. Now what about projects and to our own websites? When will we have time to post new blogs? Update images and links? Yea, this is one of those things I can say (generally speaking) that we all put of way too much.
Between client emails, conference calls, meetings, and the occasional work here and there, it’s hard to find the time to actually do work on our own projects. That includes updating those little annoyances about our work that people may have caught and we still haven’t had time to fix. You also have to consider time to learn new apps and technologies pertaining to your trade.
I’ve learned that time management is such a necessity but is often overlooked. Most of us pretty much go about our days with a general idea of what tasks we will accomplish. Whatever is most important and approaching a deadline, we put to the top of our list of things to do, and the rest is a bonus or shelved for a later date. However there are days where this could totally bite us in the rear for lack of planning. I’ve come up with 5 quick and easy ways to find ways to get to our own projects while keeping in step with our client ones.
1) Populate your calendar down to the hour. This may seem like a big task, but once you get it started and up to date, filling in your tasks and projects by the day and hour will really help you find open times.
2) Create a To-Do List. There are many books out there on Getting Things Done (GTD), and all will recommend a list of some sorts with all of your tasks. Since we’re so tech savvy, there are also smartphone apps and web sources to help with this also. Toodledo is a great free one to get you started.
3) Set Realistic Goals. If you know you need to make some serious adjustments to your own site or work, set a goal for when you want to complete it. Not just a mental one, but actually write it down and place it somewhere that you’ll be constantly reminded of it. Be sure to make these goals tangible. After completing a few you’ll feel proud and accomplished.
4) Eliminate the fluff. The constant checking in on your social sites, spam email accounts, watering the plants, watching sunsets, calling to check on mom. You know what I mean. These fillers are nice “fluff” but take away from what you really need to get done. Though it may be important
5) Make yourself accountable. Now this may be the toughest off all, but I promise it works. Being a freelancer, you really are only accountable for your deliverables to yourself and your client. As an employee, your tasks need to get done so that the next person in line can do theirs. So appoint a fellow designer, friend, or significant other to monitor your projects. Maybe start with the big ones at first so you don’t start resenting them with the smaller tasks and projects.
If you’ve come up with ways other than what I’ve described please let us know in the comments below. It’s all about helping others improve, and we all know we can use improvements every now and again.
