Firefox 3 Is Ready!
Jun 19 by Marcus Hochstadt | Posted in HTML, CSS, Design, Pickups
I exclusively use the Firefox browser for more than three years now. It never ceases to amaze me. It’s fast, it’s reliable, it’s safe. And Firefox is predictable in terms of coding.
What I mean is when you know how to code (html, css, that sort of thing) and you do it correctly, the Firefox browser will display your code just the way you intended. Whereas when you deal with Internet Explorer’s and Safari’s idiosyncrasies, it can give you headaches as to why they behave to strangely.
Sorry, Safari enthusiasts, but how come a page displays and a video plays correctly in Firefox, IE, Mozilla, Opera and Netscape, but not so in Safari? I don’t get it…
Not only that though, Firefox is fast, too. In fact, it was faster than IE and now they made it even faster.
I downloaded Firefox 3 last night. Already after browsing a couple sites I discovered how fast it has become. Internet Explorer is now up to 20 times slower!
I know that 73% of my visitors are Firefox users. Therefore, I encourage you to download the newest version 3 from www.mozilla.com or the World Record page they’ve set up…
http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord
On that World Record page, you can see how many downloads where in which country.
What amazes (but not surprises) me is the numbers of Germany. Out of more than 8 Million downloads worldwide, there where almost (or, by now, probably more than) 1 Million downloads in Germany alone and more than 4 Million downloads in Europe, making Germany the #2 country and Europe the #1 continent in terms of downloads.
Anybody still concerned about the German and/or European Internet market? ;-)
—Marcus Hochstadt
6 CommentsPermalink Tags: ff, firefox, ie, internet explorer
Utilizing Link Targets To Your Advantage
Feb 16 by Marcus Hochstadt | Posted in HTML, CSS, Design
Do you know what “link targets” are? I get this question from time to time. It has to do with where you want links to appear (once a visitor clicks on them.)
Whether you link to another page on your own site or to an external one, it is a neat way to “help” your visitors navigating through the Web, and to not lose them when linking to external sites.
Without further ado, here’s what link targets are and how you can use them to your advantage in your Internet business endeavors…
NOTE: You may see curly quotes below due to a certain setting in my WordPress installation. Make sure you always use plain quotes in coding. Using curly quotes in HTML often results in strange symbols in other people’s browsers.
target=”_blank”
target=”_self”
target=”_top”
target=”_parent” -and-
target=”anything”
As an example…
<a href=”http://www.domain.com/” target=”_blank”>Link text</a>
Is old school HTML and was developed for when you use frame sets on your page. It’s commonly used in HTML nowadays and tells the browser where exactly should that other content be displayed when someone clicks on the link.
In other words, when you use the target=”_blank” it’s going to open in a new browser window. Whereas when you use any other word (and not the underscore at the beginning,) like target=”new” it will target the browser window that has been “tagged” with the title “new”. This is not necessarily a new browser window though!
For instance, you have plenty of photos on your site. You show them as thumbnails on your pages. When someone clicks on them, you want the larger version of that thumbnail image to open in a new browser window.
Now, to avoid that your visitor has 50+ windows open just from browsing your site and looking at the countless images you offer, you can “tag” that new browser window specifically and individually. Meaning, if you want all those large images open in the same new browser window then use target=”photo”. Then all other large photos will appear in the window that you tagged with “photo”. (The word ‘photo’ is just an example; you can use any other word. Just make sure the target attribute is without the underscore at the beginning, in this particular case.)
On the other hand, in cases where you rather want a completely new browser window to open you shall use the target=”_blank” though. For example, you use affiliate links and want them to open in a completely new window, and you want that new window to open up right in front of your visitor’s eyes. That way, you won’t loose your visitor, leaving your Web site underneath the new window. (The target=”anything” may appear underneath the current window.)
By the way, when going through my Internet business blog, you’ll see that I often use target=”external”.
—Marcus Hochstadt
E-mail Follow Up Plugin For Comments Section?
Jan 29 by Marcus Hochstadt | Posted in HTML, CSS, Design, Traffic Generation
I seek your help. :-)
I’d like to implement a plugin that sends e-mail notifications (or follow-up messages) to those commented on a blog article. Anyone knows of a plugin that works like a charm? Instead of testing and headaches, I’m more after using the collective wisdom of my wonderful readership as for which works best. :-)
Opinions and experiences, anyone? Which e-mail announcement or e-mail follow-up WordPress plugin would you recommend to your best friend?
Submit your findings, experiences and knowledge by posting a comment to this post.
Thanks in advance!
—Marcus Hochstadt
New Face
Jan 28 by Marcus Hochstadt | Posted in HTML, CSS, Design
“Oops, is that a new site?” No, I just took the time and replaced the infamous WordPress standard template with a more professional looking one that is still light and fast loading (isn’t it?).
It’s not perfect yet though. Some spots are not behaving and looking the way I want.
I’ll play around with it in the next couple days (I like to play with/on code ;-), so don’t be surprised (or shocked?) when it looks a bit differently from today; although it shall not change that much.
If at all, your browsing experience will improve. :-)
—Marcus Hochstadt
RSS Feed Is Working Again
Jan 22 by Marcus Hochstadt | Posted in HTML, CSS, Design
My blog’s RSS feed was crushed for a couple days. I was actually wondering why my NewsFox RSS reader couldn’t retrieve any new data from my feed. It was when I read Llama’s comment that I clicked on the RSS button myself and saw there was something wrong.
After checking and looking and scratching my head a couple times, I remembered I created a new sub-domain with the same title of my RSS feed. This caused my feed to disappear.
It’s all working now again so feel free to subscribe. :-)
This brings back memories of my almost daily discoveries…
Folks, I encourage you to not only check your site at least one per day but also your RSS feed. I see so many sites and blogs that display an MySQL database or a WordPress error. Strange symbols or lines of code, some of them even come from the Webhost.
It can have many reasons, sure. Just make sure to know how your blog is doing and if it’s in good shape.
If you don’t have the time nor the inclination to perform this task yourself, why not hire someone doing it for you? The intelligence factor necessary to perform this kind of task is fairly low, so is the hourly rate. :-)
—Marcus Hochstadt
P.S. Now I still have to figure out what to do so the feed will be published in a sub-domain instead of a sub-folder. (I.e., instead of domain.com/feed to feed.domain.com.) Any ideas?
You Comment, I Follow
Jan 22 by Marcus Hochstadt | Posted in HTML, CSS, Design, Traffic Generation
I feel the urge to let you all know that when you comment on my blog, I follow. I thought you guys would figure it out, but I learned not everyone takes the time and looks into the source code. ;-)
It was one of the very first plugins I enabled when I launched this blog. We have the ability to control and eliminate spam, therefore I saw and still see no reason why outgoing links are assigned with the “nofollow” tag.
Yes, it is a time consuming process to get rid of all the spam and delete spammy link-to URLs. Up to this point it is worth the time.
So again, when you comment on my blog I’m going to follow; provided your comment is in “good shape.”
That’s the way it should be. My 2 cents anyway.
—Marcus Hochstadt
6 CommentsPermalink Tags: comments, nofollow
5 Goofproof Ways To Kick Butt Your Visitors
Jan 19 by Marcus Hochstadt | Posted in HTML, CSS, Design
You build a Web site in order to attract visitors to it, right? You want them to get excited, read through the content, and to do your Most wanted Response. Why then do I see so many doing the following five mistakes over and over again… atrocities that make them click on that Back button almost instantly?
#1 – Splash or “Welcome” pages
Imagine you clicked through and arrive at a home page with a large image. Nothing else, just a large image. Perhaps even good looking, yet what you gonna do? Looking? Clicking? Clicking! But where? No text, no visible link.
Even if there is an “Enter here” link, do you click to enter? You’re already there, why enter?
Solution? Remove (or decrease) the image and provide real content (in text form) and easily recognizable links. Ask your visitor what you want them to do in an easy to understand format.
#2 – Flashy Banner Ads
Even the least net savvy people have trained themselves to ignore banner advertisements so you will be wasting valuable virtual real estate.
Instead, provide content of high quality. If you’re in affiliate marketing, weave the links into your content and mark them as your personal recommendations. Don’t be pushy. Let your reader want to buy; it makes all the difference.
#3 – Complicated 3-fold Flash or JavaScript navigation
You’re trying to click through to another page on the site. They provide a hyper flashy navigation menu that may look great at the graphic designer desktop. But does average Joe know where or how to click through that graphical mumbo jumbo forest jungle?
Do you think it is useful to have the navigation text change its weight when someone hovers with the mouse over it and it starts to flicker?
Yup, I hear you saying “But *I* love how it looks; it might not pass usability test, but it’s MY site and *I* love it.”
Well, I thought you want to attract visitors and have them coming back over and over again. Do you think they will?
Perhaps (just perhaps) you’re better off providing a simple and very straightforward navigation structure so that even a 5 year old knows how to go from point A to point B.
Or in other words, avoid amateurish looking fancy stuff, complicated Flash menus, or multi-tiered JavaScript dropdown menus. Your visitor may leave your site instantaneously when they can’t figure out how to navigate.
#4 – It takes 50+ seconds to load a page
Do you use JavaScripts and external image references excessively? Does the user have to wait 50+ seconds until s/he sees the actual content? You want them to fall asleep? Like, “Go grab a cup of coffee and come back later, until I’m finished loading all that tracking stuff, and until those external affiliate banner JavaScript links are loaded so I can pitch you.”
That is, s/he’ll certainly click the Back button faster than you can watch it happening. (Those records where they stayed “0 seconds” on your site.)
#5 – Background Music
I can imagine you want to entertain your visitor or make their stay more desirable. But are you really sure they have the same taste you do? You think they’re in the same mood you are?
At least you should offer a huge, easily to recognize STOP button front and center of their eyes so they don’t have to annoyingly unplug the speakers.
–
Bottom line? Focus on simplicity. Excessively use of fancy, distracting stuff pushes your visitor away from your Most Wanted Response. Focus on what you want you visitor to do. Use a clean, light layout. Offer audio and video, yes, but give your visitor tools to control and adjust it to their hearts content.
Do not pull them to your site. Make them WANT to stay on and come back to your site. It makes all the difference.
—Marcus Hochstadt
4 CommentsPermalink Tags: layout mistakes, usability, website coding
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