If you’re seeking a job in social media, we’d like to help out. For starters, Mashable’s Job Lists section gathers together all our resource lists, how-tos and expert guides to help you get hired. In particular, you might want to see our articles on How to Leverage Social Media for Career Success and How to Find a Job on Twitter.

But we’d like to help in a more direct way, too. Mashable’s job boards are a place for socially-savvy companies to find people like you. This week and every week, Mashable features its coveted job board listings for a variety of positions in the web, social media space, and beyond. Have a look at what’s good and new on our job boards:

Mashable Job Board Listings

Do you want to work for Mashable.com on the business side?

Read more about this opportunity here.

The incumbent we are seeking will execute and administer the email and database marketing functions.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Bazaarvoice is looking for a Creative Director who will continue to drive our brand forward as we experience robust growth.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Progressive biofuel producer needs a communications professional to manage social media campaigns, create sales presentations and work with developers and designers in the implementation of a new company website.

Read more about this opportunity here.

This position is responsible for formulating and directing the strategy and plans for Community and Social Media in building brand, increasing membership and participation, and customer acquisition.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The Social Media Community Manager helps companies execute their social media strategy.

Read more about this opportunity here.

We are one of the leading Drupal shops: WorkHabit, Inc., and we’re looking for a few outstanding members to join our teams in San Francisco and New York City.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Responsibilities include working closely with creative, tech, media and account departments to mastermind social media – and new media – initiatives as part of integrated campaigns.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The Social Media Marketing Department of a Los Angeles based Marketing and Advertising Agency is seeking to hire a project manager.

Read more about this opportunity here.

A Senior Social Media Marketing Specialist works with our search marketing and optimization senior leads and teams as well as client agencies, support people, and in some cases the clients themselves, to help us help our clients

Read more about this opportunity here.

An Intermediate Social Media Marketing Specialist works with our search marketing and optimization senior leads and teams as well as client agencies, support people, and in some cases the clients themselves.

Read more about this opportunity here.

As a web-designer, you will be working closely with our marketing team and graphic designer to enhance and routinely update the customer facing side of our website.

Read more about this opportunity here.

We’re looking to expand our team with a Lead Developer who can elevate our back end and application layers, as well as help support and maintain our front end.

Read more about this opportunity here.

We are seeking a User Experience Web Designer for a 6 month to permanent position in the Philadelphia area to help develop two exciting, new web projects.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The Digital Marketing Manager is responsible for developing and executing web site strategies and recommendations including user experiences, information architectures, interactive marketing, and content strategies.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Network for Good seeks an energetic, extremely organized and highly business-minded Nonprofit Marketing Director

Read more about this opportunity here.

Quiksilver is looking for an Email Marketer to be part of the team in Huntington Beach, CA.

Read more about this opportunity here.

You would help us design and create marketing campaigns to promote the launch of Tradepal.com in your College.

Read more about this opportunity here.

We are looking for a Los Angeles based Community Manager to develop the country’s smartest and savviest community of money saving experts

Read more about this opportunity here.

In this position, you will provide best practices consultation to a variety of clients across leading-edge project initiatives.

Read more about this opportunity here.

BitDefender, the world’s fastest growing antivirus software company, is looking for an active, tech-savvy, maybe even a little bit nerdy new addition to our team.

Read more about this opportunity here.

BitDefender, the world’s fastest growing antivirus software company, is looking for an active, tech-savvy mom to bring her knowledge of gadgets, gizmos and the crazy world of all things “Mom” to the blogosphere.

Read more about this opportunity here.

We’re looking for an experienced and fast-working Drupal developer located in Washington D.C. who can work with us on a freelance / contract basis to improve our new website – from bug fixing to new functionality and improving the look and feel

Read more about this opportunity here.

Dallas Observer has an immediate opening for a web editor. This position combines online journalism and social media marketing, with the overall goal of growing dallasobserver.com’s readership and community

Read more about this opportunity here.

You’ll be responsible for New Media Content and Communication and contributing to and supporting Shedd’s online communication initiatives, with a 40% focus on Great Lakes conservation awareness and 60% on marketing.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The successful candidate in this role manages the execution of Internet-related projects from concept through development and delivery.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The Web Content Administrator is responsible for directing the development of websites to support business areas, including making changes and enhancements using CareFirst’s content management system or other web development tools.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The User Experience Architect will lead the conceptualization, planning and information architecture for retail ecommerce applications and design prototypes for usability testing.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The Interactive Designer works closely with Creative, Product development, and IT to establish a branded interactive experience through the use of relevant program language.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The Account Planner embraces clients and consumers as partners in the process of developing marketing communications, using their input to inform and inspire creative ideas, and guide and validate the resulting integrated marketing campaigns.

Read more about this opportunity here.

You will be the Big Kahuna of our online customer acquisition efforts (email, website, print, newsletters, SEO/SEM, social media, affiliate sales, and events to maximize online revenue), as well as manage initiatives that deepen relationships with existing customers.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Recessionwire, a website featuring news, advice, perspective and humor about the recession and recovery, is seeking a marketing/social media intern to help increase brand awareness, drive traffic, expand a loyal user base — and maintain the buzzy profile that Recessionwire has enjoyed in the media, the blogosphere, and with our readers.

Read more about this opportunity here.

A Boulder, CO based experiential marketing agency is bolstering its digital capabilities and is seeking field experts to help lead the evolution of the agency into a stronger, more digitized culture

Read more about this opportunity here.

Homeboodle.com (.NET shop) is looking for a talented and energetic front-end developer to lead the interface side of development for a new and innovative housing-related web based application.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Root Orange is seeking someone to provide support with our in-house online marketing initiatives as well as to contribute creative thinking on how to virally spread the word.

Read more about this opportunity here.

360i is looking for a Group Account Director who will be responsible for representing the agency on multiple pieces of business while consistently championing 360’s digital offerings (SEM,SEO, Emerging Media, Customer Insights, Design & Development and more) among senior level clients, both existing and new.

Read more about this opportunity here.

EdgeCore is looking for a talented, motivated, and experienced individual in the production of printed materials for a National, Fortune 100 company.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The position offers complete account responsibility from first contact to end negotiations, and account management.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The ideal candidate will possess a background in business and be an innovative leader with functional knowledge and experience in Human Resources.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Ideal candidate is extremely hard working, extraordinarily talented, entrepreneurial, THINKS OUTSIDE THE BOX, has great problem solving skills excellent intuition for user interface, and is extremely passionate about open source applications, web 2.0, mobile applications, social networking and social commerce.

Read more about this opportunity here.

You will be responsible for writing public-facing blog posts, commenting on articles and videos in the community, and Facebook/Twitter updates, all with correct grammar and tone.

Read more about this opportunity here.

In this position, you will play a pioneering role in the convergence of content and social media.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The ideal candidate will coordinate and execute interactive media plans, lead generation and special projects in accordance with the client’s objectives and budget parameters.

Read more about this opportunity here.

The National Sales Manager is responsible to lead CUnet’s efforts to sell our suite of interactive media products and services to higher education clients.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Senior Developers lead project development at Odopod. They are responsible for planning and implementing the code that drives our projects and collaborating with other developers and vendors to execute on larger projects.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Developers support Senior Developers on project development. They are able to independently research and complete development tasks assigned to them.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Odopod is organized into multidisciplinary teams of 5-8 designers and engineers. Each team is led by an Associate Creative Director and a Senior Producer. Your job is to lead your team to create great work.

Read more about this opportunity here.

Mashable has a variety of web 2.0, application development, business development, and social networking job opportunities available. Check them out at Mashable’s Job Board.

Got a job posting to share with our readers? Post a job to Mashable today ($80 for a 30 day listing) and get it highlighted every week on Mashable.com (in addition to exposure all day every day in the Mashable marketplace).

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This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.

Name: Quix

Quick Pitch: Quix is an extensible bookmarklet, allowing access to all your bookmarklets, across all browsers, while maintaining them in one spot.

Genius Idea: Think of Quix as a command-line of sorts for your web browser. The bookmarklet makes it possible to quickly and easily do stuff like search Google, shorten links, and send stuff to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr or Posterous all from any browser — including Mobile Safari.

Check out this screencast that gives a two-minute overview of Quix:

Inspired in part by Shaun Inman’s Shortwave, Quix is a utility made for people trying to increase their web productivity. Check out the list of help commands to see all the stuff Quix can do. Plus, you can add your own functionality, which makes this really killer for web developers.

What we like about Quix is that it is cross-browser. You can use it in Safari, Firefox, Internet Explorer or Chrome, on a Mac or PC. For users who love browser plugins but loathe the memory usage and performance slowdowns that can come with them, Quix might just be a godsend. As a Mac user, I love the integration with some of my favorite Mac apps.

If you’ve ever doubted the power for Javascript, play with Quix. It’s free and it’s web-geek nirvana!

Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark

BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platform for their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest – use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* (please see website for official rules and guidelines).”

Tags: bookmarklets, javascript, quix, software

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Last year at The Future of Web Apps (FOWA) London we invited Paul Boag, host of Boagworld and author of the Website Owners Manual, along to conduct a series of interviews with speakers from the event. Over the next few weeks we will be publishing some of these here on the blog.

First up is Kevin Rose. Following on from his FOWA keynote “9 Ways to Take Your Site from One to One Million Users” Paul and his co-host Paul Stanton asked Kevin a few questions on community, user testing and advisory roles.

This interview lasts for 19 minutes.

Read the full transcript by Simon Hamp.

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Originally posted at Web Crawler

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BandCentral is a web tool that helps bands manage themselves online. BandCentral gives bands their very own online ‘Band HUB’ with all the tools they need to communicate with each other, store files, manage gigs/ merch/ music/ money/ tasks/ fans/ contacts and everything else associated with their band in one central, secure and instantly accessible place.

BandCentral is also great for Band Managers & record labels. By centralizing all aspects of a bands management activity, BandCentral encourages greater collaboration between the band, band manager and third parties (such as producers/ promoters) and minimizes the effort required to complete day-to-day admin tasks.

http://bandcentral.com/

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Go check it out and submit your own!

Actually I got this article idea, when I accidentaly found great video tutorial on Deviantart which by the way is the first video in this list as well. It is Photoshop tutorial, where author explains several of his great techniques while creating designs – what font to choose, how to think about spacing, wirefrime, colors, blending options and a lot more hidden tips.

1. Website design walkthrough from Derek Toigo

This video will walk you through Derek Toigo design process of a simple website template. He will explain and unreveal many hidden tips and techniques in his daily designing process.

2. Letterpress text tutorial from che mcpherson

In this tutorial you will learn how to create the trendy letterpress or emboss text affect thats flooding the web design scene at the moment.

3. How to slice a Photoshop image into a website

4. Fancy Frames Photoshop Tutorial

5. 3D Web Design Effect in Photoshop

6. Web 2.0 Footer in Photoshop

7. Vista Inspired Menu in Photoshop

8. Create a Watercolor-Themed Website Design with Photoshop

9. How to Make a Highly-Textured Site Layout in Photoshop

10. Web Text Box and HTML: Photoshop Tutorial

11. Photoshop Tutorial Text Mirror Effect

12. Web Design Tutorial – Apple Navigation in Photoshop

13. Spark Beam Photoshop Video Tutorial

This video tutorial will show you step by step how to create this really stunning spark beam effect which can be commonly seen in cell phone ads for example.

14. Creating a Website: From Start to Finish Part 1

15. iPhone icon design tutorial from SoftFacade

In this tutorial you will create iPhone application icon for address book in Adobe Illustrator with some Photoshop touches.

16. jQuery slider tutorial from Dimics DM

17. WordPress theme tutorial Part 1 (PS) from Dimics DM

The first part of an WordPress theme tutorial. This video will cover the Photoshop/design part of the WordPress theme.

18. Frames and Peels in Photoshop from Navdeep

19. Style Techniques of Mantrastic by Mantrastic

Mantrastic is a great artist on Deviantart, you should view his photomanipulation works and you will understand what I mean and why you definitely should download and see this great video tutorial straight away!

20. Photoshop – Learn how to create an Apple iPod Shuffle from kakkuk

21. Web Development – Tutorial 1 – Basic Layout from Michael Daley

Basic Layout is now uploaded and ready to view and runs for around 36mins. This tutorial covers basic CSS/XHTML to get a simple design from Photoshop into a web page. This tutorial is aimed at beginners who are just starting out with CSS/XHTML and need a few tips on how to do simple layout.

22. J Taylor Design ~ Web Design from J Taylor

A little video on a typical outline working with a client on their website.

23. K-DESIGN Windows Blue – Your Choice Tutorial from
Mo4itajs

24. Photoshop Tutorial 1 from Alistair Rossini

Interesting Photoshop web design tutorial, explaining how to create simple but good looking layout.

25. How To: Gradient, Gloss, Shadow & Reflection Effects from Ryan

A Photoshop tutorial showing how to achieve a great effects you can use in your designs everywhere.

26. Web 2.0 Gloss Orb from Navdeep

This tutorial will walk you trough the creation of a Web 2.0 style gloss orb with lights and shadows in Photoshop.

27. Web 2.0 Menu Bar from Navdeep

In this video you will see how to design a Web 2.0 Style Menu Bar with lights and Shadows using Photoshop.

28. Web Design Tutorial Part One from andrew

This video covers the basics of web design, mainly composition design, and the process that I go through to create mockups. The video covers basic wireframing, grids, psd structure and general design techniques. This video is for people who are new to web design, and the techniques used are basic, more advance design tutorials in the future.

29. Web Design Tutorial Part 2 from andrew

Part 2 of my webdesign tutorial, covers building out the rest of the site, this video is intended for beginners only.

30. Integrating Lightbox 2.0 in to your web design projects from Psmeg

This 10 minute standalone video demonstrates how easy it is to install and use the popular Lightbox 2.0 javascript effect in your web design projects.

The tutorial takes you step-by-step through the whole process, from downloading to integration to testing.

If you know more of this type tutorials with unique webdesign techniques, please share! It was really hard to find something good out there from keywords, so I believe I should more listen to recommendations.

Related posts:

1. 22 Photoshop Web Design Interface Tutorial Sites
2. 1st Photoshop Web Design Professional Layout Tutorial
3. 50 Really High Quality Photoshop Navigation Menu Tutorials
4. 90 New And High Quality Photoshop Web Layout Tutorials
5. Unique 3D Text – Xara 3D + Photoshop Tutorial

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Photo via Internet Explorer 6 Uninstall Day.

• After Google hack, Microsoft asks users to abandon IE6, XP
  At long last, Microsoft gets serious about pushing users to leave IE6 behind, motivated in large part by the recent attack on Google’s servers from China (the exploit only works on IE6 with XP or Windows 2000. [Ars]
• Rumor: Apple iPhone OS 4.0 Features Detailed
  Background apps! MORE multi-touch! Syncing! Rumors! [Gizmodo]
• Typing Errors
  An extremely interesting and in-depth article discussing the commonly held claim that QWERTY is a scientifically inferior keyboard layout, particularly relative to Dvorak. [Reason Magazine]
• Firebug 1.5 released!
  Every web developer’s best friend in the whole wide web, Firebug, releases a pretty significant update, with all kinds of great new features. [hacks.mozilla]
• Chrome OS Zero VM Image Available
  A virtual-machine-friendly version of the previously mentioned Chromium OS Zero, the auto-updating version of Chromium OS. [The Chrome Source]
• DNS Security Extensions are about to make the Internet a lot safer
  DNS hacks, like the Twitter hijacking in December, may get a lot harder with an updated extension structure for DNS servers. [Download Squad]
• New ways to navigate column view Finder windows in 10.6
  If you like the column view in Finder, Macworld highlights the shortcut timesavings of using Tab/Shift+Tab vs. the Left and Right arrows. [Macworld]
• Helping computers understand language
  Google offers some interesting insight into how their algorithms handle synonyms when executing search queries. [Official Google Blog]
• Guess The Apple Tablet Features, Win One For Yourself
  Gadget-obsessives, Gizmodo’s running a guess-the-Apple-tablet-features contest. The prize: An Apple tablet of your very own. [Gizmodo]

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SlideDeck aims to make it easier for users to digest and understand the content of a website. It was designed to replace the web’s current model of text heavy services pages, unclear product tours and confusing process diagrams with a fun, quick and beautiful way to interact with websites.

When viewing a SlideDeck, you can index the content at first glance by reviewing the vertical sliders. You can take a holistic approach with the SlideDeck by progressing through each slide in order to understand the complete concept. Or you you can jump ahead to the topic you are interested in. Each slide can contain simple HTML text and images as well as rich content such as flash, videos, screen casts and presentations.

A SlideDeck can be custom designed to blend in perfectly on your website as a header or navigation system. It can also be contained within a button, waiting to be clicked and opened in a lightbox view. Think of all the content you can express to your user in a simple, elegant and fun interface. SlideDeck adheres to web standards and is great for SEO as it is entirely indexable via search engines.

SlideDeck Lite is a limited version of the feature-rich SlideDeck Pro. It’s a great way to give SlideDeck a try and immediately improve the performance of your website. SlideDeck Pro ($299 usd each) includes all the features listed below as well as free upgrades for new functionality. Now, you can have a chance grabbing a SlideDeck Pro for Free. Simply leave a comment under this post. We will randomly select 5 lucky people and announce the winners on 27th Jan. What are you waiting for?

Sponsors

Pixmac: Stock Photos, Royalty Free Pictures and Images

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We’ve been working in project for a Web Hosting client. After doing a few wireframes, we realized that we had to find good references to the pricing page. A good table just pops out in the middle of the layout, and makes it unique.

<!–break–>

So, I had to find some examples of Pricing tables to use as reference, so I spent my afternoon looking for these… we even had some kind people helping us at Twitter (thanks guys). So, here are the ones that we got to get together. I hope you enjoy it!

Media Temple

LightCMS

Squarespace

Wufoo

Backboard

HiTask

Gloss

Shopify

SlideDeck

Check the link for full view.

Big Cartel

The Invoice Machine

Newsberry

Pulse

Ballpark

MailChimp

The Resumator

Highrise

Web Notes

Crazy Egg

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Well it’s January already and we’re all tired from the holidays and stuff, but we never have enough goodies to read and our RSS basket is never too full. So here’s the list of inspiring blogs for January. Also, don’t forget to follow them on Twitter as well and be sure to check our latest top – The Most Creative 40 Newcomers in the Design Blog Community

Jay Hollywood | @jay_hollywood

I specialize in branding, user experience, and interface design, specifically when it relates to the digital world (although I do dabble in a bit of print work too). I work with all types of clients to achieve specific results and exceptional outcomes through creative problems solving and development.

Geek Tyrant | @geektyrant

Movies, Games, TV, Animation, NEWS; GeekTyrant.com is the premier website for hardcore geeks everywhere!

Addy Osmani | @addyosmani

A geek that loves experimenting with jQuery, JavaScript and everything else to do with web development

Coolvibe | @coolvibe

A blog showcasing digital art from around the web. We’ll update this page with more info once it’s necessary

Black Moon Design | @blackmoondev

We’re small, frisky company based in Poland and we’re deep into webdesign, illustration, websites and apps

The Web Design Blog | @philmatthews

The Web Design Blog was setup in 2009 by freelance web designer Phil Matthews with the intention of providing web design news, articles, tutorials and interviews for everyone to enjoy!

But You Are a Girl | @adriarichards

Adria Richards has been in the IT industry for 10 years and launched her own consulting company in 2006. She is an active supporter of open source and promotes developers and their tools on social networks

Media Militia | @mediamilitia

We are the place for free resources, tutorials, and inspiration. When you need to jump start a project, we are here to help you out

Vunky Blog | @vunky

Vunky Blog is a blog about design and development. It contains everything I come across in my day to day job as a designer and active Ruby on Rails developer

Vizualize | @albyantoniazzi

A handpicked selection of cool infographics

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MODx is a free opensource new generation CMS with PHP Application Framework functionality and extensive API and event model that allows you to override core behavior. You can build XHTML 1.0 Strict sites just as easily as a pie. Menus made from ULs (unordered lists) are ready to go out of the box. MODx is the dream CMS for CSS and Standards oriented designers.

Besides that, MODx is the first free PHP CMS to offer an API that fully supports Web 2.0 Ajax technology. MODx gives you the freedom to choose jQuery, Mootools, ExtJS, Prototype or any other library you choose. MODx can be deployed “to the cloud” via Amazon EC2 Complete. It features full control of all metadata and URL structure for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) purposes.

The sites featured here show the flexibility of MODx CMS in their varying design and purpose, and you can build virtually any design you can dream up in MODx CMS.

If you don’t want to miss out our next posts, you can Subscribe to the 2Experts Design Blog or follow us on twitter

Websites Showcasing

Quamm

Blog.Medianotions

Elive

Dwell Missional Church

Jet Republic

Steve Mullen Creative

Chris Chase Design

YDRA Web

Hevy Festival 2009

Webdesign Karlsruhe

Anhalt Ticket

Grand Belleza

Pop Labs

Phenotype

Tulsa NORML

Orange Objects

Smarthistory

Energy Radio Belgrade

National Portrait Gallery, London

Nappelpage

Enjoy this Post? Subscribe to the 2Experts Design Blog or follow us on twitter

Our blog is updated regularly with content related to web design, inspiration, tutorials, wordpress, freebies and much more. If you don’t want to miss out on future posts, you can subscribe by RSS or Email

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Social Media is “media designed to be disseminated through social interaction, created using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques” (Wikipedia), and if that doesn’t make sense I don’t blame you.

Basically everyone these days is interacting through online groups on Facebook, real-time feeds on Twitter, real-time searching with One-Riot and getting their website-of-the-day from automatically generated lists such as Newsified. A web article that was hot one day probably isn’t going to be hot the day after because there will be another one in its place. Social Media changes shape every day, in fact it’s changing the web every second!
Your website needs to utilize Social Media effectively in order to get a leg-up and be recognized in this constantly-shifting web cosmos. As a follow up to my previous article, I wanted to share a few tips that might help your website or web application grow. Since launching Project Bubble I have seen massive growth which I attribute mostly to the use of social media and I’m sure your website too can benefit from this.
A good place to start is to learn to understand Social Media by subscribing to blogs like Mashable and staying on top of the latest trends by following key people on Twitter. Once you get inside the world of Social Media and begin to understand it the following tips will make a lot more sense to you and you will be able to apply them to your website.

Build Community

A lot of websites are static, with a few simple pages and a contact form. The owner of the website only knows if someone has visited based on the tracking statistics (such as Analytics) and they can only communicate with their visitors if the person visiting fills in a contact form. Also anyone else visiting the website won’t be able to interact with other visitors, let alone find out if anyone else is interested in the products or services offered by this website.

Building social community features in to a website will spark life in to your online presence and make it change a lot more often. A site that you might have only updated every six months will suddenly get updated by your community every day, providing you can get the traffic. Your site will look a lot more active, but also by capturing your visitors’ information (such as email, name, country, likes, dislikes etc) you can collect a lot of data on your audience which will be really useful to you (make sure you have permission to capture your visitors’ information with a clear privacy policy).

Community features such as allowing comments on a blog will let your visitors say what they think about your products and services. A forum feature will allow users to network with each other, as well as being able to discuss a recent event in your business. Building a sign up feature to your site will let users be able to return to your website and have their preferences saved, and you will be able to store the contact information and data of those who regularly visit your site. Most of these features are fairly easy to implement and can make a world of difference.

Get Feedback

It’s important to get feedback from your users, especially if your web business is new. Don’t be ashamed of any bugs or small issues that might happen on your new website because if you can prove that you are listening to your users, and that you can fix these issues quickly – that will outweigh any problems or bugs people find.

A feedback system will let you know about issues that you might not have otherwise found through your usual testing methods, for example a recent one that came up in Project Bubble is Japanese and Russian characters. Someone reported the issue (and I would never have known about this) then straight away provided a fix. I learnt a lot about UTF-8 that day! Finally, providing a channel for feedback shows that you care about your customers and you are willing to change things based on what people report. This builds loyalty to your brand and will help with user retention. Tools for getting Feedback could be: UserVoice and GetSatisfaction.

Offer Interaction

Not only do you want to capture the users who visit your site and build a community, you want to offer them the facility to interact with you and vice-versa. Interacting with your website users will build brand loyalty and people will see that you’re not just a big corporate identity but are actually real people behind all the PR gloss. Get your users to talk to you, and when they do make sure you talk back to them straight away.

Tools such as simple web forms are absolutely essential in providing your users with quick, clear and targeted contact methods. Studies have shown that the more work you have to make your user do on your website, the less likely they will do what you want them to do. So, for example in the case of web forms – if you don’t use them and you rely on “mailto:” email links it means that people have to do much more work, whereas with a contact form all they need to do is quickly fill in their name,  email, select a subject from a drop down and then type out a simple message there and then. Also web forms allow you to find out data such as where they came from (based on the I.P. address), what page they were looking at when they visited the web form and so on.

Other tools you should look at to enhance user interaction are blog comments as mentioned before but most importantly Twitter. There are other articles on Woork that you can read which describe the power of Twitter so I won’t go in to detail here, but I’ll just say that it is absolutely essential for any web based business. You can not only find out who is following the developments of your business, but you can talk directly to them and involve everyone as you do so.

For example, you have just launched a new home page design and you announce it on Twitter, then somebody replies saying they can’t view it properly on their browser. You can fix the issue, reply back to them and then not only will they be informed of this fixed but so will all of your followers. The person who reported the issue will likely be very pleased that you fixed their problem so quickly they will praise you on Twitter, then you can re-tweet this feedback to all of your followers. So you have an issue reporting tool, but also a testimonial tool – all for free! A Facebook page is a great way of providing real-time interaction with your user base. Set up a Facebook page and publicize it just as you would a Twitter link.
People use Facebook every day (in some cases all day!), so the minute you post a status update you will likely get comments back straight away. Also because of the real-time feed system people will see your new update pop up just as they look at their other feeds. You can also allow users to upload photos, join in a discussion through forums and install loads of different modules such as a Poll system with just a few clicks.

Offer the Best Customer Service

As mentioned earlier, customer service is crucial to the success of your business. Your customers will want to see that you are active and in-touch with them. They will want solutions to their problems as soon as possible. The quicker you can turn-around with these solutions, the better people will rate your customer service. This will in turn create buzz about your company throughout the social sphere (Twitter, Facebook etc).

Let Your Users Create the Buzz

Make it easy for your users to create this buzz. As mentioned before you need to make it really easy for your users to do the things that you want them to do. With regards to creating buzz, you can add buttons and ‘widgets’ to your web pages that allow them to do this easily.
Such as TweetMeme or Topsy (offer a retweet service so your page will get easily posted on Twitter), Add to Delicious (allows users to add your page to their Delicious favorites), Digg This (allows users to add to their Digg bookmarks), Add This (allows users to add the page to every social website out there). The more times people add your web page to a social media site such as Digg, Mixx and so on the more likely your site will get featured on their home page. So it’s important to have these facilities in place if you are expecting a surge in traffic at any time, for example after doing a television, radio or magazine advert.

Good luck!

I hope these tips help. I personally think that social media is a lot of fun, and because there’s always something new to read every day it makes the web so exciting. Maybe your website will be in my RSS aggregator tomorrow as I read the Delicious most-popular list?

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The Web is evolving fast: new features, formats, user needs, continuously change the way we interact with websites. In this post I want to suggest you some interesting emerging techniques every web developer should know in order to build modern web applications.

HTML 5 Offline Application

The HTML 5 specification introduces a lot of new features that radically improve the way users interact with websites and web applications. With HTML 5 developers can build easily offline web applications by using a SQL database API and an offline application caching API for storing data locally (by using a client-side SQL database) and allowing applications are available even when users are offline. This technique use a .manifest file and JavaScript to get an update of the cached files when is not available a connection to the server.

You can enable offline application caching by using the manifest attribute on the html tag:

<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<html manifest="cache-manifest">

You have to create a .manifest file that specifies which files are to be cached offline. Here is a typical structure of a manifest file:

CACHE MANIFEST
index.html
about.html
style.css
logo.png
...

NETWORK:
server.cgi

According to the W3C Working Group Note about Offline Web Applications topic, server.cgi should never be cached in order to continuously get updates from the server.

Apple Developer Connection provides a full detailed, step-by-step guide to help you learning how to buit modern offline web applications. You can read the full guide here.

oEmbed

oEmbed is basically an open format for allowing an embedded representation of a URL on webpages. Facebook probably has one of the most popular implementation of oEmbed API. For example, when you copy a link from YouTube, Vimeo, Flickr, into your status bar, Facebook converts this link into a movie or image embedded on your profile.

Previously on Woork Up I wrote this interesting post “Learning oEmbed: Convert Links Into Embedded Content” where I explained how to use oEmbed API to implement a Facebook-like link-to-embedded-content feature. The tutorial is really simple, easy to customize and reuse on your projects. A working example is also available.

HTML 5 contentEditable

The HTML 5 contentditable attribute allows to make editable the content within a HTML element with the contenteditable state set to “true”. This attribute is useful for example for easily developing edit in-place features or advanced rich text editors without using third party resources. All major browsers (IE, Firefox, Safari, Chrome) implement this attribute and here is a sample usage:

You can use document.execCommand to add some basic features to your custom editor simply adding this code in the head tag of your webpage:

<script language="javascript">
function formatText(cmd){
    document.execCommand(cmd, null, null);
}
</script>

This is the result:

Bold Italic Underline

Here is an example of button to format the selected text:

The previous code is only an example. I suggest you to use unobtrusive approach for separating HTML structure from JavaScript code (in this case the onclick event).

OAuth

oAuth is an open protocol that implements an authorization model for allowing websites and web applications to publish and access data stored in third party websites without sharing user login information. Yahoo! Developer Network provides an interesting and detailed tutorial that illustrates how to create an OAuth application for accessing Yahoo! services.

If you want to implement OAuth protocol on your application also take a look at the following links:

Implement OAuth for Google
Implement OAuth for Twitter
Implement OAuth for Yahoo

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If you just want a PDF of a given URL at a certain time, PDFmyURL gets the job done with no fuss, no muss. You can also grab the bookmarklet from the front page to pull off the conversion at any time.

Click the “Advanced Options” on the right, though, and you’ll learn how to pull off PDF production without even visiting the site, embed advanced options, and even run PDFmyURL from your own server. Neat, free stuff, and a great public service.

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Upload any PowerPoint presentation or PDF to the site to get started (or just forward presentations from your email account to a private email address) to get started. Once your presentation is in the cloud, you can invite anyone to join you. When they click through to your presentation, they’re looking at the presentation as controlled by you—again, either from a web browser, iPhone or Android device.

As I mentioned, the free webapp could come in particularly handy for short-notice presentations—you don’t have to set up any projectors or have any files on hand. All you need is a supported device on your end and a laptop the people you’re presenting to can look at. (You can invite multiple guests, too, so a room full of people could watch your presentation directly in front of them.)

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There’s really not much to say about the site beyond that. You can search for books by ISBN, title, author, or keywords, and it returns search results into categories sorted by lowest overall prices, used book prices, new book prices, and rental prices.

In short, it makes it very easy to find the most inexpensive option for your book buying.

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Have a look at what we thought was the cream of the web design crop this week. If you have seen some great web design that you think deserves to be in here then let us know and we will be sure to review it

Academy

Fitbit

Epic Event

Digital Podge

Roadside Heritage

We Say So

Yamaguchi Web

Sanctuary

Team Excellence

Adobe User Group

INQ Mobile

Smooth Step

Preloaded

Foxtie

Feed Of Rap

Less CSS

Hii Def

Toshiedo

Where We Design

If you like this post you may also want to look at:

Weekly Web Design Inspiration #35

Weekly Web Design Inspiration #34

Why not follow me on twitter: @atikusdesign
or to ensure you are updated with every D-Lists posts follow: @d_lists

Did you enjoy this post? If so please share and allow others to enjoy it:

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I read A LOT of web design posts during a week and thought that the very best articles deserved to be shared with you, my wonderful readers. So be sure to check back here every Saturday to find some great web design links.

Whitespace The Underutilized Design Element

In Defense Of Vertical Navigation

Process Of Redesigning N.Design

24 UX Articles To Start 2010

The Web Designers Guide To User Experience

Charles Elena Design Review

12 Killer Tips For Designing In The Browser

4 Rules For Pitching To Offline Clients

If you like this post you may also want to look at:

Blue Website Showcase

Guerrilla Advertising – Creative Attention Seeking #4

Why not follow me on twitter: @atikusdesign
or to ensure you are updated with every D-Lists posts follow: @d_lists

Did you enjoy this post? If so please share and allow others to enjoy it:

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While pondering ideas to cap off the week, I thought it would be a good chance to take a look back at the popular posts over the last couple weeks as well as some of the upcoming posts and contests. Also, I would never leave you guys without a tasty morsel of contesty-goodness if I could help it — so read on to see what goodies you can grab from CodeCanyon.

In Review

Now that I’ve picked up the reigns here, I’m gaining speed and planning some great stuff for later. So far though, these are a few of the posts that have been most popular.

Myows

Instant Copyright Protection with Myows

As a digital media author and HTML/CSS template reviewer at ThemeForest.net, I know first hand how frustrating copyright can be — especially for those who pay their bills with the works they create. It’s difficult, at best, to keep an eye out for people infringing on your works let alone attempting to do something about it. Even worse, authors can be accused of copyright infringement by those who may know nothing about it, causing serious problems for (an often innocent) author.

(read more…)

Setup Your Personalized Google Apps Suite

Setup Your Personalized Google Apps Suite

Google provides a powerful suite of web applications ranging from email and calendar to documents, chat and sites [and so much more]. For web professionals, the typical “@gmail.com” just won’t do. Thankfully, Google offers a professional version (called Google Apps) for professionals, educators, non-profits and government.

(read more…)

5 Great IDEs to Start Coding in the Cloud

5 Great IDEs to Start Coding in the Cloud

Cloud computing has started proceeding beyond the hype stage and into the beginning of mainstream adoption. Gartner had included cloud computing in their list of Top 10 Strategic Technologies for 2009. They also reported that worldwide cloud services revenue is on pace to surpass $56.3 billion in 2009.

(read more…)

Getting Things Done with Google Calendar

Getting Things Done with Google Calendar

It’s 2010 and it’s time to get things done! Okay, 2010 or not, many of us are always looking for a better way to manage our tasks, events and goals. The truth of task management is that there’s no single best way to tackle it for everyone. It will depend on your style of management, your interaction preferences and how the solution integrates into your current workflow.

(read more…)

Upcoming

Transitioning into 2010 I took a moment to list some of the planned improvements for this year. Those are still on the way! While I can’t give too many secrets away too far in advance, here’s a few sneak peaks of upcoming posts.

FormSpring

FormSpring

Next week we’ll be reviewing FormSpring and some of its awesome capabilities and uses. FormSpring will also be giving away a couple paid accounts. That giveaway will accompany the review!

Twitter Customizations

Twitter Customization

There are some great apps for customizing your Twitter page as well as using Twitter in other places. We’ll take a look at a few of those apps and services as well as show how to use a few of them.

Threadsy

Threadsy

You may have heard of Threadsy, a really exciting, upcoming web app. We’ll be reviewing Threadsy and to cap off the week (next week), Threadsy will be giving away a ton of invites for Web.AppStorm readers!

CodeCanyon Contest!

As a web developer, I’m always watching for new files at ThemeForest and CodeCanyon. The CodeCanyon marketplace has lots of great web application elements and even some full blown web applications. These are some great items to include at Web.AppStorm occasionally, even if they are a little more developer-centric.

CodeCanyon Contest

For contest entry you’ll need to complete the following.

1. Browse the CodeCanyon marketplace and select an item you would purchase and use.
2. Tweet @WebAppStorm with how you would use the item.
3. Leave a comment below, letting us know how you would use the item, also include your Twitter username.
4. Make sure you’re following @WebAppStorm to find out who the winners are!

Three winners will be chosen at random at the end of Sunday night, Pacific Time. Each winner will receive the CodeCanyon item they chose. Winners will be announced via Twitter Monday morning.

Please Note: Envato staff are ineligible to enter.

- -

Winners: The winners have been randomly selected and contacted. Thanks @AlexDenning, @webbografico and @zarathos!

Thanks for participating everyone!

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Since 1998, A List Apart has sought to serve the international web design and development community with educational, insightful, and sometimes visionary articles on web standards, emerging ideas and technologies, and best practices in content, usability, and design.

One barrier has long prevented us from fulfilling our goal to the utmost. But today we transcend it. Introducing A List Apart Arabic—an authorized A List Apart publication. Thank you and congratulations to Mohammad Saleh Kayali and his partners.

Look for additional international A List Apart editions, coming soon.

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WordPress themes for all types of web publishers.

A one stop theme shop where you can get the finest WordPress Themes and top notch customer support. Give your website a shiny new look that you can be proud of and be up and running in no time!

http://www.woothemes.com/

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Web development can be tricky and time-consuming. To be more effective and productive, we, designers and developers, can integrate useful tools in our daily routine. Also, handy resources can be very valuable as they can help us enhance communication with clients and other developers as well as improve the quality of our work. We are permanently looking for new tools, techniques, resources and services that can improve your workflow and increase your productivity.

In this post we present a couple of extremely useful and valuable tools and resources that we found over the last months. Please make sure to follow us on Twitter for a stream of useful resources, tools and design-related articles.

Getting Inspired: Interesting Redesign Projects

Boarding Pass / Fail
A boarding pass redesign project by Tyler Thompson, the Creative Director at Squarespace. How would you design a boarding pass? The result is very impressive.

You’re killing me, Zappos
Andrew Wilkinson’s attempt to redesign Zappos.

Dollar ReDe$ign Project
An attempt to rebrand the US Dollar, rebuild financial confidence and revive our failing economy. Created by Richard Smith.

Useful Front-End and Back-End Tools

ie-css3.js
CSS3 pseudo selector emulation for Internet Explorer 5-8. ie-css3.js allows Internet Explorer to identify CSS3 pseudo selectors and render any style rules defined with them. Simply include the script in your pages and start using these selectors in your style sheets — they’ll work in IE. An alternative is Offspring.js.

CorMVC
CorMVC is a jQuery-powered Model-View-Controller (MVC) framework that can aide in the development of single-page, web-based applications. CorMVC stands for client-only-required model-view-controller and is designed to be lowest possible entry point to learning about single-page application architecture. It does not presuppose any server-side technologies, or a web server of any kind, and requires no more than a web browser to get up and running.

Typograph
A typographic tool that generates CSS for beautiful web typography, according to traditional scale and vertical rhythm.

Venkman JavaScript Debugger project page
Venkman is the code name for Mozilla’s JavaScript Debugger. Venkman aims to provide a powerful JavaScript debugging environment for Gecko-based browsers namely Firefox 3.x, the Netscape 7.x series of browsers, Netscape 9.x series, Mozilla Seamonkey 1.x and Mozilla Seamonkey 2.x. It does not include Gecko-based browsers such as K-Meleon 1.x, Galeon 2.x and Netscape 8.x. The debugger is available as an add-on package in XPI format. Venkman JavaScript Debugger has been provided as part of the Mozilla install distribution since October 3rd 2001.

JavaScript Frameworks Playground: jsFiddle
jsFiddle is a shell editor that eases writing JavaScript code by creating a custom environment based on popular JS frameworks.

jslib
Mozilla gives a great flexibility and power to Javascript. This popular client side scripting language can be used to create application level logic and services for cross platform application development.
Goal: jslib has a simple goal, “Make life easier for Mozilla Application Development by creating logical, easy to use API’s for general purpose routines that lend themselves to living in library code.”

PHP debug tools
A set of useful PHP debugging tools for debugging script trace, errors and database queries.

The Automatic CSS Inliner Tool
If you’ve ever sent an email campaign, you know that if your CSS is not coded inline, it is likely to get stripped out by email clients, which can make your email design pretty funky looking. Writing CSS inline can be time consuming, and repetitive. MailChimp has a CSS inline conversion tool built right in that will automatically transform all of your local styles into inline styles. Designers have found it so useful, we thought we’d share it with everyone else – even if you don’t have a MailChimp account.

HTML Purifier – Filter your HTML the standards-compliant way!
HTML Purifier is a standards-compliant HTML filter library written in PHP. HTML Purifier will not only remove all malicious code (better known as XSS) with a thoroughly audited, secure yet permissive whitelist, it will also make sure your documents are standards compliant, something only achievable with a comprehensive knowledge of W3C’s specifications. Tired of using BBCode due to the current landscape of deficient or insecure HTML filters? Have a WYSIWYG editor but never been able to use it? Looking for high-quality, standards-compliant, open-source components for that application you’re building? HTML Purifier is for you!

InAppSettingsKit
InAppSettingsKit is an open source solution to to easily add in-app settings to your iPhone apps. It uses a hybrid approach by maintaining the Settings.app pane. So the user has the choice where to change the settings.

Dabr
Dabr is a PHP web interface to the Twitter API for mobile devices.

SproutCore
SproutCore: JavaScript HTML5 Application Framework

Your Bookmarklets, On Steroids
Quix is an extensible bookmarklet, that allows you to easily access all your bookmarks and bookmarklets, across all your browsers, while maintaining them in only one spot. All you have to do is remember the shortcut for the bookmarklet, so, basically, it’s like a command line for your browser.

IxEdit
IxEdit is a JavaScript-based interaction design tool for the web. With IxEdit, designers can practice DOM-scripting without coding to change, add, move, or transform elements dynamically on your web pages. Especially, IxEdit must be useful to try various interactions rapidly in the prototyping phase of your web application.

minibuilder
Flash MiniBuilder is a lightweight IDE created for developing programs written in ActionScript 3.

Real-time HTML Editor
Type HTML in the textarea above, and it will magically appear in the frame below.

Unicode code converter v7.0.1
Type or paste text in any of the green or grey shaded boxes and click on the button Convert button above it. Alternative representations will appear in all the other boxes. You can then cut & paste the results into your document.

Detect Mobile Browser
Open source mobile phone detection script.

Show {if}
A script for a better targeting of site visitors.

typeQuery
typeQuery, change website typography with jQuery.

Gipetto’s wordpress.tmbundle
A WordPress focused TextMate bundle to rule all WordPress Textmate bundles.

Graudit
Graudit is a simple script and signature sets that allows you to find potential security flaws in source code using the GNU utility grep. It’s comparable to other static analysis applications like RATS, SWAAT and flaw-finder while keeping the technical requirements to a minimum and being very flexible.

WordPress Plugin Maker
This plugin is made for developers or WordPress users who love Cut and Paste and hate FTP . If you have ever been in a pinch where you wanted to create a quick WordPress plugin to do something but didn’t have FTP info or weren’t at your terminal you can use this plugin to be a life saver.

Web development and deployment tools
Free online-based IDE for professional web-development.

Create diagrams online Real time collaboration
Cacoo is a user friendly online drawing tool that allows you to create a variety of diagrams such as site maps, wire frames, UML and network charts. Cacoo can be used free of charge.

UKI – Simple UI Kit for complex web apps
Uki is a fast and simple JavaScript user interface toolkit for desktop-like web applications. It comes with a rich view-component library ranging from Slider to List and SplitPane.

snap{css}: an open-source CSS editor for Windows
snap{css} is an extremely light-weight, notepad-like application that allows css designers to easily edit their code in a familiar environment while having quick acccess to helpful features such as our beautify and collapse functions.

jQuery Browser Plugin
A jQuery plugin extending browser detection capabilities.

jsPDF
jsPDF generates PDF documents using pure JavaScript

Grid System Generator
Grid System Generator includes generated grids, tutorials and resources.

User Agent Switcher Firefox Extension
The User Agent Switcher extension adds a menu and a toolbar button to switch the user agent of the browser. It is designed for Firefox, Flock, Seamonkey and Songbird, and will run on any platform that these browsers support including Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.

Useful Resources For Web Developers

ASCII Table – The Pronunciation Guide
The ASCII Symbols Pronunciation Guide

Five Awesome On-Screen Rulers
They’re not the sexiest programs in the world, but for many designers, on-screen rulers are must-haves. Here are five of the best- including the one I can’t live without. All free.

Using HTML Symbol Entities

Editorial Style Guides
This page provides a list of resources available for the web designer or developer who needs to create an editorial style guide for writing web site copy.

Open standards Web design with CSS, XHTML, Java servlets and Javascript
Code Style answers key questions for Web developers. Which Web fonts are most common? How to use media dependent style sheets? Make more robust, accessible Websites with open standards technology.

20+ Must have documents for Designers and Developers
In this post, you would find a list of over 20 free PDF files covering aspects of Web Development as well as Graphic design. These include cheat sheet for web developers, client questionnaires for Graphic and Web design, helpful checklists as well as some useful resources for designers and developers. All of these are available in PDF format as they are easy to print. I have a number of them hanging around in my work area and find them quite useful. It would be great if you have any helpful documents to share.

45 Incredibly Useful Web Design Checklists and Questionnaires
45 checklists to make your design process easier and more organized. Consider using these checklists as a jumping off point for creating your own customized list, based on your own needs.

PowerPoint Search Engine with detailed thumbnail results
SlideFinder: a search engine for slides and presentations.

Web Development for the iPhone: HTML & CSS Support
Safari and Safari for the iPhone support all HTML elements, including deprecated elements and even some proprietary elements that were never part of any W3C specifications. In addtion, Safari supports some HTML5 elements, even though the HTML5 specifications have not been finalized.

GrepDocs.com – all your docs are belong to us – PHP, Perl, CSS, HTML, Java, JavaScript, MySQL, Ruby, Python, and more
GrepDocs: a search engine for programming documentation

Last Click (= a bit of fun)

ASCII Fire Animation with JavaScript
This is when JavaScript is abused: ASCII Fire with JavaScript.

256b.htm (D)HTML Competition
256b.htm Competition: create a website in just 256 bytes

Browser Pong
This is definitely the best use of pop-ups for a long time. If you haven’t seen this, you must see it. It will make your day. Press “P’ for start.

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I know that there are many other hosting companies out there on the internet. Thousands of them! So if you know one that has a fantastic design and that deserves to be on the list and shared with the readers of WebDesignDev, then please feel free to drop in a comment. Enjoy!

Beautiful Hosting Site Designs…

Media Temple

* * * * *

Eleven 2

* * * * *

Sustainable Websites

* * * * *

This Web Host

* * * * *

Heart Internet

* * * * *

Think Host

* * * * *

A2B2

* * * * *

Rackspace Cloud

* * * * *

UK2

* * * * *

Wired Tree

* * * * *

Streamline

* * * * *

123 Reg

* * * * *

Hivelocity

* * * * *

Single Hop

* * * * *

iWeb Hosting

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As you will see in the following showcase, the most common section where textures are used is the background image. The goal is to make clear and immediate the contents and to higlight the typography creating a good contrast between textured backgrounds and texts. The results are absolutely stunning, and it’s fantastic to see as a soft texture can create a beautiful effect.

Creative and Effective Use of Textures in Web Design

Below you can see 37 examples of creative and well-designed websites that could inspire you. Enjoy!

Cooper Graphic Design

OneTwentySeven

Bahur78

Becoming Human

Urban Roots

MoNkEyNuTs

JasonGrayMusic.com

Coopers Kids

The Crazy Love Campaign

Mutt Ink

Luthier Services

Daniel Marino

Epic Event

Make Film Work

Hull Digital Live 09

Mazza Móveis

Mike Matas Blog

Levi Lodge

Odosketch

Deren Keskin

Thibault Jorge

Pepper and Koffee

BR Origin

Portfolio of Jasmin Halkić

Riot Industries

Joolz

Billy Tamplin

Corking Design

Giraffe Restaurants

Versions

Baney Design

Christina Lauer

The Caddis Fly Angling Shop

Information Highwayman

Irvine Acosta

Pat Dryburgh

Kamal Chaneman

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There are really two things to consider;  web site design and how customers are going to find the web site through mobile search.

How do you design for the mobile platform? The good news is that in most cases, you don’t need a separate site, you just need a cascading style sheet (CSS) attached to your website that feeds up specific instructions to a mobile browser. For the most part, mobile browsers are a lot like the web used to be; mainly text and links. Granted, as the iPhone, Google/Android Phones and other more advanced devices come along, the browsing features also advance. Most smart phones like the iPhone view the web as it should be without anything stripped out. But, since everyone doesn’t own a smart phone just yet, it’s worth focusing on the what the mass mobile market has, basic handheld web browsers.

When designing your CSS for handheld web browsers, here are a few things to consider:

1. You have very limited screen real estate. About 2×3 inches or so.
2. All fonts should be in their most basic format. Forget about color and typography.
3. All images should be striped out, unless they are absolutely necessary.
4. Remove all advertising as you already have limited screen space.
5. If you don’t need it, hide it. Remove any Google Friend Connect, Facebook Fan Box or other third party services. Focus on your content.
6. Remove all background colors. Basic black text on a white background is good.
7. Create basic forms, if you choose to keep them. My advice would be to remove them and just showcase the phone number. They are on their cell phone after all.
8. Remove Flash, Java and any plug-in content unless absolutely necessary.
9. All in all, simplify.

If you run a WordPress blog, you can use a WPtouch iPhone Theme plug-in to automatically create a small-screen friendly version of your blog.

If you want to view your site as if you were on a mobile browser, here are a few choices:

• Web Developer extension for Firefox. It allows you to overwrite the web style sheet with the handheld one if a site has one. If not, it’ll just show the site without any CSS styles.
• iPhone simulator called iPhoney. It looks cool, but since the iPhone really doesn’t render a striped down version of a site, it’s more of a toy.
• Opera Mini browser. There is an online version and it’s free. Simply put in a URL and it’ll render a website as if it was on a mobile phone.

From my testing, the Opera Mini browser was a great experience. It has a small screen, shows handheld versions of style sheets and all in all, it does a great job at giving you what a real phone will show. Here is my before having a handheld CSS and after experiences on the Opera Mini browser.

So where does SEO fall into all of this? Is there a separate ranking algorithm for mobile devices? No, not from what I can see.  While smart phone users can type or speak their search queries, the sort order rankings are fairly consistent between a search on a phone and a search on a computer.

Here’s an example with Google search on an iPhone and at Google.com.

The best way to ensure you are found on mobile devices is to make sure your site is in all the local search directories with full and accurate profiles. Places like Google Local and Yahoo local probably receive more traffic from users who want to find business in a certain area. When I’ve used my phone to search the web, I was searching for specific businesses to visit.  Social networking through mobile is also popular and through links, can drive web site traffic. A combination of search and social is the direction where I see the bulk of mobile traffic going.

Mobile search is an area of the Internet that is finally heating up which is supported by predictions made by eMarketer. Some marketers are putting a lot of stock into mobile marketing as cell phones and smart phones become more widespread and offer more capabilities. However, site owners are not always taking those platforms into account. To ensure your site is mobile ready, get listed in local directories and add a handheld CSS file to your site. These two easy items are a great start for optimizing your site for handheld web browsers.

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For one reason or another, almost all designers using Stock Images in their designs. Stock Images/Photography consists of existing Images/photographs that can be licensed for specific uses. Publishers, advertising agencies, graphic artists, and others use stock photography to fulfill the needs of their creative assignments.

There are a number of Royalty free Stock Images sources available on the web waiting to be paid for. Some of them are worth it, some are not. If you tired of spending money on High-Quality Images then we have something good for you by which you can save your money and increase your productivity.

Below, you’ll find Best Reliable Sources to Get Commercial and Free Micro Stock Images and Photographs over web. However, just make sure to read the license agreements carefully as they can change from time to time.

Buying the high-resolution image (purchasing the license) does not transfer the copyright. You may not claim that the image is your own and you may not sell, license for use, or in any way distribute the image for reuse. We recommend that you credit the agency and the photographer when you use an image. By this you benefit the community, of which you are an integral part, and help increase your success as part of the community, which, by growing contributions, gains quantity and quality.

You may be interested in the following related articles as well.

• 40+ Sources To Download High-Quality Royalty Free Stock Images
• 25+ Reliable Sources to Get Commercial WordPress Themes
• 20+ Reliable Sources to Get Commercial Joomla Templates
• 50+ Sources To Download High-Quality Free Vector Stuff

Please feel free to join us and you are always welcome to share your thoughts even if you have more reference links that our readers may like.

Don’t forget to subscribe to our RSS-feed and follow us on Twitter — for recent updates.

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Lets face it there is no enjoyment in writing a proposals. You became a web designer to build web sites, no one thought to mention anything about the processes you would have to follow to find new contracts and clients. Unfortunately, web design proposals are one of those essential processes you have to learn, and learn well.

The biggest question I have asked myself in the past is – "Are they really worth all this hassle?" The answer sadly is YES, they are.

A client contacts you regarding a new web site, you will discuss it first, you will then ask him to fill out a project questionnaire, and then they they will no doubt ask “How much will that cost?”. You will have to explain to them that you will have to analyze the details of the project and that you will be in touch in a few days with the report.
Now, it is those details that clients like. It is those details that will decide whether you get the contract or not. Not only will you have to convey, within the proposal, a comprehensive account of the processes involved in developing the project, you will also have to convince them that you know exactly what you are doing and that you are the best person for the job. It has to build your clients confidence from the start and allow them to trust your expertise.

In this post you will find resources to help you write a successful web design proposal, that will help you to win contracts every time…. or at least most of the time!

What are your thoughts on web design proposals? What tips do you have? Please leave a comment and share your experiences.

Writing a Website Design Proposal

A website design proposal is a fancy way of saying quote. Often a potential client will come to you asking, “What will this kind of site cost me?” You should do some research, using a client questionnaire before giving the client a quote and submitting your proposal.
Website design proposals can take all forms – there’s no set way to create one. There will be some things you’ll see in all design proposals they are a must, and the author lists the most common, and adds a fair few insightful new sections.

Writing a Website Design Proposal »

Tutorial – How to Write a Basic Web Development Proposal

Knowing and understanding what exactly you should include in a proposal is the first step to convincing clients and winning contracts.
A professionally presented and well written development proposal more often than not decides whether you will win or lose the project. The proposal can also decreases the incidences of misunderstandings between yourself and your clients when the project is under way and acts as a basis for a formal contract.
Read this article for an in-depth analysis of what should and is expected from a web design proposal.

Tutorial – How to Write a Basic Web Development Proposal »

7 Tips For Writing A Winning Web Design Proposal

If you’re soliciting web design work in traditional ways, a major step in winning jobs is the proposal phase. There are certain things you can do to put yourself, your capabilities and your company in the best possible light, whether you’re outlining what you have to offer in an e-mail message, or submitting a complete proposal.
What would you put in a proposal?
In this article they outline in detail seven very useful tips for designers of any level and background and help you improve your proposal process.

7 Tips For Writing A Winning Web Design Proposal »

How to Write a Web Design Proposal – Anatomy of a Persuasive Proposal

If you plan on paying the bills, you can’t avoid the painful activity that is web design proposal writing. What you need to do is become more efficient and better at writing them. Outsource what you can and hack the rest!
Before you can quickly and efficiently write amazing proposals, you’ll need some basic background on what a persuasive proposal is made of. A proposal has to be persuasive, it must convince the reader that you are the absolutely best person for the job.

How to Write a Web Design Proposal – Anatomy of a Persuasive Proposal »

Five Steps to Writing Proposals That Sell [Find Clients]

In today’s market, if you can’t write good proposals, you won’t be able to sell. Its a simple fact.
Let’s face it: we’re in a buyer’s market when it comes to freelance services. For every job you bid on, you’re competing with five, ten, or even more other freelancers.
When you’re stuck in a crowd like that, you’ve got to find a way to set yourself apart, or face 20:1 (or even longer!) odds on winning that contract. How do you do that? How can you beat the odds?
Even if you have a prior relationship, a good proposal helps reinforce your ability to deliver. And if you’re part of a cattle-call, a good proposal can push you to the top of the stack.
If the thought of writing fills you with trepidation, this article covers in five simple steps you can follow to write proposals that sell. The steps they cover are:
1. Steal a proposal that works
2. Understand (and flatter) your target
3. First the end, then the means
4. Use simple words
5. The price is right (and this is a buyer's market)

Five Steps to Writing Proposals That Sell [Find Clients] »

Writing A Project Proposal – Don't Give Up!

Having 100% of project proposals accepted usually means that a freelance developer has had very few clients. Low percentage rates usually mean that proposals are being sent to people who didn’t ask or the proposal writer simply needs a few good “getting warmer’s” in the right direction.
The tried and tested tips, in this article, are to encourage the 100%ers to write more proposals and the low raters to take heart and give it another try.

Writing A Project Proposal – Don't Give Up!

The Secret to Landing Clients Nearly 100% of the Time

Turning a prospect into a client is a process-based on a system. Identifying deliverables and executing campaigns for a client is a series of tasks based on a system.
Create the right system and you can almost flawlessly guarantee success and satisfaction every time.
In this informative and eye-opening article, the author not only writes about his experiences as a freelancer but also how they stumbled upon a system for winning over clients (nearly all the time) by simply outsourcing…

The Secret to Landing Clients Nearly 100% of the Time »

How to Make a Positive First Impression with Potential Clients

For clients, choosing a designer for their project is often based on their comfort level with the designer and their confidence that the designer will do a great job.
First impressions make a huge impact here and can either get you much closer to landing the job, or they can lead the client to eliminate you from consideration.
In this article they look at 11 significant factors that may influence the early impressions from a potential client. These are things that you should focus on to show that you should be considered for the work and that you are more than capable of giving them an excellent website that will be effective for their business.

How to Make a Positive First Impression with Potential Clients »

The Ultimate Design Brief

Your design can only be as good as the brief you worked from. The best projects are borne from briefs that are open enough to inspire ideas, while being specific enough to feel workable.
Unfortunately, clients who aren’t familiar with the design process don’t see carefully-written briefs as a high priority. This may be because they don’t have time. Quite often, it’s because the client hasn’t made fundamental decisions about the objectives of their marketing collateral.
This article talks about how to influence potential clients into writing detailed briefs that will allow you to write a winning proposal.

The Ultimate Design Brief »

Downloadable Web Design Proposal Samples

The first thing to make clear is that the below samples are not templates. Meaning, you can't just take them and use them for your own proposal.
What they do is demonstrate how to effectively and professionally write a winning proposal.

Website Proposal for Company X

Rogue Element Sample Proposal

Sample Website Proposal

Gold Sample Proposal

Professional Web Design Proposal Sample

Sample Web Design Contract, Budget, Timeline & Proposal

A Sample Web Design Proposal: The Designer's Blueprint for the Site

Free Web Design Proposal Contracts (I)

Free Web Design Proposal Contracts (II)

Free Web Design Proposal Contracts (III)

Proposal Apps and Services

Using a web based app to create your proposals is perhaps an option you should consider. There is of course, a trade-off in terms of customizability and originality when you compare templates to your own original documents, but what you get back in time saving may make it worth your while.
Below you will find the best online services for generating professional web design proposals.

Bidsketch

Bidsketch is a proposal-writing tool created specifically for designers. With Bidsketch, you can quickly and easily create elegant, customized proposals and send them to clients. You can also use Bidsketch to keep track of both existing clients and potential clients, so you can find the work you need to stay in business.
There are several professional-looking templates available for proposals, and you also have the option to create a custom template with a little HTML knowledge.
Bidsketch is not free, but you can try it for free for 30 days. The Premium plan costs $19 a month and the basic plan is only $9.

Try Bidsketch »

Video – Bidsketch Walkthrough

Proposalware

Proposalware has been developed and can be customised for almost all types of industry, so is not only restricted for web design proposals.
You can use this app via your computer or any smartphone, allowing you to send proposals quickly and timely and not wasting precious time preparing complicated forms and documents for every single contract.
This service offers a 60 day free trial and the premium package cost $10 per month and $100 per year.

Try Proposalware »

Video – iPhone Proposal Web Application ProposalWare.com

ProposalPad

ProposalPad is a unique system developed for web designers and graphic designers that makes it very easy to create FREE (with premium options) professional graphic and web design project proposals.
Its a very easy to use free service. All you have to do is upload your company information, color scheme, and logo initially, and you're good to go.

Try ProposalPad »

Flowlett

Flowlett is a complete proposal management system that goes beyond traditional CRM and messaging systems to streamline customer interactions around proposals. Once you create a business proposal (example: Quotes, Agreements, Marketing Creatives etc.), you can use Flowlett to route it internally for reviews and approvals, using serial, parallel or hybrid workflows that you define dynamically.
Once ready to present to the client, you can use Flowlett to securely collaborate with your client to finalize it. Once finalized, your client can securely approve it online.
They do give a 30 day FREE trial, where after you can choose between the Standard Plan ($15 a month) or the Plus Plan (from $50 a month).

Try Flowlett »

Video – Introduction to Flowlett

You might also like…

10 Completely Free Wireframe and Mockup Applications »
A Collection of Useful Web Design Wireframing Resources »
10 Online Tools and Apps to Help Optimize and Format CSS »
CSS References, Tutorials, Cheat Sheets, Conversion Tables and Short Codes »
The Blueprint CSS Framework – Tutorials, How-to Guides and Tools »
50 Essential Web Typography Tutorials, Tips, Guides and Best Practices »
50 Useful Tools and Generators for Easy CSS Development »
20+ Resources and Tutorials for Creative Forms using CSS »
24 CSS (in some cases with jQuery) Navigation and Menu Tutorials »
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The best way to keep track of our tweets is simply to follow us on Twitter, however, in case you missed some here’s a quick and useful compilation of the best tweets that we sent out this past week.

Note that this is only a very small selection of the links that we tweeted about, so don’t miss out.

To keep up to date with all the cool links, simply follow us @DesignerDepot

10 Keys to Growth as a Designer: http://bit.ly/85TvVc

How to create funny swirls in Illustrator: http://bit.ly/6RQ6Rf

Printers from hell? http://bit.ly/5gSM2y

To Serif or Sans-Serif, That is The Question: http://bit.ly/7laIpZ

Stunning Bokeh Textures: http://bit.ly/4Q9efG

12 Killer Tips for Designing in the Browser: http://bit.ly/55RE9g

On font pairing in logo design: http://bit.ly/81gGYz

The Case Against Vertical Navigation: http://bit.ly/5F8clt

Let Your Audience Guide Your Design! http://bit.ly/5v3q3y

The six fundamental ways of adding depth to your designs: http://bit.ly/5AsYjA

What happens when you mix living room furniture and the male form? http://bit.ly/8rrDsO (via @Behance)

On the Track of Good Type: http://bit.ly/51bOX9

Designer Desks to Kill For: http://bit.ly/4xSCKV

Designing an Idea – How to Beautify your Inspiration: http://bit.ly/75O2pl

How to Make Yourself Stand Out as a Freelancer: http://bit.ly/4QFd1p

Usability Study: Shopping For Bedsheets – How Hard Could It Be?: http://bit.ly/5NVzt6

Principles of Great Design: Craftsmanship: http://bit.ly/8YpT7C

Packaging Designs That Pack A Punch: http://bit.ly/6YU2aj

All the Apple tablet rumors in one picture: http://bit.ly/8zhTiY

Clever and Creative IKEA Advertising: http://bit.ly/5e1MIU

Want more? No problem! Keep track of all our tweets by following us @DesignerDepot

If you find an exclusive RSS freebie on this feed or on the live WDD website, please use the following code to download it: E0th0K

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The content revolves around web design, blogging and funny situations that we encounter in our daily lives as designers.

These great cartoons are created by Jerry King, an award-winning cartoonist who’s one of the most published, prolific and versatile cartoonists in the world today.

So for a few moments, take a break from your daily routine, have a laugh and enjoy these funny cartoons.

Feel free to leave your comments and suggestions below as well as any related stories of your own…

A Marketing Genius

Bad Timing

We’re in the Money

Can you relate to these situations? Please share your funny stories and comments below…

If you find an exclusive RSS freebie on this feed or on the live WDD website, please use the following code to download it: E0th0K

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An new year new sponsors our first new year edition of our monthly thank you post to our sponsors for their support throughout January, who have helped and supported Creative Nerds immensely to help increase the growth of our site.

Become one of our sponsors and get your site noticed by our readers

Creative Nerds has thousands of visitors each day and one of the main perks of becoming one of our sponsors is that your company or product will be noticed by thousands of people each month. Each Month we write a post dedicated to our sponsors thanking them for their support, making our readers aware of our sponsors and chance for our readers to learn a bit more about sponsors.

Heart Internet

Heart Internet’s Reseller Professional account is every Internet professional’s dream. Specially tailored for web designers, Internet integrators, web hosting resellers and developers, our Reseller package includes unlimited web space, unlimited bandwidth and the ability to host unlimited domains at no extra charge!

ForeUI

ForeUI is a handy UI prototyping tool. It can rapidly create static or interactive, skinnable UI prototypes of your website or software. You can use ForeUI to:

Create mock-up for the GUI in your mind and make others understand quickly. Make working prototype of website or software to collect feedback from potential users. Perform usability testing before releasing the beta version. Generate the schematics that can be inserted in the design documents.

PSD To Html

RapidxHTML is a small team of designers and developers, with a wide range of skills and experience. Each of us know our strengths and weaknesses and how these fit into the big picture.

They came together with one simple objective to offer professional XHTML / CSS markup services at affordable price. We combine expertise in eye-catching graphic layout with modern web design standards built into one of the most powerful systems in the world.

Premium WordPress Themes

Premium WordPress Themes Club! Are developing professional wordpress themes and provide efficient support of our templates. Join the club and choose the membership that suits your needs. We are proud to invite you to the best wordpress themes club and provide you with the full access to all our themes, as well as tutorials, support and the community forum.

Viva Themes

They create quality and professionally designed wordpress themes. They offer themes for your business, blog or personal sites. All of that comes with their excellent free support.

PSD Mall

Psdmall is a web design shop that sells unique photoshop designs. All designs are created from scratch in photoshop and are delivered in a .psd format. Psdmall is the perfect solution for newbie designers, developers, domainers, or anyone in need of a high quality design at an affordable price.

Digital Product Delivery

Each day, thousands of vendors use DPD to automatically sell downloads and deliver their digital products to customers. Integrating with PayPal and other popular payment processors, DPD is the quick and easy way to set up your products for automated selling.

Stockvault

Stockvault.net is a stock photo sharing website where designers and photographers can meet to share their images. You don’t have to sign up to be able to download our images, but we’d like you to do so anyway, just so you can gain access to our special features. All images on this site are free for personal and non-commercial usage.

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There are many elements that go into the creation of a website. A website is the best medium to communicate with users from all over the world. It is therefore essential, it should be designed in such a way that users should be attracted and be engaged on the site. This is when a website can reach its users effectively.

Designers have often wondered about the secret ingredient to make a website appealing. The combination of design and functionality is something every designer wishes to implement in a site. Many successful websites have one main secret ingredient, not every designer is aware about. That element is website interactivity.

What is Web Interactivity?

A simple example can illustrate this point. Picture this: 2 shopping stores are right next to each other. However, one attracts more customers than the other although both have the same goods. This is only because of one reason. The one shop that attracts more customers uses the concept of interaction with people. This is in terms of consumer suggestions, attractive offers, contests and displays. The whole scenario draws people as the overall environment makes a customer feel more comfortable.

In terms of web design, the concept can work in the same manner. The trick lies in a subtle use of web interactions to attract users and cause them to engage on a page.

Here, we can take another example. A radio button or hyperlinks are elements of a web interface. Contrast these with a 3Dimensional Cube or a 3Dimensional Flip Book, both being examples of interactivity. They are complete experiences of doing stuff that engages users with web pages whilst the user is going through the information displayed on the website. This is what makes these examples stand out. The use of interactivities woven very creatively with website content makes them successful in capturing user-attention.

How does one achieve website interactivity?

There are many elements that can be focused upon to achieve web interactivity that attracts users. The main subject of the website should be taken into consideration. This can give a clue as to the kind of interaction to be used. For example, a product website will have various categories on display. The range should be presented in an interactive manner rather than plain rows of products. A 3Dimensional Flip Book can be used to its advantage to showcase a range of products with the relevant information. A user gets engaged whilst flipping through the book.

The creation of these website interactivities requires time to be spent on technical details. However, in the recent times, designers can create these interactivities within minutes without any programming with rapid interactivity software that is available in the market.

Examples of great interactivity websites

Infinit Colours
This example shows the creative use of design and content. The design of the website is such that it engages users from the first moment itself. A user can change the background of the website. Besides, the menu is simple and hangs freely at the bottom area. It can even be dropped down if required. The color and layout used is clutter free. The text is neat without seeming too overpowering yet giving the message to be conveyed. The company is an advertising based company that conveys to users about the abundance of creativity.

Starbucks Coffee at Home
This brand sure does know how to impress its users with loads of creativity that is used generously on its site! A user can simply know the kind of coffee taste he/she is more suited to by taking a simple Find my Perfect Coffee quiz. It makes browsing the site fun and interactive. A user can view the different types of coffee available by moving the cursor over the coffee packets as shown in the image.

Square Circle
This creative agency does know how to connect with its users. Prospective clients are bound to be impressed with the way the site engages the users; one needs to pan through the page and zoom in to view details.

Roth Aniko
This artist manages to display the portfolio in an interactive manner. In this website, users can find a good balance of color, layout along with the interesting presentation of information that engages users.

Harry Potter
Harry Potter lovers will surely love this interactive site which has used interesting elements for display. The picture gallery is used in an interesting way with the pictures revolving around the main figure as shown in the image.

Cathy Beck Communication
The home page of this website involves little interaction. But as a user clicks on the tabs, the layout unfolds into an interesting layout with a zoom panel in the corner; a user can zoom in and out and is engaged on the site!

Magnivate Interactive Boutique Agency
This creative agency has used a unique approach on their site. The site has a cartoon character which takes a user through the various segments in a very interactive way.

Data Fisher
The company information is presented through an interactive 3Dimensional book. This book has a very creative mix of visuals and company information, the combination of which makes the content very readable!

Mercedes A-to-S
This site is one of the perfect examples of a creative and intelligent use of interactivities. The various features of the Mercedes car are explained through a very intelligent use of Flash. The quality of leather can actually be ‘felt’ once the cursor is clicked and dragged over the surface as shown in the image.

Nokia 3110 Evolve
This Nokia website has a very interesting and engaging interaction, where in a user can move the cursor over the mobile phones and the entire angle of the phone changes.

In the same website, a click on the phone enlarges it, as shown in the image. The phone can be viewed in a 3Dimensional way which definitely appears more interesting as compared to a display of images.

Aparte Graphique
The website has a great combination of interactivity. There is a cartoon character along with an engaging way of presentation of information.

Monoface
This creative agency knows how to display its creativity rather than talk about it! The main image can be played around with, by changing the facial features to try many funny combinations!

Unfortunate Events movie
This popular movie needs no introduction as it is full of creative effects. The website is created on the same lines; users can move the cursor over the elements to know details. These are shown in a very creative fashion keeping in mind the concept of the movie.

Website interactivity thus forms to be a very important ingredient for web design. Has this idea made you have a second glance at your website? I would love to hear your response about website interactivity.

Let us share our experiences right here, keep the comments rolling in!

About Author: Poonam works as Product Manager at Harbinger Group and looks after Raptivity Web Expert. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Engineering and is an active blogger.

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This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business.

Small business owners may have more of a need than most to be able to access their chosen suite of productivity tools from more than one computer or platform. As a business or startup owner you may have occasion to bring your work home with you, or require frequent access to your to-do lists, notes and documents on the go.

Choosing primarily online tools for your productivity workflow is a great way to address the issue of source agnostic accessibility. It’s also a convenient method to ensure you have a backup of your important day-to-day items and files in case a particular computer or device fails. One other not insignificant factor in selecting cloud-based tools to keep you and your business on track is cost: the online equivalents of once desktop-bound applications are often much cheaper in both raw cost and maintenance cost, as tool upgrades usually happen behind the scenes and don’t require an in-house IT staff to keep up and running.

With the tools on this list, you should be able to check in on your current workflow stack regardless of which machine you happen to be in front of, what operating system it uses, and what browser it’s running. Plus, if you have a smartphone as your trusty mobile companion, chances are you’ll be able to access your tools from there as well. Check out our previous guide to mobile productivity tools as a logical companion to this piece, and consider your phone platform and setup and how well it may integrate with particular tools as you build out your productivity arsenal.

To-do Lists

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One of the favorite and often-mentioned entrants in the to-do list category among productivity geeks is Remember the Milk. Featuring a robust reminder system via your choices of SMS, IM, or email, offline task management, integration with Google Calendar, and tight integration with several mobile platforms, Remember the Milk also has a clean and easy to use interface that Gettings Things Done aficionados swoon over. It also integrates with a number of other web services and third parties including Netvibes and iGoogle, Google maps, Twitter, Jott, the Mac and Linux desktop, and more.

Far from being the only game in town, however, Remember the Milk has a number of online to-do list peers worth checking out. Toodledo is a popular newcomer with a full-featured slate of ways to enter, organize, and sort your tasks. Featuring a tiered freemium service model, Toodledo also has great mobile integration and offers a handy comparison chart on how it stacks up against other popular web-based to-do apps.

If your to-do tastes run on the simpler and less cluttered side of the spectrum, there are several options worth looking into. TeuxDeux bills itself as a “simple, designy, free, browser-based to-do app” and embraces a minimalist interface accordingly. Task.fm is another interesting option in the minimalist category, with a source agnostic and natural language approach to getting items in and back out to you at just the right time with various reminder options. Ta-da List is a product from 37signals, makers of other popular web project management tools like Basecamp, Backpack, and Campfire — so if your small business already uses any 37signals tools you might find Ta-da List an excellent companion. Last but not least, the former Gmail Labs project Gmail Tasks is a simple to-do list that integrates right into Gmail, making it a nice and lightweight option for businesses that already use Gmail and/or Google Apps for email.

Note-Taking

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It’s difficult to write about cloud-based note-taking without mentioning Evernote. You can get notes into Evernote in any number of ways, from email to browser bookmarklet to desktop or mobile app, as well as via the web-based interface and even via Twitter. You can also leave voice notes, plus have Evernote use optical character recognition to scan photos of business cards and other documents, converting printed material into searchable text. On the organizational side, you can create multiple notebooks, tag individual entries, and set up saved searches for frequently accessed collections. Evernote’s freemium business model offers a generous amount of monthly usage in the free version and a reasonable $5 per month/$45 per year premium version with a higher usage limit and other pro features.

Two other good choices for cloud-based notebooks that integrate well with their full-featured office suite counterparts are Google Notebook and Zoho Notebook. Both feature a typical web-based WYSIWYG note-taking environment as well as sharing and collaboration options for your notes and documents that need to be socialized. If you already routinely use either Google Docs or Zoho Office in your business to manage documents, it might make sense to adopt their notebook counterparts for your outboard brain workflow needs.

A couple of online note-taking options based on wiki technology include Springnote and Luminotes. They feature easy methods of linking pages and concepts together, and if you’re already familiar with the wiki concept and looking for a lightweight notebook that uses similar concepts you may want to check out these two. Springnote also promotes collaboration via notebook sharing as well.

Information and News Gathering

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When it comes to staying on top of developments in your industry and trends that might affect your business, it can seem daunting to make sure what’s most important crosses your desk and your eyeballs. Several related categories of online tools can help sift through the noise and help you pull out the signal, plus safely store information and concepts you may need to retrieve later.

In an earlier article we covered how to choose a news reader for keeping tabs on your industry, and by far the most popular web-based offering in that category is Google Reader. And if you prefer a cleaner, more magazine-like view of your Reader feeds over Google’s native interface, Firefox users should definitely give Feedly a try. But simply employing an RSS reader doesn’t always solve the problem of having too much incoming information to stay on top of, which doesn’t always come in at the most convenient time for you to absorb it.

A couple of tools can help with the latter problem of specifically storing an article and helping you remember to read it later, perhaps when other duties and tasks have quieted down and you find yourself with some spare moments to catch up on the things you knew you should make time to read at some point. Both Instapaper and Read It Later allow you to create a stack of items set aside for later reading, with a simple and uncluttered interface allowing you to check off or archive items after you’ve gotten around to reading them. Both integrate with various other tools in your online arsenal, with browser bookmarklet entry and iPhone integration. Instapaper also integrates with Feedly so you can send items directly to it from your feed reading experience, while Read It Later offers a Firefox extension that brings your “to read” stack closely into your browser. Instapaper also allows you to easily generate a printable version of your on deck items, or even download them in Kindle or ePub formats for reading on the go.

For longer-term storage of important articles, social bookmarking tools come in handy for preventing your bookmarks from being “trapped” in a single browser on a single machine. One of the original pioneering web services, delicious.com, is still flourishing (and now owned by Yahoo). Using a browser bookmarklet you can send articles and web pages you want to refer back to later to your delicious account, plus a short personal note and topic tags. The net effect of collecting many users’ individual bookmarks also creates a valuable discovery engine that can turn you on to even more relevant material in your business’s industry or niche. Two other options worth checking out include Diigo, a relative newcomer that offers integration with your delicious collection and allows you to highlight and annotate portions of pages, and Clipmarks, which focuses on saving and sharing just the parts of web pages you find most useful.

Going Further

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The above are just a few of the productivity categories in which online tools can help your current workflow stack stay accessible from almost anywhere. Other web-based tools can help with mobile office needs from calendaring to document collaboration, file-sharing to collaborative presentations, from start pages to contact management and more. Other tools, like Jott Assistant, are out there to help you tie those tools together and access them via other applications you use regularly.

It’s helpful to keep a flexible and open attitude towards your workflow and the tools you use, and occasionally take stock of what’s working, what’s not working as well as it should, and areas where your productivity seems to suffer. If you’re willing to spend even a modest amount of time being periodically adventurous with new tools, you could open workflow channels you weren’t even aware were blocked, and even infuse your day-to-day and your business with new ideas and new energy.

More business resources from Mashable:

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- HOW TO: Choose a News Reader for Keeping Tabs on Your Industry
– HOW TO: Use a Start Page to Stay Organized
– The 10 Stages of Social Media Business Integration
– 5 Tips for Creating a Successful Social Media Contest
– HOW TO: Measure Social Media ROI
– HOW TO: Use Social Media to Connect with Other Entrepreneurs
– HOW TO: Implement a Social Media Business Strategy

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, inkastudio

Tags: business, evernote, gmail tasks, google notebook, google reader, List, Lists, online productivity, productivity, Productivity Lists, small business, task.fm, Zoho

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Every page of Yahoo Finance has a link that says "Finance Search". Users can simply click this to search or browse a list of the day’s popular finance searches.

When a user’s search exactly matches a ticker or quote name, the user will see pricing information and a chart. They will also get news stories from Yahoo and the web. Another section provides a list of companies (pubic and private), ETFs, Mutual Funds, and Indices (from US and worldwide exchanges) generated from matches between the user’s search and content on Yahoo Finance, including company/quote name, ticker, business summary, key execs, analysts, and insiders.

"As an example, you can enter the name of a person (‘Carol Bartz‘) or a topic (‘biodynamic farm‘) to find related companies," explains Yahoo. "In the example of Carol Bartz, she is a key exec and insider at the companies listed. In the example of ‘biodynamic farm,’ biodynamic farm is mentioned in the business summary on the company profile pages."

When a user uses web search results, they will find content from Yahoo Finance and the web. In the default "all results" view, the top three results come from Yahoo Finance and the ones after that are from the web. However, users can choose the option to view only results from Yahoo Finance or only the web.

Related Articles:

> Yahoo Sponsored Search Getting New Features

> Carol Bartz Gives Self A B-

> Yahoo, Bing Trade Market Share Again

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Trouble is, that’s what their competitors are doing also and in this day and age, it’s just not enough.

Does Your Business Stand Out Online?

Most advertising on the Web follows a time-honored format, although some might call it a time-worn format as it does little to differentiate itself. You can bet that a high percentage of this advertising will be ignored and the money spent on it will be wasted.

So how does a company stand out from the crowd online?

Thanks to an oversupply of similar text, claims, and presentation – coupled with a short 21st century attention span – your website has less than ten seconds to move a visitor to action. If it doesn’t, that visitor will click away to another site, and then another. Therefore, it’s critical that you find a way to break through the noise your competitors are making. But even that’s not enough.

Statistics show that even the best-looking websites generate conversion rates of under one percent, so for every 100 visitors you do manage to get, less than one will call or email you. Sound bleak? Thinking of redirecting more of your advertising budget back to the Yellow Pages? Don’t. You’re on the right
track – you just haven’t leveraged all the power available to you online.

One-to-Many Communication. On-on-One Feel.

Most websites are little more than electronic versions of Yellow Page advertising. For the most part, they don’t encourage interaction beyond the obligatory “Contact me for more information” plea. These sites don’t encourage trust any more than their print counterparts. They don’t give visitors the
warm-and-fuzzy feeling that a face-to-face meeting would. But they can.

Searching for a local service provider online can be a daunting prospect, but even more daunting than the search is deciding which provider to use once you get to the page, especially since most websites promise the standard good service, competitive pricing and high quality.

So how does a business differentiate itself from the sea of competition? Web video makes this possible on a grand scale. Thanks to rapidly improving technology, it’s easier than ever to add that warm-and-fuzzy, face-to-face element to your site, replicate an in-person interview, and offer your visitors an opportunity to check you out before picking up the phone. With Web video, you can present an interview that addresses all the questions and concerns of potential clients. You can keep them on your site longer and give them insight into the “business behind the business.” In a way that wasn’t possible even a few years ago, business owners can now speak directly to their audiences and showcase their personalities and areas of expertise. This is especially helpful if you are a professional service provider.

Any business that relies on conveying trust-ability will benefit from this type of web marketing. Really, it’s one-to-many communication with a one-on-one feel. It’s the perfect ice breaker and an efficient means of generating the interest and trust needed to compel potential clients to make an appointment
and do business.

A high-quality Web interview placed strategically on your site is a huge timesaver for you and prospective clients because you reach a wide audience in minimal time. Potential clients get the information they need to pre-qualify – and pre-sell – themselves before they call.

Online video delivers some of the best ROI of any advertising medium today and if set up properly, actually ranks higher than text now by the major search engines like Google. Short of spending valuable face time with a potential client (often times a poorly qualified potential client) there is simply no better way to forge a personal connection with them. With that in mind, here are 10 tips to help you get the most of your online video marketing efforts.

10 Tips for Making the Most of Online Video

1. Make Sure Your Video is Professionally Done.
This is an absolute must. The whole point here is to establish credibility and trust, but you’ll do the opposite with a poorly executed and produced video. Yes, many of the videos you find on sharing sites are mediocre at best, but that is changing rapidly as companies begin to see the value of promoting themselves in this manner. In fact, a recent Permission TV survey found that 67% of 400 hundred top executives intended to focus their online marketing efforts on video in 2009. The rush is coming – find a personable, engaging interviewer and a top notch production crew to really stand out.

2. Submit Your Video to as Many Outlets as Possible.
While YouTube is the clear leader here, there are many other video sharing sites worthy of consideration. Here are some others you won’t want to pass up:

    • Google Video
    • Yahoo! Video
    • Daily Motion
    • MySpaceTV
    • MetaCafe
    • Revver
    • Veoh
    • Blinkx
    • Break

3. Embed Your Video on the Front Page of Your Site.
Don’t hide what’s going to become one of your most effective selling tools on a dusty inside page. Get it out front. Customers and search engines will love you for it.

4. Find Out What Search Terms Your Potential Clients are Using
and Put Them in Your Video’s Title.
If you don’t know what words clients in need of your services are typing into Google and other search engines, get professional help or use some of the resources featured on this page. Once you’ve identified these terms, use the most popular in your video’s title.

5. Make Your Tags and Descriptions SEO-friendly, too.
Most video sharing sites let you tag videos with keywords and post a short description, so get the most out of these by sprinkling in the search terms you’ve identified.

6. Don’t Forget Your Thumbnail.
A thumbnail is a still shot from your video that appears along with search results. Don’t waste this opportunity to present yourself in the best light possible – choose a key moment from your video, preferably one where you’re smiling as you speak with your interviewer.

7. Link Back to Your Site.
Put your URL near the top of your video’s description. You’ll get a higher search ranking and potential clients will quickly learn where to go for more information.

8. Interact With Your Viewers.
Most video sharing sites allow viewer comments. Use this opportunity to answer questions, respond to comments, and further promote your business.

9. Consider a Pay-Per-Click Campaign.
Natural search engine optimization, while effective, takes time to bear fruit. In the meantime, you might want to jump start the process with a pay-per-click campaign that gives you a sponsored search listing. You can learn more about PPC advertising at:

    • www.google.com/intl/en/ads
    • sem.smallbusiness.yahoo.com/searchenginemarketing

    • advertising.microsoft.com/search-advertising

10. Add New Content Often.
Search engines look for it and so do potential clients. Keep your content fresh and up-to-date and keep visitors coming back for more.

With an ever-increasing stream of competition, it’s more important than ever to stand out from the crowd. These days standing out means maximizing your online presence and leveraging the technology to present the unique advantages of you and your firm. There’s no better way for a growth-oriented business to build a solid and secure future than by using effective and affordable online video.

Use these free resources to get a handle on the terms that potential clients are using to search for you right now.

    • Wordtracker
    • Google AdWords
    • Keyword Discovery
    • KwMap
    • Google Trends

Diana D’Itri is co-owner of IDR, LLC, a media production and marketing company. Since 2002, Diana has helped business professionals all over the U.S. to differentiate themselves from their competition and increase web conversions through online and cable television broadcasting. www.idrbroadcasting.com

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

10 Tips to Grow Your Business Using Online Video

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With Litmus you can:

• Web site testing: Thoroughly test your web pages. See precisely how they appear in a wide range of web browsers.
• Email testing: See exactly how your email newsletters appear in a wide range of email clients and web mail systems.

Features:

• Lightning-fast results: Iterate quickly: solve more cross-platform issues in less time.
• One-click publishing: Show your clients: instantly publish your test results online.
• Precise bug tracking: Never lose your place: at-a-glance tracking of compatibility bugs.
• Painless versioning: Stay organised: version timelines to navigate through your tests.

http://litmusapp.com/

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This is our selection of our favorite web designs from the past week, some sites we discovered, but the most of them have been recommended by our readers.
Thanks for all your recommendations, and we hope you like the selection of sites as much as we do.
Send us your recommendation for next weeks Weekly Web Design and Development Inspiration (for our review), by clicking here: Submit News.

bornintents

Auxiliary Design Co.

HiiDef Inc.

Zachary Pulman

Vegas Uncork'd

Delibar, Delicious Mac client

Digital Podge 2009

z8

Reknit

Giang Nguyen’s Portfolio

Smooth Step

Team Excellence

Notorious Design

Festival Boreal 2009

Information Highwayman

El Designo

Matt Kursmark

Larkef

Central Story

You might like… previous Weekly Inspirations

Weekly Web Design and Development Inspiration – N.22 »
Weekly Web Design and Development Inspiration – N.21 »
Weekly Web Design and Development Inspiration – N.20 »
Weekly Web Design and Development Inspiration – N.19 »
Weekly Web Design and Development Inspiration – N.18 »
Weekly Web Design and Development Inspiration Archives »

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Web design trends change with the wind – what is popular this year will undoubtedly not be popular next year. There is only one web design style that you can rely on and be deemed timeless – and that is the Vintage style. And alongside that, and similar in style, there is the permanently cool and always creative – retro(ism).

Vintage and retro should not be categorized as a style – they are much more than that. They are a movement in themselves and a bold and creative statement that is unparalleled with any other other web design style.

This article is a homage to these styles…

Team Fannypack

this by them

ONETWENTYSIX

The New York Moon

Team Fortress 2 – The Sniper vs. Spy Update

SLABOVIA

Todd Miller

MISTER-AERO

The Astonishing Adventures of Lord Likely

B I R D I E // B I R D I E

level2d

The Wayward Irregular

Taywell

The Antique Piano Shop

The Movie Title Stills collection

Linnea's Lights

KULTIKA

Ready Photo Site

16toads Design

TheStatement

Bullet PR

Mr Vector

WEB-O-MATIC

Torpedo Juice

Cheesetique

Tomatic

The Closet Entrepreneur

The Art of Catalin Bridinel

Analog

All Star Lanes

Michela Chiucini

The Dollar Dreadful Family Library

Circus Family

LP-SF

Death Cab For Cutie

Hot Meteor

MacTarnahan's Brewing Company

Jeffrey Sarmiento

singularityconcepts.com

Edgepoint Church

Webdesigner.ro

mediaBOOM

RejectedRobot

Pain is Good

Big State Games

Stolen Design

Lana Landis

Prahba

DeVotchKa

Thunderfuel

National Cottonseed Products Association

Five Cent Stand

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50 Essential Web Typography Tutorials, Tips, Guides and Best Practices »
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From the Twitter Stream

Followers

@WordCampToronto

@UsabilityDesign

@skrug

@bigspaceship

@SkinnyShips

@freeloadthis

Web Finds

mockingbird – a really simple wireframe app

project bubble – a very fun simple project management app

WordCamp Toronto – Who’s going?

Setup Your Personalized Google Apps Suite – I recently did this, and it was really really simple

Digital Podge – Measurable Fun

verb – Another nice simple Project app

Headway Themes – Is this the future of WordPress?

Web Articles

24 UX Articles to Start 2010 – UX Booth

The Philosophy of Design – Tripping Words

More on Hiring People To Write For You – Is it time to get more people on board with Inspiredology?

Getting Inspiration from Admiration – Build Internet

How to Kill Your Business: 30 Day Payment Terms - John O’Nolan

Tutorials

Contactable – A jQuery Plugin

The Right Way To Build WordPress As A Community – I really want to add a community news section to Inspiredology, can anyone help me with this? Let’s talk @chadmueller

Bulletproof Post Thumbnails in WordPress 2.9 – Matt Brett

Create Custom Options Panels with WordPress 2.9 – Build Internet

Inspiredology

I am working hard on the new Inspiredology redesign… I am adding some new features that I have been wanting for a very long time. I need some help, if anyone knows how to add a Community News feature using TDO Mini Forms, if you can help please let me know @chadmueller or muellerchad[at]gmail.com.

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More and more visually appealing and image heavy websites are being created, and of course we’ve got a reason – days with slow Internet speed are going to past and technologies are evolving every day! Let’s get started – shall we?

1. Art-Label.net Board Skin by DouglasEltz

2. Environment information pages by SneakyOne1990

3. Angel by miko434

4. Green Palacy Theme by DouglasEltz

5. InfoShop.com by DouglasEltz

6. Idyll Ads by miko434

7. Mecra by SencerBugrahan

8. 99studios by dot-next

9. Fenixround by DouglasEltz

10. IT Services Company by inspiredMark

11. Bonsai Collectors 2 by INSEKTart

12. Another Portfolio Layout by simiographics

13. EdgeSpan Revolution by deadlinesdesign

14. Mocha furniture by gdnz

15. 4 Sale Gaming by AndasoloARTS

16. gs.com by akenord

17. Caffeteria by Tokumoto

18. OneSize v2 by acidflow

19. KO by trunglq

20. Restaurant Asian Bistro by preet618

21. Pro web 2.0 portfolio template by jackinnes

22. Portfolio by Mac002

23. Szpital – FOR SALE by PanthereNoire92

24. Quality Furnitures by Aqib14

25. Lion Design Premium by FluidStudios

26. My first attempt at web-design by vrs85

27. Luscious by timsilva

28. Web2.0 Company Portfolio by princepal

29. Santa’s Town by Pilej

30. Photographer by arEa50oNe

31. The Web Meeting by miko434

32. Joomla Template Tutor by princepal

33. Vid by crazyclouds

34. Amazium by sergitosuanez

35. Counter Strike Evo 2.0 Design by renderworks

36. Kreativo by cheafy14

37. Oxid Eshop by Honya

38. Alexion Home Page by raven9327

39. Gaming Website by zblowfish

40. Great Business Template by mabucs

41. Balai besar 5 website by champchoel

42. Glob-Data-website by desdoc

43. Travel Inside by lewkaART

44. RJDesignz by rjoshicool

45. Layout-I Real Estate by whatnameisit

46. Gold by aadi-f

47. Cache networks by manujg

48. Expoze Media Webdesign by EXPOZE-MEDIA

49. Light Design by deadlinesdesign

50. Template 19 by nodethirtythree

51. Swiat Kwiatow by Pilej

52. Officina Digitale v3 by Svengraph

53. Pure Home by touchdesign

54. iClipeo.com by mateuszmadura

55. Folio Layout by inspiredMark

Related posts:

1. 48 Trendy And Fresh Web Interfaces From Deviantart: August 2009
2. 60 Trendy Web Design Interfaces Created In October
3. 46 Outstanding Web Layouts From DeviantArt: September 2009
4. 91 Trendy Contact And Web Forms For Creative Inspiration
5. 22 Photoshop Web Design Interface Tutorial Sites

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A/B testing is the process, usually aided by tools like Google Website Optimizer, by which you are able to test different elements of your page such as graphics and text to see which generates the best results.

For example you might wish to work out which banner for your latest special offer generates the most clicks to the detail page. The results will help you make an informed decision not only about that campaign but future ones as well.

Sharing results

ABtests.com is a site that allows you to upload and share your A/B testing results. It’s not often this information is exposed as it could lead to an obvious competitive advantage. It’s definitely worth looking through the results as you will be instantly able to implement many of the ideas on your own sites.

Currently there are sections covering tests for:

• email newsletter sign-up pages
• home pages
• landing pages
• launch reminder pages
• pricing pages
• product pages
• sign-up pages

If you are into testing then you should check it out.

Site URL: http://www.abtests.com

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There are many ways to secure your server from configuring it yourself and using open source software, to hiring an IT staff with a support team to monitor your server. Each option has its merits and flaws. If you configure it yourself, do you have the knowledge to correct issues that come up without major downtime? If you opt for the IT staff, does their cost out weigh the benefit? Do you use open source? All of these questions and more need to be answered to have a secure server.

One of the simplest ways to secure your server is to make sure it is patched and updated with the latest updates. This is a simple step and needs to be performed at least weekly. Another simple step would be to do testing on your server before you make applications live. Not just making sure that it works correctly, but making sure that it is not vulnerable to SQL injection.

Web applications have opened up an entirely new headache with security. Many times they have direct access to the database with little error checking. A way to help try to stop this is to use something like ModSecurity. ModSecurity is an open source web application firewall. It has many features that will make it more difficult for intruders to gain access to your server.

A step that many people do but do not take advantage of, is logging. Many people have log files but never look at them. An intruder may have been trying for weeks to gain access to your server before he finally got in. If you examine your logs, then you may have discovered his attempts before he compromised your server.

There is much more to running a server than just plugging it. It takes work and a lot of knowledge. Most people can connect a computer to the internet and have it run a web server, but it takes great deal more to secure it.

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The best way to describe Evernote? Via their description, “Evernote makes it easy to remember things big and small from your notable life using your computer, phone, and the web.” Read on for our quick review of this great web app.

What it Does

Evernote makes it easy to capture almost any information you don’t want to lose. Anywhere on your computer, and even out in the real world, you can grab what you want to remember and throw it (proverbially) into Evernote. But how does this help you remember stuff?

Evernote does have a web app, but it is primarily a web service: it uses true cloud computing through native applications. Name your platform; Evernote probably has a presence on it. You can use Evernote in the following places:

• Windows
• Mac
• iPhone / iPod touch
• Blackberry
• Palm Pre / Pixi
• Windows Mobile
• Android
• Nokia N97 (very beta)

And of course, there’s the web interface. Therefore, armed with only a computer and a smartphone, you can use Evernote as your external brain. Let’s look at how you put stuff into Evernote and how to call it up when you need to.

The Evernote Web Interface

Overview

Capturing Data

Capturing Data

If you’re at your computer, your main source of stuff-to-remember is probably the web. Evernote has browser extensions for IE, Safari (on Mac), Firefox, and Chrome. If you’re on another browser, you can take advantage of the bookmarklet.

If you’re not on the web, you can set up keyboard shortcuts for screen or text captures. You can also drag files into your desktop client. And on a Mac, you can add an iSight photo note.

What about away from the computer? With almost all the major mobile clients, you can easily add text-, voice-, or image-notes. There’s a mobile web app that allows you to add text notes. And of course, every desktop client (and the web app), allow you to type away as well. With all these options, you shouldn’t have too much trouble getting that receipt or news article safely tucked away.

Premium users can store any type of file in Evernote. Free users can only store images, audio, and PDFs.

Organizing Data

Organizing Data

So once all that stuff is into Evernote, what do you do? Firstly, Evernote has already done a lot for you. If you’ve clipped an article from the web, it keeps the source URL. If you’ve add a note on the go with a mobile device, Evernote will use the device’s GPS to geotag the note. It does more, but you can add your own level of organization on top of the meta data.

Evernote has two sorting systems: notebooks and tags. A notebook is similar to a folder: notes can live inside it. And a tag is exactly like a tag in any other web app. The obvious difference is that a note can have multiple tags but can only be in one notebook, so you have to find the happy-medium that works for you.

Personally, I have 8 notebooks and about ~200 tags (for 1,430+ notes). Do what works for you!

When I started using Evernote, I thought it would be better to have only one notebook and organize everything with tags. Now that I have almost 1500 notes, I’m leaning more towards segregating notes with notebooks. It seems to help managing and manipulating my large collection.

Finding Your Information

Search

Search Attributes

How does storing your memorables in Evernote help you remember? Really, it doesn’t, but it makes them easy to access at any time. So how can you get to the note you want? If you know exactly what you want, you can easily search for it.

The beauty here—and one of the main features of Evernote—is that Evernote processes all the images you give it with their OCR software and indexes the text in them. Of course, those results are easily searchable. Evernote just recently added the premium feature of indexing the images within PDFs.

However, searching isn’t the only way to get to your notes. The sidebar offers filtering by attributes like what the note contains, where it came from, and when it was last modified. And of course, you can click on a tag or notebook to narrow the visible notes.

If you find yourself searching with the same terms often, you can easily save that search.

More Great Features

Sharing Information

Share

For about a year after Evernote went public, the only way you could share your notes with others was by making a public notebook. Recently, however, Evernote expanded on that: you can now share notebooks with only certain individuals, and (if your a premium member) you can allow them to modify the notebook.

Currently, sharing can only be done from the web interface. Once you click “Sharing Setup,” you can share your notebooks however you like: with the world, or with a few friends.

Share Notebooks

When viewing a shared notebook, you’ll notice that it’s pretty similar to the regular notebook layout. If you want to keep tabs on a notebook that’s been shared with you, just click “Link to my Account” near the top right corner. Then, the notebook will show up on your sharing settings panel, and in your sidebar.

Linked Notebooks

Great Community

Besides being a great web app, Evernote has a rather active community; to mingle with other Elephant lovers, you can join the FriendFeed group, follow Ron’s Evernote Tips tumblelog, check out their forums, or listen to the official Evernote Podcast.

The podcast is always a really fun listen to!

Alternatives

Although Evernote has a great feature set, you might want something more. Springpad offers great templates, as well as “apps” for turning your notes into vacation plans, weekly meal menus, and more. Zoho Notebook is an amazingly powerful online notetaker that integrates perfectly with the Zoho office suite. And if you prefer to keep your notes completely local, OneNote and Yojimbo are leaders.

Final Thoughts

I’ve been using Evernote for over a year and a half now, and I’ve found that the longer I use it, the more I use it! What makes Evernote stand out in the crowd is how they focus on letting you get what you want to remember into the system with absolute ease.

It would be nice if Evernote offered templating for notes; also, the checklist feature is really weak, and it’s something I would use a lot more if improved. Overall, their platform ubiquity, solid organization, and continually growing feature set makes this service indispensable.

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A design is only as good as the functional usability of it. Think of it like a pretty lady or handsome guy with no brain or personality. You can only handle it for so long because they don’t offer much, which eventually leaves you bored or uninterested.

Just like the scenario above, regardless of how amazing your design looks, without any functional usage, readers will only stay for so long. Even worse they probably won’t return, which is what any website does not want. There is no getting around content as the number one factor to gain returning visitors, but there are some design and functional aspects that can be implemented into your web design to push more users to visit your site again. We will look at some of these popular practices below.

Displaying Follower Count

The Internet is just like high school: everybody wants to be part of the crowd. If you have a lot of followers via social networks and/or subscribers, then why not share it with the world. By displaying the count, visitors will be more likely to subscribe themselves because they see so many other people are doing the same. I recommend not sharing your follower count until they are at least plus 500; however, the number can vary through different niches.

You can see a great example of this here, at Inspired Magazine. Above the fold, visitors can easily see that there are over 35,000 combined followers and would be enticed to become part of the crowd.

Another example of this can also be seen at Smashing Magazine. In fact, they even designate a much bigger spot than most sites by taking up nearly ¼ of the space above the fold.

Subscription Box

Another method to increase the rate of returning visitors is to build an email list. This is usually done through a subscription box placed somewhere on the sidebar. Obviously the higher up, the more likely it is to be seen.

As seen on The Wild Investor, the subscription box is placed in the sidebar above the fold. More importantly it is styled in a different color box that stands out from the rest of the site.

More often than not, sometimes you just need to put the offer directly in front of the users face. John Chow does this through a pop-up box that is displayed to first time visitors and briefly describes what the subscriber will get and a concise form to sign up.

Subscribe to Comments

Getting readers to post comments is great, but usually visitors will leave comments and then never return. You can see where this could make it hard to build any sort of dialogue. A good method to try and fight this problem is to give your readers an option to subscribe to comments, either through RSS feed or email notification. This will not only bring them back to your site, but could also build your comments as dialogue will continue to grow.

Problogger simple adds a check box at the bottom of his comments box to subscribe using ‘Subcribe to Comments’ WordPress plugin.

Six Revisions attacks this problem by using a text link that directs you to the comments RSS feed.

Display Popular Articles

Whether your visitors come from search engines or referred from another site, odds of them subscribing or returning to your website will be based off more than one article or piece of your content. So help facilitate this process by sharing your most popular content.

Noupe does this by displaying a thumbnail and comment count of the 12 most popular articles. Not only does this show what type of articles is published on this site, but also when you see multiple articles with 100+ comments, odds of returning just jumped a whole lot more.

While a design should be pleasing to the eye, it should also be functional. What good does an amazing looking house mean if it doesn’t have a kitchen? Ultimately your design should facilitate growth, which could be hard to do without returning users. Hopefully the above examples and practices will inspire you to make some adjustments to your current or future web design.

With nearly a decade of experience in web design and owner of his own web development company, Amey Shivapurkar shares the latest webmastering trends, tools, and practices over at Webtolerant.

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