Archive for the 'Design and Usability' Category

One of the most common design issues associated with web sites, and especially with blogs, is clutter. It's so easy to fill the sidebar with links, widgets, and clicklets. So easy that even the most ardent minimalists have to stop and unclutter their sites from time to time. So, how do you decide if something should be displayed on your blog? Here is an easy to follow process to help you unclutter your blog. Photo by ...

One of the most important concepts in producing successful creative works is to know your audience. If you know what they want, and what will encourage them to do what you want, then you know what to produce. Photo by delgaudm via Flickr In blogging, once you get going, you can know your audience by their comments. But what about the early stages, before your blog has many commentators? The simple solution is to become your ...

Whoa, is there such a thing as the wrong WordPress theme? Sadly, the answer is yes. There are literally thousands of themes out there. There are some really good ones, and inevitably, there are some bad ones too. Where to find WordPress themes Before I show you what make a theme bad, I would like to share some resources where you can find WordPress themes: WordPress theme directory -- the most well known one since it is linked ...

Aside from the standard accounts for your blog -- i.e., domain name, web hosting, and WordPress -- there are several companion accounts that I think are very useful. Below are 12 essential companion accounts, plus two that are worth mentioning. For Money and Monetization PayPal - This is an online payment web site that allows you to accept money and credit card for products or services that you sell. I have used PayPal to accept payments, ...

Writing the first post for a blog is never easy -- it is an art in itself. For me, this is an opportunity to say how it came to be, what the blog is all about, and why you should read it. So why did we start this blog? My friends at the M-network and I have been blogging for various lengths of time, but most of us started sometime in 2007. We got ...