Bloggerrific

Google Analytics is an amazing tool for web designers and web developers. There are really four different types of things you can do with Google Analytics, and I’m here to write about each one, and some of the benefits of them, as well as a few downsides.

1. Enhance your user experience: Google analytics has tools to track the types of users you are getting. You can look at their location (in the world), their computer specs (computer type, screen size, operating system, browser/version), their viewing trends (page views, bounce rates, time on the site), and much more.

So why is this helpful? It allows you to design your site around your users. You know what browsers and versions they are using, so you can decide how much time to spend cross browser testing. You know what screen sizes your users are using, so you can figure out how wide you want your designs to be. You can see when you launch major changes to your site what happens to your user trends (did it cause an increase or decrease in the positive experience of your users). But these are all very broad things, let’s get more specific.

2. Test and improve specific content: Google analytics takes the first benefit a step further by allowing you to look at most of the above data and more with specific pages and sections of your site. This will allow you to test out smaller changes to your site by looking at user trending and navigation on specific pages or new sections that you just launched or changed.

So why is this helpful? Imagine you just put up a new section of your site that is a little more alternative to the standard navigation you have throughout the rest of your site, or the design is a bit more energetic and you aren’t sure how it will be received. Now, say a week after your launch, you can go back and see how your users interacted with the new section. You can see where they came from in the site to get there, what they did there, when they left, and where they left to go to. You can compare the visitor trends with the overall site averages and get a feel for whether the new design and/or navigation is an improvement to your site, or a detriment. It can then guide future changes to that section, or even the rest of your site!

3. Pimp out your SEO efforts: With the “sources” section of Google Analytics, you can track where your users are coming from, and how they are finding you. You can see how many users are coming in directly (typing in your web address or using a bookmark), through referring sites (external links), or through search engines. Then you can look at keywords that people used to land on specific pages within your site, or the site in general.

So why is this helpful? If you have been trying to up your SEO, then you can see how often people are linking to you (based on the rate of referring sites) and how effective you are at certain keyword searches that you are trying to optimize for. Knowing what people already land on your for and teach you what your site is doing well, and help you decide what other keywords you might want to focus more on.

4. Make some moolah: Lastly, Google Analytics allows you to track sales and other goals within your site. If you have specific items you are trying to sell, you can put in a specific goal that tracks it. Then you can see the paths those users took to get to that sale and optimize for it even more. To be honest, I haven’t focused on these tools much myself. For my own website, I don’t have much of a need for it with all the other customization options. For my work at College Prowler, though we do have sales, I tend to focus more on the user experience considering that is where my background is, and my boss looks at everything, including the sales “goals” and “ecommerce” options.

All of these sections have some additional benefits that Google Analytics is still testing out, in particular the “advanced segments” tool. This tool allows you to set up segments of your visitors or your site so that you can get even more detailed with your website’s statistics. Say you have too main sections of your site, and though they sometimes cross over with users, they are often relatively separate. You might want to see just what one half of the users are doing, as compared to the other half, because they really represent two completely different user bases. Again, it allows for even more customization to your user. There are some downsides to this tool though. In particular, you can create segments, but you can’t share them with co-workers that might be on the same analytics account, they are only available to you. I already emailed Google months ago and complained about this, but they are slow to respond to that kind of stuff. I think sometimes they pretend to be all focused on usability, but in reality, they lose that focus too often…

One more downside to Google Analytics is the slight inaccuracy of information. Data is never 100% accurate or reliable. This is a problem with really small sites where small differences can really cause issues with the data (because of low statistical power). Still, take everything you see with a grain of salt, but also put some trust in it. If anything, it will lead you in specific directions for real user testing! Overall though, fantastic tool!

So I’m not going to pretend that I’m an expert at freelancing, because I’m certainly not. However, I do have some experience, and I think after your first few times doing freelance work, you learn a whole lot. So I figured I’d offer up some advice to those of you who may be getting into the freelance web design or graphic design business.

1. The most important thing you can do for a freelance job is write a contract! A simple one page contract can go a long way in encouraging both you and your client to abide by specified timelines, payment dates, etc. In all likelihood you’ll never even need to threaten your client with breach of contract, but it is nice just to have the comfort. You should write you contract in a way that indicates a timeline for the project. This will encourage you to keep on top of your work, as well as make sure your client provides any materials that you need in a timely manner. It also makes sure you can’t get screwed over if they “aren’t happy” in the end (you’d be surprised how much people will try to reduce the price after you’ve already agreed on something). Clients also have the tendency to ask for something, agree on a price, and then ask for more without wanting to pay more. For these reasons specifically, ALWAYS get a contract written up and signed before you begin any work. (For sample contracts, check this out (make sure to edit this to apply to YOUR situation!), or if you’d like, shoot me an email and I can give you some advice).

2. Make sure your client is aware of their responsibilities (because even though you are the freelancer, they almost always need to provide you with something). The best way of doing this is to include deadlines for the client as well as yourself in the contract. These deadlines are often dates that you need content by to finish the website, or logo materials to work on the designs. Timeliness of your client’s deliverables will affect the timeliness of yours.

3. Ask your client for a list of websites that they like, with details of why they like them. Getting this information will help you understand the design aesthetic that your client appreciates, and give you an idea of how they might want their users to work through their website. It might also be helpful to sit down with them as they discuss this, and even ask them to visit their competitor’s websites if you are working with a business.

4. Make mock-ups before you start coding anything. When presenting mock-ups to your clients make sure to do four things. First, always make multiple options. Presenting one looks cocky and stingy. When you present multiple designs, ask for critiques (both positive and negative) on all of the design possibilities, but have them pick one. Then incorporate those critiques into the final design. Second, present your mock-ups in PDF format. PDFs are by far the most professional way to send documents. Sending Photoshop or Illustrator files is unprofessional, and they can rarely be opened by clients. Sending jpegs/gifs is lame because then your client is opening up your design in random programs. Keep it consistent with PDFs. Third, use “lorem ipsum” dummy text. It fills the page realistically without requiring actual content from your client or you. It isn’t worth wasting your time coming up with realistic content, just make it look good while you are working on the mock-ups. Fourth, it helps to present your mock-ups in a browser window skin. This will help your client imagine what the website will really look like live to their users. Looking at the design outside of a skin is like looking at a photograph outside of a frame. Sure there is information there, and sure it might look good, but it sends a much different message in the frame.

5. Figure out ahead of time how your client will be updating their content. There are many possibilities including you updating your client’s content, the client using a content management system, or if the client using Dreamweaver or plain markup after you tutor them. These three options will most likely impact how your code the website.

6. Find out what other things you can do for your client on top of their website! There is no better place for more business than the people you already do business with. Many clients just getting into the web also need help with other graphic design needs (such as logos, letter heads, business cards, etc.) or will want you to do updates on their site, or SEO work for their site. This extra work leads to extra cash. Just make sure to include it all in the contract from the start.

7. Get a feel for your client’s expected website users. If you have a good feel for the people that will be using the website you design and/or create, then you’ll be able to do an infinitely better job at creating the website.

Got any other questions? Let me know!

SEO or Search Engine Optimization is a very complex process. People make a living doing SEO work for other individuals. Entire companies exist that tout the best SEO practices. Well, for the simple minded, for the not so wealthy, and just for the interested, let’s break down what SEO really is and what simple steps you can take to help out your own site.

Okay, first a definition. Simply put, Search Engine Optimization is an attempt to get your website higher up on search results run by Google, Yahoo, et cetera. Why is this important? Don’t you want visitors!?! Search engines are the best marketing tool out there. You’ll never come close to getting more direct or referral traffic than search traffic to your website (unless you are as big as say facebook.com for example). Even the biggest of businesses such as Amazon.com still rely very heavily on search traffic. So how can you push yourself higher on those results?

Well, there are countless articles out there trying to tell you how to perform SEO. I’m not saying you should listen to me, in fact, I consider myself a novice when it comes to SEO, but I do have a few easy suggestions that just about anyone can do.

1. Make sure to set up a redirect between the www and non-www version of your website. Search engines see http://www.example.com as a different site than http://example.com. If you set up a permanent redirect, then search engines will bump you up higher, links to your site will be consistent. Here is a great tutorial on it.

2. Register with sites like dmoz and yahoo and zoominfo. These sites are essentially listings of websites and companies and people. Being listed on these helps show search engines that your website is essentially more reputable than websites not listed there. Yahoo costs money, but dmoz is free. Hurry up though, it can take months for them to get you on the list!

3. Write a BLOG!!! I know, ironic right? The reason that I started this blog in the first place was to drive more traffic to my site. Sites with blogs have tons more content, and because the content is constantly changing and updating, it is much more likely to pop up in search results. Even more than that, people might start bookmarking your blog posts on sites like del.icio.us and digg.com. Bookmarks on these sites can drive hundreds of visits in under an hour once they are posted. Also, when there are bookmarks to your site from these websites, search engines use that as another form of validation that your content is useful, just like being listed in those conglomerate sites mentioned above.

4. Get lots and lots of links to your site. The more links that exist on the web to your site, the better. Search engines see those links as even more validation for your content. Try establishing relationships with other businesses you work with on a regular basis and get them to link to your site in return for a link to theirs. Make a facebook page for the website with a link. Anything that will add more links to your site out there in the web is good!

5. Lots of content, that you update, with good header tags. Google is known to use the content of a website to determine what is on it. Go figure right? In the past, all search engines used the Meta Keyword and Description tags, but then people started stuffing their tags with thousands of unrelated words in hopes of landing on tons of search results. As a result Google, and many other search engines have followed suit, do not use them anymore. Stick to under a dozen keywords, and then just pay attention to your content. Having useful header tags (h1, h2, h3, etc), lots of good content, preferably that you update, and purposeful images will do wonders.