Mesmer Lab » Usability

Digging into WordPress: Book Released

Jason — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:05:49 +0000

The much-anticipated book about the ins and outs of WordPress is finally here. Chris Coyier and Jeff Starr released Digging into WordPress today. Currently, the PDF version is available for immediate download for $27.

I suggest you pick up this book if you’re new to WordPress or if you’ve been using it for a while. Chris is great at explaining how web-related concepts work at CSS Tricks. He joins Jeff Star in this project, and the professionalism in the product is stunning.

Features

Listed on the book’s site are the following features:

How to get things set up right
Building themes and how they work
Keeping sites secure and optimized
Using WordPress as a CMS
Integrate things like Twitter and Delicious
Making the most out of WordPress

Peek Inside!

From CSS Tricks, Chris offers a peek inside the book. I really like how much color and engaging images they’ve included. This is a welcome change from all the black-and-white instructional books I know you’re used to.

Buy the Book

You can buy the PDF now and get the print version at a discount later. You will also have access to updated versions via a download link in your email when they’re released. Free upgrades for life are always awesome.

So go on over and pick up Digging into WordPress now!

WordPress Plugin: WP-Table Reloaded

Jason — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 19:51:46 +0000

So I wanted to have a table with zebra stripes in a WordPress installation. I found a quick and full-featured plugin that allows the stripes, plus so much more.

WP-Table Reloaded will let you import a table from a CSV, HTML or XML file. You can enter the cell data directly into the admin page. You can swap column or row order with minimal effort. You can hide or show columns or rows.

Extra Features

But then there are extra features that really make this plugin shine.

Alternating row colors: Every second row will have an alternating background color.
Use Table Headline: The first row of your table will use the tag.
Print Table Name: The Table Name will be written above the table in a
tag.
Print Table Description: The Table Description will be written under the table.
Use Tablesorter: You may sort a table using the Tablesorter-jQuery-Plugin.

I’m currently using this plugin on a website for a sprinkler company in Houston, Texas. Everything you see on the page is pretty much stock settings. There is one table for the service fees, since I didn’t want zebra stripes on a 2-row table. Then another table for the rest of the services.

I just wanted to give a quick nod to this well-rounded and very functional WordPress plugin for implementing HTML tables. Thanks go to the author of this plugin. (Apparently this is his first WP plugin!)

Related Blogs

Anchor Tags, IDs, Google and You!

Jason — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 22:52:47 +0000

So Google added yet another facet to their SERPs this week. The new feature allows you to jump to the information you want right from the search snippets. At first glance it seems they’re acknowledging the proper use of the named anchor tag. Further investigation turns up clues of nimble ID attribute seeding.

Page Division Benefits for Visitors to Your Web Site

This is great news for both sides of the SEO table. The search engine user can click directly to the desired information instead of wandering around the page once they’re directed to a site by the SERP. The old way was sort of like getting directions to a house party that left you at the entrance of a neighborhood. This new way leads you to the right driveway.

Page Division Benefits for Web Developers

For the web professional, proper SEO techniques will allow you more granularity and specificity in your SERP presence. A few choice placements of the correct anchor tags (and possibly usage of the obligatory ID tags) can net great returns and more ‘good’ traffic to your sites. When I say ‘good’ traffic, I mean people who won’t end up in the bounced column in your analytics.

For a more in-depth look at how the new algorithm works, please jump over to Site Booster’s article entitled New Strategy to Increase Search Engine Visibility.

What Comes Next?

I’m more interested in if IDs will be included in the Google SERPs. I’d rather give IDs double duty than have to insert tags into my code. Most well-written pages employ header tags,

and so on.

The example Google gives on their blog uses:

Now I’m not sure if the Google algorithm is triggering on the anchor name or the ID. Big points to the big G if they use both. I’m using different methods in different areas of this article to see how things turn out.

Your Turn

Let me know what you’re thinking about this new avenue of Search Engine Optimization and how you plan to implement it. I’d love to hear your ideas in the comments.

Google’s New Sandbox Search – Caffeine

Jason — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 21:31:44 +0000

It seems the search engine market is becoming competitive again. In response to the recent release of Microsoft’s ‘decision engine’ Bing, Google is stepping up their game.

Competition breeds innovation, proof that capitalism works.

This week, Google released their new sandbox search engine, nicknamed ‘Caffeine’. In my initial tests, it seems Caffeine results are focused more on articles and web pages, not video or news results. Youtube and news items are typically still on the first page, but they are further down instead of always sticking to the top.

It seems you can’t saturate your Youtube video description with keywords anymore. Content is king.

I have had pretty good results on SERPs by using the WordPress platform, which in cooperation with the All-In-One SEO plugin, makes META info maintenance a breeze. You have control of each page’s data, as well as the overall site’s META keywords and description. And well, content is king. Write a good article and you should see good results.

My best performing article here at Mesmer Lab is about how I add custom fonts to my WordPress installation. I wanted an easy solution for having a unique look, but flexible enough to only require regular text, not opening Photoshop every time I need a new header image.

So to that end, when you search for ‘add custom font wordpress’ right now you’ll find the following results:

Google (current): http://tr.im/wi30
Google Sandbox: http://tr.im/wi2Q
Bing: http://tr.im/wi53

First off, let me explain how good tr.im is as a URL shortener. Create an account with them and you can track clicks. That alone should give you enough incentive to use them exclusively. Add that they use unique URLs and you’ll never use another URL shortener again.

Now there are some interesting differences here. The current Google SERP has my article at #4, including an indented link for a related article on my site. Indented results are a function of Google’s algorithm and are typically seen as having more authority. I was pretty jazzed when I noticed I had one.

The Caffeine SERP shows the same article at #3, pushing ahead of the result from Digg. Hmm, what does that mean? Google is giving less weight to bookmarking sites? I never really got into Digg, but I use Del.icio.us pretty regularly. And although I see their merit, I’d rather find actual articles in my SERPs rather than a middleman.

And well, Microsoft hates my site it seems. Where’s Mesmer Lab on Bing? Not sure. I went through the first 10 pages and couldn’t find a trace. I gave up digging deeper into the SERP pages when I started seeing results that weren’t even related to WordPress or fonts.

So what does this mean to you? Well if you’re a typical web user you should start seeing more direct links rather than having to click through a bookmark aggregator. Less clicks, less bandwidth, more efficiency. If you’re a web developer, your SEO prowess should shine through much easier. Using Caffeine could possibly give your expertise a 10% boost in authority. Content writers should also see similar results. Just keep writing good content and your analytics and AdSense results should validate your worth.

The people over at Facesaerch have developed a side-by-side comparison of the current Google engine and Caffeine. Test it out at http://www.facesaerch.com/caffeine/.

Lowering Friction with Call To Action Psychology

Jason — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 20:23:00 +0000

David Hamill has written an excellent article about the psychology of a good ‘call to action’ implementation on your site. He walks you through actual and alternative designs of Twitter, Amazon, Firefox, and why specific things work.

Usability is key. You can have the best information and product, but if there’s a problem with catching your visitors’ attention on how they can benefit, then you need to rethink your design. David describes how your wording, the positioning of your call to action links, and even the size, will help you convert your visitors into users.