Design gurus often talk about simplicity in design. That by using less to convey your point you actually are able to convey your message to a broader audience. That you’re able to be more relevant with less rather than more.

I think this idea would be better applied in our everyday lives.

In my life the most fulfilling moments, the most life altering times, have happened when I cared very little for what I possessed, or what I wanted to posses.

Since George Carlin died I’ve been watching quite a bit of his work. He was before my time, and I hadn’t seen much of his material. With all the hullabaloo over his death I decided I should check out his work. I’ve been incredibly impressed with what he did.

It seems that he had a penchant for calling people out on their absurdities. Sometimes in a gentle way, sometimes in a not so gentle way.

Here’s a video that I really enjoyed (warning it contains some blue language):

He talks about how our houses are just a great big pile of “stuff.” I couldn’t agree more. It seems as though increasingly our lives are valued by how many gadgets we can accumulate. Life is not about enjoying the time you have, but rather minimizing the time you have to think about the life you’re wasting.

I need my Xbox360 so I can escape my job. I need my job so I can afford my Xbox360, and my lease on my BMW. College was great, and now I get to pay it off for the next thirty years. I should get a mortgage and buy a house, everyone else is doing it. That must be what will make me happy.

My parents suggested that if everyone else was running off a cliff, we should think twice before doing the same thing. Perhaps we should apply the same logic to walking down the long slow path of an utterly meaningless life.

If you could do anything you wanted, what would it be?

From ‘Getting Real‘ by 37signals;

“…success isn’t the only thing you’ll find in the details. You’ll also find stagnation, disagreement, meetings, and delays. These things can kill morale and lower your chances of success.”

“Forget about locked-in specs. They force you to make big, key decisions too early in the process. Bypass the spec phase and you’ll keep change cheap and stay flexible.”

If you haven’t read ‘Getting Real‘ I highly recommend it.

I greatly enjoy the book and appreciate much of the content, but I have to wonder if the “agile” attitude to design is so easily accepted because it encourages laziness. If planning is distasteful to you then saying, “Screw specs we don’t need em!” is extremely easy. It’s probably not beneficial though.

Saying specs are unnecessary and they prevent ‘agile’ work is akin to throwing the baby out with the bath water. A well thought out plan prevents problems. If you’re in an environment that says the spec is the golden rule which cannot be broken, then throwing out specs, for a while, may be a good idea.

If you find yourself constantly modifying features, encountering delays based on client expectations, or are in a continual state of crisis, it might be worth your time to develop some preventative maintenance.

Agile is defined as, ‘Being able to move quickly and easily.’ Agility can be achieved by a lack of planning, sometimes. Most of the time this is not the case. If you’ve got a development team that’s worked together for years, has some sort of a psychic mind meld, or you’re just one person working on a personal project, you may be able to launch faster without specifically defining your product.

However, if you’re working on a team without a telepathic connection, I’d recommend you take the next best route. Write out a game plan. If you don’t have someone who’s capable of writing a decent spec, hire one. Having a good plan will only enhance your agility.

Make the spec agile, change it when you need to. You’ll never be able to anticipate every issue that will arise in a project, but planning for what you can anticipate will save you from unnecessary deliberation and disagreement. Don’t sacrifice the agility that having a well written spec can provide, embrace it.

Here are several great articles to get you started.

Marshall is slightly crazy. You can read about his adventures in Europe at the incredibly entertaining LazyVoice.com

1. Why’s (Poignant) Guide to Ruby
A tutorial like you’ve never seen before, complete with talking foxes and examples based on chunky bacon. Also, keep an eye out for the most entertaining side bars you’ll ever come across.

2. More great tutorials:

• Nuby on Rails.com
• Really Getting Started in Rails

3. Ruby on Rails on Hotscripts.com

4. PHP vs. Ruby on Rails. An evolutionary story of a Web Developer and his tools- A great comparison of the super-hero abilities of RoR and PHP. At the very least, this is a good primer on the differences (and similarities) of both.

5. Ruby User’s Guide

6. The Complete Ruby on Rails Manual

7. For more links, screencasts, and other RoR goodness, go to Ruby on Rails.org

As a means of communication, words are incredibly important. In lieu of verbally exchanging words, we use written text to do the bulk of the communication for us online. Any degree of miscommunication can have far reaching consequences (online), so every “i” has to be dotted, every “t” crossed, and every word weighed.

However, good content, like the emperor who needed to put some clothes on, should always strive to look first rate.

Enter typography, whose sole aim is to dress words up so that they look good. Its noble aspirations are simple: to make the reading experience easier, by relegating itself so far into the background that it’s never noticed.

Regardless of how tricky typography on the web can be, it is the responsibility of everyone on a design project (both team members and stakeholders) to bother about a website’s type. After all, if you want me to take the time to read your marketing pitch, or your smashing novel, why should it also be hard for me to read it?

If we’re on the same page so far, then here are some guiding principles on selecting type:

1. Read it- Just because you’re writing a masterpiece on Antiqua doesn’t mean you should write it using Antiqua. Reading the material (to understand it) will provide a better understanding of the copy’s context, and the user’s needs. This in turn translates into subtle changes to the over all look and feel of the website.

2. Know your audience- Blaktur is not the way to go on a pre-school program’s website, so it’s important that you know who your audience will be.

3. What will it look like?- Convention over configuration is not always a bad thing so keep in mind that there are limitations on the available font choices. Here’s another good article on the topic.

4. It’s not the end of the world- At the end of the day, your decision is subjective since there is no “end all” formula. As long as you diligently address the above, the whole time remembering that “it takes five hundred small details to make one favorable impression”, you should be fine.

1810 - 1913

When someone dies, the usual inscription on the tombstone is the year of birth and the year of death, separated by a dash, along with an epitaph in memoriam.

The initial reaction is to do the math, and figure out how old she was when she died (shameless you!).

What’s interesting about the whole thing is how much we concentrate on how long she lived, when at the end of the day, it’s the dash in the middle that defines what we remember.

JFK is a favorite of very many people. Nixon, however, is a different story because it’s what they did that we remember, and cherish (or detest).

Everyone wants a great website. And why not? If you’re really worth your mettle, and treasure your audience, you should make the effort to have a good website.

The problem is not wanting a great website. It’s the “I want it now!” paradigm that kills the potential for greatness. It’s too easy to give in to the temptation to rush a project so that “we can get it over with.” As a result, revisions are often rushed, features are cut down, etc…, all in an effort to bring the project completion schedule as close to 5 minutes as possible.

In the process, the end-users are forgotten, there are holes in the features, and somehow the message gets lost in all the noise.

The use of time, in and of itself, is nothing unless value is being delivered. Like life, it’s the quality of the time spent that determines the level of success (or failure) that’s achieved.

Design projects are tasking endeavors that take time, and significant effort. You shouldn’t decide to get a website “because everyone else has one”, then relegate it to “side project” status, and expect to get a website you’re going to be truly proud of.

How about this for a new way of thinking: it’s the quality of time spent on the project, not the quantity, that matters.

It seems like “Google it” has now become the de facto answer to any question with an unclear answer (is it strange that a man-made machine will provide a plethora of options to answer most questions?).

When the Internet became widely available a little over a decade ago, I doubt anyone had the slightest idea how revolutionary this thing would be. Obviously, that’s a different story now: in today’s world, it would be foolish to deny that this “series of tubes” (techno remix here) has had a significant effect on the way we think and live.

In fact, that last sentence is probably the understatement of the year. The Internet has so revolutionized the developed world that there are very few parts of our lives untouched by this force majeure.

The news reader no longer has to wait until morning to read the news, or wade through mind-numbing commercials to get the jist of the situation on CNN. Instead, the news is available to anyone who wants it, anytime and anywhere. All available in a dizzying number of customizable formats: email, text message, RSS reader, and the list goes on.  And not just read the news! They can share it with friends through email, recommend it to total strangers on StumbleUpon or reddit, and discuss it with a healthy vigor (Google even lets you make your case if you’re the subject of an article and there’s more on the topic in this NPR podcast).

Traditional media now has some very, very stiff competition. The behemoths are slowly catching on, lest the Internet leaves them in it’s dust. To be fair, there are exceptions to this. One of my favorites is the BBC, who have always provided excellent content for as long as I can remember, and continue to do so even today.

This radical shift is by no means limited to just the news: almost any topic you can think of will do. The accessibility of the the Internet now means music like Mongolian folk rock (video) is just as readily available as Paul Simon (an even better example might be Finnish band, the Leningrad Cowboy’s performance of Sweet Home Alabama, with the official Soviet Red Army Choir. I’m not kidding). It’s an open secret that the Internet is not so slowly eating up music labels profits (IMO, Janis Ians The Internet Debacle is still a classic on the topic).

The list goes on and on:

Wikipedia has made knowledge sexy again. In what other world can you carry a whole encyclopedia in your back pocket?

Traffic is getting more difficult to battle, and work sites are more expensive (and many other reasons), more people are beginning to working from home. Businesses are also finding that this is more productive (and cheaper), and so more are allowing their staff “telecommute“. Some have never even met their colleagues, even though they work together regularly.

Shopping too has become a lot easier (a slight understatement, I admit). From groceries to books, to shoes, and just about anything you can think of.

The Internet has also managed to destabilize the traditional balance of power of society by allowing everyone to participate. By bringing lots of small voices together, the little man is now making enough noise to make a difference. American politics (with Howard Dean, Ron Paul, and more successfully, Barack Obama) is a perfect example of this. Governments who have tried to control the volume can attest to the difficulty of doing this (Egypt had this experience a few years ago, and more recently is China’s experience with Tibet).

The Internet revolution is here to stay. Will you be a part of it, or would you rather be left behind?

Realizing your dream of having a professional, functional, and profitable website is not always an easy task. We’ve heard all too many horror stories of individuals and companies trying to build a website, only to run into one problem or another at seemingly every turn. In fact, about 35% of our prospects and clients are those that profess to have had bad experiences previously and are usually looking for relief in the form of a smooth web design project, a website well-aligned with their vision, and a return on their marketing investment.

If you’re working with multiple people to plan and execute your web design project, beware: “Fire the committee. No great website in history has been conceived of by more than three people. Not one. This is a dealbreaker.”-Seth Godin. If this isn’t possible, look for web design companies with strong expertise in high-caliber project management, hopefully facilitated by applications like Basecamp (what we utilize).

In an effort to reduce the number of nightmare experiences out there, we developed the following list to serve as a helpful general guide. Feel free to jump from step to step, but be warned: your sorrow will lessen significantly if some form of logic, other than convenience, guides the jump from step to random step!

Step 1: Obtain & register a domain name

This is easy, cheap, and doesn’t take a lot of time. A good place to start would be to search nameboy for your name ideas. If a name turns “No Match”, you’re in business! Alternatively, domainthenet is a domain name generator that will give you various ideas if what you want is taken. Picking a name is not always easy. It’s possible to have an idea, with everything, except the name, scoped out. If using a name generator (like Domain Name Generator or the Web 2.0 Name Generator), rubbing a lamp, or twisting your tongue still doesn’t bring a name, skip it and come back when you have the perfect name (just don’t wait too long). And if the name you want is taken, you might be able to contact the owner and see if they’ll let you have it for a price. You can find the domain name owner’s contact information by again searching nameboy and and when a domain name is registered, scroll down to view the administrative contact’s information.

By the way, it’s important to make sure the domain name is registered in YOUR name, not the person or company who registered your domain name (we see this happen all the time and it’s not always pretty).

Read more here:

• How Do I Get A Domain Name?
• What to do When the Domain Name You Want is Gone
• PickyDomains: For $50, these guys will give you a bunch of domain name suggestions based on your specifications. Don’t like any of their ideas? You get your money back (free for bloggers).
  

2. Design a site map

In a web design project, the importance of good documentation can’t be overstressed and many who have worked on a web project can attest to the misery bad documentation can trigger.

As the first piece of documentation, this step is very important because not only will it come in handy as a planning tool, but you would also be doing your chosen web design firm a big favor (or yourself, if you’re adventurous!).

For the uninitiated, a site map is simply “a visual representation of a website’s structure.” They come in different shapes and sizes, but in our experience, the best site maps are simple documents listing a website’s sections and pages in outline format, maintaining a hierarchical order.

When all is said and done, your site map should look something roughly like this:

1. Home
2. News Room
2.1 Register
2.2 Archives
3. Customer Service
3.1 Packages and pricing
3.2 How to order
3.3 Additional Services
3.4 Tips of the Trade
4. About Company
4.1 How it works
4.2 Additional Services
5. Contact Us

It’s really that easy.

The important things to remember when composing your website’s site map are:

• Remember that site maps are hierarchical and should clearly illustrate a page’s position (in relation to the others) within the website.
• Use numbers. It’s a lot easier to say “1.4.2″ than it is visualize (then say) “I.IV.II” (as if if roman numerals aren’t bad enough, bullets are even worse).
• Pages, it’s all about pages. As a planning tool, the site map tells you a lot about the pages by not only establishing the relationships pages have to each other, but by also “mapping out” these relationships and how they relate to the different components of a project (of course, hence the phrase “site map”). These page relationships can be rather complicated, and adding technical details and aesthetic notes will only quadruple the complexity. All of this to say, avoid including functionalities, images, placement instructions, etc… If necessary, put an asterisk next to an item and add a footnote.
• Titles matter. If you’re still trying to decide on the page titles, use “working titles” so that everyone knows you’re talking about the apple, not the kiwi.
• Lists are all the rage. Although not a part of the site map, it’s a good idea to start compiling lists as you develop your site map. How many forms will it have? What will they be called and what kind of information will you collect? How about videos and pictures?
• Make a list of all the pages that will have videos, pictures, etc… (obviously that creates another list: “Stuff I Need To Put Together”. Do you see how useful a site map can be?).

Read this blog post for more on site maps.

Step 3: Compile a “Technical Notes” document

After completing your site map, it’s time to draft the “Technical Notes” document. Your “Technical Notes” document deals with the internal elements of each individual page and contains a description of the features for each internal page and specific placement instructions for content like pictures, videos, forms, Flash animation, etc… This document should also maintain the outline form of the site map.

For example, the notes for “2.1 Register” in the “Technical Requirements” document would say something like:

2.1 Register

This page should contain a form with the following fields:
Name:
Email:
Password:
Address:
Phone:
Note: the “Phone” field should be optional

Step 4: Identify SEO phrases

Search engine optimization (or SEO) is the process of structuring your website so that search engines can find and index them better (here’s a good introduction to SEO).

The best way to do this is to put yourself in the shoes of someone looking for what you’re offering. What words would they use in a search? Make a list of these words, and their derivatives, and you’ll be well on your way. This is a great tool. This will probably happen naturally as you develop your written content more (here’s on writing online content).

Additionally, there are a lot of online SEO tools that can help you generate these phrases. Even if you think you’ve done a good job, it might help if you used one of the tools as a check.

Step 5: Develop great content

Now is the time to develop the actual content of your website. Not just the words and titles, but you also want to include everything you’ll want on your website. But remember, don’t over-write: “Less. Fewer words, fewer pages, less fine print.” -Seth Godin.

Do you want any pictures, graphics, etc… on your website? Where? Take your time and play with different combinations until you find something you like. It might even help to draw out a few sketches (the design firm you use will certainly love that) or play with PowerPoint, Publisher, Excel or if you’re a Mac fan, Pages or Keynote to plan out your designs.

The filenames for your content, like that of the “Technical Notes” section, should also maintain the outline form of the site map. For example, you would name the file containing the copy for the “Register” page “2.1_Register” or the video for the “How It Works” page, “4.1_How It Works”. Again, adding placement instructions should not be necessary since those are covered in the “Technical Notes” document above.

Lastly, it is very important that you submit your final, proofread content at the same time. This ensures that confusion is avoided and your project stays organized. Compose the content for each individual page in a separate Word document (don’t forget to use the same titles used in the site map when naming them) and combine them in a folder, which you can then zip.

6. Find a remarkable (not just good) web design firm

In the words of marketing guru Seth Godin: “If you hire a professional, hire a great one. The best one. Let her do her job. 10 mediocre website consultants working in perfect harmony can’t do the work of one rock star.”

This is not as easy at it sounds. A recent Google search returned 491,000,000 results for “web design company” (a staggering amount if you ask me).

It may be difficult to separate the good from the bad, but fear not, there is hope.

There are some people out there that genuinely love what they do and honestly want to help (like those guys at Epsilon Concepts).

When you’re talking to the web design companies, how much listening do they do? Do they genuinely have passion about you, your project, your company? How long have they been around? Who have they worked for in the past? How does their work, testimonials, and website make you feel? Are they willing to give you references and are those references satisfied or ecstatic? Are they trying to capture your vision or do they tune you out?

This checklist has a lot of other angles you should consider as you search for the perfect web design firm.

7. Choose a hosting company

Like web design companies, there are tons of hosting companies. Hosting in this age is pretty much a commodity. Many web design firms also offer hosting as an add-on. However, it’s just as easy to end up with a bad hosting company as with a web design firm. We believe it’s also always best to go with a hosting company as opposed to a web design firm offering hosting on the side. It’s best to have the experts in each category of your web strategy, rather than a jack of all trades, master of none. Because hosting is a commodity, it’s not hard to find one with great rates, excellent support, and the right specs.

When looking for a hosting company, make sure they guarantee 99% uptime and 24/7 support (obviously, this is very important since they will be storing everything related to your web site and in case something happens, you need to be sure you’ll be able to get the help you need). Also need to make sure the hosting company of your choosing has all the features you need and will need as you grow. Some other things to keep your eyes peeled out for are PHP 5, MySQL 5, SSL, and an uptime guarantee, but this does depend on your unique project requirements.

Don’t know where to start? Then try http://www-thehostingchart.com/ and http://webhostinggeeks.com/ and we recommend Moonrise Hosting as well as Rackspace. If necessary, test their support claims before going with them (here’s more on choosing a hosting company).

PS: We also made an info-packed Squidoo lens a few months ago on “How to Plan a Web Design Project and Choose a Web Design Company” that has color charts, document templates, links to web design directories, articles, videos, and more.

Reader Comments:

“A lot of times, steps #1 and #7 can be combined into one. Most hosting providers will register the domain for you and park it until you are ready to use it. Also, one other tip. If you already have a domain name, make sure you setup hosting first. It usually takes time to update the DNS records and other relevant registrar data to work with the new hosting environment. If you leave it until the end, you’ll have a web site ready to launch, but will be waiting on domain registration issues. That has been our experience.” - John
Thanks John for this valuable tip! 

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the necessary art and science of positioning your website as relevant in the eyes of search engines. Often overlooked because of the time it takes to get results, SEO can be a very valuable marketing tool if used properly.

The following tools cover several SEO aspects that most websites require and are perfect for search engine optimizers, search engine buffs in general, or the overachieving website owner willing to take the extra step to make their site that much better.

• SEO Analyzer
  Grades your website’s search engine optimization level by analyzing download time, semantic structure, use of table elements, etc…
• Link Value
  This link value tool can help you decide if a link is worth paying for by calculating the link value per month of a given website.
• Another great tool from Link Vendor: Outbound Links
• Keyword Density
  To determine a website’s theme and relevant terms, one of the factors search engines consider is keyword density. This tool will help you balance your website’s keyword density by mimicking search engine spider behavior and returning a table of density values for key terms.
• Keyword Cloud “is a visual depiction of keywords used on a website, keywords having higher density are depicted in larger fonts. “
• KwMap
  Simply put: “A Keyword Map for the Whole Internet”
• Keyword Difficulty
  Great tool to analyze the competition you’re up against for particular a search term by analyzing “how difficult it will be to rank for a particular term.”
• Title & Meta Tags Generator
  Instantly create the meta tags you need for your website. This tool will also generate title tags, description, abstract, keyword, and robot meta tags (more info here).
• One great way to get your website noticed, is to submit to directories. Last time I did a search for “online directory,” Google returned 70,000,000 results. Clearly managing all those directory submissions is a pain (i.e, a slightly necessary pain). Enter the Directory Submission Manager, which removes the pain of “directory management”, while helping you monitor and track your directory submissions.
• Advanced Google Searches
  Very useful Google tool that will analyze, pages indexed by Google, pages with a specified keyword (in title, URL, file, etc..), keyword definitions and synonyms, and _many_ more.

Want more?

Here you go then:

• 30+ SEO Tools
• 136 SEO Tools
• Free Search Engine Optimization Tools from SEOBook

-FTK

What is a good Site Map?
There’s a debate going on about whether site maps will remain necessary with the advent of sites that do not immediately gain much from generating a site map (blogs, media sites, etc… ). While the debate about what will happen rages on, reality reminds us that this is today, and in today’s web, you need a site map.

What is a site map anyway?
A site map is simply, “a visual representation of a web site’s structure,” with the site map items typically arranged in hierarchical order. A site map can be used as a planning tool in designing a web site (the aspect this post deals with), or as a web page listing all of a websites pages (usually for search engines purposes and to help visitors easily find pages).

Site maps are displayed and presented in a variety of ways and have also been labeled structure models, a taxonomy, site hierarchy, navigation model, site structure, or site index. As a website planning tool however, site maps are best in outline format within a Word document or .rtf file.

Online collaboration tools have also proved to be helpful, especially if the site map is still being developed (my favorites so far are 37signals’ Writeboard and the handy Writemaps.

Why make a site map?
The importance of good documentation in a design project can’t be stressed enough. Anyone who’s been involved in a design project knows first hand the pain involved when ignoring good documentation comes back to haunt you later in the project.

Web projects are complex beasts requiring the skill and ingenuity of at least a couple people. The larger a web project is, chances are, the more people will be involved with the project (and not all of them will remain for the life of the project). Having good documentation then ensures that everyone stays on the same page, regardless of how often they come or go. This, however, does not just apply to large teams: even with smaller teams, it’s amazing how easy it is to miscommunicate ideas and/or spend time clarifying issues because of unclear documentation.

Did you notice how the last 2 paragraphs have been about documentation and not site maps?

That’s because the site map is the first (and possibly, most important) piece of documentation needed for a web project. As the name implies, it’s a “map” of a “site”, and without it, everyone would be lost.

What makes a good site map?
There are no “hard, fast rules” in writing out a site map. However, like the pirate’s code of yore, there are certain principles that should be followed:

• Remember that site maps are hierarchical and should clearly illustrate a page’s position (in relation to the others) within the website. IMO, the best way to achieve that goal, and come up with a usable planning tool, is to use a simple numbered, outline format.
• Use numbers. It’s a lot easier to say “1.4.2″ than it is visualize (then say) “I.IV.II”. (as if roman numerals aren’t bad enough, bullets are even worse).
• Pages, it’s all about pages. As a planning tool, the site map tells you a lot about the pages by not only establishing the relationships pages have to each other, but by also “mapping out” these relationships and how they relate to the different components of a project (of course, hence the phrase “site map”). These page relationships can be rather complicated, and adding technical details and aesthetic notes will only quadruple the complexity.

All of that to say, avoid including functionalities, images, placement instructions, etc… If necessary, put an asterisk next to an item and add a footnote. Which sort of leads to my next point…..

• Titles matter. Titles matter because if everyone refers to an apple as an apple, we would all understand that you want someone to pass the “round fruit with a firm white flesh and a green, red or yellow skin” and not, the “oval fruit with brown hairy skin and bright green flesh” in the fruit basket. As much as possible, choose the title for a page and stick with it. If you’re still trying to decide on the page titles, use “working titles” so that everyone knows you’re talking about the apple, not the kiwi, in the basket.
• Now tie them together. Although not a part of the site map, it’s a good idea to start compiling lists as you develop your site map. How many forms will it have? What will they be called and what kind of information will you collect? How about videos and pictures? Make a list of all the pages that will have videos, pictures, etc… (obviously that creates another list: “Stuff I Need To Put Together”. Do you see how useful a site map can be?).

Note: these lists you’re beginning to compile don’t have much to do with the site map. Essentially you’re compiling them at the same time you develop the site map so you can develop a clear picture of how your website will function3. More on what to do with the lists later….

Want more? Check out:

• Communicating Good Design by Dan Brown
• Last, always remember that the way you want it to function is not always the most feasible, or may not even be the best way, so keep an open mind!

-FTK

In what’s becoming a crowded space (though don’t get me wrong, there is still much seating and standing room), social networking websites in mass have “officially” arrived. Sure, the industry powerhouses have been around for some time now, but over the last couple of years it’s feeling like “Star Wars — Attack of the Clones” with all of the social networking websites cropping up around this niche and that specialty and those demographics. It’s similar to the domain name explosion or the rise of e-commerce; more often than not if you can think it, chances are there’s a social network around it.

So what’s my point, you ask? The point is, if you’re going to build a successful social networking website and you want a vibrant community (as no matter what your goals are with the website, community will be critical), you must avoid the idea of simple cloning what’s already out there. Sure, the up-and-coming social networking platforms (like Ning and Pringo Networks) can put the power of deploying a social networking website in the hands of anyone. And, for many, this approach will work extremely well (we’ve launched 5 or 6 Ning networks ourselves!), but sometimes a mass-market solution is only a solution to a mass-market problem. And with the mass-markets being heavily drooled over by the likes of Facebook and mySpace, the smaller markets are becoming king. Small IS the new big when it comes to social networking, apparently, and therefore it matters what platform you use and how many others use the same.

But it’s not just about a more custom social networking site, though. This certainly won’t ensure growth… you can get a social network created free via Ning or you can spend $250k on developing a completely custom monster, but at the end of the day the money you spent doesn’t mean piddly if the rest of the recipe is out-of-wack. In fact, it can’t be narrowed down to your design, your innovative functionalities, or your clever branding either.

It’s: a passionate topic/niche + a vibrant community + an innovative spin on integrating social networking functionalities = a solid platform to build from. Disappointed? If you’re were hoping for the “make it big in social networking” winning formula, I’m sorry to let you down! It’s that same thinking, though, that you MUST fight. There is NO standard formula or method for social networking success. And the problem is, too many are trying to find or build sites using just that kind of thinking!

So… back to reality: how can you build on that solid social networking platform you have? To start:

• Write (or have written) better copy (or different or cooler or sexier or more entertaining)
• Ask different (or more intuitive or funny) profile questions
• Use innovative spins on traditional methods and technology (e.g. a new spin on user dashboards or a new way of searching profiles, etc…)
• Employ unique ways of showing boring data (can stats, rankings, points, stars, levels, thresholds be expanded into remarkable visuals?)
• Be proactive (just because you don’t have to do something doesn’t mean it won’t help in 6 months)
• Make it viral (viruses don’t spread without a method of transmission, neither will your social network)
• Pat them on the back (give your users incentives, rewards, titles, roles, or whatever it will take to pat them on the back and make them feel good about themselves… it’s simple, but it works every time!)

Want more ideas on how you can set apart your social networking website? Then check out the following:

• Social Networking Differentiation
• Ideas for Differentiating a Social Networking Application

“A meme constitutes a theoretical unit of cultural information, the building block of culture or cultural evolution which spreads through diffusion propagating from one mind to another analogously to the way in which a gene propagates from one organism to another as a unit of genetic information and of biological evolution.”

Evolution of Technology
“Like genes, memes are in competition with each other. While genes compete for representation in the genepool, memes compete for representation in the memepool — the huge collection of ideas that are currently circulating the world. Human minds have limited room, so only the best memes manage to implant themselves. Memes that are good at replicating tend to leave more copies of themselves in minds and in other mediums such as books. Memes that are not so good at replicating tend to die out. There is a gigantic history of extinct memes, but since they are extinct we do not know what they were.”

It’s All in the Memes
“Once memes may have traveled at steady rate, taking hold with pernicious stealth. Now contagious ideas can be delivered direct to millions through newsgroups, mailing lists and websites. Dancing hamsters and Mahir do not hold the meme monopoly. It seems that just about any daft idea will do.”

Applied to the Internet today, a meme (or internet meme) “…is a neologism used to describe a catchphrase or concept that spreads in a faddish way from person to person via the Internet. The term is a reference to the concept of memes, but is used loosely to refer to things that are not necessarily memes in a technical sense, although they may become memes when they replicate.” -Wikipedia

Applying various available online technologies allows anyone to easily follow the spread and evolution (sometimes into extinction) of a meme:

How to Find the Weirdest Stuff on the Internet
“…a demonstration of how you can use a handful of different applications together to automate the discovery of the content that’s most worth your time in any niche - whether you’re looking for weird stuff or anything else..”

In addition to the De.licio.us, Reddit and Digg trinity, some of my favorite memetrackers include:

“Wikio is a personalized page of news, including a news search engine that searches media sites, blogs and member publications.”

“Megite is the social news aggregrator for anyone interested in what’s happening right now by intelligently uncovering the most relevant items from auto discovered news sites and weblogs.”

Tailrank finds “the hottest stories by tracking conversations between blogs” and has a plethora of additional tools for meme junkies.

Now convert them into RSS feeds and track away!

Bonus:
Six Creative Uses for RSS: “The following are six uncommon, yet effective, creative uses for RSS, in no particular order of importance.”

Then check out this great read on planning and documenting your web design/web development project the right way (and here you go all you Kindle readers)!

“Most discussion about Web design seems to focus on the creative process, yet turning concept into reality requires a strong set of deliverables—the documentation (concept model, site maps, usability reports, and more) that serves as the primary communication tool between designers and customers. Here at last is a guide devoted to just that topic. Combining quick tips for improving deliverables with in-depth discussions of presentation and risk mitigation techniques, author Dan Brown shows you how to make the documentation you’re required to provide into the most efficient communications tool possible. He begins with an introductory section about deliverables and their place in the overall process, and then delves into to the different types of deliverables. From usability reports to project plans, content maps, flow charts, wireframes, site maps, and more, each chapter includes a contents checklist, presentation strategy, maintenance strategy, a description of the development process and the deliverable’s impact on the project, and more.”

The eye is an amazing piece of work, both from an aesthetic and functional point of view. The way that it interprets color is one of the more fascinating things I’ve ever come across.The difference between what someone with normal vision would see and what someone who was color deficient would see while looking at the same website is striking and, I hope, gives us a greater appreciation of the colors we’re surrounded by (this link will allow you see any website like a color blind person would).

The way the human mind perceives color adds some interesting points of observation to the mix. Colors have cultural meaning, can cause a physical reaction, and are even of philosophical interest.

All of this to say that colors are important. They are ever present and are an integral part of our lives (unfortunately, they are also under-appreciated and very often overlooked).

If you want your website to be a smashing success, why don’t you pay attention to the colors of your website? If color can be used as a defense mechanism in animals and blue can suppress your appetite, what effect does the color of your website have on people?

Extra tip:
The Internet has a wide variety of resources on colors and the best ways to use them for the web. There are websites dedicated to the use of color in design, color theory and there’s even a tool that will blend a color. You can also generate a color scheme, convert a color to its web-safe alternative and experiment with the color wheel.

So stop feeling blue about your lack of an eye for colors and start seeing green by taking advantage of the numerous free tools and resources out there to help you in making better use of colors in your design and marketing pieces!

News Alert: 2008 Color of the Year Chosen By Pantone — can you incorporate this calming color of 2008?

It’s 2008 and by now the majority of people know what a blog is and many people have even adopted “really simple syndication” or “RSS” as a valuable tool whereas just a few years ago, these terms were relatively unknown by most (now, a Google search for “blogging” returns 55.6+ million results).

With the rise in popularity and the spread of blogging, more people and businesses are using blogs to communicate and accomplish Internet objectives than ever before. As a result, the clutter is building and the number of “junk blogs” is growing. More and more people are starting blogs and then abandoning them or starting blogs that simply pale in comparison to quality, useful, and fresh blog content.

Despite the increasing number of blogs in cyberspace, there is still only an estimated 5% of small businesses (less than 100 employees) that are blogging. There is also a growing uprising of blog readers that are looking for valuable content written by experts and passionate fans rather than from people trying to simply make a buck or sell a product. If you own a small business or work for one, you already have the “expert qualifier”! If you have a strong business web presence, build in a blog and let your business lend credibility to your blog, just as the reverse is true.

To help you get started, check out these great resources:

• The Blogging Starter Checklist (an excellent Squidoo Lens)
• How to Leverage the Power of Social Media to Market Your Blog
• ProBlogger.net (an excellent blogging resource)
• 15 Powerful Ways to Differentiate Your Blog from the Crowd
• 4 Tips for Making 2008 Your Blog’s Best Year Yet
• Exposed! 10 Secret Habits of Top Bloggers

Here’s a great video with advice on business blogging.

And here’s a great video on using WordPress (one of the most popular open source blog applications and the blog software that we use for this blog).

The house my parents currently live in was designed and built many years ago when I was a kid.  I remember sitting down with the architect as a family and we made a list of all the cool things we wanted the house to have. We made a list of everything; from the necessary things like how many rooms to the seemingly insignificant (like the hole in the wall my sister wanted instead of a bedside table). It was a long and tedious process, but it was also exciting and my fascination kept me intrigued.

The architect then drew up a blueprint based on our conversations and as we went over it, we gradually adjusted the list of features we wanted the house to have. Some of the things we started with were abandoned and others we hadn’t thought off were added. In the end, we had a blueprint mapping out the layout of the eventual house.

Based on the blueprint, the architect built model/prototype of the house  (my sister eventually converted it to a doll house). My siblings and I spent hours looking at it and imagining what life would be like after the house was finished. Again, we spent time going over the features of the house and rearranging things until we were sure it was perfect.

Many years later (or so it seemed to me at the time), our house was finally ready.

I often feel like that architect whenever I start out on a new web design/development project because it turns out the only difference between our jobs is that I build websites and he builds houses (granted it’s a pretty big difference, but the methods are strikingly alike).

Just like with the house, the beginning of a project is spent learning about it, the clients and their goals, etc… We discuss your project and list any features you’d like, colors, etc… until we eventually settle down on a final list of features and how we would like them to work. This is often the most tedious part but doing a good job at this stage exponentially increases the chances of a smooth project experience.

This is also a good time to develop the content for your website and compile any additional files that will also be used throughout the website (images, PDFs, documents, etc…).

With the list of features in mind, a layout of the finished website is designed. Much like the blueprint of a house, the layout simply gives us a visual overview of the website’s structure and concentrates on placing each feature in the right place. In fact, the website layout is often called a blueprint in some circles (wire frame is another term also commonly used).

That layout then serves as the platform the mockup (the model) is built on. Basically, a mockup is a picture of what your website will look like after it’s been completed and its features have been implemented. It maintains the structure from the blueprint but now the color scheme is added, buttons designed, etc…

It’s never quite right the first time around so several revisions are designed, colors experimented with, features are moved around, etc… until the “Eureka!” moment arrives (this is hands down the best part of a project).

This is where you (the client) goes to Mexico, the production team work their magic with code and another remarkable website goes online.

-FT

Special thanks to Eric of Floorsnet for allowing me to use his project as an example