Twitter Resources

By Tim Priebe on March 3, 2010 at 2:09 pm in Link Roundup, Social Networking

PrintUnlike some other social networking sites, Twitter does not have third party applications on their website. Instead, they allow those to be hosted on other websites, and let those tie directly into Twitter. Here are a few of those Twitter resources I’ve found useful

TweetBeep.com

tweetbeep

If you are familiar with Google Alerts, then you’ll understand TweetBeep.com, which bills itself as Google Alerts for Twitter. Basically, you can enter search terms, and TweetBeep.com will email you tweets that match the search when they show up on Twitter.

TwitBacks.com

twitbacks

If you’re not a graphic designer yourself, TwitBacks.com is a good resource for getting a background image for your Twitter account that’s more customized than the backgrounds Twitter offers by default. They have over 80 backgrounds, and you can customize them online with your social networking links, a longer biography than Twitter allows, and even add a picture of yourself or your logo.

SocialOomph.com

socialoomph

If you’re looking to schedule tweets, automatically follow those who follow you or automatically send direct messages to new followers, SocialOomph.com is the choice for you.

Twitter Feed

twitterfeed

Tweeting about your latest blog entry is made automatic with Twitter Feed. Just enter in any RSS feed address, customize the settings if necessary, and every time you blog it will be pushed automatically out to Twitter. Of course, other RSS feeds will work as well.

Twitter Grader

twittergrader

Wanting to see how well you’re using Twitter? Twitter Grader is an automated tool from the guys that brought you Website Grader. While this type of tool should be taken with a grain of salt, it is neat to see how you rank compared to others in your town.

Your Twitter Karma

twitterkarma

Your Twitter Karma will give you a list of all the people who you’re following or who are following you, and will let you filter the list. A good tool if you want to see who’s following you that you’re not following, or vice versa. It was extremely useful when they would let you bulk unfollow people you were following who weren’t following you, but apparently Twitter asked them to remove that feature. Also, it’s a bit slow and the site is as ugly as sin, but it’s useful otherwise.

Know of some other great Twitter resources you’ve found useful? Please let us know!

Pros and Cons to new Facebook layout

By Tim Priebe on February 22, 2010 at 5:04 pm in Social Networking

Over the last month or so, Facebook has been rolling out their redesigned site, with many key elements changing in an overall layout overhaul. I asked some of the T&S staff to let me know what they thought of the new Facebook layout, now that they’ve had some time to use it. Here are their thoughts:

Elyssa Dolinger

I think it’s usable, but I always hate how they change things without asking. Yeah, they’re not going to listen to me, but I’d at least like to be asked. I miss my little bar at the bottom! I know it’s on the side but there is so much stuff over there it’s cluttered. I also wish there was just a little bit better definition between sections, color-wise. It all gets mucked together which means I gloss over the link I’m looking for.

fb-1The thing that I actually really DO like in this change of layout is the little notifications next to the Facebook logo on the top left of the page. The three subtle icons representing friend requests, messages, and notifications get these little red flags on them when you have some. It’ll even have a tiny number in there telling you how many you have so you can know what you’re getting into before you commit to clicking.

Sean Sanders

fb-2I feel like the new layout is more organized. Having the bar on the bottom made it less noticeable than it is now. Also, I like seeing all the categories broken down on the side. It just seems a lot easier to get to different places now. That’s about all I’ve noticed that’s really different.

Amber Hanks

I really like the new design of Facebook. I think the simplified look works better. It took a little getting used to though. I also like that the friend requests and messages are more dynamic. I also like how notifications show up in the left sidebar when you’re logged in.

Unfortunately, chat still appears to be buggy when you have several chats going. It will say people are offline for just a second, and messages won’t go through. Then a moment later, they’re back online again. It’s too bad they didn’t fix some of those things.

fb-4

Emily Spirek

My initial reaction of the new layout was the opposite of most. Although Facebook has made some questionable updates in the past, I don’t understand why so many people disliked this one. I think the overall intention was a good one, but there still needs to be some improvements.

Here’s what I like:

  1. The dashboard with a more central location of everything you need.
  2. “Live Feed” changed to “Most Recent”…not a huge deal, just think it makes more sense.
  3. I love icons, mainly b/c they simplify everything and look cool. I like the addition of Friend Requests, Messages and Notifications in the top left.

fb-3Here’s what I’d like to see:

  1. Home, Profile and Account on the same side as the new icons I just mentioned, and turn those into icons as well.
  2. I’m not sure if they were refraining from total shock by keeping chat in the same location, but I don’t understand why the Friends Online needs to be in 2 separate locations. On the left sidebar where it says “See All”, it’s awkward how a pop up appears across the screen. I feel like the random choices of online friends is a waste of space. Either put the whole list in the left sidebar or stick with the original chat in the bottom right.

That’s all I see so far, overall I think it was a smart move by Facebook.

Looking for a salesperson

By Tim Priebe on January 13, 2010 at 2:59 pm in General

salespersonOnce again, we’re looking to add to our fantastic team here at T&S Web Design. This time, we’re looking for a full time salesperson. This is a full-time position, and comes complete with a base salary, commission and a bonus program.

If you are interested in joining the fun, motivated team here at T&S, just call our job hotline at 241-1051. Listen to the entire message, then leave the information that you’ll hear me ask for.

And if you know anyone who is a good candidate and might be interested, be sure to pass this information along to them.

Thanks!

Alternating column colors with jQuery

By Tim Priebe on January 4, 2010 at 7:04 pm in Design, Technical, css, html

jquery-tablesWe recently had one of our designers create a table design for a client with alternating column colors. Instead of laughing at her and not coding it, we instead decided to use a little jQuery goodness to get it taken care of.

We included the following code in our document’s head, using the Google jQuery implementation:

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.google.com/jsapi"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
google.load("jquery", "1.3.2");

google.setOnLoadCallback(function() {
$("table tr td:nth-child(even)").addClass("even-column");
$("table tr th:nth-child(even)").addClass("even-column");
});
</script>

So that’s the code that gives every other table cell, including header cells, the class of even-column. Now we can style those cells however we’d like.

In our case, a little CSS transformed the table pictured below on the left into the table on the right.

screen-shot-2010-01-04-at-64457-pm screen-shot-2010-01-04-at-64510-pm

Of course, putting the following in our google.setOnLoadCallback function will do something similar for rows.

$("table tr:nth-child(even) td").addClass("even-column");

This would result in the following:

screen-shot-2010-01-04-at-64554-pm

While this could have been solved by actually hard-coding the table’s cells with the even-column class, we are using Wordpress on this site. This means the client could add their own table on down the line, having no idea what a class is, much less to add a specific one to every other cell in every row of the table. Plus, that would be a lot of work.

First page SEO guarantees are lies

By Tim Priebe on December 29, 2009 at 6:49 am in Search Engine Optimization

SEO salesman lying“Can you guarantee I can get on the first page of Google?”

That’s a question I often get when discussing search engine optimization (aka SEO) with clients and potential clients. The short answer?

Nope. Nobody can. Anyone who says they can is lying.

Let me clarify a bit.

Optimizing your website for search engines involved improving its content with words and phrases that research and common sense shows your target market might be typing in. It’s more than just picking one single word or phrase you want to rank well for.

How people search

Let’s look at a hypothetical situation. Say we have someone with a company based in Edmond, Oklahoma looking for a website. If they are unfamiliar with web design companies in the area, but know they want to hire a local company, they’re much more likely to search for “web design Edmond” than they would be for “T&S Web Design.”

Okay, you caught me, that’s less hypothetical and more something we deal with every day. So we chose to optimize our site more for “web design Edmond” than any other phrase. But search for the phrase “web design” by itself, and we’re somewhere past the 200th listing.

Remembering the competition

Also, there are competitors to think about. We are very careful to explain to those in certain industries like insurance and real estate that their chances of getting on page one of the search engine results are low at best. Realistically, the chances are pretty close to zero, unless they’re in some niche that has a realistic chance of less people being able to fill. “Castles in New York” might be one such area.

We aren’t Google

Finally, the simple truth is that we’re simply not in control of search engines like Google, Bing or Yahoo because we’re not them. As any parent can tell you, no one person can tell exactly what another person (or company) will do.

So if you run into one of those companies that “guarantee” first page placement for search engine optimization, just remember it’s a scam. So don’t fall for it.

But don’t take our word for it

Feel free to check out Google’s advice on SEO, which also warns against placement guarantees. Yahoo! also gives their own SEO advice. Finally, if you really want to, you can read Bing’s blatantly biased SEO advice.

* If you were not aware, Google, Bing and Yahoo! are the top three search engines out there currently. According to some sources, over 96% of searches done online are performed on those three sites.

Losing control is good

By Tim Priebe on December 25, 2009 at 6:30 am in Video

Merry Christmas! During the past year, a lot of business owners come to me concerned about not having control over blog comments, social media comments, etc. What they don’t get is the fact that they don’t have control is what makes it more useful and genuine. In the video below, Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian discusses that viewpoint at a conference in less than five minutes using a real-life example.

Google Names T&S Web Design a Favorite Place

By Tim Priebe on December 16, 2009 at 5:07 pm in General, Search Engine Optimization

We're a Favorite Place on Google

We’ve long thought of T&S as our favorite place. It looks like Google agrees with us. Well, Google users, anyway.

Google recently sent us a small package with a decal and letter in it to let us know that we’ve been selected as a Favorite Place on Google. Apparently less than 1% of the businesses in the United States were selected, based largely on their popularity on Google results.

Here’s how Google describes it on their FAQ page on the topic:

The list was determined based on the popularity of a business’ Local Business Center listing, as determined by how many times Google users looked for more information about a business, requested driving directions to get there, and more. Google users “decided” based on their actions, and we sent the decals.

…

Over 100,000 businesses were identified as Favorite Places, representing less than 1% of the 28 million U.S. businesses. We believe that our standards for selecting businesses are as selective or more selective than other companies which have run similar initiatives.

We're a Favorite Place on Google with BarcodeVery cool! The decal actually has a QR barcode pointing to our Google Business Listing.

Interested in an enhanced Google Business Listing for your business? We actually provide that as part of our SEO services. Contact us if you’re interested in knowing more.

Two job openings at Midwest City Chamber

By Tim Priebe on at 10:59 am in General

Midwest City Chamber LogoJust received an email from Dave Burnett with the Midwest City Chamber about a couple of job openings.

Read the information below, and email Dave if you’re interested.

We have two position vacancies to fill.

1. We are looking for a person with charm and professionalism to serve as the face of the Chamber to the business community as our Membership Sales Director. This is a full time position that pays $2,000 per month + commission. We provide a $150 health insurance allowance, mileage allowance and cell phone allowance. We do not have a group health insurance plan, but qualify for an employee to subscribe to BC/BS through another group’s plan. The position requires experience in outside B2B sales.

2. I need a part-time paid intern with computer skills to assist in maintaining my economic development publications, blogs and web sites. Other clerical duties will be assigned as necessary. Pay is $9.00 per hour for 20 hours per week. Phone voice and front-desk ability required.

Email me at david.burnett@midwestcityok.com if you, or someone you know, is interested in either of these positions. No phone calls please.

Thanks,
Dave Burnett

Demo of Wordpress Plugins 1/3

By Tim Priebe on at 6:32 am in Technical, Video

Recently at a local Wordpress Users’ Group, I discussed some of our favorite Wordpress Plugins here at T&S Web Design. Check out part 1/3 below, with Contact Form 7. Parts 2 & 3 coming soon…

Facebook on a dial-up modem

By Tim Priebe on December 9, 2009 at 3:29 pm in Social Networking

lite.facebook.comIf you’re connected to the internet on a dial-up modem (yes, non-believers, there are still dial-up modems out there), you may have experienced some frustration when trying to access sites like Facebook.

Fret no longer!

Facebook is offering lite.facebook.com, a site designed specifically for people who like less clutter, or just have limited bandwidth like dial-up users do.



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