Tag Archives: Business

Why we will continue to support IE6

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Possibly adding fuel to the fire, but to at least put my opinion on the matter out there… here is my view on the prospect of web developers discontinuing support for Microsoft’s eight year old browser Internet Explorer 6 (released on August 27, 2001).

According to Wikipedia:

“The end-of-life support for Internet Explorer 6 is July 13, 2010″

That alone tells me that it is an actively supported means of people accessing websites for at least another 10 months.

A lot of opinions seem to be around the lack of standards support by the browser and I don’t dispute this fact, but you also can’t look beyond the fact that there are still users out there that are stuck with it. Unfortunate, but true.

Just so you’re clear on my position on the matter; we will support IE6 until there is what I deem to be a sufficiently low enough percentage of visitors using it. There will be exceptions in cases where I know for a fact that the audience of the site/intranet is closed enough and mandated to use a newer or different browser, but by rule of thumb, we will support it.

My clients’ reputations are important to me!

According to w3schools, last month 13.6% of users were still on Internet Explorer 6.

For technology to cause their image to possibly be tarnished to approximately 13% odd of their visitors is simply unacceptable. Especially when those possible problems are avoidable through producing “gracefully degradable” sites where necessary and providing code hacks (a sad reality my geek friends) to have them rendered properly.

Really people… if you’re not in the web design and development industry, and you can’t update your browser, then you probably wouldn’t give a toss about anything besides the fact that you’re inconvenienced by a breaking website! In my eyes, thats not good business.

A good coder should make a site work in all required browsers

The discussion often pops up in forums I frequent, and it’s usually someone having a hard time getting something to render consistently. While I do empathise with them (I have been there too), you need to suck it up, figure it out and make it work… it is your job, do it properly!

Usually someone with a bit more experience will chime in that it’s not that hard when you know how. Those people -in my opinion- are the true professionals. Not the guys whining about it and trying to get everyone to stop supporting it.

Upgrading your browser is necessary

All the above being said, don’t get the impression that I think the www should stagnate and indefinitely be stuck with archaic systems like IE6. There is a world beyond simple browsing, and the likes of the Mozilla Foundation, Google, Opera, Apple and even Microsoft themselves have forged on and created some far more modern, more secure, more user friendly and just better browsers.

Here is a list of browsers I recommend:

Opening or closing the channels of communication

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We seem to be in a stage of evolution where communication is at the highest point it has ever been, and while some embrace the connectivity brought about through telephones, mobile phones, Skype, email, instant messaging and social networking sites and tools like blogs, twitter, facebook, myspace etc. there are some that aren’t. And I mean “really” arent.

Funnily enough, I respect the choice of those on both sides of the fence. I’m more on the side that makes use of the new technologies, unless they annoy me or are done better by something else. Twitter for instance. It’s something I’ve never really managed to understand the need for. Perhaps that will change, but I find the concept of micro blogging to be a bit odd and unnecessary.

Coming back to the sheer volume of protocols you can use these days, I keep my communication to the following:

  • Email
    In order of preference, this is on top of the list as it is the most traceable and effectively indexed form of documenting one’s communication.
  • Instant Messaging (Skype & MSN)
    Generally I have multiple IM conversations open to various clients, service providers and colleagues at all times. If you know how to manage these conversations and cut off the ones that are wasting time, this is a very effective means of communicating. I log all conversations, so backtracking to he said, she said is pretty simple. Being stern and honest when you’re busy with tyre kicking friends is a must, and if done politely doesn’t harm your relationship (as far as my experience tells). If someone tells me they’re busy, I leave them alone. Or email them to respond when convenient.
  • Telephone
    Thanks to Alexander Graham Bell, this device is still the tried and tested standard for remote communication 132 years after it was invented! Alexander’s photograph above.
  • Mobile Phone
    Can be the most annoying device in the world, but it also saves lives and offers a 24/7 means of connectivity. Looking past the obvious calling and messaging features, I also use my smart phone as a web browser and IM client.
  • VOIP
    Voice over IP would be above telephone and mobile phone if I lived in a country where the connection were a bit more stable. There are some people I know I don’t have any problem chatting to, but sometimes it ends up being a “can you hear me?… I can’t hear you… can you hear me now?…” schlep in which case I pick up the phone and dial their landline number or mobile. A pity really, and a fact that will hopefully change for the better in time… sooner rather than later.
  • Fax
    If you really have to. And sometimes you do. I rarely send faxes, and I receive them as an email. This saves paper, and the related storage space, and wastage.

Well, those are what I use.

A (very successful) colleague of mine’s signature features:

  • Mobile
  • GTalk
  • Skype
  • Twitter
  • MSN
  • AIM
  • Yahoo!

and another (equally successful colleague) features only his 3 website address. On which you’ll only be able to contact him via email, or twitter. Sure he has a different business model and this works for him. It wouldn’t work for me, nor for Joey (above), but different strokes for different folks.

Taking a page from Pablo Picasso’s book

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Illustration by Christian Mugnai

I had lunch with the exceptionally talented artist Christian Mugnai at Spiga d’Oro today and we had a rather interesting and amusing discussion about things. Chris and I have been mates since we first taught each other swear words when he moved here from Italy… in std 2 (approx. 5yrs old). In amongst all the jibber jabber and catching up we drew some parallels in our work, and trials and tribulations we face daily.

One of them was the inevitable discussion of the value of one’s work. I had the perfect story to let Chris understand how I feel about evaluating one’s work. Here it is, and if you’ve heard it before and I got details wrong, or know the original storyteller, please comment and let me know before crying foul. I will credit the originator once I know.

Pablo Picasso was walking through a park one day and he came across a woman who recognised him immediately. “You’re Pablo Picasso aren’t you?” she stated, and he replied that he was. “You’re my favourite artist!” she exclaimed. “Won’t you sketch my portrait?”.

Pablo agreed to do so and whipped out his sketch pad and pencil. He looked at her with intense concentration, tilted his head to the left, then the right, closed his eyes and thought for a second, opened them and laid 3 lines on the paper with great dexterity.

He passed the paper to the woman who looked at it for a moment, and she cried out “Absolutely incredible! In these 3 lines you have captured exactly who I am! I must pay you for this sketch Mr Picasso, what do I owe you for this?”.

Pablo thought for a second and said it would be £5,000 for the sketch. “What!?” she blurted. “It literally took you 20 seconds and 3 strokes of your pencil?!”.

“No my dear” he calmly replied, “it took me my entire life.”

And that’s the story. If you don’t understand the moral, or what it’s about, just comment and I’ll gladly explain. It’ll actually be interesting to see if anybody “doesn’t” understand.

Joining The World of Photo Sharing and Social Networking

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Flickr ScreenshotCall me slow, or whatever. I have finally decided to give Flickr a serious chance. I’ve always known about it and had a profile on there for as long as I can remember. For some reason I always just saw it as another one of those “photo sharing” tools that were okay to post pictures of your last vacation or new toys, but not the kind of thing you want to use to promote yourself as a serious professional photographer.

Times they are a changing. Social media has grown so much over the years that things are actually turning back on themselves… in a good way. At first there was apprehension and a lot of people had the same attitude as mine on the use of things like Flickr.

Surely it devalues the industry? Yes and no. If you’re not educated enough on the topics of copyrights and image usage rights, then you could easily be taken for a ride. If you do your homework however, you have a brilliant medium to showcase your work and you can pick and choose commissions or photo sales from enquirers at your discretion. Just as you would in the world outside of social networking.

Surely you’re mixing it in amongst the amateurs and hobbyists? Yes, but is that a bad thing when you stand out like a diamond in the rough? If Sally and Bob are posting images of their doggies and kitties and trips to the dentist, and you’re posting your high quality images showing a distinct theme or pattern of your strengths… who is someone looking for a photographer likely to call?

Microstock sites are an entirely different discussion, but play a part in so far as the fact that they are slowly feeling the pinch of the professionals coming back with a vengeance on systems like Flickr.

A professional stock photographer has to sell one image hundreds or thousands of times to make the same amount of money a traditional professional photographer can make in the sale of one. Given, the systems are all set up and it’s a different business model targeting a different market segment, but rather than throwing breadcrumbs to the pigeons, I’d prefer to set up a professional shop front and entice the serious buyers in.

I’ll be integrating my photostream into this site in due course, but while I do that, please check it out on Flickr.

Stage One Of My Re-Branding – The Logo

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Allchorn Design Logo Redesign

I’ve decided that I am going to re-brand myself. Starting with a new logo. Quite honestly, I’m sick of my glassy globe with cheesily gradiented AD.

The direct metaphor of the earth representing the “world” wide web being the audience of my creations is replaced with a pretty direct graphic representing design in the form of a fairly realistic looking fountain pen drawing a vector line over the d.

If I remember correctly, I did the fountain pen illustration a few years back in a concept for use on one of my websites, but never managed to fit it in anywhere. Some aspects of the vectors aren’t quite up to the standards I set for myself these days, but thats just a matter of tweaking it.

I will refine the vectors, but in the meantime, I’m happy to use it on the web (in 72dpi). Before going to print with cards, I’m going to make it 100% for just about any medium. Right now, it works equally well on white and 90% black, or anything in between.

There is a whole website redesign in process too, which is currently in the theming phase. I’ll hold off on showing that till it’s actually live. Put it this way… it’s a complete change in direction, style and colour.

More soon.

Website Design And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance

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Motorcycle Engine and HTML CodeHigh levels of stress and a reasonably obvious truth have driven me to write this post. A rather corny title it may be, it’s pretty spot on to what this is all about. It all stems from the true nature of the internet, and the common misconceptions of what that true nature really is.

Defining The True Nature Of The Internet

Is it like print, where you design or typeset your way to a happy conclusion? Possibly fight a bit with colours and plate registration, but ultimately end up with something you can reproduce?

Or perhaps it’s like television where you produce a linear presentation of audio visual goodness?

Nope, it’s actually like both of those, but with more factors drawn into the mix which -in my opinion- closely resemble that of vehicle maintenance rather than some facet of any advertising aspect.

Am I nuts? Maybe, but hear me out.

The internet is a living breathing entity which has ins and outs. It is fed with information (text, video, files, images etc.) and it allows for this information to be extracted, viewed, manipulated, deleted and well… used.

With this interactive nature and the fact that it is constantly changing, there is always margin for error. There is always a loophole for malicious action. There is also the amazing opportunity for which the internet is used for at large and thats it’s main intent; facilitating greatly enhanced communication.

So How Is Website Design Like Motorcycle Maintenance?

Can I rephrase that to “Motorcycle Design, Production and Mantenance”? Sure I can. This is my blog!

The reason I see it this way is through my experience of designing, maintaining, developing, moving, deleting and administrating websites since 1999. All websites start somewhere. Maybe in the mind of an entrepreneur, or perhaps in the marketing department’s weekly board meeting. Regardless what the website’s inception was, it had a beginning, and from there it grew into what it is now.

Designing the website -if you’ve read anything I’ve written- doesn’t relate only to the pretty colour scheme you used and the frilly edges, but rather the the overall design. The proverbial engine behind the website (be that straight HTML, or a fully fledged Content Management System) as well as the page layouts, the structure and flow of information etc. It all needs to be “designed”. If not, you’re using someone else’s design (ready made software/solutions), but either way, it was or is designed by someone.

Production of a website can come at whatever phase the team or individual finds to be the most effective time to do so. Whether things are meticulously planned out with all the i’s dotted and all the t’s crossed, or if a single page objective document was drawn up and an evolutionary project was embarked on. It’s the same thing at the end of the day and the end result is subjective and up to those web “builders”.

Maintenance of a website. This is where things get interesting. Does the website maintain itself? Does a website fix itself when a human or non-human error causes something to go wrong. Does a website with user generated content work indefinitely without some form of moderation?

The answer to all of those questions is a resounding no. It does not. You can fake it. You can make it do some form of moderation and clean out naughty words, or go with the best hosting provider money can buy. At the end of the day, no the website will not stand the test of time, neither in looks (another subjective matter that) nor in it’s structure.

A motorcycle’s valves wear. It’s pistons grind up against the barrel and it’s constantly exposed to varying degrees of intensity of use and heat and cold.

Similarly, a website sits on a server. It’s visited by varying quantities of visitors. Information is pumped into it and drawn out of it and not only by humans. There are automated programmings scraping information from it. There are search engine spiders following links. There are spam bots posting anoying links to their Viagra sites.

Maybe your host is insufficient? You take it out of that provider’s warm comfy bedded engine mountings and plonk it into an unknown environment and things break. They need to be fixed. Folder permissions change and the engine’s fuel line is effectively clogged. The website slowly or quickly suffers and dies.

Okay, Enough Drama

You should now understand what I mean in my metaphoric comparison of Websites to Motorcycles, and if not, read it again. If you still think I’m wrong, then maybe I’m crazy, or you are.

There are other aspects to a website that aren’t mentioned above. Things like online marketing and SEO, optimising content for the web (believe it or not, you cannot copy and paste from Word without creating an invalid botch job of your site) or just keeping things fresh by tweaking colours, focal points, specials, announcements etc.

A new browser might come out and get very quickly adopted (Firefox as an example grew from nothing to almost a 30% market share). If your website doesn’t work in the new browser… are you willing to exclude 30% of your target audience?

Have a think. I reckon my point makes sense.

I’m South Africa’s No.1 Web Design Consultant and Why

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It’s nice, and quite flattering for me to see that Google has appointed me as South Africa’s number one website design consultant. You can see in the SERP (search engine results page) that they have appointed me the organic position number one (at the time of posting this).

I think this goes to show quite effectively that if you just concentrate on your content, and keep putting things out there that show what you do… for the visitors -not just the search engines- you will reap the rewards.

It’s actually been happening a lot lately. Smaller clients of mine that haven’t invested much, or anything in SEO are achieving nice results. Not enormous amounts of traffic that would impress people with numbers, but rather highly targeted traffic that actually converts into sales.

Case Scenario 1 – Perfect Bounce

perfectbounce.jpgPerfect bounce is a pleasant company that offers the construction and maintenance of all sorts of sporting facilities. My contact at perfect bounce is organised, professional and has been a pleasure to work with. They took my advice on how we should construct the site (on a tight budget) and over time, the search engines have picked up their content and ranked them accordingly.

They are receiving traffic for the terms “cricket nets“, “indoor cricket nets” and “concrete cricket nets” amongst others. This shows that people coming to their site are actively searching for what they offer. From that fact, the conversion rate (conversion of casual visitor to paying customer) is very high.

Case Scenario 2 – Active Soul

activesoul.jpgActive Soul is another one of my smaller clients that offers the production of quality promotional sportswear. At least thats what they started out offering, but as things have progressed, and the demands being shown by the marketplace, they have branched out into other promotional clothing avenues.

The couple that own Active Soul have been awesome, and through my recommendation they commissioned GnuWorld to optimise and market their online presence online. It took a bit of time (as it sometimes does) for them to be ranked effectively in this highly competitive market, but they are now receiving traffic for terms like “sportswear“, “gym wear” and “promotional clothing“.

In Summary

I might come across as an arrogant jerk with the heading of this post, but since Google appointed me that position; at least in their eyes it’s the truth. I don’t really view myself as number one anything, but I do try hard, work hard and aim to provide services that perform for my clients. With a friendly and mutually respectful relationship, these two sites illustrate why I am pretty good at what I do, and these guys are feeling the results where it matters; in their pockets.

If you’re wondering why I linked to those two sites with those keywords, it’s not merely to confuse you or annoy you, but to give them a little link juice from my site which has a relatively decent PR (Page Rank). More on that at another time. Nothing below board, but a healthy recommendation for them, since thats what they do.

Designing Websites and Taking Photos

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No rest for the wicked, or should that be “no rest for the industrious”. I’m hoping the latter is the case as I don’t feel particularly wicked. With a slow start to 2008, things have thankfully picked up quite considerably around here.

From the inception of a new professional photography service called From the Camera with my photography partner Jason Wilkinson, to the creation of Sitepress, for affordable yet professional content managed website design and the every day running of the constantly growing motorsport photography blog, Circuitchaser.com.

Yeah, I’d guess you could say I’ve been busy. Working during the week sorting and editing humungous batches of images, writing newsletters and blog posts, while setting up Sitepress and From the Camera from a business, legal and financial standpoint. No small task, and I hope it doesn’t all go unrewarded.

From the Camera – Professional Photography Service

fromthecamera.jpg

As briefly mentioned above, Jason and I have officially teamed up in a 50/50 effort to provide a professional photography service specialising in functions, sports, weddings and food. With our experience combined, we have a considerable amount of expertise in all of those fields of photography.

I’ll be the first to admit that Jason is a more experienced photographer than me, and I am constantly learning from him and new things just about every time I go out in the field. My most recent shoot at Killarney providing me with one of my most prized collections of images thus far.

Sitepress – Affordable Content Managed Websites

sitepress.jpg

Not everyone can afford to cough up the initial R10 – R15,000 required to get a custom designed website with an elegant, easy to use content management system to edit their own content. I thought it would be a good idea to offer this service including…

  • a free initial consultation
  • domain name registration
  • web hosting with email
  • custom design
  • configuration
  • training and support

…all on a slightly different payment model. Based on the cellphone industry’s contract system, I’ve introduced Sitepress to accommodate budgets with 4 options. You can get the site on a 24, 12 or 6 month contract, or go the whole hog with a 50% deposit and balance on completion. Pricing is all on the website, so check it out if you’re interested.

Circuitchaser.com – Motorsport Photography Blog

circuitchaser.jpg

My baby for the last few years. Circuitchaser has grown and matured since I started it in the beginning of 2006. My grand plans of hitching a ride to the world’s MotoGP’s a little humbled by my realisation of what it costs both in time and money to get to that level, but as things progress, I know I’ll get there one day.

Concentrating mainly on local events like the Boland Bikes/RST track schools, as well as the Mike Cameron Track days, the WPMC regional racing and the occasional national or international events that come our way.

With a newsletter that now goes out weekly(ish) I’m keeping people in touch with whats happening on the coming weekend, as well as what galleries are up from the previous one. The unique gripes of HTML emails rearing their ugly heads and giving me a headache, but nothing that cannot be countered.

Well, for what it’s worth, thats what I’ve been busy with lately, and with what it all entails, I’m likely to be good and busy well into 2008. I thought it would be nice to share with you all what is on the cards, and keep you up to speed.

Affordable Website Design

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logo1.jpgI’m busy working on and have recently launched a beta(ish) version of a new concept. It’s called Sitepress and it’s a combination of all my accumulated website design, content management and consulting knowledge rolled into one offering. It has a twist however, and one I hope will bring professional website design to those that previously couldn’t afford it or couldn’t justify the cost in their budget.

That twist is that it comes more in the shape of a cellphone contract than a huge once off or phased costing. Starting with 3 packages, you get a host of features and special services which you’d otherwise pay no less than R10 – R15k for.

It’s an idea that just could bring quality website design, development and consulting services to small and medium sized businesses, or even individuals. It’s a concept that poses a certain element of risk to me, but with things planned out properly, I have minimised this risk and with me not out to “get” anyone we can settle into some good productive design work.

My one aim behind this is to minimise the crap that is currently being spewed out by the hoards of newbie web designers and moonlighters that clients seem to be so readily commissioning for quite an important, powerful part of their business. At the same time making it affordable with the option of payments split over your choice of term (6, 12 or 24 months).

Whether or not this will pick up, I have put a fair deal of effort into it’s modelling and planning. I started with a business model document which outlined the offering, the conditions, the pricing and what ever else needed to be put in writing from a business perspective (this is still a work in progress, but will probably never be “finished”). I had Cobus over at Fresh01 integrate my design which I created using some of the content I wrote in the business document into WordPress and the legal side of things is underway by my lawyer.

I’ll most certainly post updates on the progression of this endeavour as and when they happen.

Design as a Business Part 1

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Designing websites for a living, or for extra money, is an exceptionally popular part of life for people all over the world in all age groups. There are kids and recent school leavers either doing it as a hobby or full time, as well as many people with intentions of making it big in the industry after growing bored of their nine 2 fiver..

I’ve been doing a lot of soul searching lately, with the drowning flood of insurgents bombarding the market with half baked proposals with ridiculously low price tags. It seems to be happening more and more frequently, and with these newbies not fully understanding the nature of design as a business, the commodity market continues to spread like a disease.

I Repeat, Design is NOT a Commodity

Designing a web presence, not only visually appealing, but designed to perform and communicate effectively is not something I can offer on a half price special, or a buy 2 get one free business model. You will invariably end up with work that is squeezed out of the lower creative orifice. Something that makes the designer or the client go “oh cool!, but ultimately not perform, or in more severe cases, actually damage the company reputation.

Spec Work and Free Pitching

I’ve had a bit of a lengthy email conversation with Cathering Morley from no-spec.com and contrary to my previous article on spec work vs pitching, she has convinced me how damaging the practice of spec work and free pitching really are. I mistakingly perceived pitching as a necessary evil where a portion of the work should be a sacrifice of time to land a possible large project.

An excerpt from one of her emails:

“I’ll bust my butt doing my best for them, but I want to start off right. I want them to respect what I do as much as I respect what they are doing.”

Catherine effectively convinced me that not only was I wrong and it will waste my time on the whole, it’s also an irresponsible and damaging practice. What you’re effectively doing is giving your uneducated, un-researched “opinion” of what the client needs and leaving it to them to choose the prettiest of the bunch.

The portfolio should represent the quality of one’s work, and a frank, honest discussion with a designer and the possible commissioning of him/her for a paid pitch is an ethical and effective plan of action (should you not be 100% certain about them).

If you don’t like the resulting work, talk to the designer. Maybe the brief was not clear enough. Maybe the designer went another route to that what you expected. Worst case scenario is you pay them for their time and use it as a learning step towards reaching your goal. If you choose a good, professional, reputable designer with trade references, you’ll likely not have to do this. Pick someone amateur or unqualified, then you probably will and spend more money either taking ages to get the desired result, damaging yours our your company’s reputation or having to pay somoene else to fix their mistakes.

Design Business & Ethics

AIGA, the professional association for design have published a series of brochures explaining the necessary ethics and business acumen of both the client and designer on a professional level. Well worth downloading, reading and keeping as reference.

One thing I read in the client document mirrors mine and all professional’s thoughts on the topic:

“Unlike so much in today’s business world, graphic design is not a commodity. It is the highly individualized result of people coming together to do something they couldn’t do alone. When the collaboration is creative, the results usually are too.”

Download the client’s guide to design brochure here (216KB PDF).