Blog
Over the years, I’ve written a lot of blogs on several sites. Some of my favorites are here, mixed in with my original content. Enjoy.
More Calls to Action = Lower Conversion
When more is less: A case study in three screenshots.
California SB1486 may make accessibility audits help avoid lawsuits
A bill that would modify California law on website accessibility has been making its way closer to law. It has some very welcome provisions for those who care about accessibility – and gives the law some teeth for enforcement.
The Sunk Cost Fallacy in content marketing and SEO
I tend to be very reluctant to remove old content, because Internet Bit Rot is a serious problem. It’s hard to find old-but-good information when you need it.
But over time, I've softened my "keep all content forever" position. Jimmy Daley at Animalz offers useful advice to identify when content has served past its sell-by date, and how to convince your boss to let it go.
These are my eclipse photos. There are many like them, but these are mine.
Like many others in the US, on Monday my New England-based family travelled most of the way to the Canadian border to see the 2024 solar eclipse. It was, in a word, stunning. Here I share both what we did, and the photos themselves. Enjoy!
SEO fail? Content to the rescue!
A story of how a company trashed its SEO rankings by accident, and how we rescued it. Using pure 100% white hat SEO techniques – no tricks, just great content.
SEO meta tags: "NOINDEX,FOLLOW" not recommended
If you set your category pages to NOINDEX, Google warns it may not be able to understand that those products are actually useful and important. So maybe don’t do that without a really, really strong reason.
Plume SuperPods vs TP-Link Deco: Head to head test results
I’m breaking from my usual topics of privacy and user experience. Today: Wi-Fi mesh showdown! Let’s see how my three-year-old Plume SuperPod network did vs a new TP-Link Deco X55 network.
How to make an accessible carousel
“A good indication that a carousel is a poor choice of interface is that the term derives from a kind of spinning disk festooned with impaled horses.”
If you absolutely must use a content carousel, here’s how to do it well. You can have good accessibility and usability, and avoid some pitfalls. Includes a complete working demo with full markup, styles and script.
Quick Stats, CRO edition: Form Conversion
Need to talk a client out of making a really bad decision on a web form? Here are some quick stats you can use to try to talk them off the ledge.
Are domains with a keyword in them good for SEO? Not since 2012.
A couple years ago, a domain squatter offered to sell "massachusettstriallawyer.com" to one of my clients for $500. They came to me for a sanity check. Short answer was "No", and the long answer was “Oh HELL no”.
So let's talk about why.
Accessibility Checklists
Ever see a project requirement "Must be accessible to WCAG 2.0 Level A" and wonder what the heck that means? We're here to rescue you with this quick and easy checklist!
If you're a TL;DR type, click the link, remember that your work should meet Level A guidelines, and move on with your life. But for the curious…
Experience Rot affects full-site redesigns, too
So often as designers, we try to out-do the previous site – adding on design elements and movement and "surprise and delight" and bells and whistles and new content and and and AND—
Do sites really need a Sitemap.xml for good SEO?
There is no shortage of SEOs saying a sitemap.xml is practically mandatory. But does SEO really benefit from a sitemap file?
(Betteridge’s Law applies. Mostly.)
How to speed up Docker on Docker with an external SSD, without losing data
A quick guide to (1) speed up Docker on Synology using a USB SSD, and (2) How not to lose data from this spectacularly ill-advised hack
How long does Synology support its NAS products?
The question of how many years a Synology NAS owner should expect software updates, security fixes, and support comes up a lot in r/synology. Synology doesn’t seem to have a public policy, so I decided to figure it out from available information.
What California's CCPA and CPRA consumer privacy laws mean for your website (2023 Update)
The California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 established a number of consumer privacy rights. The California Privacy Rights Act of 2020 extended it. CPRA’s new requirements go into effect in January.
Are you ready for CPRA? Here’s the executive summary of what you need to know. Updated for 2023.
Can you iterate your way to great UX?
Agencies do a lot of big-bang website redesigns – projects where everything changes all at once. For marketing sites, this usually isn’t a problem. But it can be a problem when used for intranets, asset management systems, member service portals – applications, in other words.
Here’s how to deal with it.
When "improvement" becomes experience rot
Better doesn’t mean more, and it may not even mean adding at all. When you undertake a re-design, think long and hard about what you add. Because often— more is less.
Should I Google AMP my website?
I get a lot of questions about Google AMP and what it means for my clients’ websites. In this article, I’ll discuss what AMP is, some pros and cons of adding AMP to your website, who benefits from AMP, and whether you should AMP your site.
(Or you can skip it. As of 2021, Google is no longer shoving it down our throats. Yay!)