Articles – Page 28 – Thoughtfaucet

Landing Page

Landing Page: The first page seen by a visitor to a site. This could be any page on a site at all, as long as it’s the first page the visitor sees.

Realtor.com RE.net conference call/webinar featuring Gahlord Dewald

: Image via CrunchBase

Gahlord will be speaking on the Realtor.com blogger conference call this coming Thursday. Audie Chamberlain says it best: “We’re excited that Gahlord will be sharing some great insight and education on how to use web analytics make life better for Realtors and their clients.”

Dewald will be presenting on specific analytics reports to look at for the end of the year as well as web analytics reports to watch in the coming year. There’s going to be time for Q+A as well so come with questions.

You can sign up here.

Two Yoast google-analytics-plugin hacks for WordPress

: Image by Getty Images via Daylife

I love WordPress. And I love Yoast’s Google Analytics plugin for WordPress. It makes installation of GA so much swifter. And I really hate hacking plugins because that means I have to be careful when I upgrade them. But there are two things that really stick in my craw:

The RSS campaign tags are configured so that each article is it’s own campaign.
I’d love to be able to implement additional tricks, like using a timer to make my Bounce-rate a function of time, not pageviews. Continue reading “Two Yoast google-analytics-plugin hacks for WordPress”

A small case for qualitative analytics.

: Image via Wikipedia

A lot of the work I do is focused on web analytics. When making things for online consumption, one of the few ways to know whether anything is working as intended is via web analytics. It’s our only way to observe how humans are really interacting with the things we make.

And while Google Analytics and other tools like it are great at getting the quantitative story–how many people saw what and did something–it isn’t very good at getting the qualitative story. The qualitative story would let us know how much people liked (or didn’t like) something we make. It might let us know more about the intent of audience when they found the things we made. Why did they use it? Did it work? Why so, why not? That kind of thing. Continue reading “A small case for qualitative analytics.”

Bounce Rate

Bounce Rate: In web analytics, the bounce rate refers to the percent of visitors that see the page or site and then leave without seeing anything else.; The Web Analytics Association defines the Bounce Rate as “Single page view visits divided by entry pages.” (from Web Analytics Association Web Analytics Definitions v4); Some people find this definition too limiting. For example, someone coming to a blog, reading an entire blog post and then leaving without seeing any other page would be considered a bounce.

Gahlord Dewald to teach animation course at Burlington College

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Thoughtfaucet President/Janitor will be teaching “Introduction to Animation” for Burlington College this Spring. The class will meet at Thoughtfaucet on Pine Street in Burlington to make use of stop-motion and other traditional media production tools here. The course is a part of Burlington College’s successful Cinema Studies program.

“I always enjoy teaching this course at Burlington College because the students are exceptionally engaged and creative.” says Gahlord Dewald. “Having gone to Marlboro College, myself, I value the approach of Burlington College — a stronger focus on learning outcomes than letter grades. Plus, a list of of their film alumni and faculty is pretty much a directory of the top talent working in Vermont right now. I’m honored to be a part of that group.” Continue reading “Gahlord Dewald to teach animation course at Burlington College”

Getting started with a website on the cheap.

: Image via Wikipedia

Note: If you already know a lot about your customers, your corporate design sense, your product and your broader marketplace this article is obviously not for you. If, on the other hand, you’re just starting a business and want to get going on the right foot but aren’t sure how to do it without spending all your startup capital on a website, please enjoy this post (and ask questions).

I often speak at small business groups or startup classes and I teach a beginning class on HTML/web design for continuing ed here in Burlington, VT. It’s awesome to see people get excited about starting something new and working on their thing.

Inevitably, after doing one of these events I get a few calls from people wondering what it costs for me to make a “starter” website. Usually my number is bit larger than they were hoping it would be.

Here’s what I say to people trying to make decisions about getting started with a website if you’re bootstrapping your business into existence. Continue reading “Getting started with a website on the cheap.”

A Little Quick SEO for a Book Author

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Awhile back, a phone conversation with someone inspired me to write my SEO Nineball blog post. Well the caller didn’t take any of my search engine optimization advice. Instead, he bought three hours of my time to do what I thought was best within that budget. Here’s what happened. Continue reading “A Little Quick SEO for a Book Author”