Understand How Websites Work in 5 Easy Steps: Chalk Talk #7

 

As a business owner that’s constantly overwhelmed, how do you stay on top of how your website works? Understanding how the Internet works is essential to finding success managing a digital business. In this article, I’ll guide you through a simple explanation.

1. Let’s say your on your cell-phone. You type “name.com” into the URL bar and a request is sent to your internet service provider (ISP).
2. From there, your ISP tries to find the “name” server, which matches the URL with a string of numbers called an IP address, an address for a server.

Note!  As a business owner, you need to understand the significance of the domain name registrar.  You need to be sure you own your own domain. It’s like signing the lease on your business storefront. Your domain name registrar service is not the same thing as the server that is hosting your website, but they can sometimes overlap. Some registrar services will host your website as well. Make sure that you own both, failing to establish ownership over your domain can set you up for problems down the line.

3. Once your request has reached the server, it is routed through code written in a server-side programming language such as PHP.

Note! If you’re working with a service like wordpress, the website hosting and the code may come wrapped together. In this case, you’re getting a website that your hosting on a server. The service handles both the code that defines your website’s theme and the server that hosts your website online.

4. From there, the server sends a response: a packet of HTML, javascript, or other content.
5. The browser on your phone parses the information and presents it to the user.

In a nutshell, that’s how the Internet works! Understanding these little details will pay off in the future as you scale up your digital brand.

Transcript:

[00:02] Hey, this is Shaheen over at Web Upon and this is episode number seven of Chalk Talk Thursday. Today I want to cover how websites work. This is actually a super common question that I get all the time, and I think especially for business owners that are busy with everything else they’re doing, its hard to stay on top of all the little minute things that go into a website and what exactly is happening. I’m going to explain those, so you understand how it works, and emphasize the key areas that every business owner should be aware of when it comes to actually owning their site and making sure that their developer isn’t going to be in a position where they have undue leverage upon you. [00:38] Starting off from your cellphone, when you type something in, it’s going to go over to your ISP, this can be any internet service provider like Comcast, or Cox, or Netlink. I looked and there’s hundreds of them in the US, but there’s probably about a dozen. These are the people that are delivering internet to you directly. From there, let’s say you type in name.com, it’s going to go off and basically try to find something called a name server. What the name server does is matches this letter, this word that you can understand, name.com or whatever it may be, with a string of numbers that’s actually the address for a server. [01:18] Now, the thing I really, really want to emphasize here, and this is again something that every business owner should understand is that, there is something called a domain name registrar. And this is something that you as the business owner really, really want to own. You want to own your domain name. Occasionally, developers will buy the domain name for you just because they’re trying to help you out. Some of them are more nefarious about it, but the thing to understand is, you really, really want to own your name. It’s like you signed the lease on your actual business storefront. You want to own the name. What this is, is a domain registrar. [01:55] Now, domain registrars are separate from servers. The server is the actual host, that’s the data server that you’re paying for. Some common hosts in the US are GoDaddy, you may have heard that name before, or DreamHost, I love using WPX host. So there’s tons of hosts out there. And what they do is maintain the server space. Now the thing to keep in mind is that these two things, the registrar and the host can be separate, but they can also be the same thing. So you can have your name registered with a separate service and you can have it hosted on a separate service. [02:32] Often with GoDaddy installations, I find people who have registered their name there and they’re also hosting it at GoDaddy. But in both cases, you as the business owner want to make sure that you’re paying for, and you own your hosting, and you want to make sure that you paid for when you own your domain registration. You don’t want to hit a situation where a couple of years into your business growth, you come upon a day and suddenly your website’s down, and it’s down because you haven’t renewed your domain name or your actual hosting has gone down because you haven’t paid for it, anything like that. So it’s very important to remember that. So once it’s at the actual server, it gets routed through some code. So this could be PHP or any number of other languages that are able to operate on the server. [03:14] And what this code does is sends information out in html, JavaScript, it sends you the pictures, all these things you’re probably familiar with. Now, the thing to keep in mind here is that when it comes to the server code, this can also basically be functioning on a service that wraps the hosting in with the code. So if you’re using WordPress, you’re basically getting a code set that you’re hosting on a server. Let’s say you have a WordPress website, you may have paid for someone to get you a WordPress setup, you may have paid for a theme, that’s all code focused. Now, you may also be paying for hosting for that same WordPress website, so you paid for the theme, you paid for the WordPress development and it’s sitting on a server, and then you also may have independently paid for a registrar for your domain name. [04:00] It can also be the case that you paid for a name, you’re also hosting with the same company that’s your domain registrar, and you also just use one of their site builder or something like that, but that’s something that I think every business owner should really be aware of. I often encounter a lot of confusion around what a domain name registrar is and what an actual host is. So there are some services that are basically combining the code and the actual servers all into one package, so you’re also paying for that. Something like that could be Shopify, or BigCommerce is great one also it does this, Volusion does this but they’re terrible as an SEO. I’m just going to throw that in there. Don’t go with Volusion. Magento can also be grouped into here, but I wouldn’t recommend them either. [04:45] So basically with these services, you’re paying for the code package and there handling all the server hosting functions for you. They may also offer to register your domain name. I of course would always just being the paranoid developer that I am, separately register my domain name so I own it from any other services. And then that way you’re basically secure no matter what happens. And that’s a good place to be for any business owner, especially when you’re investing a lot of time and money into your brand name and into your business growth. [05:13] So you have these stacks of code that are operating on servers and what they’re serving on html and pictures and JavaScript. And then at the end there, what’s happening is that a browser is parsing this information which is going to give you your nice little Emoji on the very, very end of this entire circle here. The browsers can be anything like Safari, or Chrome, Firefox. So all of these things are browsers, and what browsers do is basically parse these html and pictures and Java scripts, so you can see it all nicely on your phone or your desktop at the end of the day. And yeah, that’s how websites work.

 

How to Leave Your Marketing Company (or 9 Things to Grab Before You Go) – Chalk Talk Thursday #4

It’s important that all business owners make sure that they have complete ownership of their site, social media accounts, ad tools, and any associated collateral. Unfortunately I’ve encountered many situations where business didn’t know what they did and didn’t own. This video will cover all the essential items you should always “own,” especially if you’re leaving a marketing company.

Transcript:

Hey, this is Shaheen over at Web Upon, and this is episode number 4 of Chalk Talk Thursday. Today I wanted to cover how to leave your marketing company, or nine things to grab before you go. Now, no one expects a marketing relationship to turn south or go sour as things proceed, but it’s something that can happen, and it’s very important that every business owner has these nine things handy either before they start a major site redesign project or any sort of marketing, or if you’re leaving a company, these are the essential things that you should really have a handle on and make sure that you grab before you head out the door.

So the first thing you really want to think about here is your domain registrar. Now, I’ve encountered some horror situations in the past, where people leave companies and they find out that they don’t actually own their domain name. Now, it is possible to get your domain name back, especially if you have trademarks associated with your brand, but it’s a pretty lengthy process with a sort of amorphous organization that no one really knows who runs, and it’s really not worth diving into, because you as the business owner just want to own your business name.

You should always own your business name, so be sure that you own your domain registration. This is usually done on a company like GoDaddy, but any host will also allow you to register a domain, and there are tons and tons of companies that do it. So not everyone keeps track of this. Most people know to own their own domain or to make sure that they at least have ownership of it before they’re out the door, but it’s very important to make sure that you own your own domain name.

The second thing I would say is hosting service. Now, your domain registrar is what people type into a URL search bar, and that gets converted into an IP address, which is on a specific server. So this is all happening behind the scenes, but your actual domain registration and the server that you’re using to actually host and execute your site for the end-user are separate services. So you want to make sure that you really own whatever that domain server or service is and that you’re able to log in there. So you should have a developer on your own team or someone that you trust not associated with the company that you’re leaving that’s able to get in there and assess and make sure that you actually do have ownership and control of your domain server.

I’ve also seen some people, where their current dev company basically invoices them for the hosting that they have every month, so be sure that you actually own the hosting payment structure, right, so that your credit card information’s actually associated with it or that it’s not just free-floating and randomly after a year chunk when you initially signed up, and let’s say you fired the company over here, you’re basically just like, “What happened to my site?” one day. So make sure that you own the server and that you own the name associated with it.

The third thing is CMS access. So make sure you actually own the back end and that you have administrator or super-administrative access on that, and that you’re able to control all user flow, people that are coming in and out of the actual CMS. So one really big red flag that I’ll see is some people will build, say, a WordPress site for client, and they won’t actually ever give them admin access to the site. So you as the site owner need make sure that you own the admin or super-admin access on the site, that way that when you leave, you can make sure other people aren’t getting in or can’t still get in once you’re actually out the door of your agency.

So huge thing to keep in mind there, this is typically easily solved, as well, if you have hosting. So if you have control of the hosting server, it’s typically pretty easy to reset the actual CMS access. And again, if using a service that’s controlled, like Shopify or BigCommerce or Squarespace, whatever it may be, I have seen some weird setups where the agency is invoicing you as the client. So again, make sure that you’re actually controlling the billing and you’re the one that’s paying it at the end, so you don’t get a nasty surprise down the line.

The fourth thing I’ll say is as far as PPC, make sure you have control of your accounts. Now, most business owners that set this up sort of have this in their control. I have seen the occasional case where people don’t own it, so another big red flag to look out for there. But make sure that once you leave the agency, especially if you leave on poor terms, that you unlink your account from their MCC, that way they can’t control anything, and that any associated admin users from that agency also can’t access your account.

So again, hopefully you own it, and make sure that you unlink once you’re out the door of that agency, and make sure that your account is safe. And it’s also just a good practice generally to sort of clean this out every so often. I’ve seen some PPC accounts where they have contractors that they were working with five years ago, randos all over the world. They basically have access to your PPC account. And as we all know, you could have a rogue account or a rogue campaign that just spends way more than you want it to. So be sure to be on top of that, especially when you’re leaving a marketing agency that’s been doing sales and advertising for you.

The fifth thing I’ll say is Google Analytics. This is, again, another area where you need make sure that you own it, and generally speaking, if you don’t own it, if it’s in your company’s … their own view or property ID, that can also be a red flag that you might be dealing with a shady agency. Things can sometimes happen if you’re not technically in the know, where people set up a Google Analytics account for you, but you want to make sure that you are the end-user and owner of it. If it’s under their property ID, a view under their property ID, it’s extremely difficult, and you really can’t move the information over from that view onto a new one that you own. So be sure to own this out the gate, and also make sure that you have this admin control, so you can remove or add people as you like, whatever you want. Right?

So the sixth thing I’ll say is social accounts. So big thing here is for Facebook page and LinkedIn pages, you have to add in a user onto your account. There isn’t a password to reset here. So just make sure that you go through there and that you remove any Facebook users or LinkedIn users that you don’t want, because in both platforms, you can run ads off of those things.

The seventh thing I’ll say is other accounts, right? So Twitter, Pinterest, these kinds of social networks, will basically allow you to reset the password. It’s not really dependent on someone joining on as a user in the same way that Facebook and LinkedIn are. So again, here, once you leave, it’s good to just do a little cleanse and reset those passwords, just to make sure that everything’s safe and that there aren’t going to be any big concerns down the line.

 

The eighth thing I’ll say is any other tools. This can actually be the hugest factor in your success down the line. I see this very frequently. One through six, most business owners kind of have these on lock. They own their social, they own their PPC, they own their registrar and the server and admin access. They have all those things handled, but they sometimes forget that there are other accounts and services that are associated with your site.

So a really common example of this is WordPress extensions. Typically, these licenses will be sold out to a company, so it’s very cheap for me as an agency to maybe buy 30 licenses, but an individual license might be pretty expensive comparatively. So sometimes when you leave an agency, their license is associated with your site, and that may expire after a year, or in more nasty situations, they may essentially have that leverage on you. And this can be another red flag, as well.

A very common thing that I’ve seen, unfortunately, in the past, which has become less frequent, is you’ll have design agencies, quote, unquote, that are really claiming the ownership of these site file pictures on your site, right? So it’s like, “If you leave us, you’re going to lose all the collateral. That nice slider image you love is just going to be out the door.” So it’s very important to be sure that you are sort of thinking about what’s going to happen with all these associated services. At the same time, maybe you have an email service or some other chat bot that the agency built for you, and it’s under their auspices again, and when you leave, there’s no one paying for it, and suddenly it goes south, right?

So be sure that any tools you’re using, it’s good to check in with the rest of the team and make sure there isn’t anything you’re not thinking of that you’re currently using as an organization, and make sure that you guys have the ownership. And again, good idea just to do a cleanse and make sure that all the passwords are owned by your company. Right?

Another thing I would say is export all your collateral. So this is a really good thing to ask for before you’re out the door. In case anything comes up down the line, you never know when you might need an Adobe Illustrator file or Photoshop file or some version of a dev site or a database export from five years ago. These things do come up, and it’s generally just good practice to get all the information, anything associated with your account, from your former agency. And any good agency will have the organized file that contains all of this information for all the years and months that they were with you.

So these are the nine core things that any company, any business owner that’s leaving a marketing agency, should think of before they head out the door. Thank you.

How Proxies and VPNs Work

 

Proxies and VPNs are excellent ways to beef up your security online, but are also major obstacles to the work of many digital marketers. But, learning about how they work, and the different times when they are useful will help prepare you for working through any issues that might come up. We like to give you the inside scoop on what’s good, and this post will be no exception.

However, before we can start talking about how to prepare for them, we need to lay a little bit of technical groundwork. Let’s go!

Internet 101

To understand what it is a proxy server does for you, it’s a good idea to have some basic internet knowledge (otherwise, the information is just more jargon).

The internet is a network that’s broken down into two components: physical hardware and information. Hardware is the server that houses information and the devices that we use to recieve it. Information is the data that is passed between that hardware. You’ve probably heard the term “server” before, and all that means is a piece of hardware that’s housing information and then sending it out to “clients” (you on your smartphone or computer).

Now, how do our machines know how to distinguish between different types of information? This is where “protocols” come in. Protocols are specific ways that information is transmitted and govern the way that our hardware interprets and communicates information across the network.

This explanation is already becoming a little long-winded, but there’s a final piece that’s necessary to understand so we can start to talk about proxies. An “IP address” is a protocol that each individual machine utilizes to identify itself on the network. Your IP address is routed through what are called DNS servers to get you to the server that contains the information you need. Then that server sends it back to you. It’s sort of like mailing things to addresses and then receiving a response, but much much faster.

Malcolm in the Middle

Now, there’s a lot of myths around the information that your IP address contains. Your precise location is not being shared. Most of the time, an IP address can be used to identify what internet service provider (ISP) you’re using. Sometimes, that IP address will be linked to a particular city or region. There’s some debate about this, but snoopy folks might be able to put together a picture of a person based on the websites that an IP address visits, and also this information is available to the ISP hosting that IP address.

So, now we have proxies. A proxy server is a middleman. When you utilize a proxy service, it works a lot like a search engine. You type where you want to go, and then the proxy returns your query and you can move on with your internet use. The proxy connects to the relevant server with an IP address that is not connected to yours, and then brings it back to you. Of course, there is an element here that’s important to note–you have to access the proxy service with your IP address to begin with, so the company or individuals that run it will still have your IP.

There’s another type of service that’s known as a virtual private network (VPN). VPNs are much more secure services than most proxy services, as they don’t just hide your IP address. VPNs use encryption to secure all of the data that leaves your device, and then allows you to browse the web and use other internet features in anonymity. VPNs offer a number of different services, and some are better than others, so do your research if you’re going to use either option.

Should You Use a Proxy?

Anyone who’s interested in security might want to check out VPNs and proxies.

However, as this is a marketing blog, we’ll go in depth as to why a proxy or VPN might be useful for understanding and tracking performance indicators in your digital marketing endeavors.

Utilizing a VPN or proxy can be helpful when you’re analyzing traffic data for a marketing effort. If you know what the IP address is, you can filter that out of your Google Analytics data so you can have an accurate picture of pageviews and conversions that isn’t skewed by your organization’s visits to the website. Proxy servers and VPNs can also be utilized to keep employees from visiting certain webpages and types of content, routing them instead to a landing page that tells them why they can’t visit. This can keep you protected from liability in the office in the unfortunate event that an employee is doing something they’re not supposed to be doing.

From the opposite end, it pays to educate yourself about how proxies work, especially in the context of doing local SEO. If you’re trying to serve content or get information in front of a certain segment of customers, you’re going to have trouble if they’re using a proxy server, effectively rendering the local marketing useless. Many of these services can also cause webpages to load strangely, so making sure your websites are clean and optimized can help a lot in content delivery.

Awareness is the name of the game. If you’re looking to work with some of the sharpest digital marketers in the business, get in touch with WebUpon. We’ll help you out.

 

10 Legit Ways to Make Money Online

Money. We always want it, but we never quite seem to have enough of it. Everyone wants to say that there’s 10 million ways to make money online, but a lot of them, unfortunately, are scams. But, that being said, making money doesn’t always have to be difficult, especially when you have a positive attitude. We’re always trying to cut through the jargon and nonsense, and we’re not going to quit that with this post.

We’ve compiled a list of 10 different ways you can start making money online. Some of them won’t make you money out of the gate, but they’re legitimate, and will help you build the foundations of you own business or even better, help you transition into a more competitive job candidate down the road.

1) Flip Goods on eBay & Craigslist

Buying a product at a low price and selling it at a higher price has always been the foundation of money making 101. With the ease of online marketplaces and most people having cell phones flipping has become a huge avenue for people to make money online. That said While it has become a legit way to make money be aware that “retail arbitrage” from big-box retailers and dollar stores. If you’re trying to find a great way to make money r/Flipping has an excellent guide on getting started. Money Crashers and GaryVee have great guides.

2) Surveys

While it’s nearly impossible to make taking surveys into a full time career that’s going to help you pay the rent every month, it can be a way to get a little cash in your pocket on an off day, or if you’re just bored with surfing around online. These surveys take between 10-15 minutes to complete, and they’ll probably net you around 5-8 dollars an hour. Our current favorites are Swagbucks (you get gift cards with this one), Toluna, and MySurvey.

If you’d like to see a whole bunch of different online survey websites, or get a better idea of what’s out there, this blog is super helpful.

3) Ads

Do you have a website or a blog that sees any volume of traffic? Incorporating some advertisements might seem like a bit of a shill, but it can go a long way to padding out that bank account. There’s plenty of affiliate programs that can get you money when people shop from your website, and there’s Google AdSense as well. Both are good ways to start. Make sure to spiff up your website while you’re at it.

4) Freelance Writing

Freelance writing is a great way to make some legitimate cash online. A good place to start is a website like Upwork. You’re not going to have immediate success, but you’ll get the opportunity to cut your teeth on some beginner projects before taking on something larger.

An easy way to drum up freelance work is to look to local businesses. Is there a business you know of or have a relationship with that needs a language facelift on their website? What about developing a better social media presence? Write up a pitch, charge a modest sum, and work on getting that first client so you can start building your portfolio.

5) Webinars

Creating a webinar and charging a modest sum for people to take it can be an excellent way to make a little extra cash, as well as generating leads for your business. However, you have to make sure that your webinar will be useful and engaging for your audience, not something that is clearly designed to separate them from their money. But, taking note of a skill or ability that you have, and crafting a webinar around it can be an excellent way to supplement your income.

And, for the digital marketers out there, webinars can be a powerful tool in your kit.

6) Sell Your Old Stuff

Got a bunch of old crap laying around that you don’t use? Why not sell it?

There’s the traditional digital routes, craigslist and eBay, which are great ways to sell things to a large audience or people locally. But, there’s plenty of new, easy ways to make extra income selling, including Mercari and Poshmark. Give them a try, and maybe even start buying things on sale and flipping them!

7) Become a YouTuber

YouTube can be a great source of additional revenue, if you can develop a following. It’s easier said than done, because you have to find something that you’re passionate about and find a way to make that thing accessible and applicable to an audience. As with most creative projects, start with trying to win over an audience of 1, and you’ll be able to build from there.

If you’re looking to get started with video production, here are some great resources to start with.

8) The Gig Economy

Finally, there’s the good ol’ gig economy. If you’ve got a car, why not explore driving Uber or Lyft? Technically it’s not all online, but all you need is a smartphone and a car. Or, if you’re handy, look into becoming a TaskRabbit. And, if all you’ve got is a trusty bicycle, Postmates can be a great way to make a little extra cash.

9) Consulting

Do you have special skills or experience that you could sell? Start consulting through your website or over Skype. It can be a lot of work to find clients, but start with a craigslist ad, and focus on making your first sale to your first customer. The world of consulting is wide open, and many consultants work entirely from home.

10) Online Trading

Messing around with the stock market and day trading can be very risky, but many people do it and see returns from their investments. Regardless of whether or not you’re interested in high-risk day trading or not, there are plenty of long term options that can help you prepare for the future. NerdWallet has a great piece on this.

If you’re interested in diving into day trading (which is buying and selling stock on the same day for small profit), this is an excellent article to start with. There’s also a whole suite of apps and websites that can help you get started, including Robinhood and Stash.

Up Your Cashflow

Remember, the key to financial success is increasing cash flow, and one of the best ways to do that is by finding work that nets you a little bit of extra money. If you’d like to learn more about content strategy, content marketing, SEO, and more, browse our other blog posts, and if you’re interesting in working with us, get in touch!

11 of The Best Free Blogging Platforms

As one of the first major innovations online, the blog spawned an entire hosting, publishing, and promotion industry. Finding a free blog service only requires you to type in a few words in Google. But, the time invested in a blog project can be wasted on the wrong service–and there are so many! This guide will break blog services down into several categories, and offer up a few recommendations along the way. Let’s get going!

If you don’t have much tech know-how, or just want to get a website/blog going quickly with a moderate amount of fuss, there’s a huge amount of choices available to you. Here is a numbered list of options, the common feature between them all seems to be ease-of-use and building websites along a set number of templates. These sorts of websites can be very useful to get off the ground, but it’s also helpful to have a little bit of knowledge yourself so you can expand if needed, and often many of these services are a little gated in their functionality and are often locked behind premium payment plans.

7 Best Free Blogging Tools for For the Casual to Serious Individual Bloggers

Looking to just write, and not currently running a business? Then read on, these are the best choices.

If you’re mostly interested in running a blog and getting your content up online with little mess and fuss, and don’t really care that much about having a larger webpage, storefront, or anything like that, these services will fit the bill. The key thing I’ll emphasize is that for anyone looking to get into blogging as a hobby, personal journal, or as part of a larger media strategy needs to think about the future. It doesn’t matter which blogging platform you use, so long as it’s not going to cause growing pains for you in the future. 

1) Medium – the professional choice for long-form

Medium started as an invite-only service that has now expanded to one of the more popular blogging services on the internet. It’s got a clean interface, a standardized font, and it’s built to service quality writing and not much else. If you’re looking to start writing for writing’s sake, Medium is the way to go. It has a supportive community, a variety of engaging “magazines” and groups, and offers excellent design with minimal work. If you just want to write and get your thoughts out Medium is the way to go. 

2) WordPress – the market leader across the board

WordPress is one of the most widely-used services for building web pages and blogs on the internet. It’s important to distinguish between WordPress.com and WordPress.org. In this section, we’re talking about the .com version, and we’ll get to the .org later. WordPress is known for its usability and accessibility, and will allow you to create the most customized and functional blog you can think of. Highly recommended. It has a basic free option, as well as more serious plans starting at $3/month. The greatest benefit of WordPress is that it’s massively popular, can expand however you want in the future (if you eventually monetize on a large scale), and features code modules called “plugins” that integrate with thousands of services. Plugins let you do almost anything on WordPress without any coding knowledge.  

3) Instagram – blogging for the personal brand

Source: Brittany Krystle’s Instagram

The days of the “Web 2.0” blog are long gone. Long form posts and micro-blogs on Instagram, and Instagram first (and only) businesses are now the norm. If you’re considering starting a blog, jumping right to Instagram may be the best way to go. If you’re looking to build a personal brand, there really is not better place to start. (thought a site you can send people back to is essential) If you’re looking to get into more complex topics, and involve multiple graphics than Instagram is definitely not the place to go.

4) YouTube – as a Vlog (video/blog)

If you’re adept at video a daily vlog (video + blog) may be the way to go. If you’re good on camera and don’t want to write then vlogs may be the way to go. Of course a solid YouTube account lends itself to Instagram and vice versa. Again this strategy is best for anyone creating a personal brand, and still has the downside of you not having a site to anchor all your social media properties. 

5) Facebook Page / Group as Blog

Although the heyday of Facebook Groups is long gone (most people have shifted to Instagram or YouTube) it still makes for an easy blogging platform. If you want to utilize Facebook’s integrated blog function  or creating an active community and forum like feeling then Facebook is the way to go. A free Facebook “blog” also has the advantage of strong interaction from the 40+ crowd and working well for both businesses and individuals. 

6) Blogger – the old, but tired classic

Blogger is an old standby, offering a mess of templates, free and paid, and has a clean, easy-to-use interface. While it’s great for many types of blogs, it’s not exactly the most cutting edge service out there, but it offers a very practical blogging toolkit. They’re part of the Google ecosystem, so it’s easy to sign up. All that said….Blogger is probably worth avoiding at this point. 

7) TUMBLR – do you hate normies?

If you think a little outside the box, and want to try something other than a standard blogging or website service, Tumblr can be a fun option. It has a very specific user base and some interesting functionality quirks, but can also help establish you as a bit more hip and experimental. If you’re working on a personal brand, but trying to keep a more edgy/indie feel than TUMBLR may be the way to go.

4 Free Blogging for Business Owners

If you’re trying to get a business off the ground, and need a good website/blog building option, there are many options, almost too many to pick from.

Most of these are free to start, but if you’re going to want to take advantage of the full suite of features, you’ll likely end up shelling out a moderate amount of cash.

8) Squarespace 

Squarespace hands down provides some of the best designs for business owners these days. They have clean templates and make it easy to blog.

9)  Google My Business Site

Looking for a new site? Why not get a Google property for your personal site. While not as slick as SquareSpace you benefit from being under Google’s umbrellas.

10) WiX

Easy to use and aggressively chasing business owners. They’ve really improved their templates recently. If you like the feel then this may be the way to go.

11)  Weebly

Similar to WiX, Weebly offers some great free templates and an easy design interface to work with.

For the power user who’s getting serious

If you’re running and growing a business, then for our money WordPress.org is the way to go. It’s free and open source, and requires a bit of technical knowhow to get going, but once you’ve downloaded the toolkit and integrated it onto your website’s FTP server, you have a massive suite of plugins, themes, and customization options available to you so you can fit your website to your exact needs. Storefront integration can get tricky, but is by no means impossible, and WordPress is constantly updated to remain secure and give users the latest features. It’s also incredibly easy way to maintain a blog over time.

Creating an effective blog is one of the most critical parts of any web endeavor, especially when you’re trying to create a digital marketing strategy. If you’re ready to up your marketing game, get in touch with us, or check out CEO Shaheen Adibi’s

CSS & JS Kerning: How to Easily & Tastefully Add Polish to Your Site

Often when I interact with clients that are less than happy with their web design results the issue tends to revolve around a lack of polish. Obviously there are are times when the web design project goes completely off the rails for other reasons. But extra polish can make a site, landing-page, custom widget or project, and even blog posts significantly more engaging.

Best of all it’s easy, and you can do it without becoming a typography nerd! (not that I’d discourage you)

What is kerning for fonts?

Kerning refers to the spacing adjustments between particular characters in a word, when certain fonts might create dissonant horizontal spacing “out-of-the-box.” Kerning allows traditional and analog visual designers to create a more harmonious reading experience for the end user.

Kerning for fonts has been around a long long time, and started with newspaper type setters who had to physically move and set each letter on a page with tight deadlines. These adjustments often allowed publishers to turnaround pages without making significant alterations or running back to the editor. Nowadays, kerning is just another tool available to designers, and I’d argue gives each end product a little bit more polish.

Check out the image below. The same word, repeated 4 times, totally different feeling each time.

From: What Is Kerning, and Why Is It Important?

Kerning Web Fonts & Other Tools:

Generally we have 5 CSS tools available to us.

1. letter-spacing – Letter spacing is a CSS property that allows you to increase the spacing between letters and words. Applied to an individual set of letters with a span tag you can kern characters, and applied to an entire word or style element you can increase tracking within elements.
2. font-family – The specific typeface, what most people refer to as a font,  you actually choose to use on your site. All of the variants and sizes of that typeface, form its type family,  which most developers call a font-family. The specific font-family you choose will also have a massive impact on your sites feels. This is a large topic, and you may not want to mess with your sites overall design for one page, but you can read more about selection here. You can also access a wealth of different fonts through embedding typefaces now: https://fonts.google.com/
3. font-weight – You no longer have to settle just for bold or non bold type, font-weight CSS modifications allow for values including normal, bold, bolder, lighter, number 100-900, initial, or inherit. Generally speaking most people use the numeric values or none at all.
4. line-height – Line height again is something that most web users won’t think about, but refers to the space between letters on your page. Most sites and frameworks have this value preset but it’s definitely something you could play with further. This is traditionally referred to as leading (or linespacing) and similarly to kerning and tracking, the dead space between letters can impart a certain emotional feel for readers.
5. text-shadow – You probably won’t use this much, if ever, but it’s a novel CSS tool available to designers. And I have seen some interesting applications of it on some sites.

As a quick reminder here are the differences between these tools:

From 8 Simple and Useful Tools for Kerning Type

Most importantly, these minutes difference really do affect how the page feels the end user.

Examples of CSS Kerning, Leading, Tracking, and Other CSS Design Properties:

Some samples:

.sampleText1:

What did Johann von Goethe mean when he wrote, “Somebody once told me, the world was going to rule me, I ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed.”

.sampleText2:

What did Johann von Goethe mean when he wrote, “Somebody once told me, the world was going to rule me, I ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed.”

.sampleText3:

What did Johann von Goethe mean when he wrote, “Somebody once told me, the world was going to rule me, I ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed.”

.dopey:

What did Johann von Goethe mean when he wrote, “Somebody once told me, the world was going to rule me, I ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed.

CSS Rules for Samples:

.sampleText1 {
    letter-spacing: 2px;
    font-size: 1.9em;
    line-height: 2.1em;
    font-weight: 400;
    font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif;
}

.sampleText2 {
    letter-spacing: 1px;
    font-size: 1.6em;
    line-height: 1.9em;
    font-weight: 100;
    font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif;
}

.sampleText3 {
    letter-spacing: -1px;
    font-size: 1.3em;
    line-height: 1.5em;
    font-weight: 900;
    font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif;
}

.dopey {
    letter-spacing: 4px;
    font-size: 1.1em;
    line-height: 1em;
    text-shadow: 2px 2px orange;
    font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, serif;
}
 

 

How to Effectively Use the CSS Font-Kerning Property

Kerning like any other design tool is an easy place to go overboard. Most people won’t care. Some people care too much. But in some areas, especially flashy text heavy sites, unobtrusive kerning increases the readability and pleasure of people perusing the website. It can also make copy significantly more impactful.

“Too little kerning is preferable to too much, and inconsistent kerning is worse than none.” – Robert Bringhurst

As you can see in the photo below, there is a significant difference in the ease of reading the copy on the right, compare to the copy on thee left. (all awkward bits have been circled by the author on the left page as well)

Kerning before and after example taken by author from the Elements of Typographical Style  by Robert Bringhurst.

A few simple modifications on your site can go a long long way.

Understanding Optical Kerning

Having a numerically equal amount of space between letters is not as important as having the optically preferred amount of space. There is definitely a degree of artistry to selecting the ideal kerning space for letters on your design. Depending on the design of the original typeface and the letters involved the specifics of spacing will vary.

from 13 Tips for Avoiding Kerning Disasters

Kerning for Fun and Style

Kerning and tracking are a just two fun tools in your arsenal as a designer/marketer. Like music everyone will have a different opinion, and though something will feel totally wrong, there can be a many right answers to the same problem.

Great Examples of Web Design Typography

1. https://www.awwwards.com/websites/typography/
2. https://www.intechnic.com/blog/top-50-best-examples-of-websites-using-typography/
3. https://www.supremo.co.uk/typeterms/
4. https://answerthepublic.com/reports/8bc60be8-14a2-423b-8335-a73b9db08ea5
5. https://www.portent.com/tools/title-maker

Resources:

There are a large set of libraries that can serve as useful tools for more intense kerning that is easily done with just CSS.

Original Kerning.js Info:

1. https://www.adamhyde.net/tag/kerning-js/
2. https://github.com/endtwist/kerning.js/blob/master/README.md

Other JS Resources for Kerning with JS:

1. http://letteringjs.com
2. https://designshack.net/articles/typography/kerning-live-web-type-with-jquery-and-lettering-js/
3. http://www.kernjs.com/
4. http://fittextjs.com/

Further Reading on Typography and UX From People Significantly more Talented than I

1. https://css-tricks.com/methods-controlling-spacing-web-typography/
2. https://uxplanet.org/10-tips-on-typography-in-web-design-13a378f4aa0d
3. https://medium.com/gravitdesigner/the-art-of-kerning-be16be25344f
4. https://cssreference.io/typography/