What is Structured Data? (Or Schema.org, metadata, and Open Graph)
A closer lookThe last time you played a song in your car and the title showed up on the radio screen, you saw metadata in action—information that is hidden behind the scenes to provide additional detail about a file or system. Websites have metadata to provide information about the company, content type, publishing date, and more.
Structured Data, commonly ‘Schema.org’ is a collaboration between Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft, and Yandex to provide a consistent format for websites. Using this clear format allows search engines to correctly categorize websites and interpret content.
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Why it is a good idea to plan and build (web) software in stages
A closer lookIt is natural to approach a new project with the finish line in your sights, and in our experience that always leads to wasted money and time. We always recommend a modular build strategy where features are split into different development phases. Why? Let’s take a look at the top 4 modular strategy advantages.
Unforeseen options. During the design process it is inevitable that there will be changes in features, specifications, and even sometimes products themselves—it is difficult to anticipate every possible outcome and useful to be able to change gears without undoing hours of project management and product scope.
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Nonverbal Communication - Why feet are usually honest
Polygraph Side ChatsDuring childhood we are taught to mask our feelings to be polite and socially graceful. Our facial expressions, voice tone, arms, hands are just a few of the things we quickly learn to control. Feet motion, however, is usually not something that a parent would correct and thus we rarely learn to control our feet and their various forms of expression.
Entire volumes could be written on the body language of feet, but let’s keep it to three interesting ways feet express how people really feel.
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Email phishing: why clicking links is a bad idea
A closer lookEveryone knows you have to be careful with links sent via email, but most people don’t know exactly why. Let’s take a closer look.
First, it’s important to know that it is still relatively easy to make an email appear to come from someone else. This is called spoofing, and allows unscrupulous people to send an email that appears to come from your bank, your credit card, your web host, or anywhere else.
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What is an API? (And why is it needed?)
A closer lookAn API, or Application Programming Interface, is an interface to a software system designed to allow access from another system. In other words, a computer talking to a computer. A great human analogy would be you as a Point Of Sale software system, and a county records office as Quickbooks. If you go looking for a record of something the clerk at the front desk will ask who you are and why you need it. The clerk here is similar to an API, and the inquiry about who you are would be authentication. Once this step is passed successfully a request is made and the records clerk (API) would then find your file and bring it back to you. Note how you never access the complete file system, but instead ask the clerk to retrieve or store the information for you. They are the interface to a much larger system and all information passes through them with strict rules.
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Five tips for hiring the right web developer
A closer lookHiring the right developer can make a significant impact on business growth, system efficiency, and even team morale. Tech is at the heart of modern business and if systems break down things fall off the rails all too quickly.
So, how do you know who to hire? You’re almost certainly not a developer yourself, so assessing skills can be a challenge. And even then, there is a wide variety of developer mentalities and as developers ourselves, we can say that we’re kind of a strange lot. So with that in mind here are five tips for hiring the right developer.
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The SEO tool you have and don’t know about: Lighthouse
One minute overview seriesThere’s a great little tool housed inside Google Chrome called Lighthouse. It’s a testing and reporting system to determine webpage performance and offer suggestions about speed, accessibility, best practices, SEO, and Progressive Web Apps. Don’t worry if you’re not a developer as this information is clearly presented and built into basic overall scores.
This test is run page by page (not website by website) so try running it on your home page, your product/post page, etc. Do some analysis of your site and see what needs a little adjustment to work well. And remember, this isn’t just for SEO, this is also for general user experience. Treat your visitors right and Google will reward you for it, so make that site FAST! Make it accessible, and keep your code clean and up to date.
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Don’t lose yourself while branding
One minute overview seriesThe problem with branding is how easy it is to abandon company essence by building a facade of what we think our customers wish to see. This is a bad strategy and a losing battle from the start. This distortion of the concept of branding is both ineffective and detrimental.
Good branding requires first determining your essence and being the best version of yourself and THEN communicating that in a clear, consistent way that your customers can actually hear.
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SAAS vs Custom Software. When and why
One minute overview seriesWe often hear the question “Should I build my own software or use off-the-shelf systems that are already out there?” and the answer is fairly simple: if you can find SAAS that meets your needs, use it. Because the development cost is shared by all of the users the price is low and the system is maintained and updated at no additional cost.
However, in most cases it is nearly impossible to find SAAS to actually meet your needs, and that is where custom systems come in. Custom-built web software usually pays for itself quickly and is a very good investment. It also allows for a much more innovative approach to business as it is tailored to YOU—if you want to try something different it can be easily built in to your system.
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Taking control of privacy with DuckDuckGo
Security and PrivacyPrivacy is complicated and every step in the right direction counts. Let’s start with web searches. We all perform web searches many times every day and Google tracks just about everything—it’s something that is alarming when you really dig into the nuts and bolts of what is being tracked and where that data goes. To quote Google’s privacy policy (05/29/2020): “We collect information to provide better services to all our users — from figuring out basic stuff like which language you speak, to more complex things like which ads you’ll find most useful, the people who matter most to you online, or which YouTube videos you might like.” - In other words, they are tracking everything and you have no privacy when you use their services. Not uncommon and not a path that should be followed without careful consideration. This is posted on Youtube—the irony is not lost on us and it’s a great illustration of how living in this era is always a careful balance and mindful compromise.
As with anything, if you don’t like it, don’t use it. DuckDuckGo is an alternative to Google with a simple privacy policy: “We don’t collect or share any of your personal information.” And that’s the sort of thing we want to see more and more of.
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