Today’s post is about RDFa and Microformats with a bit about HTML5 thrown in.  Let’s be brutal Microformats, HTML5 and RDFa are never going to be sexy.  These are ways of structuring information on the web so that computers can make sense of it.  Microformats are like glue that sticks websites together.  Stop snoring at the back.

Let’s take a step back to where we are now.  Web pages are made from HTML and display information.  One web page might hold information about an event run by a government department and another might be a news item about the Computer Engineer Barbie (opens new window).  A computer can make some sense of the pages, enough to list them in a search engine.  However it is going to struggle to make sense of the content of the page.  Pulling lots of unstructured information from a variety of websites together so it can be used in some sort of sensible way would be a lot of hard work.

Now HTML5 will add some semantic replacements for existing bits of HTML.  A computer struggles to separate out those parts of a page which were headers, footers, navigation and article because they weren’t identified clearly in a page’s HTML.  HTML5 will allow a clearer separation of different bits of a page so computers can make more sense of them.  However this only allows a computer a vague idea of the scaffolding not the finer detail.

What RDFa and Microformats do is add finer structure to the information in a page so a computer can read it.  That means an address can be structured so a search engine can understand it and let searchers find the web page when they are looking for information about a particular area.  A product can be set up so it can be listed in specialist searches.  Events from the websites of different organisations in a city can be pulled together into a central site to promote them without anyone having to do anything.  News and reviews about Computer Engineer Barbie can be shared with news sites. 

That’s why, while Microformats (opens new window), HTML5 (opens new window) and RDFa (opens new window) are never going to be sexy, they are going to be useful.  They will be the new glue of the World Wide Web.  Once we’ve done the hard work of setting up a website so it uses the appropriate structure other, good, things can happen without our having to do anything else.

Traditionally, online marketing has had a heavy emphasis on search engine visibility, be that through organic search engine optimisation (SEO), paid advertising or activities associated with SEO such as back link strategies.

However, the recent changes to Google’s interface to put ‘universal search’ at our fingertips and bring us ‘real time’ information via Google Caffeine coupled with the exponential growth of social media set down a new challenge to businesses in keeping on top of their online marketing.

At this point, some of you will be thinking, “Oh no, not another blog post telling me I should be ‘tweeting’ this and ‘liking’ that”, but before you click away, stop. This post is actually about changes in user search habits.

Those of us who have been using the web for a long time have probably schooled ourselves to use our search engine of choice to look for information, products or services. However, many of us are spending a lot of our online hours on other web properties such as Youtube, Facebook or interacting via Twitter, and it has now been proven that web users are using these tools as search platforms as opposed to what we would conventionally call search engines.

Youtube is a solid example of where a social platform has become a powerful marketing tool and now search platform; gone are the days that Youtube is seen as the place to just see extreme sports fanatics injuring themselves (although it still excels in this area). Youtube is now packed with useful promotional and value-added content which can draw you to in to commercial, branded content. Want to know how to ice a cake, or change your iPod battery? It’s there on Youtube. But from there I can easily click-through to buy cake decoration materials or that money-saving iPod battery kit.

Facebook users are now also following this trend, using the Facebook search feature to look for products and services, when they would previously have used something like Google. There is already talk about social sites like Facebook taking search further and using your Friends’ preferences to customise the results you receive; effectively making them more like personal or tribal recommendations.

Savvy businesses have already boarded these bandwagons for some time, setting up Youtube channels, Facebook Fan pages or similar, to support their existing websites. Going forward, the real winners will be the businesses that understand how different segments of their online audience access and interact with all this different content, derive value from it, and then how it generates income for their business.

Does a search in Google present your tweets and videos? Does your audience search about how to do something with your product via Youtube? Do they find you through a social networking site? If you have not started broadening your online marketing tactics using social tools, then now is the time to start evaluating the best routes for you. If you have been doing this for a while, you now need to evaluate whether your separate presences and aggregators like Google are pulling your content together to best effect.

The Google Analytics Application Gallery has been available for a little while now. Working for a provider of content management solutions, I noticed with particular interest that there are now Google Analytics plug-ins for both the Umbraco and WordPress Content Management Systems.

The Umbraco CMS plug-in (opens new window) makes it easy for editors or administrators to not only get an overview of visitors, bounce rate and other standard reports, but create their own custom Google Analytics reports. This could be a great way of reporting on standard key performance indicators to authors or technical reporting to a webmaster, without swamping them with unnecessary data such as highly customised campaign tracking.

The WordPress plug-ins not only support website owners, but also allow Google Analytics data to be displayed in your posts.

New applications that may improve your efficiency and help you get more out of Google Analytics are being added all the time, so it is well worth a visit.

It is fair to say that social media is rapidly becoming a necessary tool in any organisation's marketing toolkit. However, for any business to justify its time spent on social networking, it really needs to understand the true opportunity that particular social media audiences represent. For example, if you are a business local to Brighton, it would really help if you knew how many Twitter or Facebook users were in your geographic locale so you could make a more informed choice of social media service to promote yourself in.

We thought this was worth investigating, so armed with Microsoft Excel and data sets available online we came up with a league table of towns in the UK with highest densities of Twitter users. Interestingly, although London had the highest number of Tweeple, it was actually 10th in the list when population density was factored in, out-performed by many of the UK's media cities including Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow and Bristol. We have summarised the full results in the figure below (click upon the image for a full-size version):

Circles represent number of people signed up to Twitter with a particular location set per head of population.  Twitter user numbers from Twellowhood (opens new window) with some amalgamation of numbers where multiple spellings of the same place name had significant numbers of users.  Population figures from Wikipedia (opens new window).

It's impossible to work within a software development team these days without having enthusiastic discussions about something called 'MVC'. In broad terms, MVC (Model View Controller) is an 'architecture pattern', which Wikipedia defines as:

"Software patterns that offer well-established solutions to architectural problems in software engineering."

In software engineering, as with any other construction business, I can't stress the importance of applying good architecture and design patterns enough. MVC is one such pattern which has been around for a long time - its origins can be traced back to 1979 and the Smalltalk programming language, yet has recently seen a huge surge in popularity as it has proven to be a natural fit for web-based solutions. I'll try not to bore you with a lengthy discussion of MVC concepts, but a short overview is necessary before I discuss the benefits that the MVC pattern can bring to projects.

What is MVC?

In short, MVC projects consist of at least 3 distinct areas of responsibility:

• Models - Concerned with data modelling and capturing the project's business requirements.
• Views - Presentation / user-interface components. A view generally provides a visual representation of data in the model(s). On a web site, these are usually web pages or HTML snippets.
• Controllers - The engine room. Controllers facilitate the flow of data through the application. A controller will generally respond to some form of user-input, and then pass data to or from the model before handing another view back to the user.

So what does this actually mean? At its simplest level, MVC encourages developers to break their projects down into manageable, independent components with clearly defined lines of responsibility.

Back in the old days of writing Classic ASP or PHP spaghetti code, now often referred to as an anti-pattern (opens new window), it wasn't an uncommon sight for web pages to comprise of a mix of HTML mark-up, database access code and business logic all in one place, which while quick to write would become increasingly difficult to test and maintain during the course of the project's lifespan.

Instead, using the MVC pattern we are encouraged to break apart the tightly coupled dependencies that can exist in typical implementations (e.g. the user interface should not need to know how to access the database), which leads to code that is more modular, easier to maintain, and much more robust.

What are the benefits of MVC?

There are many benefits to using the MVC approach, some of the more tangible ones are:

• MVC's architecture makes it much easier for different team members to work independently on separate aspects of the system. For example, designers can work on the views without needing to understand how the underlying database technology works. Likewise, the programmer with no interest in user-interface design can focus solely on modelling the database and business requirements of the project.
• MVC projects are very easy to test. Developers typically create 'unit tests' which can be run automatically and allows them to quickly verify that each part of their application behaves as expected. Being able to break an application down into the loosely coupled components that MVC encourages is key to being able to create good unit tests.
• MVC projects tend to be modular by nature, which makes it much easier to alter (or even rewrite) one part of the application without it adversely impacting on other areas. MVC makes it very easy to achieve Separation of Concerns (opens new window) - a key principal to writing code that is easy to maintain and refactor.

Where do we use MVC?

We work with plenty of legacy applications written using non-MVC frameworks, such as standard PHP, ASP, and ASP.NET Webforms sites. These all fulfil their purpose and certainly haven't become bad applications overnight! Likewise, we won't be abandoning popular products such as Wordpress any time soon just because they aren't MVC based. However we have been shifting greenfield project development to MVC frameworks. Some of the MVC based solutions that we currently use are ASP.NET MVC, CodeIgniter - a PHP-based MVC framework, Joomla – an MVC-based CMS and Umbraco CMS - moving to ASP.NET MVC for its next release.

Of course, there is no such thing as a silver bullet in the software development world and MVC is no exception. It's possible for a good software developer to craft elegant solutions no matter what architectural pattern or framework is used, just as no amount of 'best practices' is going to save a poor developer from creating buggy, unmanageable code. But by encouraging you to adopt proven design patterns there’s no doubt that MVC empowers and encourages developers to create code that is elegant, reusable and robust - and that can only mean happier clients.

I can’t make my mind up how to start this post. Do you think more people will read it if I start with:

How many hours have you spent in meetings debating which graphic will make your web site make more money?

Maybe I should start with:

Google Website Optimiser takes the guesswork out of making decisions about your website.

Should I use web site or website? Someone just suggested swapping opinion for guesswork as it sounds better in the second sentence? Maybe I should say text instead of graphic in the first sentence? Should I use a two-column design for the page instead of three, or split the text into two columns? Maybe I should change the page round completely. So many choices…

The problem is that choices like these usually come down to guesswork, personal preference or long-held opinion. Sometimes we make the wrong choice for all sorts of reasons. Having lived with a web page for a while, it can feel jaded and stale. There is a natural urge to change it. To a new visitor to the page, the existing page may actually be better than the new page put in its place.

Marketing professionals use a variety of techniques to reduce the guesswork. Google Website Optimiser puts two powerful techniques to test variations of web pages to see which variation performs best, into the hands of all website owners. To do that you need to have a specific goal in mind for the page, such as sign ups to a newsletter, adding a product into a shopping cart or visiting a specific page. The page that you’re testing also needs to have enough visitors for you to see which version works best.

There are two types of testing you can do with Google Web Optimiser:

• A/B Split Testing
• Multivariate Testing

A/B Split Testing

A/B Testing is the simpler kind of test. In an A/B test you see how the original, “A”, page performs compared to variant, “B”, pages. There can be more than one B page. A/B testing can be used if the page is fairly low traffic (less than a thousand page views each week). A/B testing allows the testing of pages in which one simple change to the page is made, the overall look of the page changes or parts of the page are moved around.

Multivariate Testing

Multivariate Testing tests different versions of a single page. You can try out several different versions of the parts of the page's text and graphics, to see which results in the most visitors going to your goal. You can vary different parts of the page separately and Google Web Optimiser will work out which combination is the best. To use a multivariate test in a reasonable amount of time, the page needs to have high traffic (over a thousand page views each week).

Both kinds of test can be set up by someone with a bit of technical knowledge by following the step by step process on the Google Web Optimiser website (opens new window). After there have been enough visitors to the page, the tool can tell you which version performs best. It will even knock out underperforming variations so the testing won’t hurt you as it goes on.

This isn’t just a toy for techies though. It offers real business benefits. It allows you to increase your conversion rates, avoid changes that decrease conversions, and do away with those meetings debating which version of a page is best.

As part of our comprehensive approach to our web development, we offer a range of training. The training team is involved at the beginning of projects to conduct focus groups, prior to roll out with content management system user training and then during the life of the website, to train staff members in website maintenance and optimisation.

For the past couple of years we have been incorporating Google Analytics into our web developments. However, what we don’t see is every client taking up Google Analytics training, and I have been asking myself why?

Good use of website analytics is hard work, and requires an advanced skill set. Statistical analysis is a complex field, requiring a good level of numeracy. Additionally, you need to have a good grasp of web technologies and know how your analytics solution records and presents data. It is not just a case of turning analytics on, looking at a few numbers and then sending off a report by email (well you can, but your email will end up in Deleted Items).

I’ve become more puzzled by this the more I deliver Google Analytics training courses, as I’m constantly surprised by what delegates do not know. I think organisations do not buy analytics training because they think they are getting the best from their analytics (and their analyst!), when they are not. You don’t know, what you don’t know.

Therefore, I have come up with a checklist to help you understand if you are using your analytics well, or whether you would benefit from training. Try the simple health check questionnaire below (which focuses on Google Analytics, but should help with others), and see how you score:

Clearly this is not scientific (nor sometimes is Website Analytics!), but it should give you an insight into how you could improve your use of website analytics. If you have found that you are significantly ‘out of shape’, then maybe a training course (opens new window) is the shot in the arm you need.

“The nicest thing about standards is that there are so many of them to choose from.”

Andrew S. Tannenbaum

…and nowhere is the above quote truer than in the world of web design and development. The open source and democratic nature of the web means that it is a rapidly changing environment with new technologies and standards vying for attention all the time. Barely has one technology become established and supported by software and browsers when the next is already on the horizon and of course this is what makes the web so exciting and vital. These rapid developments fuel the exponential growth and use of the web. The downside of this however is that developers and designers have to be constantly aware of the limitations of the old technologies and conversely careful not to implement code that is too cutting edge and is not widely enough supported, a difficult balancing act perhaps, but one that is absolutely vital to the success of their client’s sites.

The newest kids on the block as far as standards are concerned are HTML 5 (opens new window) and CSS 3 (opens new window) and the hope is that in the next few years they will form the bedrock for web design and mark up. Both have been in development for some years and are only now starting to mature. They could be the perfect pairing, HTML 5 for the content and CSS 3 for presentation, allowing coders to build more stable, faster loading and widely supported sites and designers to create visually rich layouts without clunky workarounds. The key to this of course will be browsers adopting these two standards and users taking up the new versions.

Together these two represent a considerable step forward for the web and above all a potentially significant improvement in the user’s experience.

Google Buzz has been out for a few months now and has settled down after its dramatic and explosive launch. Its introduction was met with various user privacy issues, none more than the highly worrying ‘auto follow’ feature, where Buzz ‘auto followed’ your most emailed contacts and thus allowing others to understand your email usage (this has since been removed).

The other door Buzz faced on launch was the more obvious one, Why do I need yet another social media network? If you already use Twitter and Facebook for communication to your audiences, where would Buzz fit into all this? That is before you start with all the other Social Networks that people may use (MySpace, Digg, Bebo, Last.FM, LinkedIn). Okay, these other networks might be used for other functions such as music, photos and news, but they do account for a user’s time.

So was it Google’s answer to Twitter? Or had they missed the bus?

Buzz is similar to Twitter and Facebook as it is another mechanism to communicate with users via the web; trade statuses, links, images and videos but there are differences. Here are the pros and cons of Google Buzz.

The Pros

Find and follow your contacts

Due to the fact that Google Buzz is integrated into Google Mail, you instantly have your friends to follow in your Google Mail contacts list. They will be able to view your buzzes and vice versa. No need to be introduced or search for your friends using a search mechanism, its automatic.

Social Networks Connection

Google Buzz allows you to import your activity with other social networks automatically. Buzz feeds in your latest photos from Flickr or Picasa, your latest tweets from Twitter, your latest videos from YouTube and your news feeds from Google Reader.

No Character limitation

Where you are limited with Twitter to the 140 Character restriction, Buzz allows for unlimited-length posts.

YouTube auto embedding

Similar to Google Chat, all YouTube videos are automatically embedded into Google Buzz, avoiding you from having to click through to YouTube, thus enabling commenting on a video collaboratively within Buzz.

Conversation Streams

As previously mentioned, Google Buzz allows for the ability to follow communication between individuals and groups of individuals rather than individual posts. This allows for collaboration and conversations to grow, which is especially useful when you consider the ability to embed video, pictures and links.

Google Buzz Map

This is my personal favourite. The Google Buzz Map is viewable to all mobile phones (except Blackberry) via the Google Buzz layer on Google Maps for Mobile. When using a mobile device with a GPS, you can geotag your Buzzes with your current location. This is displayed in Google Maps with the Buzz layer, enabling you to view Buzzes from a location point of view; a new feature to social networking.

The Cons

Now the Cons. in addition to the previously mentioned, privacy issues and the need to interact with yet another social network:

Google Mail Account

This has got to be one of the biggest stumbling blocks for the product. If you already use Google Mail then great, if you don’t then you require one to use Buzz. As well as the issue of most usernames having gone, why would a user require yet another email account to the one they currently use? Simple, they wouldn’t.

Twitter Integration Delay

There is a significant delay in Twitter feeds feeding into your Buzz Account, this negates the whole real-time communication issue.

Overcrowded Buzz streams

If you have a Buzz stream where you are following a ‘Buzzer’ who comments quite regularly, then this can tend to overcrowd your Buzz stream, similar to having a Tweeter who tweets too much. But add to this the fact that they may have lots of followers who then comment on their buzzes, and your stream then becomes theirs very quickly.

Finding Buzzers

Whereas Facebook and Twitter have many different ways to find people you may wish to follow, either by similar interest or subject, Buzz fails to assist in this matter.

Conclusion.

I was lucky enough to be a Gmail user, so the integration of Google Buzz was seamless apart from the fact that it does tend to overcrowd my mail box on some days. After linking in my Twitter account, I really found no need to use Buzz on a regular basis. I do however like the Google Buzz map overlay on Google Maps and use this to view Buzzers who are located nearby.

So overall, Google Buzz is currently only offering technology that is already out there. Its integration with Google Maps for Mobile is its strongest selling point, but Google really needs to come up with the killer innovation that will help Google Buzz stand its ground against the social media big-hitters like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, and newcomers like Foursquare.

The time and money invested creating a website makes testing it properly essential. Last month we tested a site for the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG). We checked its accessibility, standards compliance, functionality, branding and content across a range of browser.

Before testing any project we draw up a test plan from original project documentation. This can include specifications, statements of requirement, standards the site is designed to comply with and branding guidelines. Without a plan there is a danger that testers will miss areas of a site or functionality that need testing.

When we draw up a test plan we included a number of separate, independent tests that can be performed. Each test confirms if the site complies with one requirement from the specification. Some tests, such as compliance with html standards, are independent of web browsers. Others, like testing site navigation works, need to be carried out across a range of browsers to ensure a feature is available to all visitors. Some are best carried out by testers with specialist expertise, such as a designer checking a site’s styling complies with branding guidelines.

Once we have a test plan testers can carry out the testing. A Pass or Fail is recorded for every test to ensure that every test is run at least once. While carrying out the test plan testers record any issues outside the test plan they comes across. A written explanation for each failure or issue explains what is wrong.

With a detailed audit trail recording outcomes and who carried out each test we can support the conclusions of our testing. This is important as it builds confidence for the client we are testing for and for the site’s creators. A summary list of failures would be quicker to produce and provides a list of issues requiring attention. A summary list doesn’t build confidence in the effectiveness of the testing.

The DCLG testing was based on the site specification and branding guidelines. A list of web browsers the site had to work with was identified by the DCLG. We drew up the list of tests and identified which tests needed to be carried out across different browsers and which were independent of the browsers. The test plan included over 500 separate tests.

With the test plan written we went through it step by step. For each test we decided if the site passed or failed and recorded the outcome. A summary and a report of the test results was compiled and sent to the DCLG the next day.