Fiona Mulreany, Web & UX professional

Intro to Balsamiq – Mockups for Rapid User Feedback

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http://youtu.be/70hfU7_95Gw I use Balsamiq quite a lot for screen mockups for clients. Over the years I found that users get very fixated on a prototype that it too 'polished' as they expect the end result to be identical to that (I learned that one the hard way). I like Balsamiq as the mockups … [Read more...]

WordPress Multisite and Domain Mapping on shared IP using H-Sphere

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Many hosting providers do not support wildcard DNS which is a very useful thing for WP Multisite as it allows your subdomain to automatically resolve. However, you can manually configure your shared hosting package and get it working without much difficulty. Once you have that working you can … [Read more...]

HFI video – 7 Principles That Make Your Website More Engaging

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http://youtu.be/3J85SUZFXNM Interesting video by Dr. Susan Weinschenk on increasing website engagement through Persuasion, Emotion and Trust. … [Read more...]

Cloud Infrastructure Explained

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I have used various types of hosting services over the years, from basic shared hosting plans to co-located servers in data centres and more recently have commissioned VPSs (virtual private servers). All of these services have their positive aspects but all have significant limitations. The … [Read more...]

Managing Ads on your WordPress site

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If you have a self-hosted WordPress website or blog you have lots of options for managing advertising on your site. It all depends on how much effort you want to put in and how much money you would like to earn. 1. Display Google Ads This is the easiest option for website owners. You simply go … [Read more...]

Widget Logic – WordPress plugin for conditional content

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Widget Logic is one of the most useful plug-ins I've found while working with WordPress over the past couple of years. Widget Logic allows you to display individual widgets only if they meet criteria you set. This can be really useful for displaying ads or other content on specific areas of your … [Read more...]

WordPress Tutorial – Finding Your Category, Page or Post ID

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Once you start using WordPress regularly you will probably need to get the ID of your pages, posts or categories. It may be for plugins such as Widget Logic or those displaying Featured Content. Maybe you want to try your hand at customising your templates or sidebars. Regardless, it is relatively … [Read more...]

Recession Advice – Improve your Website Experience

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It may seem counter-intuitive to spend money during a Recession. However a relatively small spend on improving the user experience on your website can yield huge savings / increase sales for your business. Sounds good but where are the hard facts to back up that claim, you ask. Usability … [Read more...]

10 Web Usability Priorities to Increase Sales

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Jakob Neilsen’s Top 10 Web Usability Priorities to increase your company’s sales. Email Newsletters – publish an email newsletter as this will help you establish a closer relationship with your users. Don’t publish it too often and make sure the newsletter contains content that will be … [Read more...]

Why everyone is judged against Google

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Three things have happened to change the environment for today’s websites: high speed broadband, the explosion of Web 2.0 and the availability of really cheap web hosting. The result is often slow interactive websites that are unfairly judged against the giants of the Internet like Google, Yahoo, … [Read more...]