Ryan Doom

EMP Visual Solutions

Ryan Doom — Mon, 24 May 2010 11:37:00 GMT

I wanted to showcase a cool Michigan company that we have been working with. They specalize in:

Which are all just names for large LED signs. These signs are assembled in Farmington Hills Michigan and Electro-Matic serves companies through out the nation. Their signs are often used outdoors in front of banks, churches, retail stores. Since they are in the metro-Detroit area their displays are also used indoors at many manufacturers and automotive companies.

Starting a software product company

Ryan Doom — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 01:19:00 GMT

We recently launched a DotNetNuke module development company. These are components to plug into existing websites to add functionality like a DNN store module that adds a shopping cart and e-commerce.

How to prevent duplicative content

Ryan Doom — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 13:58:00 GMT

Search engines do not care for duplicative content, if you make multiple pages that have the exact same content on your website it can negatively effect your search engine position. It probably...

Making a better 404 page

Ryan Doom — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 20:16:00 GMT

I just ran into a 404 page on a website, and realized that it should be a standard practice to customize your websites 404 page to make it more useful to users. The standard...

Getting rid of the admin area of your application

Ryan Doom — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 07:40:00 GMT

One difference that I have always liked about DotNetNuke versus Drupal and Joomla is that the admin interface is built into the website not a separate area. When Kevin and I researched all of the top Content Management Systems three years ago we decided ...

Don't forget about the empty screen

Ryan Doom — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 22:50:00 GMT

When creating web applications designers usually consider what the screen will look like when it is full of data, not empty. The first impression a user has with your application should not be a blank screen.

Increasing your business by speaking

Ryan Doom — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 23:22:00 GMT

2009 will most likely be as slow for many businesses as 2008. But you don’t have to participate, a good tip for 2009 is to work on a presentation that you can start giving to local associations and businesses. All you need to get started…

OS X Snow Leopard Features

Ryan Doom — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 22:46:00 GMT

I think it is brilliant that Apple is not advertising any new features in their next operating system installment for late 2009. It’s something other companies could not get away with, but it’s acceptable for them to do so. They will be focusing on performance, just increasing the speed and experience.
Of course there will be some new benefits....

My First week with a Macbook

Ryan Doom — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 19:43:00 GMT

Picked up a Macbook on Craigslist to start to get in touch with this hipster coffee shop, "I use a Mac I'm so cool" lifestyle. Well, and to rock out some Ruby on Rails development and have a good excuse to do so.

I have outlined 3 days of things I have loved and hated about the Macbook. I did this entire post, and photo editing on it, so I'm coming along.

Error indicates that IIS is not installed on this machine

Ryan Doom — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 16:48:00 GMT

“error indicates that IIS is not installed on this machine” when running “aspnet_regiis -i” but you do have IIS installed? This happened to me recently on my new laptop that is running Vista 64bit and IIS 7. The issue

Making Custom themes for Gmail

Ryan Doom — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 08:30:00 GMT

I wonder if Gmail will be allowing us to make custom themes for their web based email client? This week they launched a feature under the settings area to change the look and feel of your Gmail...

Presenting at ASTD

Ryan Doom — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 16:21:00 GMT

I presented at GreenStone Farm Credit Services today from 5:30 to 7:30 about Social Media.

Free Incoming Links

Ryan Doom — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 20:27:00 GMT

Incoming links to your website is a major factor in Google’s search engine algorithm. Originally called ‘back rub’ it is the main factor that differentiated Google’s search results from all the other players. Google essentially analyzes the incoming links to your website as well as the key words used in those links ...

How to Sell Agile Software Development

Ryan Doom — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 20:32:00 GMT

I have found that Selling Agile Development is easier than I would have initially expected it to be. The selling process is usually so complex. In the more complex cases it starts with a Request for Proposal. You will then wade through dozens of pages that may specify technologies, and how much load they are expecting, what type of hardware it will be on and usually only a ...

Roles a web company must play

Ryan Doom — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 20:27:00 GMT

What skills do you need to create an all-star website? It’s something I think about often, and I have had a ton of people come to us recently who have been burned. Burned because they had their friend who ‘did websites’ or a design / creative company start their projects and after in one case 10’s of thousands of dollars they had nothing to show for it. What skills do you need to look for to create a significant web project. I’m not talking...

Better services, not more services

Ryan Doom — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 21:49:00 GMT

As a business owner I am always paying attention to how other companies operate and market their businesses. Recently I have noticed that some companies tend to just offer more services to try to get more business. Why don’t companies just stick to ...

Top 5 3rd party DotNetNuke modules

Ryan Doom — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 21:11:00 GMT

After delivering over 100 DotNetNuke sites we have used dozens of 3rd party modules and have custom programmed even more. I was trying to assess what 5 3rd party modules would be the top on my list for delivering a solid website with DNN. In no particular order...

Liquid Web - Hosting and customer service

Ryan Doom — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 07:40:00 GMT

Web Ascender has always outsources our website hosting. They are essentially our machines, we have 100% access to them but our hosting company makes sure they are always up, always have internet connectivity and are in charge of the hardware if it ever bombs out. You would think website hosting and server hosting would be easy, but it is not, I assure you it is not. We started off...

Best Practices for changing DNS, A and MX records

Ryan Doom — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 00:31:00 GMT

Moving DNS, A records and MX records can be a real pain, and if not timed right can result in downtime which no one likes. I have just outlined some of the steps I take when launching a site. If you don't know what A or MX is no need to click continue reading, its a bit geeky.

Installing Python and Google App Engine on Windows

Ryan Doom — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 21:58:00 GMT

Getting Python and Google App Engine SDK Installed was much easier than expected, but I decided to document this in case anyone was having any trouble getting it running. Google App Engine is a new lab project by Google that will allow you to build and essentially host your application on their servers using their processing power and distributed database architecture. It’s a brilliant idea. Right now only Python is supported, although they claim that they will be working to support other languages in the future as well. I assume we will see PHP next. Good news is that it does support Python’s Django framework. Anyways onto the instructions:

Installing Python on Windows & Installing Google App Engine on Windows

These steps can help you Install Python on Windows as well as get Google App Engine Installed

Download Python 2.5.* from python.org http://www.python.org/download/
Run the downloaded MSI and install it, the default is C:\python25
Check to make sure Python works. Open up the command prompt by clicking on the Vista Icon, and in the Start Search area type cmd
Once the cmd prompt is open type “cd c:\python25” that will take you to the python directory

Rocking out with some new IPhone apps

Ryan Doom — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 16:46:00 GMT

I finally got around to really tricking out my IPhone yesterday. Over the last 4+ weeks I have only really been taking advantage of the: Texting, Camera, Exchange Integration & Safari. But now...

Lansing Day of .NET - LDODN - DODN

Ryan Doom — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 01:16:00 GMT

On Saturday June 21st the Greater Lansing User Group for Microsoft .NET (GLUGnet) organized its first major educational conference. GLUGnet was...

Why use Twitter?

Ryan Doom — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 01:00:00 GMT

I have only been on Twitter for about 6 months and have only updated my profile a handful of times but I think I finally ‘get it.’ I understand why...

A few usability items you may consider with your cart

Ryan Doom — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 21:22:00 GMT

Outlined are some things you might now have considered when building your last e-commerce system.

A fresh start feels good - formatted my tablet

Ryan Doom — Fri, 02 May 2008 02:15:00 GMT

I just reformatted my Fujitsu Lifebook T Series 4215 Tablet PC. I upgraded it from XP to Vista about 14 months ago and recently messed up some licensing files for some products I use daily and figured it wouldn’t hurt to just wipe it clean. I did the following...

Is the evolution of a web designer always the same?

Ryan Doom — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 01:37:00 GMT

I had the privilege of being a website design judge at the Capital Area Career Council web design showcase today. The students were Junior and Senior high school students who are taking classes at the career center to supplement their normal high school education. They are learning things like: Photoshop, Game design, Programming and web design. It is a great program and gives the students a taste for lots of different areas in the creative side of IT.

What was really odd to me is how much these websites looked like the websites from 1995. Did they have ...

Symfony PHP MVC Framework

Ryan Doom — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 16:48:00 GMT

Wow, I just finished reading The definitive Guide to Symfony, and it is definitely one of the better web development books I have read. They review everything you would need to build about 95% of web development applications. They review the model, view control concepts, the...

Ryan's radio discussion with Walter Sorg

Ryan Doom — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 14:28:00 GMT

Ryan talks with Walter Sorg of WILS1320 this morning about internet social media websites such as Facebook and YouTube.

Some topics reviewed during this radio spot.

Why are some online videos popular
How politicans are using social media
How social media might be used by a local business
Does the internet make sense for all companies?
How is selling online affecting brick and mortar shops, how can they transition

Listen to the Radio Spot (8MB MP3)

This was recorded live at 6:37am and will rebroadcast at 8:07am as well as a Memorial Day 'best of' WILS 1320 interviews.

Top Website Usability Tips

Ryan Doom — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 02:57:00 GMT

Usability is a measurement on how easy a website or user interface is to use. This term is also used to refer to how to improve the overall ease-of-use when designing an interface.
The core components of usability are:

Learnability: Can users accomplish basic tasks on their very first visit? Is it intuitive?
Efficiency: Once the user has learned the system can they do the tasks quickly?
Memorability: How easy is the system to use after not using it for a period of time?
Errors: How many issues did the user run into, how severe were they, and how easily can they recover from them?
Satisfaction: Is it fun and easy to use?
Utility: Does it do what the user needs?

General Website Tips

Use a descriptive tagline of what your website does

Have you ever been frustrated by a website after searching high and low and still cannot find out what they do? Consider starting a practice of having a one line descriptive slogan of what the business does on the homepage or every page. Not some lame marketing jargon but plain easy to understand English of what the site is for; if your parents could read it and get it you should be all set.

Using the Window <TITLE>

The number one factor to how your page is indexed in search engines is the description used in the pages title. Start getting away from the old “Company Name > About” style and move to “KEYWORD PHRASES RELEVANT TO THIS PAGE | Company Name” and excluded the company name if you feel it is not necessary.

Search Box Tips

You do not need to add the text “Search” in front of a textbox if there is a button that reads “Search” to the right that the user is supposed to click on. People have caught on, this is now intuitive behavior and it’s ok to remove that redundancy.
General rule of thumb, make your search box 27 characters wide.
Definitely include search on your site if it has over 100 pages

Having a Home link on the homepage

If you are on the homepage you don’t need to have the Home button in the navigation. If you have a consistent navigation on all pages that includes the Home page that at least make sure that the navigation element is highlighted differently when they are on that page.

Name and Logo

Include the name of your site and the logo on every page; link the logo to the homepage.

Links go to new pages, Buttons perform actions

As a general rule of thumb text links should take you to a new page when you click on them and buttons should submit some type of information or take you to the next step in a process.

Using PDF’s on your website

As a general rule of thumb you should try to avoid using PDF’s on your website when possible. They break the natural flow of website browsing. Often users will click on a link and not know it was a PDF link, it then opens up and they have to wait for it to download and for acrobat to start running within the browser and then often times they close it immediately and end up closing their entire web browser. Plus a PDF is just a mass of content that is very difficult to navigate through. Use PDFs if you are distributing large documents that the user needs to print, or documents that must be formatted in a very specific way.

Avoiding Banner Blindness

Studies show that users now understand what banners and advertisements look like on websites and often look right past them. This means it is very important to ensure your content and images do not look like banners. Avoid creating images the size that banners usually are, avoid blinking or animated images, and definitely avoid using traditional pop-ups when at all possible. Text only ads are now proving to be the most successful banner ads because users are still reading them.

Don’t open new browser windows

When you think about building websites you must always be thinking what is intuitive and what is consistent. You don’t want to break many of the normal browsing norms because you want users to feel at home on your site and have little to learn. If you program your site to start opening windows up in a new browsers as users clicks you open up a world of issues. The first and most important is that the back button does not work on the new window; and this button is extremely popular and critical when navigating the web. The second is that different web browsers handle new windows differently. In one it may be a new window or perhaps a new tab, and if it’s a new tab and then moves the user to that page they have to scan their tabs to get back to where they were. Remember, the user always has the option to make the decision themselves if they want the link to open up in a new window by right clicking or CTRL clicking on a link on your site.

Restrictive Form Behavior

Rethink your website forms. Remember that each field that the user has to fill out is some burden to them, so if you don’t need or use the salutation don’t ask for it, and ask yourself that question for each form field. When asking for phone numbers don’t split it into three separate boxes when one will do. Don’t require the user to type the phone number in a specific format or their credit card in a specific format if it doesn’t really matter. Is that field REALLY required or do you just feel it would be nice to have? Think about your forms a bit more, make them easier for your users, not just easier for you.

Splash Screens and all Flash Sites

Don’t do it, they give the impression that the website is more concerned with its own image then that of the users actual needs and their time.

Think about your Typography

You can achieve more with choosing the right fonts, sizes, colors and placement then you can achieve with large graphics and bloated designs.

Website Supplements

Email Newsletters

Your viewer is engaged in your information while they are on your website, but once they are done you have lost that connection. They might not ever come back. Enticing users to sign up for an email newsletter can help you maintain...

Getting Things Done Email Technique

Ryan Doom — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 23:57:00 GMT

I have revamped my email strategy this weekend because it was getting a bit overwhelming and my previous strategies have been failing miserably. When 50 to 100 valid emails come in every day how do you handle that? My previous technique was to read it once or twice a day, reply to what I could then mark anything I had to spend some time on I would mark them as Unread and flag them.

As I type this out I realize once again how ridiculous this ‘system’ was.

So… the new goal is to keep the inbox completely empty. I am taking some of the techniques from Getting Things Done (GTD) to create Ryan’s own Getting Things Done email technique. To start you must make 5 directories...

ASP .NET MVC vs Monorail Castle Project

Ryan Doom — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 03:52:00 GMT

Microsoft is releasing their own ASP .NET MVC platform that will create a development environment similar to Ruby on Rails and the ASP .NET Castle Project Monorail.

I have tried to start a list of some thoughts I have comparing the two at this point, but I feel Microsoft’s ASP.NET MVC will be a better choice over the Castle Projects Monorail.

How can Business Networking improve your business?

Ryan Doom — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 03:10:00 GMT

Many entrepreneurs and salesmen know that networking with other people is an important factor in creating a successful business. However, I fear that many people overlook this simple and effective way for growing your business, increasing your income and meeting great people. I attribute much of Web Ascender’s success to the "soft skills" of building relationships and working towards lasting friendships with everyone we meet...

GoDaddy has great customer service

Ryan Doom — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 21:37:00 GMT

How awesome is Go Daddy? Well let me tell you, that their prices for domain names are virtually unbeatable, their prices for secure certificates untouchable, and their customer service is ...

Where does the users eye go on a webpage?

Ryan Doom — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 14:57:00 GMT

Eye tracking studies involve using cameras and pattern recognition to track where the user's eye travels on a web page. They can then take this camera data and create heat map overlays of the web page and get an accurate measurement of what really draws the users attention.

Here are 20+ lessons learned from a recent study.

Ads in the top and left portions of a page will receive the most eye fixation.
Ads placed next to the best content are seen more often.
Bigger images get more attention.
Clean, clear faces in images attract more eye fixation.
Fancy formatting and fonts are ignored.
Formatting can draw attention.
Headings draw the eye.
Initial eye movement focuses on the upper left corner of the page.
Large blocks of text are avoided.
Lists hold reader attention longer.
Navigation tools work better when placed at the top of the page.
One-column formats perform better in eye-fixation than multi-column formats.
People generally scan lower portions of the page.
Readers ignore banners.
Shorter paragraphs perform better than long ones.
Show numbers as numerals.
Text ads were viewed mostly intently of all types tested.
Text attracts attention before graphics.
Type size influences viewing behavior.
Users initially look at the top left and upper portion of the page before moving down and to the right.
Users only look at a sub headline if it interests them.
Users spend a lot of time looking at buttons and menus.
White space is good.

Found from Seth Godin based on Tim's study

How to measure website sales?

Ryan Doom — Sun, 11 Nov 2007 17:34:00 GMT

How do you measure the success of a website? Success is measured the same regardless of whether you are measuring your website, your business, the success of an event or a grade on a test. You have to have an actual goal in order to measure it. If you have no goals, you cannot define success.
What are some goals you may strive for with your website...

Do I need a computer server?

Ryan Doom — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 16:17:00 GMT

Many small businesses start off with buying a couple of computers, connecting them to the Internet and then they operate completely independent of one another. That means that the computers are connected to a network but nothing is shared between them. A common next step is to do some simple file sharing between the computers so user A can access files and data on user B’s computer and vice versa...

What's new in Adobe Fireworks CS3

Ryan Doom — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 03:04:00 GMT

The new Adobe CS3 Suite is pretty awesome. As many of my designer and programming associates know I am a diehard Fireworks fan. The first art application I started using was Photofinish on Windows 3.1. This tool really had a lot to offer, nothing vector but you could get just about everything done with this tool. It had excellent gradients, smudge tool, cloning, it was packed full of goodies. I eventually converted to Photoshop around version 3 ...

What is long tail marketing?

Ryan Doom — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 02:34:00 GMT

“The Long Tail” as you hear it used today is a term coined by Chris Anderson editor of Wired magazine based on the statistics curve called “long-tailed distributions.” Chris Anderson has brought to light how the technological era and Ecommerce is changing today’s Marketing and Economics strategy. Imagine you own a brick and mortar record ...

Write More Effectively in Just 10 Minutes

Ryan Doom — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 20:48:00 GMT

If you’re responsible for sending out important emails, writing online articles, or crafting important documents for your employer then we have some very useful tips for you to consider. These tips are tailored primarily for writing web articles, but will be just as useful for traditional print publications. The ten minutes you spend reading this will help you to create documents and online content that will have a positive impact on your readers.

Software is easy. Marketing is hard.

Ryan Doom — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 02:05:00 GMT

It may not be the case for some but for me the idea of a great software product has come pretty easy. There are many times a day that a developer, or a manager due tasks that appear to be mundane, and would love for improvements. The opportunities for software ideas are all around you every day. After you spend a few years developing software or managing software projects these opportunities become a bit more obvious. You may see opportunities for code generation tools, ORMs, load testing technologies, deployment process improvements – there are many areas right in your industry that have ways to ease pain with a software product. When you look past what you are up to you head in all day (development) you can then see many areas for general business improvements or areas where a niche piece of software could dominate a vertical. There are tons of opportunities and ideas out there, I stress that that is not the hardest part of having a successful ...

Response to the use of logins

Ryan Doom — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 02:16:00 GMT

In response to an article on CodingHorror

Although I am extremely turned off by many sites that require logins to see what appears to be ‘trivial’ information I would not use API documentation as a way to degrade them on how ‘brilliant’ they are...

8 Ways to Boost Your Performance

Ryan Doom — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 14:26:00 GMT

Don’t have enough time in the day? Have the feeling of not accomplishing what you set out to do that day? Feeling overwhelmed by what is still yet to do? Here are some tips that will help you make the most of your day. If you would like to adopt any of these performance boosting secrets I wouldn’t recommend taking on too many of them at once. It is important to slowly adapt to change, consider taking 1 or 2 of the items and telling yourself you will stick with it 100% for 30 days. A short term commitment is a lot easier then long term; mentally you can see yourself sticking it out for 30 days, and even use a calendar to mark the days off. Once you are done with your 30 days reflect back on the success of the new habit. At that point quit, extend it for another 30, 60 or 90 days, or let it be a permanent habit.

Web Tracking - A Real World Example

Ryan Doom — Tue, 01 May 2007 02:10:00 GMT

Read about why we overhauled the Web Ascender website...

Using JQuery Photo Border, Scrolling and more plugins

Ryan Doom — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 12:08:00 GMT

JQuery Plugins

What is JQuery? JQuery is a Javascript library that makes writing JavaScript a lot easier. Once you learn JQuery you will be able to program the JavaScript you need to make functions on a webpage work in a fraction of the time it would take to write them in standard JavaScript. It works as a ‘wrapper’ of the standard JavaScript language and exposes methods that do behaviors such as selecting elements on a page, hiding and showing elements, sliding or animated effects, even AJAX. Sure you could code these methods by hand, but JQuery also handles the necessary browser sniffing and makes your scripts work across browsers (Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Safari, etc.) with ease.
Let’s take a look at one of the websites Web Ascender developed to see how we used JQuery

Visit Century 21 Looking Glass

Rotating Items the Recent Listings

On the Century 21 Looking Glass homepage we used JQuery to rotate the “Recently Listed” homes. When the page loads an Asynchronous JavaScript method is called

Effective Guerilla Marketing

Ryan Doom — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 12:41:00 GMT

I received the most interesting lead on a website yesterday. Being an entrepreneur, a salesman , a marketer, a developer and all the other roles I play at Web Ascender I have to always be consintrating on...

What the heck is RSS?

Ryan Doom — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 00:52:00 GMT

Do you know how much information is out there on the internet? The information can be overwhelming, especially if you want to stay in touch with current events or keep up with your industry. If CNN publishes hundreds of articles a day, and there are 20 websites you visit to get information on breaking news in your industry, how is it possible to stay up to date? You don’t want to check every website every day, what if...

YES! attitude

Ryan Doom — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 02:20:00 GMT

This is the speech I made and gave for my second toastmasters presentation. Remember it is ment to be spoke/improved not read and understood. It is about positive, Yes! attitude and is based on the book Yes! attitude by Jefforey Gitomer.

Good evening we all know that your attitude can be the difference between success and failure...

Search Engine Optimization

Ryan Doom — Sat, 17 Feb 2007 19:39:00 GMT

Web Tips for 2007

Ryan Doom — Sat, 17 Feb 2007 19:36:00 GMT