N Ideologics

Recently I came across Everton’s post regarding lingscars.com – claiming it was the worst website ever! At first I laughed profusely, but soon came to realise that laughing at someone elses work and success is quite rude.

Ling responded to Everton with a snap of reality, reminding him that she shifts millions of pounds worth of cars every year, and people enjoy her site. In reality, she is quite successful, and if I were to choose a website to sell cars I probably wouldn’t be as daring as she is.

Which leads me to my question – does having standards make you a snob? At what cost do we adhere to standards?

Back in 2002, when I started BloopDiary.com, the site had a colourful appearances like crayons. It grew popular very quickly. Now days, it is somewhat bland in appearance. When it was colourful, it stood out from the other sites. I almost miss my awful colour scheme!

And look at other sites, such as PlentyOfFish.com, a hugely successful website with a layout that a 5 year old could design.

What Ling’s site, my site and Plenty Of Fish all have in common is one thing – the value they offer to the people that visit. Somewhere we get lost in design, and forget about what really matters. To be honest, when I’m looking for something on the web, I could care less about what the website looks like, as long as I can use it and it gives me what I want. I definitely don’t search Google and then drool over how a page looks.

I think we need to step out of our boxes for a while, and look in as a visitor before our collective ego explodes.

Recently I’ve been getting back in to blogging. Part of blogging, that I’m sure is as true for newbies as it is for the experienced bloggers, is research. Researching how to best mesh your blog in with the blogosphere.

While I like the name Eye On Silicon, there are several downsides to it. One is the negative word Eye – sometimes AdSense assumes this is a keyword and posts advertisements offering contact lenses which is definitely off topic. Back in the days of web desing, I registered a domain called Ideologics, both .co.uk and .com.

The name Ideologics doesn’t bring forth any imaginative advertisements, it’s about as neutral as one can get. It’s also much older than the Eye On Silicon domain – by approximately 6 years – and will likely help with SEO. That’s a theory that will be put to the test as I keep an eye on my statistics.

Stay tuned.

To have a reason is to have a purpose. Why do you blog?

I started Eye On Silicon as a small tech blog on my Ideologics website early 2008. I decided that it needed its own home, and promptly bought eyeonsilicon.com. Shortly afterwards I bought the .co.uk domain so I could invade the UK search engine.

Read the rest of this entry

Statistics say that returning visitors rarely click ads, but visitors from search engines love to click them. How can we use this knowledge to our advantage?

Read the rest of this entry

Following the previous Editor’s Choice post regarding the correct use of categories in WordPress, I’ve made some small changes to PostLove.

Here’s a rundown:

• When you’re reading a post, the PostLove widget will display the most popular posts from the categories specified in that post.
• When you’re browsing a category’s index, the PostLove widget will display that category’s most popular posts.

It’ll be interesting to see how this serves my traffic.

The changes haven’t been published yet as I’m still testing them.

As part of an effort to provide daily content, I’ve decided to start linking to posts that I consider great value to those who blog. I’ll be categorising these posts under one of the five head categories – but also inside a new category called Editor’s Choice.

Ironically, the first post in this category is all about categories.

Read the rest of this entry

Word Press is incredibly versatile – and I think it’s safe to say that plug-ins help achieve that versatility. As a tribute to those coders that help make my blog more versatile, I’m listing five Word Press plug-ins that I consider invaluable. They won’t be deactivated until something better comes along!

Read the rest of this entry

If a visitor to your blog doesn’t see something – will they click it? No! If you’re monetising your blog by selling advertising space, make sure the space is visible – it gives value to your visitors, and value to the advertisers bidding for space on your site.

Scared that people won’t click the ads if you put them in a visible spot? Don’t be. Here’s some myths I’d like to dispel:

Read the rest of this entry

If blogging is your profession, then appearance is everything. An employer wouldn’t hire a potential employee if he came dressed in jeans without a tie – but that employee could have been the best employee he would have ever hired. On the same principal, a potential subscriber to your content could pass over your blog because it simply doesn’t look the part.

So I’ve been racking my brain to find 10 guaranteed tips that will help your blog look professional, and help you make money online.

Read the rest of this entry

I’m looking towards adding new features to my blog to make it more community orientated. For members of EyeOnSilicon.co.uk, I’d like to offer the following:

• Webmail with POP3 / SMTP – your_address@eyeonsilicon.co.uk
• Personal Home Page (with RSS feeds)

That’s it at the moment. Does anyone have any ideas for other features I could offer?