Conversion: Do Audio Clips on Landing Pages Increase Conversion Rates?
From: www.wilsonweb.com

"Ken Evoy, author of Make Your Site Sell!, has found that audio clips can increase response rates as much as 15% to 30%. But loud, pushy audio can hurt sales. He recommends testing and using audio judiciously. Two vendors are AudioGenerator and Sonic Memo. Date: May 19, 2004, 13:48 PST"

E-Mail Marketing: Survey of Small Businesses Shows No Dominant E-Mail Marketing Software
From: www.wilsonweb.com

"Web Marketing Today survey of small- to medium-sized business owners and marketers concerning what e-mail program they used to send e-mail newsletters or promotions to customers found no single dominant vendor. Most popular programs included Constant Contact, Group Mail, Lyris, Gammadyne Mailer, AWeber, VerticalResponse iBuilder, GotMarketing Campaigner, Yahoo! Groups, 1ShoppingCart, Topica, Dada Mail, Exact Target, GoldMine, AutoResponse Plus, Mailloop, ProAutoResponder, Site Build It!, Subscribe Me, WorldCast, G-Lock EasyMail, bCentral List Builder, and MailerMailer. Date: May 17, 2004, 11:50 PST"

E-Mail Marketing: Blacklisted Autoresponder Service
From: www.wilsonweb.com

"If you're not very careful, you could be stuck with an e-mail service that is blacklisted for allowing spammers to use their service. This article explains how to see if a vendor is being blacklisted as well as the advantages good ASP hosted e-mail distribution services bring with regard to deliverability. Date: May 12, 2004, 14:51 PST"

Miscellaneous: Focus on Great Content, not Content Thieves
From: www.wilsonweb.com

"Don't worry about protecting your content from thieves. Instead concentrate on producing great, compelling content and marketing your site effectively. The thieves who try to take shortcuts won't be able to compete with you. Date: May 11, 2004, 13:52 PST"

Site Design: Website Building Programs
From: www.wilsonweb.com

"Describes various kinds of sitebuilding wizards to build and maintain a website: standard website builders, store-building programs, Ken Evoy's Site Build It!, website updaters, and content management systems. Recommends tools from Yahoo!, SiteSell, and Interactivetools.com. Date: May 5, 2004, 14:04 PST"


AskJeeves Expands Smart Search To Include Current Movies
From: www.webpronews.com

"The AskJeeves search engine contains a function called smart search. Smart search was designed by Jeeves to offer detailed, relevant information included in search engine responses. AskJeeves has expanded this option to include current movies."

Dogpile Updates RSS Enabled Toolbar
From: www.webpronews.com

"Search engine Dogpile has released the latest version of its toolbar. According to a Dogpile representative, "the upgraded toolbar includes new functionality that provides even more timely and convenient access to users' personalized lists of RSS and Atom feeds.""

Overture To Launch Local Search Ads
From: www.webpronews.com

"Yesterday's Piper Jaffray Technology Conference saw Overture discussing its plan for the near future with its search engine advertising business. Among the items discussed by Overture's General Manager David Karnstedt was the introduction of its local search product this quarter."

Interland Finds Search Engine Marketing Best For Small Businesses
From: www.webpronews.com

"Small business web hosting company Interland has released the findings of its Spring 2004 Business Barometer of Online Activities survey. The survey tests online usage by small businesses with Web sites. The results found that online marketing is the preferred method over traditional marketing tools."

Nick Berg Video Leads Search Engine Queries
From: www.webpronews.com

"The gruesome beheading video of Nick Berg has become the most queried item in search engines, according to Terra Lycos' Weekly (http://50.lycos.com/)Top 50 . The site which initially aired the video, Muntada al-Ansar, was 3rd on Lycos' list."


SBC Workers Go on Strike
From: www.wired.com

"The union representing SBC employees calls a four-day strike. Also: Gateway's CEO defends low-cost computers.... Mitsubishi cuts jobs.... and more."

For Speeders, Hybrids Suck Gas
From: www.wired.com

"One of the biggest selling points for hybrid cars is their fuel-efficiency, but some disappointed owners still have a case of the gas-pump blues. They're discovering that, just like with regular cars, driving styles dictate mileage. By John Gartner."

Gates Fetes America's Top CEOs
From: www.wired.com

"In his annual schmoozefest with top American CEOs, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates says technology still has a long way to go in improving productivity. The CEOs politely listen, then go about networking. Cydney Gillis reports from Seattle."

Spam Adversaries to Meet, Debate
From: www.wired.com

"Alleged spammer Scott Richter and SpamCop founder Julian Haight will meet next month to duke it out in a public debate. It could get nasty. By Amit Asaravala."

New Slice of Apple's Pie
From: www.wired.com

"Apple Computer creates a new iPod division. Also: A parts shortage hits Nintendo and Sony.... and more."


Potentially Annoying Features
From: webword.com

" Joshua Kaufman-- "As someone who notices annoying software features nearly everyday, I found the Potentially Annoying note quite refreshing. While some users may find it useful to see an alert dialog when Mail isn t running, other users like me will probably find it annoying. Just imagine if Microsoft Word s preferences marked all of their potentially annoying features. How many user frustrations could be avoided? What other software could benefit from notes like this?"

Read the posting... "

Professional Usability in Open Source Projects: GNOME, OpenOffice.org, NetBeans
From: webword.com

" "Working as a usability professional in the open source arena is a challenging task. The decentralized and engineering-driven approach of open source projects can be at odds with corporate processes and usability engineering methodologies. Nonetheless, there is great potential for large corporations to contribute to open source projects. Providing usability know-how that leads to usable and useful products is a win-win situation for developers, the corporations, and most importantly the users."

Based on a presentation at CHI 2004.

Read more...

"

Design Eye for the Usability Guy
From: webword.com

" Everyone seems to be pointing to this."

Findability.org
From: webword.com

" "Findability refers to the quality of being locatable or navigable. At the item level, we can evaluate to what degree a particular object is easy to discover or locate. At the system level, we can analyze how well a physical or digital environment supports navigation and retrieval."

Check out Findability.org

Related Article: Information Architecture for the Rest of Us"

Baekdal.com
From: webword.com

" I've been very impressed with Baekdal.com and I suggest you visit the site. I don't care for the design, but the content is wonderful. For example:

Minimum font sizes

Habits and Expectations can Render Usability Tests Invalid

Usable Breadcrumbs with Guidelines

...are three recent postings. Check the site out and let Thomas Baekdal know that I sent you!"