1. W3 Total Cache

Visit Plugin Page

This is the most complete WordPress performance framework. Default WordPress installations now come with WP Super Cache, which is pretty great at performance optimization, but W3 Total Cache really takes the cake for its excellent interface and customization options. The plugin is free and greatly enhances your site’s user experience by improving serve performance, cache every aspect of your site, reducing download times, and providing transparent content delivery (CDN) integration. All features are customizable, so you can select only those options you want to utilize. A must-have for all websites.

2. Editorial Calendar

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Editorial Calendar is a super plugin that makes it possible to see all your scheduled posts in a nice calendar format. The real selling point is that you can drag and drop posts in the calendar and the posts will automatically be rescheduled to the correct day. Plus you can edit posts right in the calendar and manage posts from multiple authors. A must-have for any blog or magazine publishing regular content.

3. Ajax Event Calendar

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Ajax Event Calendar is a super easy-to-use community calendar and event list that allows authorized users to manage events. This is an awesome plugin, and to date, I haven’t see any other calendar plugin that has the features this one does. This is ideal for a website running any sort of community event calendar that needs to be updated by multiple users. With this plugin, you can create authorized users (ie. Calendar Contributors – so they don’t have access to editing anything else in the dashboard except the calendar), and events can be added, edited, moved, etc. into custom categories. The calendar itself can be added to any page, post, or text widget on the site with a simple shortcode. Seriously awesome. (See one example of it running here: http://lalitscene.com)

4. Custom Contact Forms

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Custom Contact Forms is a really robust plugin that offers a lot more functionality and options than the popular Contact Form 7 plugin. There are a ton of customization options for the forms and fields, you can rearrange fields using a nice drag-and-drop interface, you can view form submissions in a dashboard widget (really great), you can create custom HTML forms, and a ton more features. Best of all, it’s free!

5. Gravity Forms

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Though we recommended the Custom Contact Forms above, you’re right, no other  form system really compare to Gravity Forms. The only thing is that Gravity Forms is not free. (For a single license it’s $39). But especially if you’re working on a project where the forms are an integral part of the site or contribute greatly to user experience, Gravity Forms is well worth the money. The form builder interface is really easy to use and you can customize every aspect of it. You can even create multi-page forms. Plus, you can employ conditional logic on form fields, you can easily create order forms with custom field options, shipping methods, and total calculators, and you can view all your entries in the WordPress dashboard. The list of features really goes on and on. If you’re working with forms and you need anything beyond the basics, you want Gravity Forms.

6. Jetpack

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Jetpack is a plugin that basically supercharges your self-hosted WordPress site with awesome features previously only available to WordPress.com users. Features include site statistics, email subscriptions for your blog’s posts, easily embedded media, a widget for displaying recent tweets, a spelling & grammar checker, and integrated social share buttons.

7. Disqus Commenting

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The Disqus for WordPress plugin seamless integrates using the Disqus API and by syncing with WordPress comments. The system basically replaces the default WordPress commenting system and offers a large range of options, share buttons, and increased spam protection.

8. Google XML Sitemaps

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This handy plugin automatically generates your site’s XML sitemap to submit to search engines like Google, plus updates automatically when you post new content. Super convenient and great for SEO.

9. Google Analyticator

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Google Analyticator is a simple plugin that adds the necessary Javascript code to enable Google Analytics tracking on your WordPress site. The plugin also includes dashboard widgets for Analytics data display.

10. Cart66

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Cart66 is a premium e-commerce shopping cart plugin for selling both digital and physical products and services. From all the other shopping cart options out there that integrate with WordPress, we found Cart66 to be the most customizable and robust. It comes with all the basic e-commerce functionality, including product configurations, custom field options, live shipping, sales tax options, and inventory tracking. In addition, it allows for premium membership subscriptions and the ability to sell both digital and physical products. The fully functional premium plugin can be licensed for $89 for a single website, though there is also a limited “lite” version available as a free download.

11. Slick Social Share Buttons

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Slick Social Share is a nice little plugin that adds social media share buttons (ie. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Google+, Digg, & others) in a slick looking floating or sliding panel. The plugin also allows you to see all of your social metrics on the admin page. Works with all of the major social networks and offers some customization options for displaying the buttons.

POTG Design only has a couple spots left for new clients for the rest of 2012.

If you’re interested in working with us, please fill out our Project Planner and we’ll contact you ASAP with details.

If your project is smaller in scope (ie. minimal branding, individual website), we are more likely to be able to squeeze you in. If your project is a larger one, keep in mind that we may not be open until 2013.

Thanks to everyone for the continued support.

Due to an overwhelming (and flattering) demand, we are currently overbooked and will not be available to take on any new projects until May 1st, 2012.

If you are still interested in working with us, please contact us for a consultation and secure your spot in May or early summer 2012.

Created by: OnlineMarketingDegree.com

Check it out: No office, no problem – how POTG Design manage client projects

An excerpt:

“Janice, Eugene, and Jeff make up POTG Design’s three person team.  Despite not working from the same office, the apps POTG built on Podio make collaborating on projects easy, not just from their desks but on their iPhones, too.

POTG created a workspace on Podio for managing their projects internally; sharing images, sketches, wireframes and specifications for websites, and also workspaces for communicating with their clients.”

Full story here: No office, no problem – how POTG Design manage client projects

Here are some of the notes I took (as unorganized as they are) at the conference today.

Chris Brogan (Keynote Speaker) @chrisbrogan

- strategize how to wedge your business & business interests into the social media world where are already sharing their thoughts

- sustainable relationship – minded business

- YOU ARE A MAGAZINE AND TV STATION.

- audience vs. community (which way the chairs are facing)

- tactics: 1) invest in listening tools 2) make videos this year 3) measure what matters

Jason Falls (Small But Social: How Small Businesses Can Win With Social Media) @jasonfalls

- relevant message for relevant audience at relevant time & place

- it’s possible to be successful in with social media marketing without “joining the conversation” (ie. case study of real estate company who used extremely targeted Facebook ads)

- what’s important is to plan strategically

7 Business Drivers of Social Media Marketing
- enhance branding & awareness
- protect your reputation
- enhance public relations
- build community
- enhance customer service
- facilitate research & development
- drive sales & leads

- be your own pr outlet

- before strategizing, think of what your goal is. goal should include expected level of attainment, deadline, and audience ie. I want to make $50,000 sales from Facebook by the end of the year.

- being a social business = being present (online & offline)

- social media is a supplement to other media outlets (ie. radio ads, direct mail, etc.) – holistic approach

Jason Womack (Unleash Your Competitive Edge) @jasonwomack

- there are 96 fifteen minute blocks in a day

(so 15 minutes = 1% of your day)

- try anything 5 times first

- time, energy, focus, ecosystem are limited resources

- try this: schedule meetings to start on the 15 and end at the hour (ie. 2:15 – 3)

- 80% of your business comes from 20% of your (happiest) customers

- I am my best when …….. [fill in the blank].

- practice makes ….. habit.  practice makes …… comfortable.

- tell the truth more.

- you are an average of your 5 closest associates.

- practice saying no to potentially real questions.

Erin Napoletano (All Fired Up: Tips to Ignite Customer Passion For Your Brand) @RedheadWriting  /  Redheadwriting.com

- running a business is not about being popular. build your brand to be loved by the RIGHT people (& dismissed by others)

- being unapologetic about who you are and who you want to do business with is one of your greatest assets

- brand personality: approachability, sharability, scalability, profitability

- stop giving shit away for free. give away the why, not the how.

- trading services is bs. if you engage in trade, make sure you treat it like a business transaction (with contract, monetary value, expectations, etc.)

- commoditization is rarely a viable business model

- our customers are the reason we’re lucky to be in business.

The best thing you can do to improve the quality of work and help make the entire process more efficient (which means less work, and hours, for both of us!) is to provide specific & constructive feedback. Here’s a little guide that’ll help you out with the feedback process and help things to run more smoothly.

Preliminaries.
Before we even begin, do you feel like you have a clear understanding of the process? If you have any questions as to the terms, process, or schedule, this is the time to ask. Make sure you fill out your Project Planner as completely and detailed as possible. The more information we have to work with, the better we can accomplish your goals.

Some general things.
At each stage of giving feedback, spend some time with the design and really make sure you’ve got everything and are sure about your requests. It is time-consuming to make changes and edits, so be complete in your feedback. Compile all your notes in ONE response and send only when you are absolutely ready.

Understand that design is interconnected. So it may not be so easy to simply change the color of one element without affecting the entire design.

Not sure about something? Ask us. We’re supposed to be the experts, that’s why you hired us right? So if you don’t understand why something is the way it is, ask us to explain it to you.

Draftest.
We may provide you with a Draftest link where you can rate various designs. This will help us hone in on your aesthetic, style, tone, & layout. Use your first impressions. And provide feedback if it seems useful. Don’t be discouraged if many if the designs are not to your liking. This is a tool for honing in, so we may intentionally include designs that we know you might not like or different styles so we can be absolutely sure.

Interactive Demo of Website.
While looking at the interactive demo of your website, be thorough in your evaluation. Make sure everything LOOKS the way it’s supposed to, but also make sure it WORKS the way it’s supposed to. Check all the various page elements: Header, Footer, Navigation, Body. Check to make sure all links work (including social media buttons, navigation, etc.). Are all fonts displaying correctly and is all text styled appropriately? Check the display of all link properties: Link Colors, Active & Hover State Colors, Alt Text. Check the spacing. Is everything aligned correctly? If we’ve asked you to check the content, make sure all copy is there and correct. Proofread. Test all functionality (image sliders, contact forms, gallery, etc.) Check the website on multiple browsers and operating systems. Also check the website on a mobile device.

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Giving Better Design Feedback.

[Excerpts from "Giving Better Design Feedback" by Mike Monteiro.]

It’s Not Art.
First rule of design feedback: what you’re looking at is not art. It’s not even close. It’s a business tool in the making and should be looked at objectively like any other business tool you work with. The right question is not, “Do I like it?” but “Does this meet our goals?” If it’s blue, don’t ask yourself whether you like blue. Ask yourself if blue is going to help you sell sprockets. Better yet: ask your design team. You just wrote your first feedback question.

I Don’t Know Anything About Design.
Who cares? Your customers probably don’t know anything about design either, and the project’s ultimate success rides on how they respond to it.

Let the design team be the design experts. Your job is to be the business expert. Ask them how their design solutions meet your business goals. If you trust your design team, and they can explain how their recommendations map to those goals, you’re fine. If you neither trust them, nor can they defend their choices it’s time to get a new design team.

Good vs Bad.
Good feedback relates back to goals and user needs. Bad feedback is subjective and prescriptive.

For example “There’s way too much going on here and the “Add to Cart” button gets lost.” That’s excellent feedback. Relates to the goal of the page, which is to apparently sell something, and communicates a problem to be solved, which is to get rid of all the junk on the page.

Avoid personal preferences: “I hate green.” There is absolutely nothing I can do with that statement other than feel sorry for you because there are some very nice green things in the world. Like money—which you’re now wasting by giving me bad feedback.

Prescriptive feedback comes along the lines of “Move the buttons over here.” And, of course, everyone’s favorite: “Make the logo bigger!” These may, in fact, be excellent ideas, but if we talked about the problems you’re trying to solve with these prescriptive solutions we might come up with better solutions or possibly uncover a bigger problem in the overall design system.

It’s like walking into your doctors office and demanding a prescription for penicillin. Could be that’s actually what you need, but there’s no way you’re walking out of that office without the pants coming down.

Ask Questions.
Not sure about something? Ask. Don’t wait until the feedback is due. Pick up the phone and ask your design team for further clarification to write your feedback.

Distill Your Feedback.
“John in marketing wants to be able to log in directly on the home page, but Tim in Engineering would prefer it on its own page. Can we compromise?”

No. We cannot compromise.

If you tell your barber that you like it short, but your significant other likes it long, you’re gonna get a mullet.

Listen to your team’s feedback, weigh the plusses and minuses, and then compile a clearly written feedback document full of strong decisions. There is no way to design a solution to an internal debate. Nor should that debate be passed along for your customers to suffer through. If members of your team have varying ideas on something, iron it out. Invite your design team to join in the debate. They should be eager to as it informs their work. But reconciling feedback is important to moving the process along successfully. Again; having to sort through 10 pages of internal disagreement means lost time and lost budget.

[Read the entire article here: "Giving Better Design Feedback" by Mike Monteiro]

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Beyond ‘I Don’t Like It.’

[Excerpts from "Beyond 'I Don't Like It'" by Jeff White]

Getting it right from the start: providing good direction.
So, how do you make sure your project starts off on the right foot? Tell us what you want from the beginning. It’s weird, but big agencies are really the only ones who sort of get this process dialed. Probably because they have the staff and overhead and understand the process enough to get it right. If you’re giving a project to a designer, you need to be prepared to put in some time up front as well. And your designer should ask the questions you haven’t answered in your [Project Planner] or initial discussions. The most important things to learn for any project, whether it’s a web site, email campaign, logo, ad campaign or anything, really.

Obviously we’ll need to know the background about your company. Where did you come from? How did you get here? What marketing has been done in the past? Are samples available?

What does the audience look like? Are they old? Young? Male? Female? What’s their level of expertise? Is it a captive audience, running out-of-date hardware or software? More research will need to be done into this group by the creative team, but it’s good to have a starting point.

What are your goals for the campaign? More email signups? Actual sales? A list of prospects? Brand awareness? Mentions in traditional media? It’s amazing how often this question never gets asked, especially when it comes to building web sites, which are often seen as a must have with no particular purpose other than to provide information. And this is ok, but it still needs to be understood.

Who are your competitors? What do their websites look like? How do you compare to them? What’s better about your product than theirs? What threats do you foresee?

I once had a client who sent me a link to a competitor’s website as an example of what he liked. He wanted me to download everything from the site, change the logo and the name and repost the site. Of course, no ethical designer would ever do this. But that doesn’t stop people from asking.

What do you like? Dislike? Keep in mind, that really this should have absolutely no bearing on what gets produced. Although it’s your project and needs to represent you, it’s really your customer’s site or logo. In the court of opinion, theirs matters more than yours. Sorry. More on this later.

And lastly, prepare to be challenged by your creative team. If they’re doing their job right, they should be making you comfortable that you’ve chosen the right team, but perhaps a bit uncomfortable with the probing questions.

Putting it into words.
This is the hard part for many people. It really often does go back to what you like and dislike and being able to find the words to describe what you want. The trouble is, the visual language of creatives is by necessity more developed than most clients.

What does it mean when you say that you want your site to be modern? And how is modern different from contemporary or trendy?

For the love of all things holy and even some things that aren’t, don’t ever say “I don’t know what I want, I’ll know it when I see it.” That just wastes everyone’s time. Clients are as responsible for the success of a project as the creative team. Giving good direction is the client’s responsibility. Without good direction, you have no one to blame but yourself when the design doesn’t meet your needs. We can’t read minds (although that won’t stop us from trying!).

Design is a process and it takes requirements analysis, objective research and goals that need to be met to really achieve success. If you haven’t set any goalposts at all, but instead just want the designer to noodle, that’s all well and good–but don’t expect that noodling to come in on budget or on target. There is no target in this situation.

Words we loathe.
If you’ve ever had a conversation with a designer and used any of these words as creative direction, you’re not helping them achieve your goals.

• Edgy
• Cool
• Make it pop
• Push it
• Think outside the box
• Have fun with it

Now, of course you want the designer to have fun with it, but unless you have given additional direction on top of that, they’re not going to be able to take that anywhere. These words are completely devoid of meaning when used as direction. The only time they’re useful is when describing something that has already been created.

Getting the Context Right.
Everything in communication design needs to be pragmatic. In other words, it needs to understand the context in which it exists.

For example, a bed and breakfast, located in an historic part of the city, housed in a hundred year old Victorian mansion might use the following words to describe their desires for a website:

• Classical
• Traditional
• Ornate
• Retro

Whereas, a startup business providing software as a service to twenty and thirty somethings might look for an interface that is:

• Fresh
• Contemporary
• Fun
• Simple
• Current

An architecture firm that specializes in creating buildings for progressive clients might need a website that embodies these qualities:

• Modern
• Technical
• Clean
• Swiss

And lastly, a site for a bar/club that organizes late night live music shows might look:

• Contemporary
• Trendy
• Grungy
• Playful

The great thing about all of these terms is that they immediately create a mood. When combined, they help to build a persona for the site, similar to the way that UX designers will create personas for people who might visit a site. You’ll note that many of these terms cross boundaries and are quite similar.

For example, contemporary in the context of the bar site would mean in keeping with styles as seen in the music industry, but in the context of the startup software company, it might mean to make it more like the look and feel of the 37Signals site, a leader in the online software business.

Although they sound like they mean the same thing, Modern and Contemporary, to a designer are very different. Technically, Modern refers to an era in the late 50s and 60s, a period that brought us the Bauhaus and the Eames chair. At this point in time, both of these ideas of ‘modern’ are decidedly ‘retro’. Yeah. I know.

However, all is not lost. It’s important when dealing with a designer to explain what your idea of ‘modern’ is. This is where the creation of a solid brief at the beginning of the project comes in. It’s perfectly acceptable to call something modern, as long as you explain what your version of modern looks like by showing examples.

[Read the entire article here: Beyond 'I Don't Like It' - Part 1 & Part 2]

***

And from the good folks over at WeeNudge, a few more resources:

What is The Fold?

Providing Content.

What are Wireframes?

More on Giving Feedback.

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&

How a Web Design Goes Straight to Hell [COMIC] via The Oatmeal.

Clients From Hell.

We’d like to let you know of a few events coming up in early 2012…

First, POTG Design will be a featured entrepreneur at Alleyne Connect’s network mixer CONNECT 2 COLLABORATE on Sunday January 15, 2012.

Get more info on the event here: CONNECT 2 COLLABORATE

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Also, POTG Design will be giving mini website consultations at The Beauty Expert Exchange’s event: Ultimate Makeover:  Tools to Build Your Beauty Biz in Style.

Sun, Feb 5, 2012

Nakeah Cosmetics and Beauty Lounge
6 PM – 9:30 PM
7471 Melrose Ave
Los Angeles, CA

More details on their Meetup page.

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We’ll be offering exclusive website packages for event attendees.

Hope to see you there!

(And don’t forget, we’re offering discounted website packages this holiday season, so take advantage!)

Hosting.

This is a huge one. We’ve now worked with a plethora of hosting companies and we’ve only repeatedly had great experiences with one: Dreamhost. Dreamhost is only hosting company we make recommendations for when asked, and the only we’ll continue to recommend. Register your domains with them as well. They’ve got a super user-friendly process for registering domains & securing hosting (vs. Godaddy’s hideously and amazingly confusing interface), they’ve got a great panel & dashboard setup, top-tier customer service (they always get back to me within the hour with above-&-beyond support/advice), and they offer easy secure ftp access. Also, they’ve got easy one-click installs for WordPress CMS.

Project Management.

This one’s a new one. We’d been looking awhile for a good project management service. Basecamp wasn’t an ideal situation for us, though it works great for many people. Podio allows businesses to manage various processes, projects, and work tasks in one place, all with the customizable feature of “spaces.” There are a ton of free apps for tracking for specialized tasks, plus you can easily create your own. Offering task management, file sharing, and calendars, Podio offers all the features that competitors like Basecamp do, but in a fast, easy, customizable interface. Plus, you can access your account from your smartphone. Read Mashable’s writeup of Podio here.

Collaboration/Whiteboard.

The only thing we wished Podio had was a built-in whiteboard function. We usually use Skype for our meetings, but sometimes it’s useful to be able to simultaneously chat and collaborate over a mockup or wireframe. So we found Scribblar. We looked at a lot of different services, free & not free, and Scribblar was our favorite. It’s free, you can upload images (ie. mockups, wireframes, design drafts), collaborate or sketch on top of these images with their editing tools in real-time, and then download those images to keep for reference. We love this for in-house collaboration, but also to talk with clients and go over design specifications.

Social Media Management.

There’s a ton of tools out there right now: Tweetdeck, Buffer, etc. But our favorite is still Hootsuite. You don’t have to download any software and can easily manage multiple Twitter, Facebook, & LinkedIn accounts, plus even your Foursquare, WordPress, and Google+ profiles. You can schedule your messages for anytime in the future (we use this feature religiously), and track your success.

Content Management System (CMS).

A Content Management System (CMS) provides clients with the convenience of being able to control and update their own content. We currently use WordPress for all of our client websites because it is quick to develop, offers diverse functionality & flexibility in design, and comes with a full-fledged CMS for the end user (you, the client). It is trusted by web designers & developers worldwide and is one of the most developed blog frameworks available today. The great amount of support, customization, and convenience means we can spend less time reinventing the wheel and clients can spend less money for a quality website. Some of its competitors also have great support and huge communities surrounding them, but we still prefer WordPress for its ease of use, especially for the end-user or client.

Web Statistics.

At this point, Google Analytics probably needs no introduction. It’s a free service by Google that allows marketers to track vital web traffic statistics like visitor types, traffic sources, browsers, clicks per page, and more. It’s a vital tool now for anyone managing a website or blog. And because it’s free and easy to integrate, there’s no reason not to use it. From the Google Analytics home page: “Google Analytics is the enterprise-class web analytics solution that gives you rich insights into your website traffic and marketing effectiveness. Powerful, flexible and easy-to-use features now let you see and analyze your traffic data in an entirely new way. With Google Analytics, you’re more prepared to write better-targeted ads, strengthen your marketing initiatives and create higher converting websites.”

Web Development Tool.

Ahh. The faithful companion of web developers everywhere. This free and open-source tool works as a Firefox plugin and enables web developers to view & edit code within the browser, debug, & even run Javascript within the panel. Can anyone remember what it was like to before Firebug existed? I’m not sure if I want to. Another great tool we use in conjunction is YSlow. Another free plugin for Firefox, it measures web page performance and load time, another invaluable resource.

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And check out our BestVendor profile for more recommended products & services.