Marc Bissonnette - Beachburg - CanadianISP: February 2011

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Traffic Shaping: We did it to ourselves.

Originally posted on CanadianISP.ca

Okay, so this piece isn't going to make too many people overly happy with me, but I think many of you will at least see the logic of it.

So the trend lately is traffic shaping: That is, when an ISP throttles down the speed of a connection depending on the type of traffic being sent. Most commonly, this is done on P2P connections - So, for example, if you are downloading the latest Fedora ISO over bit torrent, your 400 Kb/Sec connection suddenly drops to 5.3 Kb/Sec. Betcha expected me to use the example of downloading music or a movie, didn't you ? Of course, THAT is one of the reasons traffic shaping was intrododuced, though maybe not for the reasons some might think. I used the example of a perfectly legal large-scale P2P transfer to demostrate that there are perfectly legal and legitimate uses that are getting nailed by this trend, as well as the music and movie downloaders.

It's not about the ethics or the legality - It is simply supply and demand. There is a lot of "demand" for media files - Music and movies. However, there is only so much "supply" of bandwidth.

For example, my ISP has a 100 megabit pipe between Beachburg and Pembroke. From Pembroke, they hook up to Bell and then the rest of the world. This 100 megabit pipe is serving approximately 400 households, about 300 of which have 5 Mb/Sec connections (approimately 75 others use dial-up and the other 25 still haven't heard about the Internet, yet ) If all 300 households were to start downloading a 1 gigabyte file at once, the pipe would be saturated - that is to say, we'd all suffer a speed reduction as the switches try to even out the demand from all the users. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, because my math sucks, but that looks like we'd all drop to about 60Kb/sec.

Fortunately, the chances of all 300 households doing that are next to none: As a matter of fact, many ISPs *depend* on that and thus the term "acceptable over-subscription" - That means that at any given time, you know that only about X percentage of your users are going to be using the service and even at that, only a fraction thereof. In my ISP's case, peak usage of the 100Mb/sec pipe is 28 Mb/sec - More than acceptable (Indeed, I'm quite happy with NRTCO - Not that I have a choice in broadband providers, but it's nice that they *are* a good provider )

So where's the topic I started with ? How did we do it to ourselves ? The above is simply background to help understand: By consumers demanding more and more "unlimited" connections, we have placed more burdens upon the ISPs to keep providing more service without any additional compensation. Before you start screaming that I've "gone over to "The Man"", consider this: If you get paid eighty bucks to work an eight hour day and your boss suddenly tells you that your work day is now twelve hours, but your paycheque is still eighty bucks - you wouldn't be too happy, now would you ?

Now, I *know* some of the complaints to this are going to be like this: " But I *PAID* for *UNLIMITED* service and I *WANT* unlimited service, dammit!". To those people, I have the following statement to make to you:

Grow up.

Seriously: Grow up. If you're a lawyer and going to complain to me about how it's false advertising and the law says this and that about it, I say this to you AND the judge AND the lawmaker: Grow up.

When I was younger, living in Dorval, there was an all-you-can-eat chinese buffet about five blocks from my house. My room mate and I and our next door neighbour started going there. Now, Mike (my room mate) and I could pack back a respectable meal. My neighbour, Chuck, was a dump truck with two legs: He could eat *SIX* heaping plates of food and STILL be hungry. Eventually, we were banned from going there, because the owner said we were making him lose money. Being young snots, we made those same selfish complaints "But you SAID unlimited and I DESERVE unlimited". Of course, none of us DESERVE anything: It's not in the Charter or the Constitution, so we're just shooting hot air. Of course, now that I'm older, I understand that "unlimited" is aimed at "the common man/woman" - I.e. if I can normally eat a plate at $6.95, then unlimited means I can eat two and maybe even three plates once every now and then. But we'd bring friends and new business and it'd all even out. Mike and Chuck and I went there *every* day, though: We really were eating the poor man out of business (Well, Chuck was, Mike and I just added salt to the wounds )

So how does my Chinese buffet story compare to unlimited Internet ? Look, if you want to download the occasional ISO of Ubuntu or whatever other large-size media file (without breaking and copyrights, of course...), go for it - that's what the service is there for. It's when that small percentage of you start downloading EVERYTHING you can get your hands on, twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, that you start saturating that bandwidth that all the other customers are supposed to use, as well.

Just to cut off the other whiners: The response of "Well, they should increase their backhaul, then, after all, they SAID unlimited" - Guess what, buddy ? That backhaul costs $$money$$ - Who do you think pays for it ?

So now the ISP is faced with a darned-if-you-do and darned-if-you-don't choice: Raise the price for *everyone* to cover the saturators, stop advertising unlimited access or take up traffic shaping.

Why darned if you choose any of them ?

Raise the price for everyone: No one likes paying more. There is a certain segment of every customer base who just will not accept raised prices and will use price as the lowest common denominator between services: Ergo, loss of business.

Stop advertising unlimited access: Well, you lose a bunch of customers who just want the *choice* of unlimited - You also put yourself at a competitive disadvantage to the ISPs who are advertising unlimited. Ergo, loss of business.

Traffic shaping: Now you're dealing with people who expect the full spectrum of speed, but suddenly aren't getting it, depending on the application. Well, you're still going to get people who complain - Legitimately. You will still lose some business - also legitimately. But: It's the least of the three evils: Your price stays the same, you can still say "unlimited", but your speed might drop a bit for the P2P users duting peak times (or all the time, however it's been set up)

Do I *agree* with traffic shaping ? Have I sold my geek soul to the big, corporate interests, once and for all, guaranteeing that I'll get to play nothing but "Pong" in the afterlife ? No, I don't: I, too, believe that if I've paid for 5 megabits per second, then by Ghu, I should be getting that no matter what I'm doing. That being said, though: I also run a business: I have seen and suffered first-hand when a customer takes advantage of either generosity or vague wording, no matter the intent.

So, no one likes a whiner about a problem unless you're offering a solution to the problem and I do indeed have a solution, but I don't think it's going to be super popular:

Pay by the byte.

The irony of this position is that CanadianISP was *founded* specifically so customers would not only have a choice in ISPs, but because there was a misconception that the "only" ISP out there now had caps - I knew that wasn't the case so the site was built and now, literally, a couple of thousand people a day use the site to see what those choices are. BUT: The 'net and media in general are growing at phenominal rates: Websites are getting bigger; Movies are getting bigger; Games are getting bigger: This means a *critical* need for more bandwidth is here, now and will be getting more urgent as time goes on. However, for an ISP to stay competitive, it means that they *cannot* let a minority of their users suck up their resources at the expence of the majority of their customer base. If I'm paying $40.00 a month for my five megs a second, but downloading three terrabytes each month, I am an actual *liability* to my ISP.

Don't forget that, people - This is why I don't have a lot of pity for the whiners who cry that "unlimited is supposed to be unlimited" - Remember: As a *customer* you are supposed to be a *source of profit* to the ISP. I'm not revealing any state secrets by saying this, folks: It's common sense: Your ISP isn't connecting you to the Internet out of the goodness of their hearts: They're doing it to pay their bills, set aside for their retirement, buy their kids some nice toys and build a nest egg. Don't get me wrong: A *smart* ISP will get all this by giving you the service you pay for, prompt and polite service over the phone, etc, but they're doing it for the *profit* you represent each month (Which, by the way, is usually less than five bucks). When you become a *COST* to the ISP - Just how far do you think they're going to bend over backwards for you ? If instead of *making* the ISP a measly five bucks per month, you are *costing* them fifteen bucks in upstream bandwidth - Why on Earth should they be giving you *even more* when do so so means it costs them *even more* ?

So, in a nutshell, my suggestion to get rid of traffic shaping is the following:

Offer your connectivity at whatever your price is per month - Include the lowest average of monthly gigabytes in transfer - Nowadays, that's probably around 15 gigs for the average user.

After than fifteen gigs, charge a *reasonable* fee per gigabyte over that. By *reasonable*, I mean actually sit down with the calculator, figure out what your cost per gig is, add a respectable profit (I mean 20-40% - not 3000 - 9000 percent <*cough*Sympatico*cough*> and charge for the overage. Make it so that a user will pay an overage use, but they're not going to be getting monthly bills in the hundreds of dollars.

Now, of course, this means educating the public, first: It means that "unlimited" is *not* a good thing because there will *always* be a minority of people who *consistantly* abuse this, making it an untenable service offering.

The first step would be for an ISP to offer something like this:

"5 megabits/sec, 20 gigs per month, $39.95, $0.10 per gig over 20" - or something like that.

Remember *most* users don't go over 15 gigs a month.

Okay, I'm done. I've been meaning to get this off my chest since December.

Update: There is a much more detailed by-the-byte proposal on CanadianISP, which aims to be reasonable to the ISPs, the last-mile/backbone providers *and* the public:

How "last mile" providers, telcos and cablecos, could improve the entire industry

Let the flames begin

(Feb. 2011: And yes, I appreciate the irony of all of this, given the recent UBB debate)

Marc Bissonnette is the proprietor of Internalysis, a competitive intelligence firm from Beachburg, Ontario, Canada and CanadianISP.ca - Canada's largest Internet Service Provider (ISP) search and comparison tool!

Are you really ready for the launch of your new site ?

Originally posted on CanadianISP.ca

There are two big mistakes in launching a public websites that are made by companies big and small

Waiting until everything is "just perfect" before launching at all
Launching the site on the same day that press releases and radio/print/television/email ads go out, announcing it.

At first glance, those two reasons seem to contradict each other, so let me explain the pitfalls of each:

1. Waiting until everything is "just perfect" before launching at all

Some people absolutely refuse to put anything at all up on their website unless every single bell, whistle, dotted "i" and crossed "t" has been designed, implented and reviewed by fourteen departments.

The problem with this is that the web is a constantly evolving entity. People expect information to grow and change as they come back to your website and by holding off until you've got a year's worth of content to post means your website sits, stale, with nothing new for people to read while you're re-writing the equivalent of the Ilead for your site.

Remember: The key to a successful website, no matter what your industry is, is getting people to come back. If you are putting information up about a new product or service, but are waiting for your technical writers to finish all the chapters and details: Post the précis! There is nothing wrong with adding "The next installment will be available on March 2nd, bookmark this page and come back for more" or "Click here to be notified when the next chapter of information is available" or "If you need additional details right away, click here to email us or call us at 555-555-1234.
Note: Do NOT use this as a permanent tactic: Don't post a teaser and expect that to lead people to call or email you: This tends to annoy people more than anything. For example, a BIOS company lost my business when I submitted a page full of information about my computer in order to determine the proper BIOS update and, instead of being immediately led to the download/purchase page, I received an email saying "Please call us, we have a question about your computer". Cheap sales tactics that work in bricks-and-mortar retail do not necessarily work on the 'net.
People expect to be able to find the information they want on your site: They don't want to be forced to pick up the phone or send you an email. If you don't have all of the information posted right away, give a date when it will be available and offer to notify customers when the information is up (Which further brings traffic to your site when they return).

2. Launching the site on the same day that press releases and radio/print/television/email ads go out, announcing it.

This should be obvious, but some people just don't get it: We do not live in a perfect world. We do not have perfect talents, nor do our employees with whom we entrust to build our web content. This is normal. If you've just spent a whack of time and money to build or rebuild an entire website, do you really think it's a good idea for the general public to first see it during a press conference ?

Your first temptation to answer will be "Um, yeah, that's the idea of a press conference, dummy..." - But what happens when there is a URL over looked ? A Flash component that works on MSIE but not on Opera or Firefox ? What about that one component of the website that everyone though the other guy was going to take care of? What about the domain name itself?

At the very, very least, a new website should be posted to the 'net 24 hours before your press releases go out. If you're smart, that will be 72 hours ahead of time, which is the recommended propagation time for new DNS changes, should that turn out to be your issue. I cannot tell you the number of times a client has registered a domain name with a registrar, built a website or section around it, issued the press release and then called me the same morning to say "Make this domain work now". You've got to point your A record (or, in some cases, your primary and secondary DNS records) from your registrar to the machine hosting your site. The webserver itself needs to recognize the domain being pointed to it and itself point all such requests to the right directories and applications. Even when you do all that work yourself in ten minutes, it can take three days for your new domain and site to be accessible around the world.

There is also simply human error to account for: Before you use the newswire to announce www.foo.com : Have you actually typed in "http://www.foo.com" in your web browser and received what you expect to receive ? If you haven't, you are inviting disaster. What about the email addresses and forms used within the page you are announcing ? Has someone actually sent email to each of the addresses and confirmed that they are deliverable ? What about your forms ? Has anyone filled them out and clicked submit to make sure that they actually work ? How about phone numbers: I don't mean just looking at them to make sure they're there, but actually dialing them to make sure that it connects to the right person and place on the other end?

All of the above can save you a lot of ambarassment on press release day or even worse: At the trade show with five thousand people watching you get the "404: Not found" on the thirty foot screen behind you.

Marc Bissonnette is the proprietor of Internalysis, a database and CGI programmer specializing in content management solutions from Beachburg, Ontario, Canada and CanadianISP.ca - Canada's largest Internet Service Provider (ISP) search and comparison tool!

Building a website for a local business

Originally posted on CanadianISP.ca

Since moving from the urban city of Toronto (pop: 4 million) , Ontario to the tiny, rural village of Beachburg (pop: 900), Ontario, I've had a few people ask me about building a business site for them.

What prompted me to write this article was a common thread amongst their queries: How can I get to the top of the Google rankings for my site ?

The answer might surprise you: Why bother ? Seriously: If you are a local artist who does commission work in person, why would you care, if your business was located in Tucson, Arizona, if someone in Brisbane, Australia found your website ? It's not like they are going to get on a plane, fly literally to the other side of the planet to commission you for a $400 portrait.

This is not to say that a small business in a small town can not benefit from a global audience. You do, however, have to ask yourself:

Can I reasonably fill orders that come from out-of-city, out-of-state/province or out-of-country ?
Will it cost me more to ship it than I would make in profit?
Do I have the resources to communicate and support customers in a language other than my own?

Chances are, if you are a small business in a small town, your goal is more than likely increasing your sales locally, or reducing your sales support costs locally. (If you are already servicing a global market, then this article simply isn't for you :) ). So, you need to achieve a few basic things with your web site:

Is it professionally laid out and designed? You don't have to spend thousands on a good, clean, informative and easy-to-navigate web site, but if it looks like it was a failed high school project, you're going to lose sales and never even know about them.
Is your contact information, especially telephone number, easy to find ? In a smaller community, many people will much prefer picking up the phone and asking you questions directly, once they've found you on the web.
Is your pricing appropriate to the local market? In my case, I could never charge the rates I would charge in Toronto, Ontario here in a rural farming town.
Do you have your site set up in a way that you will continue to add content in order to give people a reason to come back to the site? If a visitor reads all of your content and it is apparant that it never changes, there is no reason to come back and therefore a lost opportunity for business.

Those are the basics your web site needs to meet. Now, on to promoting it: It never ceases to amaze me the number of people who have a website, have their own domain, but their email address is either one of the freebies (Gmail, Yahoo, MSN, etc) or that of their local ISP. This is a big indicator of someone who just doesn't know what they're doing with regards to internet marketing, image and communication. If you've got a domain name for your web site, use it for your email as well! The beauty of using an alias from your domain to point to your 'real' email address is that if you ever need to change ISPs, you do not need to notify a massive list of contacts that your email address has changed!

Next, and I've mentioned this in other articles: Your web site address should be on _all_ of your materials: Invoices, bills of lading, business cards, bags, signage, etc. If it's not, how are people going to know that they can still find out about your business even after business hours ?

Talk to other local business owners: Many of them may well have a website themselves where you can swap links. I.e. if you are running the local movie rental store, why not talk to the local book store and agree to each create a "other shops in [your town here]" page and link to each other ?

Legitimately Promoting Your Site On The 'net

Originally posted on CanadianISP.ca

I was spammed today by someone pushing an employment site. This isn't uncommon at all. The site they were promoting was unprofessional, looking like it was thrown together in about 5 minutes using MS word and there were several "Coming Soon" links. This isn't unusual, either. I sent her (the spammer) a note telling her that not only was she spamming, she was spamming a very poorly thought out site with little content and terrible design. We're still not at the unusual stage, yet.

What prompted me to write this article was the fact that she wrote back. She was apologetic for bothering me, saying that she was only trying to promote a site that was beneficial to those seeking jobs and that she found my name and email address from an online directory. Since she took the time to actually reply in person to me, I got the impression that she was yet another new web business owner, trying desperately to get the word out about her new service at the lowest cost possible.

This is not only not unusual, but depressingly common. It used to be, not too many years ago, that when you received commercial email in your in-box, it was at least a semi-genuine attempt to promote a legitimate business. You don't need me to tell you that the trillions of spam mails sent out over the past couple of years have completely ruined email as a legitimate, or even effective, method of first-contact business promotion.

So what are you supposed to do when you've got a hot new online business, little to no promotional budget and a burning desire to succeed ? Some people turn to spamming, thinking that while it is distasteful, it is a low-cost method to reach millions of people. Some even rationalize that those they tick off with their spam weren't going to be customers anyway - how naive this thought process is!

It's not just that you're annoying, aggravating and angering millions of people at once - even that some businesses can live with - it's the fact that some people - like me - get so annoyed with spam that we take the extra ten seconds out of our day to forward the spam to the spammers mail AND web provider. Most legitimate ISPs absolutely cannot afford to have entire IP blocks blacklisted by Real Time Blackhole operators that it is simpler and more cost-effective to simply cancel the offending spammer's email and web accounts without notice.

Some people figure "Well, I'll just get a new web provider and a new ISP" - but they fail to think about the double-whammy in doing that: Out of the millions of unsolicited mails they sent, they may well have recieved a few legitimately interested customers. In the time that their ISP has cancelled their web and email accounts and they restart with a new ISP, however, those legitimate responses were lost - deleted by an annoyed ISP. Now you've got people who are even more ticked off with you because they actually replied to your message, but you never replied back to them - because you were shut down - forever causing them, your potential customers, to go out of their way to avoid your outfit.

It is a shame that so many people think that the Internet operates in a vacuum - they forget that the Internet is just one tool of the business person - it should be used in conjunction with the rest of your business acumen to achieve success. For example, I have recently started a small venture with a small paper publishing partner called Penny Pincher Newspaper - I know the classifieds and auction market online is saturated - I'm doing this to prove a couple of points to myself:

Traffic to an classifieds/auction site can be achieved without spamming
Quality tools, as opposed to the brochure-ware that is out there today, will generate return visitors
Old fashioned pavement and telephone pounding can generate interest - and profit - in a website.
You don't need a million dollar ad budget, or a million email address spam CD, to get the word out about a website.

My point is that this site I'm working on is like, in it's concept, a thousand others - but I'm going to generate at least a moderate amount of success for it without resorting to spamming the living daylights out of people. If, in the possibility that I fail at achieving success for this site, I'll leave this article up and post a follow-up as to what I did wrong. Don't count on it, though :)

So what can you do to promote your site legitimately?

Start locally: Talk to local businesses and people about your website. If you can't impress the locals with your website and services, what makes you think you're ready for the global scene? Better still, if you do make a few mistakes, better it is only the local populace, who is much more likely to be forgiving, to see it, than the whole world.
If your site would benefit from cross linking with another website, pick up the telephone and talk to the site owner - an email will likely be dismissed as yet another spam - it's unsolicited commercial email (UCE), so it IS spam!
Try a few classified ads in your local or regional papers to promote your site. This goes with 1) above, but when you've generated a considerable amount of local traffic, it makes your site look already heavily trafficked when you go to global promotions
Don't forget Usenet! Find usenet newsgroups that relate to your site and start participating in the discussions. When appropriate, point out your website as an answer to a question or discussion in the newsgroup. If your site does not *specifically* answer a question in a discussion, then feel free to participate and simply have your URL and site name in your .sig file.
(If you do a google news search for my email address, marc@canadianisp.ca - you'll see what I mean - my .sig is at the bottom of almost all my posts and very rarely do I mention internalysis.com or CanadianISP.ca in the body itself.)
KEEP YOUR SITE CONTENT FRESH! There are several other articles on this site that talk about avoiding the brochure-ware effect on your website. You must give people a reason to come back to your site by providing new content whenever they come back. Do not assume that just because you are selling something, that the only time someone should visit your site is when they're ready to buy - if you don't give them reason to come back and browse, they'll never give themselves the reason to be ready to buy from you!

Marc Bissonnette is the president of Internalysis, a competitive intelligence firm from Beachburg, Ontario, Canada and CanadianISP.ca - Canada's largest Internet Service Provider (ISP) search and comparison tool!

HUMOUR: The Evolution of Catastrophic Service Failure at My ISP

Originally posted on Internalysis.com

OK, based on my experiences working for other ISP's, this is the normal progression of events during a catastrophic or major service failure (news, mail, etc). This assumes a complete and total failure and no backup machines / service are already in place (which there should be).

Problem starts: A few users complain. ISP staff makes note to fix it.

6 hours later: Lots of users complaining. One sysadmin is working on the problem almost exclusively.

12 hours later: Problem still there. Support mailbox is getting flooded. At least 2 sysadmins are working overtime and Tim Hortons has been contacted to keep a steady flow of coffee going. Network status page updated. Description and apology entered in the support newsgroup.

24 hours later: Problem still occurring. Customers are getting *really* ticked. All qualified support staff are working on the problem. Outside contractors/specialists are called. Someone is looking into a complete replacement (mail/news/web/etc server).

48 hours later: Problem still occurring, replacement server has been purchased, it's on the way. Damage control is occurring in the support newsgroups. Support and Billing have been instructed to offer discounts for each half day of service outage.

60 hours later: Replacement server has arrived, new server software installed. Backup data being transferred. Patched into the network and testing starts.

72 hours later: Replacement server is up online, service restored to normal. Detailed description and explanation of the problem and it's solution posted to the newsgroup and network status page. All users who complain are automatically given a 3 day credit. Problem server / service being analyzed in detail. Once fixed, will be kept as emergency backup machine.

Now, here's what appears to be happening at My ISP during catastrophic failures:

Service fails: User complains. Complaint ignored as tech assumes user doesn't know what they're talking about (irony???)

6 hours later: service still down. Users complaining, but at a slow rate, since 310-SURF is so impossible to get through (and so many DUMB levels to go through in the menuing !) A trouble ticket is opened, but it gets deleted for the same reasons as 1) above.

12 hours later: Service still down. Users complaining in droves now. 310-SURF wait times are now measured in geologic ages. A note is forwarded to the My ISP's upstream provider's staff that there 'might' be a minor problem somewhere. My ISP's upstream provider ignores it, assuming My ISP doesn't know what they're talking about. (Aha! There's that irony again!)

24 hours later: Service still down. Users are *ticked*. Complaints now flowing into tor.general, ott.general, etc. Someone at My ISP actually *calls* My ISP's upstream provider and says Okay, there is a problem. My ISP's upstream provider opens a trouble ticket, but it's deleted for the same reasons as 3) above.

36 hours later: service still down. Rogers (Major competitor to My ISP) sales line experiences a sudden increase in inquiries. My ISP's upstream provider's staff admits something may be wrong. A junior tech tries to send email to himself as a test.

48 hours later: Service still down. Anarchist's cookbook gets lots of downloads and there is a sudden interest in the location of My ISP's customer service centers. My ISP's upstream provider's senior admin finally looks at the problem (She sends herself an email as a test). Starts trying to fix things. 310-SURF told to deny existance of a problem.

60 hours later: Service still down. My ISP's user's start buying new telephones as they throw theirs across the room in frustration. My ISP's upstream provider's staff are trying to re-write a custom version of TCP/IP in an effort to "fix" things. My ISP's support person breaks ranks and whispers to one caller that there might indeed be a problem. 5 minutes later this support person is fired.

72 hours later: Service definitely still down. Rogers marketing staff are dancing jigs as their market share visibly increases by the hour. My ISP's upstream provider's staff are now trying to re-write their own versions of Windows 98 to "fix" the problem. My ISP's tech support are busily instructing people on how to re-format their hard drives and re-install windows 98. My ISP makes a new TV commercial with a focus on the word "reliability". My ISP's prez laughs diabolically and states "I LOVE it! Go to press!"

90 hours later: A staff person from My ISP's upstream provider realizes that someone pulled the power cords simultaneously for their routers, UPS AND coffee machines. He plugs in the coffee machine and writes an email asking about the router power cords.

102 hours later: A tech from My ISP actually drives over to My ISP's upstream provider's office to see what's going on. While waiting for someone to answer a question, notices a power cord on the ground an plugs it in. Service restored. Tech from My ISP is fired.

My ISP posts nothing to the newsgroups. Tells callers that there was a very small minority of people who had problems, all of which had unplugged their modems by mistake.

New commercial for My ISP hits the airwaves. It's *very* effective. Unfortunately, they screwed up and put the Rogers sales number instead of their own.

The scary thing is that the above isn't really so unbelievable, is it?
The above is, of course, pure satire and humour. No offense is intended, though a suggestion that the ISP in question could seriously improve their response times is definitely intended :)

Excuse for censoring My ISP (Of many, many years ago and not my current ISP) and their upstream provider's name:I've removed the name of my ISP and their supposedly arm's length (ha!) upstream provider, simply because some people don't have a sense of humour and take things far too seriously. Sadly, "My ISP" could be replaced with many of them (ISPs) out there and this story would be just as accurate :(

Marc Bissonnette is the president of Internalysis, a competitive intelligence internet research firm located in Beachburg, Ontario, Canada and CanadianISP.ca - Canada's largest Internet Service Provider (ISP) search and comparison tool!

Modern Web Site Design: Getting people to come back Part V

Originally posted on Internalysis.com

Here we almost a year (now more than fifteen years since this was first written! - Marc) after the last installment of this series was written and there are still a lot of sites falling into the same traps as before. Therefore, we will look again at a few necessities of a website.

The very first thing you need to accept is the fact that your website needs new content *at least* on a weekly basis. Given some of the portal sites out there that you are competing with for your user's attention, new content on a daily basis is more realistic if you're looking for a site that *really* attracts the traffic.

The first question you need to ask yourself about your website, on a regular basis, since a purpose of a site can change easily is this: What is the purpose of my site?

The answer will fall into one of four main categories, with combinations being common, as well:

Sales: My site is designed to sell a product or service.
Support: My site is designed to help my clients with my products or services and to reduce support costs. (This also works for internal support or Intranets)
Portal: My site is designed to be an information resource, to attract people repeatedly, as well as advertisers.

Sales:

Many site owners think that simply posting the information about their products to a website will result in thousands of easy sales with little effort. This is a sure-fire way of sending your site to the brochure-ware graveyard in the Great Hard Drive in the Sky. In a sales site, you should have the following:

Comparisons with your competitors. Show why your product or service is better than the others are. Avoid stating the obvious, like "We care", "We listen", "We're the best", "We're the most cost effective", etc, since EVERYone will say the same about their own firm. Tell people WHY you are the best. HOW will your product or service solve their needs or make their lives easier or more enjoyable?
Support information: Never assume your product or service is dummy-proof. There are plenty of people out there who cannot follow even the simplest of instructions (To be fair, often "Simple" to the developer translates to "Nuclear Physics" to the public). Have your support staff keep a list of FAQ's and list them and the answers on the site. If there are additional products, files, information or hints that make your product easier or more useful list them!
Related industry information: Even after a client has purchased your product or service, you want them coming back to your site. Since you cannot release a new product every day for them to buy, have information related to the industry your product serves on your site. It keeps users coming back and builds brand awareness for your firm.

Support:

As above, *never* assume your product or service is dummy-proof. It is not. If you just said to yourself "But mine is" then start reading this sentence repeatedly until your answer changes. ASSUME something will go wrong with the installation or use of your product and have the information for a fix available on your site, EVEN IF THE FIX DOES NOT BELONG TO YOU. Do not leave out even the obvious. For example: If you are selling natural gas stoves on your site, you should have a list of natural gas suppliers, as well as installers on your site. (You would be surprised how many people buy a gas stove with no natural gas service to their homes).
User Forums: Your users are often your best resource for free support to your other users. It also shows new customers that you have a devoted enough clientele that they are willing to support other users of your products. There are a ton of discussion-board CGI's available out there free or for a reasonable cost.
Manuals: Put your manuals online. Do not be so silly as to be afraid your competitors will "get" your manuals from your site. If *I* were to compete with you, your product manuals would be the first thing I would acquire, and it would not necessarily mean buying your product. Save your users the time and yourself the support cost of a telephone call for simple questions. Put the manuals and helpfiles online.
Upgrades: Make product upgrades available on your site. DO NOT make the mistakes of certain large software companies (You know who I mean) by charging your users for what amounts to bug-fixes (your fault) or incremental upgrades (nickel-and diming). On the other hand, if there are major product improvements and additions (or new modules) then your support site is an excellent sales resource!

Portal:

This is the topic I have the most fun with in dealing with new clients. A true portal site has new content on a daily, if not hourly basis. (You should see the looks on the faces of people who think the web is a get-rich-quick scheme involving simply posting a bunch of brochure contents online).
Update your site. If you need to, hire someone to stand behind you with a cattle prod at a certain time of each day to add new content to your site. If you cannot do this, hire someone who can. Additionally (NOT "alternatively"), invite content submissions from other authors around the world (like I am doing right now :) to submit their articles to your site in exchange for proper credit and a link. If you are serious about being a portal, do not insult the authors by telling them you want the articles free AND the copyright. I usually get two or three of these requests a month. I do not even bother responding (Now you know why). If you want authors to give you content on your site, but do not want to pay for it, then you must offer proper credit and a link to their site or email address. If you want total ownership, then compensate appropriately. (US$50-150 is appropriate, depending on the nature of the article).
Did I mention updating your site? Stop reading this, go add a new article to your site (This one, for example) and then come back, and keep reading.
Cross-linking: Find other sites related to yours and contact their webmasters asking for cross-links. There is nothing wrong with piggybacking someone else's traffic!

If you do not follow at least some of the advice above, then you should not be running a web site. I am not saying this out of arrogant confidence in my own knowledge, either: Look at any successful website: amazon.com, cnn.com, ebay.com, yahoo.com, etc. You will rarely (If EVER) see the same words on the page two days (or twelve hours) in a row. Something to think about.

Marc Bissonnette is the president of InternAlysis.com , a Custom CGI programming and consulting firm in Beachburg, Ontario, Canada and CanadianISP.ca - Canada's largest Internet Service Provider (ISP) search and comparison tool!

Modern Web Site Design: Getting People to Come Back, Part IV

Are you really USING the internet for your business?

This article was prompted by a client's responses to their website, after spending $30,000 on it's re-design and technology upgrades. Some of the comments and "suggestions" included:

Let's take the sample downloads away from the website and make everyone request it to be mailed.

Let's make people register with their name and email address in order to get the fact sheets on our products, and then put them all on a mailing list.

There are some errors in the content (that we provided), let's roll back to the old site (a week after launch and with the old site containing the same errors)

We can't include our product documentation online because the competition might see it.

There were more, but these are the basis for this article.

In case you are not familiar with the term, "brochure-ware website", it's a non-interactive website that just endlessly displays text and graphics, usually attempting a "hard sell".

Take a good look at your competition. No, I mean a really good look at them and their web sites. How many of them are brochure-ware? Probably not many. The reason for this is the fact that with it's exploding popularity, competition for the customer's dollar online, even if the purchase is made off line, is hot.

It's a shame that there are still people out there that just don't get it when it comes to the Internet. It's a medium that is all about speed, convenience and efficiency. If all you're doing is replicating your newspaper and magazine ads, don't even bother wasting your time, or risking your reputation with a web site.

Let's take a look at the individual comments from the client above and their associated problems:

remove downloads and force requests for mailers

This just completely avoids the purpose of a potential client visiting your website. A client is at you site to get information, now. By forcing requests for mailers, you're slowing the information process, and thus the purchasing process, by at least three days, assuming you receive the request and act on it immediately and there are no postal delays. Your website should *never* have requests for information to be mailed, unless it's a product sample (Videos and CD's are fine to be mailed, too, but there should at least be a summary and excerpt of the materials)

This not only (again) completely negates the purpose of your website (fast access to information), but forcing users on a mailing list is not only unethical (and stupid), but illegal in some states and countries. If you want the user's name and email address, fine, but make sure it's not mandatory in order to see information and let them know in no uncertain terms what you will do with the information. (Spamming, or sending unsolicited commercial email can also cost your your website and access account, too!)

errors in content, let's rollback to old site

First of all, doing a roll-back to your old site will cause viewers to wonder if you even know what you want to do with your corporate identity. Second, if you're paying someone to create your website (or even if it's your own staff), REVIEW and APPROVE your content before it goes up! So many people claim they don't have time to do this, but it's a feeble excuse for taking a couple of hours and going over your site for proper content. Take it home, if you have to, but get the information right the first time! There are also caching issues to worry about, too. People who visited your site last week and come back this week may see corrupted or wrong images if they're loading a completely different version from cache (Especially if you've used similar file names for your graphics and documents!)

Our competition might see our documentation

This is not only naive, but not a good reason to provide your potential clients with more information on buying your product. Though many don't like to acknowledge it, competitive intelligence by rivals is alive and healthy, using both ethical and unethical means. For something as simple as your installation manuals and help files, it's a no-brainer to get a copy of this by simply calling your sales staff or VARs and asking a copy to be sent as a pre-cursor to a purchase decision. (There's also simply going to your clients and asking to see their current product's (i.e. yours) documentation and promising to out-do it in a competitive bid. Good business practice assumes your competition knows all the simple stuff about your product anyway. In most cases, excessive secretiveness will make your company not only slow and inefficient for providing sales material, but will more than likely make you look silly.

Basically, your site should be able to provide information on your services in as fast and efficient a method as possible. Forcing clients to resort to off-Internet venues to get your sales information is plain stupid, as it's the same as telling them you don't want to sell to them right now. Trust me, your competition will not make the same mistakes. Worse, they'll be selling to your clients, for the simple reason that they made the purchase decision easier.

Marc Bissonnette is the president of InternAlysis, a competitive intelligence and CGI Programming firm located in Beachburg, Ontario, Canada and CanadianISP.ca - Canada's largest Internet Service Provider (ISP) search and comparison tool!

Re-vamping a website

This month's article is on a few common items surrounding re-designing a website and how to go about it.

The very first thing you should do, before making a single change to your site, is take a look at your site's traffic logs. This will show you which part of your site is getting the most exposure, thus giving you an idea of what your visitors are most interested in. You may be surprised at the results, especially if the content getting the most visits isn't your strongest specialty. If the traffic to a specific section is high enough, it may even be worth thinking about a slight change in your firm's or your website's focus.

Once you know what section receives the most visitors, that will give you an idea on the content that is generating the most interest in your site. This should be kept in mind when updating the rest of the content on your site, as well as adding new content.

Next item should be the HTML itself. When you designed the site, where you relatively new? Did you use a WYSIWYG editor? If you've learned proper HTML by now, its worth going through you site and re-coding the pages by hand. You'll be amazed at how much you can shrink filesize just by getting rid of all the excess junk most WYSIWYG editors add to your code.

For those sites using graphical icons or buttons for navigational aides, here's a good test to determine whether your icons are helping or hindering your site navigation: Make a copy of your main page or nav bar. Remove any text or ALT tags from the images, or near them. Next, ask a friend or colleague who isn't a regular visitor to the site to find five of your most common documents on the site, using the changed nav-bar. If they can't figure out which icons link to which sections of your site, your graphical "aides" are more of a hindrance. It's amazing how many people choose imagery for their site just because they look cool, and not because they relate to the site or the content they are pointing to.

Next item should be dated content. If you have a news or what's new section, remove or archive all information that is older than six months. Not only does older content take up more space and cause more time to be spent finding information, but it looks a little silly to have content from 1996 in your "What's New" section. If you want the content available for viewing still, create a sub-section called "News Archives", or similar, and put the items there.

Next is your products and / or services list. Take a look through them, their descriptions and their pricing. Over the years, you've probably thought of better ways to describe and sell what you are offering than what was originally put up on your site. The last time I re-vamped my site, I was a little surprised at some of my descriptions of my programming services (And they could probably be better worded, still!)

Remember when you checked your stats page for your highest-traffic areas? Now is a good time to put a few discreet links from those sections to your lesser-visited sections to encourage more visibility. Even if you have a nav-bar in a frame or sidebar, put a link in the content somewhere. People tend to put the nav-bar to the back of their mind when reading content. Try to keep the links related to the high-traffic content, as well. (Ex. My highest-traffic areas in www.internalysis.com are two of my shareware scripts, multipass and membermanager, so the logical link from there is to my Perl programming services)

While you're in your code, take a look at your Meta tags for descriptions, keywords and titles. If they're not there, fix that! You may need to update keyword lists and descriptions, as well, especially if they're more than a year old. The search engines will be much friendlier to you for the effort!

As always, if you have questions or comments on this article, feel free to contact me. I've done a lot of work in re-vamping sites for content, as well as speed and navigability and am willing to lend a helpful comment here and there if need be.

Physical Telephone Line Checks

First, the disclaimer. (Everybody's got one): I am not an electrician, representative of Bell Canada, Sympatico or anyone else even remotely related to Bell Canada. If, by following this advice, you get yourself electrocuted, melt your computer, any of its components, cause your neighbourhood to sink into the ground or trigger Armageddon, it's all your fault for doing this in the first place. When working with ANY live wires, follow good safety habits. I've shocked myself a few times by stupidly touching two wires, or one wire and a ground. Personally, I use insulated construction boots when working on home wiring / telephone wiring.

If you're not sure of what you're doing, HIRE A PROFESSIONAL. It's not worth the hassle (and potential injury) if you haven't a clue :) If this works, and you're connect speeds triple to 15 gigabits per second then, of course, I take all the credit :) (Unless you're getting 15 gigabits into your coffin, in which case I've never even heard of computers)

Find the demarkation point in your house. This is where the phone lines come in from the outside. In some older houses (like mine), it's a little black box with a brass bar and screws inside. CAUTION: There is electricity flowing through these! It'll give you a nasty shock if you touch both wires (Or touch one wire and aren't properly insulated). If you're uncomfortable working with electricity, ask someone who is comfortable / competent to do it.
Un screw the brass plugs from the bar (I think it's called a lightning arrestor, I could be wrong, though) and with a dry cue-tip, wipe off the threads and the socket to which they screw into. Re-screw the plugs.
While still at the demark point, check the connections of the wires coming out of it and leading to the next junction box by disconnecting them (make sure to remember where they were connected in the first place) and clean them with a piece of sand paper or emery cloth. (If you're using sand paper, 80 grit or higher is good. Make sure there aren't any particles left on the connectors (If you still have that cue-tip handy, it's a good thing to clean off the sanding debris.) Re-connect the wires.
Inspect all phone wires leading from the demark point to the rest of the jacks. Look for aged wires (insulation that has dried out, cracked, split, etc), damaged wires (from mice, vacuum cleaners, your kids, you, acts of God, etc). If you find any, replace the whole run. (It's not worth soldering it, since you probably won't get a *perfect* joint and telephone wire is cheap anyway :)
Open all your jack boxes, clean the connections in those with the sand paper / emery cloth and your handy-dandy cue-tip (get a new one :). While they're open, look for excessive corrosion or build-up, especially if they're in a high-moisture room like the laundry room (This happened to me, I had a jack directly behind a dryer vent, which made a TON of static). Move these jacks if possible, but if it's not (or you just plain like the convenience of talking while washing your undies), I'm pretty sure you can buy special jack boxes for high-moisture areas (or get an outdoor box).
If you've got any really old phones, now's probably a good time to polish them up and have them bronzed, stuffed or sent to the great Switching Office in the Sky. Get modern phones for your extensions.
If at all possible (and it really isn't hard) install a dedicated line from your demark point to your computer. The lower the number of junctions and connections between the 1 meg modem (or ADSL) and the outside line, the better. (You can also call Bell, or an independent contractor to do this for you).
After all of this, pick of the phone and dial a single digit (except 0) to get rid of the dial tone. Make sure the kids aren't making a racket in the background (can you tell I'm a father?) and listen to the line for static, popping or hissing noises (even faint ones). You should also try this by calling a friend and telling them to shut up for a second, so you can hear the line quality on a live connection.

If you've done all of the above and still hear noise on your line, call Bell Repair (611) and tell em you've got line noise, which is interfering with your data connections and would they please check your line (Be nice, they're busy people). Only do this if you think there really is a problem with your line. (There's probably a limit to how nice they'll be if they get a zillion calls on clean lines :)

For me, I did all of the above and it improved my 56K modem connection from a variable connect rate of 34.4K - 42.3K to 50.3 K steady (Dialling into Interlog, using a v.90 Diamond modem). I'm sure the clean lines have something to do with steady 100K downloads on the HSE, too :)

Marc Bissonnette is the president of Internalysis, a competitive intelligence internet research firm located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and CanadianISP.ca - Canada's largest Internet Service Provider (ISP) search and comparison tool!

Return Traffic - What's In It For Me?

Though this topic has been touched on indirectly in several articles, it's worth going into much more specific detail now.

Now that the Internet, as a form of popular media, has left its infancy and entered its toddler years, there is a lot more competition out there for user's time, attention and eventually, dollars. As traditional advertising agencies finally clue in and realize that this is an *absolute neccessity* for their portfolio of services (And yes, this is a topic for a whole *series* of articles), there are more and more resources being brought to bear on client site development.

The problem, as has been pointed out by so many, is that Web sites are being developed by developers for developers, albeit on a subconscious level. Without getting into the specifics of technologies, cgi's and levels of interaction (well, in this article, anyway), there is one important question being asked these days, and that is "What's in it for me?" If you think you or the clients are asking this question, you're in the wrong industry, since the answer to that from the site owner or developer's point of view should be obvious (though my next article will be on "Pitching a Web solution"). No, the question is being asked by the *users*.

One of my favorite points to bring up whenever I'm speaking at a conference or convention is the fact that there is *nothing* you cannot find on the Internet. This means you can find everything from detailed plans on building thermo-nuclear weapons to 101 variations on recipes for chocolate chip cookies (for curiosities sake, I also searched for recipes using Spam and even found several dozen of those!) This fact should mean one important thing for you: Whatever you are offering your viewers on the web, the chances are that someone else is offering the same category of information, but only better. Now, "better" could mean more variety, volume, better presentation, better frequency, or any number of improvements.

This knowledge, in turn, should be urging you to spend several afternoons, on a regular basis (spread out, of course), checking out not only your direct competition, but those sites that seem to be attracting a lot of attention.

Far too many are the web sites, and even worse, web site developers, who seem to think the site they deliver exists in a cocoon. They pay no attention to what and how the rest of the net is delivering information and fail to implement similar strategies themselves.

Admittedly, this failure is often a failure on the client's side to dedicate either the time or the budget for ongoing development and market research. It is up to you, the developer (or your sales reps) to educate the clients on this need. (As I said, next article is on pitching a Web site and this will be covered). In the meantime, take a good look at the site you've just finished developing, or paid to have developed, and ask yourself this; What's in it for the user? If you think that gobs and gobs of information about your products or your services is exactly what they want, you've just wasted a ton of money and time on a site people will read once and forget. Try to think about it this way; When you get a brochure in the mail, or any other form of junk mail, how long do you keep it? Do you read it again and again? Will you display it on your coffee table for your guests to enjoy? No, you won't. This is because it is information on one, narrow topic and is only of limited use.

Think, now, on magazines; You do keep these around for a while, you'll show it to a friend or a colleague and it may even occupy space on your coffee table! Why is this? When you think of it, a magazine is essentially one big marketing vehicle. The reason, however, that you read it is that it covers a range of topics within your area of interest. The same principle should be applied to a web site; After all, it's relatively easy to get someone to read something (or at least glance at it) once. Your focus, however, should be to get them to keep coming back for more.

Modern Web Site Design: Getting People To Come Back Part III

Since the first two articles in this series seems to (still!) generate a lot of traffic, I thought we'd carry it on with another installment :)

So what's next, you ask? Your site is in all the search engines, your URL is everywhere but written in the sky (and you're working on that, too), your content is being updated bi-weekly, at least, and your site transfers in less than half a second on a 300 baud modem :)

There is an area of web site maintenance that people often overlook: CGI Upgrades.

We tend to write a lot of our own CGI stuff, but the original ideas for these scripts have to come from somewhere. Our bookmark file is absolutely crammed with sites that list and categorize freeware, shareware and commercial CGI scripts. Using this as a reference, we've found we've been able to not only increase the useability of our own scripts, but increase revenue from our clientele by offering upgrades or technology shifts to clients with existing CGI solutions. Here are a few thoughts to consider:

First of all, take a look at all the CGI's you are using, as well as those of your clientele, *even if you no longer do business with that client* (This is a great way to 'bring them back into the fold' if they've left you for another web developer)

Separate your CGI list into categories; mailers, search engines, discussion boards, guest books, etc.

Then take an afternoon and look through the CGI resource sites to see how these scripts have progressed, whether there are upgrades to the specific CGI you used or scripts with similar goals, but added functionality.

For example, last time we took a look at all of our clienteles CGI's, we found there were a couple of clients still using an original version of a mailer script that simply printed a $key:$value pair on each line. Since implementing those mailers (two years ago), we've moved on to templated mailers that allow the users to write a plain text template, with slots for the variables to be replaced as they're mailed (allows for more 'letter-like' CGI mails. After contacting all these people using the old scripts, all of them upgraded to the newer mailers, which increased revenue for us (the web developers) and added funtionality to them (the clients) in making the mailed results more useable.

The same thing can be looked at for any script-type: Search engines have come a long way since two years ago (I'm talking about the simple Perl-based fake-a-bases here, not the ultra-expensive 'real' databases like Oracle, AltaVista, etc, etc). Discussion boards have evolved tremendously, file uploaders, so on and so forth.

If you are managing your own site, or that of your employers, the benefits are tangible:

Increasedfunctionality in your scripts
Better "PR Value" from your clients/users as your firm keeps a modern image
Better information retrieval as you move more of your scripts to storing copies of data into database format for later analysis
Increased speed and response time from your scripts as they take advantages of newer environments (Perl5, for example)
Brownie points from your supervisors/managers as you increase the above mentioned attributes for your firm (Remind them of this when you ask for your raise!)

If you are a web developer, the benefits are equally tangible:

All the above benefits for your clientele
Earned 'brownie points' from your clientele as you prove you are looking out for their best interests
increased revenue from the new work this creates
A good starting point for new business you may want to pitch

And of course, the users of sites with new / upgraded or revamped scripts all benefit from:

Fresh look to tradidtional interfaces
Increased speed
More functionality
More 'toys' to play with on their favourite sites

If you would like a list of the sites we commonly use for CGI ideas and implementation, please feel free to contact me.

To WYSIWYG Or Not To WYSIWYG?

This article was inspired by my latest client project, a web generator that creates web sites on-the-fly based on form input.

The concept for the scripts themselves are relatively simple: take all the input from a form and put those values in place of some pre-defined places within a template form and write a new file, unique to each new user.

There were two problems in developing this product: The first was the fact that all of the HTML files were created by a Macintosh, resulting in some funky control characters that only the Solaris system would see and thus cause the scripts to hiccup (Of course, on my PC, these files appeared perfectly normal). And the second was the absolutely horrible quality of HTML the WYSIWYG editor my client used generated.

The first problem was easy to solve, literally cut and paste the entire file into a new text file and save as ASCII text (or run a conversion utility, same result) the second, however, required almost completely re-writing the HTML to something approaching a standard quality.

There are several reasons for having structured HTML code and I'll cover a couple of them here, but first, I'll quote from a book I've used occasionally for Perl reference, and this sums it all up very nicely:

"Using Perl for Web Programming"

"Form design is a key step in the creation of a CGI application that programmers often overlook. If you are working with a form that has poorly named variables or strange values for check boxes or menu items, writing the program is more difficult. I recommend that you spend significant time getting the form right before you get too deep into your programming; you'll save time in the long run. Also, it frequently makes more sense to change the form than to go through some programming magic to make the form do what you need it to do."

This quote is * so * true! Basically, if you're creating a site that will either:

remain static (not change much)
be maintained by the same people
not use any complex CGIs

Then your HTML style and quality is pretty much irrelevant, as long as it displays properly to your target audience. If, however, your site, or your client's site is destined to be maintained by people other than your own, or will be using more complex CGI scripts, it is well worth your while to consider learning the raw HTML yourself.

There are several advantages to knowing HTML by heart:

You can do things in HTML right off the bat, as you become aware of them, or as they become available, without waiting for an update to an editor.
Your code (should be) much more easily readable by other coders, be they in your own team or subsequent site managers.
You have the pride and right of saying that you're a "real" html programmer, rather than a button pusher :)
Complex CGI's, such as search-and-replacers, some forms of search engines, cataloguers, etc, will be able to read and parse your code more efficiently.
Your code tends to be much tighter than a WYSIWYG editor (Properly done, there is more white space to your code, but browsers ignore that).
Troubleshooting your sites tends to be much easier, since you *know* the code and what does what.

There is nothing to say that you shouldn't use a WYSIWYG editor for redundant or quick-and-easy tasks (although I have yet to see an editor that creates a proper table format), though you should always go into the code itself and clean up any quirky layouts your editor may create.

If you're still new to HTML, and have to use an editor to get started quickly, I'd recommend an editor that shows you the code as you create it. Personally, whenever people ask me about editors, I always recommend (after suggesting they learn the language itself) Hot Dog Professional by Sausage Software (www.sausage.com) as their first-exposure to HTML. It's a WYSIWYG editor, but it shows you the HTML in a separate window as you edit, thus actually teaching you the language as you go. This is a Good Thing, since you will eventually become much less reliant upon third party software to maintain your living :)

Rather than take up a chunk of this newsletter with samples, I've put a sample page with good code / bad code up here:

www.internalysis.com/nwex.htm

Naturally, in the "proper" half of this sample code, you can go even further with the indentation, in order to be 100% technically correct, but I feel the trade-offs here are minimal to retain both "good coding" standards, as well as readability.

Using Web Stats To Build Your Site

Everyone knows (or should know) what web traffic statistics are, at least in the basic sense. What most people do not know however, is all the information they contain (actually, that should read "all the information they *can* contain", depending on your ISP).

First of all, my caveat: My first article with Net World covered the fact that not all stats are necessarily accurate or complete, due to the large amount of cacheing servers on the Net. With that being said...

There are far too many site owners who use their stats solely for the purpose of determining total number of visitors to their site. While this is nice to know, it certainly doesn't help you determine which areas of your site need more work, which are the most popular, which might be attractive to advertisers, and which sections can be turfed altogether.

So just how do your stats do tell you all of this? First of all, you'll need one or more of a few things;

Access to your raw server logs
A stats analyser (or one being run on/by your ISP)
Patience

or hiring someone to interpret it all.

Now, having access to all your server logs isn't necessarily a guarantee that you'll get all this wonderful information. You have to make sure the ISP is tracking all the data you need. Some things like http_referrer and user_agent are left out of server logs to save space. (http_referrer tracks which page linked to yours, pages visited, the path users took through the site, average length of visit etc, and user_agent tracks which browser people are using to view your site, which Operating System they're using, etc). If your ISP doesn't track these right off the mark, you can ask your ISP to implement them either in general or for your particular VWS (Virtual Web Server).

So, assuming you have access to this kind of data, how do you access it all? We use MarketWave's Hitlist Standard (freeware version, although there are some *very* impressive "pro" versions in the US$295 to US$995 range) for our statistics analysis.

There are many other excellent statistics analysers, running on all platforms, as well as versions that will run directly off of your server.

So what do you do do with all of these numbers?

There are a zillion different uses for these numbers and I'll try to cover a few of the more important ones here. (The section titles are used from HitList Standard, your stats analyser may have different titles, but they're fairly self-explanatory)

* * *

Total Visitors / Requests: There is an important difference between the two (Visitors and Requests). Total Visitors is the total number of unique visitors to your site. Total requests are the total files transferred from your site. (Remember, one visitor can make 15 requests in a single visit: Consider: One page, with fifteen images and one java applet, is 17 requests or hits: 1 for the HTML page, 15 for the images and one for the java applet). I've seen a lot of people get really excited by seeing 15,000 requests to their site, but then come crashing down when they discover that those hits all come from 300 people alone.

* * *

Most Popular Pages: These, as the name implies, are the most frequently viewed files within your site. What this should mean to you, however, is that these are the pages where you will get the most bang for your buck, so to speak. These are also the pages that you would use to drive traffic to other, less used sections of your site that you wish to draw attention to. These numbers are also the ones the advertisers will want to see to ensure that they're not being placed in the "back corner" of your website.

* * *

Most Popular Entry Pages: These are the pages where people are first coming into your site. This can occur either from the users typing in the URL directly, from a bookmark file, a search engine or a cross-link from another site (Remember how important cross-linking is!)

* * *

Most Popular Exit Pages: These are the pages that users last viewed before leaving your site. These are a good indication of which pages may need some tweaking in order to keep people within your site.

* * *

Most Popular Single-Visit Pages: These are the files that people are entering your site to view and leaving without visiting elsewhere. These are also good targets for tweaking to encourage users to visit further within the site. Chances are that the users have viewed the site and left immediately for one of the following reasons:

they were looking for specific information and found it/did not find it (usually from a search engine)
the page they entered did not appeal enough to them to continue to visit
wrong number :-)
the information they were looking for was not clearly defined (similar to 1) above)

Again, take a look at the single-page visits to determine what can be done to encourage further exploration of your site. Ideally, get a neutral, third-party to view the site and ask their opinions. Personally, I ask my wife to do this from time to time for some of my sites, since

she is not in this industry (or even remotely linked)
she is typical of the target markets
she was not involved in the process of design and therefore is less biased
she loves finding faults :)

Even better would be to get a client to do this for you, as a favour, since they are definitely your target market.

* * *

Visitors Origins: This is usually the list of countries people are visiting from. It's amazing the number of companies / business owners that discount international visitors to their sites. Unless you're selling groceries in a corner store, chances are you have the capability of international business of some nature or not. Consider your home nation's dollar, as well. Personally, as a Canadian, our weak dollar vs the American dollar makes InternAlysis very attractive to U.S. firms looking for our type of services. I would imagine that a great deal of the readers of this list are from New Zealand (about 1/2 - Ed), which is in an equally attractive position for international marketing.

As an example, my own site has traffic from United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Denmark, Japan, Brazil, Australia, Trinidad and Tobago, Norway, Netherlands, New Zealand, Israel, Malaysia, France, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland and Singapore.

If you think that because my business is Canadian based, I ignore requests for service from all of the above, you'd be quite wrong! :)

Depending on the types of services and / or products you offer, you may want to consider keeping your international visitors in mind when updating your site.

Well, those are the most common logfile elements, though by no means are they the only ones. Depending on your log analyser, you can manipulate your display to show literally hundreds of combinations of the data and their patterns/trends

I should also mention that for those of you who have further questions or comments about this article, or any of the others I've written, please feel free to email me.