Author: Precise Business

Software development is the term used for the process of creating software or applications in computer coded and specific programming language. It is a process of developing software by writing maintainable code. Software development means creating, planning, reusing, research and development, making things simple, broader usage, etc. Web development is the term used for the process of creating web applications or websites that needs to get hosted. Web development means developing a complex web-based application as well as the development of simple and single-page applications. Web development mainly is done as client-side scripting, Server-side scripting, and database scripting.

Software Development

• Software development gives the product with features that have been planned and required for the computer software. Software development mainly referred to as a desktop application. While developing software, developers should have specific knowledge of client requirements, programming language, and end user’s usage.
• Software development based on the software development life cycle (SDLC).SDLC consists of many phases or stages that are: 1. Requirement Analysis and Planning. 2. Requirement defining. 3. Designing Requirements. 4. The building of Application or Coding 5. Testing of Application 5. Implementation. 6. Deployment and Maintenance.
• Software Development follows different methodologies for building the software or for a development process that are Waterfall model, Iterative model, Spiral Model, Agile methodology, prototype model, rapid application development, DevOps, etc.

Web Development

• The web development includes other work also like content management, web designing, security, etc. The engineers who develop web applications referred to as a web developer, full-stack web developer, front-end developer, UI developer, back-end developer.
• Web development based on the web development life cycle which is similar to SDLC only. In this, the phases are 1. Requirement gathering (Purpose, Goal, and audience) 2. Planning (Workflow creation) 3. Designing (Site page designing) 4. Content Management or writing 5. Coding (building website) 6. Testing 7. Deployment, hosting, and maintainability.
• Web development also follows different methodologies to build or develop applications like Agile methodology. The process of breaking big tasks into small and checking the continuous progress from beginning to end to design the web application that is web development.

Head to Head Comparisons Between Software Development and Web Development (Infographics)

Below is the Top 8 Comparisons between Software Development and Web Development:

Key Differences between Software Development and Web Development

Below are the lists of points, describe the key differences between Software Development and Web Development:

1. Software developed applications mainly perform better in gaming, file-handling. Web developed applications perform better in data centralization or multi-user.
2. The key difference between the both Software Development and Web Development is a change of Interface.
3. In software development applications, customisation has limitations. Web developed applications have a wider range of customisation.
4. In software development, screens are developed with static content. In web development, static pages as well as dynamic web content can be managed.
5. Software developed applications can be used in specific machine in which it has been installed. Web developed application can be accessed from any system as it has been deployed to server and easily accessible with help of domain.
6. Software developed application does not need more security. Web developed application requires more security from virus, malware and data hackers.
7. Software developed applications are not stateless. Web developed applications are mainly stateless.
8. In software development, there are certain limitations on using technologies

Software Development and Web Development Comparison Table

Following are the list of points that shows the comparison between Software Development and Web Development.

 Conclusion

Software development and Web development both are used for developing applications. Software development means developing windows based application and Web development means developing web-based applications. Software development and Web development has used a standard set of rules for software and web designing to create applications more secure, reliable and with better performance.

Web development vs Software development is using different methodologies to check or keep the track of the progress of development of software and web application. In software development, the main focus is on logic written for the screen rather than UI, data loading to controls. In web development, front-end development is the topmost priority as to make the web application more attractive or interesting.

Web development can be considered as lightweight programming as it gives the ready result even with the small change. It is a process of creating a full fledge or featured application rather than just web designing only. Web applications can be used in mobile browsers or computer browser. Some web apps are similar to software only like executing logic on button click or on an event occurring by displaying the feasible results.

Web development is more in demand in a market with continuously increasing use of Internet and availability of resources at every place through mobile and personal laptops. With help of mobile, we can easily access the Internet and use the web applications anywhere in the world through Internet connectivity. In our daily routine, we are using social media sites, e-commerce sites for selling and buying products, traveling sites to book tickets; which are having user-friendly interfaces, security features like validating login and reliability.

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Web design is tricky. One has to take a lot of things into account when designing a website, from visual appearance (how the website looks) to functional design (how the website works). To simplify the task, we’ve prepared this guide.

In this article, we’ll focus on the main principles, heuristics, and approaches that will help you to create a great user experience for your website. We’ll start with global things, like the user journey (how to define the “skeleton” of the website) and then work down to the individual page (what should be considered during web page design). We’ll also cover other essential aspects of design, such as mobile considerations and testing.

Designing the user journey

Information architecture

People often use the term “information architecture” (IA) to mean the menus on a website. But that’s not correct. While menus are a part of IA, they are only one aspect of it.

IA is all about the organization of information in a clear and logical way. Such organization follows a clear purpose: helping users to navigate a complex set of information. Good IA creates a hierarchy that aligns with user’s expectations. But good hierarchy and intuitive navigation don’t happen by chance. They are a result of proper user research and testing.

There are a number of ways to research user needs. Often, an information architect will take an active part in user interviews or card sorting, where the architect would hear of user expectations directly or see how prospective users would categorize a variety of information groups. Information architects also need access to the results of usability tests to see whether users are able to navigate efficiently.

Card sorting is a simple way to figure out how best to group and organize content based on user input. One of the reasons why information architects like card sorting is because of the clarity of patterns that typically emerges. Image Source: FosterMilo)

A menu structure would be created based on the results of user interviews, and card sorting would be tested for whether it satisfies the user’s mental model. UX researchers use a technique called “tree testing” to prove that it will work. This happens before designing the actual interface.

Tree testing is a reliable method of finding whether users can work with the proposed menu structure. Image Source: Nielsen Norman Group

Global navigation

Navigation is a cornerstone of usability. It doesn’t matter how good your website is if users can’t find their way around it. That’s why navigation on your website should adhere to a few principles:

• Simplicity. Navigation should be designed in a way that gets visitors where they want to go with the fewest clicks possible.
• Clarity. There shouldn’t be any guessing about what each navigation option means. Every navigation option should be self-evident to visitors.
• Consistency. The navigation system should be the same for all pages on the website.

Consider a few things when designing navigation:

• Select a navigation pattern based on the user’s needs. Navigation should accommodate the needs of the majority of your website’s users. A given target group expects a particular type of interaction with your website, so make these expectations work in your favor. For example, avoid hamburger-menu navigation if the majority of your users aren’t familiar with the meaning of the icon itself.
• Prioritize navigation options. One simple way to prioritize navigation options is to assign different priority levels (high, medium, low) to common user tasks, and then give prominence in the layout to paths and destinations with high priority levels and frequent use.
• Make it visible. As Jakob Nielsen says, recognizing something is easier than remembering it. Minimize the user’s memory load by making all important navigation options permanently visible. The most important navigation options should be available at all times, not just when we anticipate that the user will need them.
• Communicate the current location. “Where am I?” is a fundamental question to which users need an answer in order to effectively navigate. Failing to indicate the current location is a common problem on many websites. Think about location indicators.

Links and navigation options

Links and navigation options are key factors in the navigation process and have a direct effect on the user journey. Follow a few rules with these interactive elements:

• Recognize the difference between internal and external links. Users expect different behavior for internal and external links. All internal links should open in the same tab (this way, you’ll allow users to use the “Back” button). If you decide to open external links in a new window, you should provide an advance warning before automatically opening a new window or tab. This might take the form of text added to the link text stating, for example, “(opens in a new window).”
• Change the color of visited links. When visited links don’t change color, users could unintentionally revisit the same pages.

Knowing which pages they’ve visited keeps the user from unintentionally revisiting the same pages.

• Double-check all links. A user can easily get frustrated by clicking a link and getting a  404 error page in response. When a visitor is searching for content, they expect every link to take them where it says it will, not to a 404 error page or another place they weren’t expecting.

“Back” button in browser

The “Back” button is perhaps the second-most popular UI control in the browser (after the URL input field). Make sure the “back” button works according to user expectations. When a user follows a link on a page and then clicks the “back” button, they expect to return to the same spot on the original page. Avoid situations in which clicking “back” brings the user to the top of the initial page, instead of where they left off, especially on pages. Losing their spot forces the user to scroll through content they have already seen. It’s no surprise that users get frustrated quickly with no proper “back-to-position” functionality.

Breadcrumbs

Breadcrumbs are a set of contextual links that function as a navigation aid on websites. It’s a secondary navigation scheme that usually shows the user’s location on a website.

While this element doesn’t require a lot of explanation, a few things are worth mentioning:

• Don’t use breadcrumbs as a substitute for primary navigation. The main navigation should be the element that leads the user, whereas breadcrumbs should only support the user. Relying on breadcrumbs as a primary method of navigation, rather than an extra feature, is usually an indication of poor navigation design.
• Use arrowheads, not slashes, as separators. Separate each level clearly. A greater-than sign (>) or right-pointing arrow (→) is recommended, because these symbols signal direction. A forward slash (/) isn’t recommended as a separator for e- commerce websites. If you’re going to use it, be certain that no product category will ever use a slash:

Search

Some users come to a website looking for one particular item. They don’t want to use the navigation options. They want to type text in a search box, submit their search query, and find the page they’re looking for.

Take these few basic rules into account when designing the search box:

• Put the search box where users expect to find it. The chart below was created based on a study by A. Dawn Shaikh and Keisi Lenz. It shows the expected location of the search field, according to a survey of 142 participants. The study found that the most convenient spot is the top left or top right of every page on a website. Users can easily find it using the common “F-shaped scanning pattern.”

• Display search prominently on content-rich websites. If search is an important function on your website, display it prominently, because it can be the fastest route to discovery for users.
• Size the input box appropriately. Making the input field too short is a common mistake among designers. Of course, users can type a long query into a short field, but only a portion of the text will be visible, which is bad for usability because seeing the entire query at once won’t be possible. In fact, when a search box is too short, users are forced to use short, imprecise queries, because longer queries would be hard and inconvenient to read. Nielsen Norman Group recommends a 27-character input field, which would accommodate 90 percent of queries.

• Put the search box on every page. Show the search box on every page, because if users cannot navigate to the content they are looking for, they will try to use search regardless of where they are on the website.

Designing individual pages

Content strategy

Perhaps the most important thing about content strategy is to focus the design on page objectives. Understand the goal of the page and write content according to the goal.

Here are a few practical tips to improve content comprehension:

• Prevent information overload. Information overload is a serious problem. It prevents users from making decisions or taking action because they feel they have too much information to consume. There are some simple ways to minimize information overload. One common technique is chunking — breaking content into smaller chunks to help users understand and process it better. A checkout form is a perfect example. Display, at most, five to seven input fields at a time and break down the checkout into pages — progressively disclosing fields as necessary.

Image Source: Witteia

• Avoid jargon and industry-specific terms. Each unknown term or phrase that appears on the page will increase the cognitive load on users. A safe bet is to write for all levels of readers and pick words that are clearly and easily understandable to all groups of users.
• Minimize long content sections that have a lot of detail. In line with the point about information overload, try to avoid long blocks of text if the website isn’t geared to major information consumption. For example, if you need to provide details about a service or product, try to reveal details step- by- step. Write in small, scannable segments to facilitate discovery. According to Robert Gunning’s book “How to Take the Fog Out of Business Writing,” for comfortable reading, most sentences should be 20 words or less.

Image Source: The Daily Rind

• Avoid capitalizing all letters. All-caps text — that is, text with all letters cap­i­tal­ized — is fine in tiny doses, such as for acronyms and logos. However, avoid all caps for anything longer (such as paragraphs, form labels, errors, and notifications). As mentioned by Miles Tinker in his book Legibility of Print, all caps dramatically reduces the speed of reading. Also, most readers find all capitals to be less legible.

Text in all caps is hard for users to read.

Page structure

A properly-structured page makes it clear where each user interface element is located in the layout. While there are no one-size-fits-all rules, there are a few guidelines that will help you create a solid structure:

• Make the structure predictable. Align your design to user expectations. Consider websites from a similar category to find out which elements to use on the page and where. Use patterns that your target audience is familiar with.
• Use a layout grid. A layout grid divides a page into major regions, and defines the relationships between elements in terms of size and position. With the help of a grid, combining different parts of a page together in a cohesive layout becomes much easier.

Grids and layout systems are part of the heritage of design and are still relevant in a multi-screen world. Adobe XD’s layout grids enable designers to achieve consistent, organized designs for different screen sizes and to manage the proportionsbetween elements by customizing the grids.

• Use a low-fidelity wireframe to cut out clutter. Clutter overloads an interface and reduces comprehension. Every added button, image and line of text makes the screen more complicated. Before building the page with real elements, create a wireframe, analyze it, and get rid of anything that isn’t absolutely necessary.

A low-fidelity wireframe created in Adobe XD. Image Source: Tim Hykes

Visual hierarchy

People are more likely to quickly scan a web page than to read everything there. Therefore, if a visitor wants to find content or complete a task, they are going to scan until they find where they need to go. You, as a designer, can help them with that by designing a good visual hierarchy. Visual hierarchy refers to the arrangement or presentation of elements in a way that indicates importance (that is, where visitor’s eyes should focus first, second, etc.). A proper visual hierarchy makes it easy to scan the page.

• Use natural scanning patterns. As designers, we have a lot of control over where people look when they’re viewing a page. To set the right path for the visitor’s eyes to follow, we can use two natural scanning patterns: the F-shaped pattern and the Z-shaped pattern. For text-heavy pages, such as articles and search results, the F pattern is better, whereas the Z pattern is good for pages that aren’t text-oriented.

An F-shaped pattern is used by CNN. A Z-scanning pattern is used by Basecamp.

• Visually prioritize important elements. Make focal points of screen titles, login forms, navigation options, and other important content so that visitors see them right away.

The “Learn More About Brains” call to action stands out.

• Create mockups to clarify the visual hierarchy. Mockups enable designers to see what a layout will look like when it’ll have real data. Rearranging elements in a mockup is much easier than doing it when the developer is building the web page.

Scrolling behavior

A persistent myth among web designers is that people don’t scroll. To be clear: Today, everybody scrolls!

Improving scrolling behavior is possible with a few tips:

• Encourage users to scroll. Despite the fact that people usually start scrolling as soon as the page loads, content at the top of the page is still very important. What appears at the top sets the impression and expectation of quality for visitors. People do scroll, but only if what’s above the fold is promising enough. Thus, put your most compelling content at the top of the page:
  • Offer a good introduction. An excellent introduction sets the context for the content and answers the user’s question, “What’s this page about?”
  • Use engaging imagery. Users pay close attention to images that contain relevant information.
• Persist navigation options. When you create lengthy pages, keep in mind that users still require a sense of orientation (of their current location) and a sense of navigation (other possible paths). Long pages can make navigation problematic for users — if the top navigation bar loses visibility when the user scrolls down, they will have to scroll all the way back up when they’re deep within the page. The obvious solution to this is a sticky menu that shows the current location and that remains on screen in a consistent area at all times.

Scroll-activated sticky navigation. Image Source: Zenman

Provide visual feedback when loading new content. This is especially important for web pages where content loads dynamically (such as news feeds). Because content-loading during scrolling is supposed to be fast (it shouldn’t take longer than 2 to 10 seconds), you can use looped animation to indicate that the system is working.

Subtle animation (such as Tumblr’s loading indicator) tells the user that more content is being loaded.

• Don’t hijack scrolling. Hijacked scrolling is one of the most annoying things because it takes control away from the user and makes the scrolling behavior completely unpredictable. When you design a website, let the user control their browsing and movement through the website.

Tumbler’s signup page uses scroll hijacking.

Content loading

Content loading is worth additional clarification. While an instant response is best, there are occasions when your website will need more time to deliver content to visitors. A bad internet connection could cause a slow reaction, or an operation could take a bit more time to complete. But no matter the cause of such behavior, your website should appear fast and responsive.

• Make sure regular loading doesn’t take long. The attention span and patience of web users is very low. According to Nielsen Norman Group research, 10 seconds is about the limit for keeping the user’s attention on a task. When visitors have to wait for a website to load, they will become frustrated and likely leave if the website doesn’t load quickly enough for them. Even with the most beautifully-designed loading indicator, users will still leave if loading takes too long.
• Use skeleton screens during loading. Many websites use progress indicators to show  that data is loading. While the intention behind a progress indicator is good (providing visual feedback), the result can be negative. As Luke Wroblewski mentions, “Progress indicators, by definition, call attention to the fact that someone needs to wait. It’s like watching the clock tick down — when you do, time seems to go slower.” There is an excellent alternative to progress indicators: skeleton screens. These containers are essentially a temporarily blank version of the page, into which information is gradually loaded. Rather than showing a loading indicator, designers can use a skeleton screen to focus users’ attention on actual progress and create anticipation for what’s to come. This creates a sense that things are happening immediately, as information is incrementally displayed on the screen and people see that the website is acting while they wait.

Facebook uses skeleton screens to fill out the UI as content is loaded incrementally.

Buttons

Buttons are vital to creating a smooth conversational flow. It’s worth paying attention to these basic best practices for buttons:

• Ensure that clickable elements look like ones. With buttons and other interactive elements, think about how the design communicates affordance. How do users understand the element as a button? Form should follow the function: the way an object looks tells users how to use it. Visual elements that look like links or buttons but aren’t clickable (such as underlined words that aren’t links or elements that have a rectangular background but aren’t buttons) can easily confuse users.

Is the orange box in the top-left corner of the screen a button? No, but the shape and label make the element look like one.

• Label buttons according to what they do. The label on any actionable interface element should always tie back to what it will do for the user. Users will feel more comfortable if they understand the action a button initiates. Vague labels such as “Submit” and abstract labels (such as in the following) don’t provide enough information about the action.

Don’t make people wonder what an interface element does. Source Image: UX Matters

• Design buttons consistently.  Whether consciously or not, users remember details. When browsing a website, they’ll ass
  ociate a particular element’s shape with button functionality. Therefore, consistency will not only contribute to a great-looking design, but will also make the experience more familiar to users. The image below illustrates this point perfectly. Using three different shapes in one part of a website (such as the system toolbar) is not only confusing, but sloppy.

Strive for consistency.

Imagery

As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words. Human beings are highly visual creatures, able to process visual information almost instantly; 90 percent of all information that we perceive and that gets transmitted to our brains is visual. Images are a powerful way to capture the user’s attention and to differentiate a product. A single image can convey more to the viewer than an elaborately-designed block of text. Furthermore, images cross language barriers in a way that text simply can’t.

The following principles will help you integrate imagery in your web design:

• Make sure images are relevant. One of the biggest dangers in design is imagery that conveys the wrong message. Select images that strongly support your product goals and ensure that the images are relevant to the context.

Images that aren’t related to the topic will cause confusion.

• Avoid generic photos of people. Using human faces in design is an effective way to engage users. Seeing faces of other humans makes viewers feel like they are connecting with them, and not just being sold a product. However, many corporate websites are notorious for using generic stock photos to build a sense of trust. Usability tests show that such photos rarely add value to the design and more often impair rather than improve the user experience.

Inauthentic images leave the user with a sense of shallow, false pretense.

• Use high-quality assets with no distortion. The quality of assets of your website will have a tremendous impact on the user’s impression and expectations of your service. Make sure images are appropriately sized for displays across all platforms. Images shouldn’t appear pixelated, so test resolution sizes for various ratios and devices. Display photos and graphics in their original aspect ratio.

A degraded image versus a properly sized image. Image Source: Adobe

Video

With increasing internet speeds, videos are becoming more popular, especially considering that they extend time spent on site. Today, video is everywhere. We’re watching it on our desktops, tablets, and phones. When used effectively, video is one of the most powerful tools available for engaging an audience  —  it conveys more emotion and really gives people a feel for a product or service.

• Set audio off by default, with the option to turn it on.    When users arrive on a page, they don’t expect that it will play any sound. Most users don’t use headphones and will be stressed because they’ll need to figure out how to turn the sound off. In most cases, users will leave the website as soon as it plays.

Facebook videos play automatically as soon as the user reaches them, but no sound plays unless the user enables it.

• Keep promo video as short as possible. According to the research by D-Mak Productions, short videos are more appealing to the majority of users. Keep business videos in the range of two to three minutes.

Image Source: Dmakproductions

• Provide an alternative way to access content. If a video is the only way to consume content, access to the information becomes limited for anyone who cannot see or hear the content. For accessibility, include captions and a full transcript of the video.

Subtitles and transcript will make video content more accessible. Image Source: TED

Call-to-Action Buttons

Calls to action (CTA) are buttons that guide users towards your conversion goal. The whole point of a CTA is to direct visitors to a desired course of action. Some common examples of CTAs are:

• “Start a trial”
• “Download the book”
• “Sign up for updates”
• “Get a consultation”

Take a few things into account when designing CTA buttons:

• Size. The CTA should be large enough to see from a distance, but not so large as to detract attention from other content on the page. To confirm that your CTA is the most prominent element on the page, try the five-second test: View a web page for five seconds and then write down what you remember. If the CTA is on your list, then congrats! It’s sized appropriately.
• Visual prominence. The color you choose for CTAs has a tremendous impact on whether it will be noticeable. With color, you can make certain buttons stand out more than others by giving them more visual prominence. Contrasting colors work best for CTAs and make for striking buttons.

The green of the CTA on Firefox’s page jumps off the page and immediately gets the user’s attention.

• Negative space. The amount of space around a CTA is important, too. White (or negative) space creates essential breathing room and separates a button from other elements in the interface.

The previous version of Dropbox’s home page has a good example of using negative space to make the primary CTA pop. The blue “Sign up for free” CTA stands out against the light blue of the background.

• Action-oriented text. Write text for the button that will compel visitors to take action. Begin with a verb like “Start,” “Get” or “Join.”

Evernote has one of the most common yet still effective action-oriented texts for its CTA.

Tip: You can quickly test a CTA using a blur effect. A blur test is a quick technique to determine whether the user’s eye will go where you want it to go. Take a screenshot of your page and apply a blur effect in Adobe XD (see the example on charity: water below). Looking at the blurred version of your page, which elements stand out? If you don’t like what’s being projected, revise.

A blur test is a technique to reveal a design’s focal point and visual hierarchy.

Web Forms

Filling a form remains one of the most important types of interaction for users on the web. In fact, a form is often considered the final step in the completion of a goal. Users should be able to complete forms quickly and without confusion.

• Ask only what’s required. Ask for only what you really need. Every extra field you add to a form will affect its conversion rate. Always think about why you’re requesting certain information from users and how you will be using it.
• Order the form logically. Questions should be asked logically from the user’s perspective, not from the application or database’s perspective. For example, asking for someone’s address before their name would be incorrect.
• Group related fields together. Group related information into logical blocks or sets. The flow from one set of questions to the next will better resemble a conversation. Grouping related fields together also helps the user make sense of the information.

Group related fields together. Image Source: Nielsen Norman Group

Animation

More and more designers are incorporating animation as a functional element to enhance the user experience. Animation is no longer just for delight — it is one of the most important tools for effective interaction. However, animation in design can enhance the user experience only if it’s incorporated at the right time and place. Good UI animation has a purpose — it is meaningful and functional.

Here are a few cases in which animation can enhance the experience:

• Visual feedback on user action. Good interaction design provides feedback. Visual feedback is helpful when you need to inform users about the result of an operation. In case an operation isn’t performed successfully, functional animation can provide information about the problem in a fast and easy way. For example, a shake animation can be used when a wrong password is entered. It’s easy to understand why the shake is a fairly universal gesture to communicate “no,” because a simple head shake is so prevalent in interpersonal communication.

Users will see this animation and immediately understand the problem. Image Source: The Kinetic UI

• Visibility of system status. One of Jakob Nielsen’s 10 heuristics for usability, visibility of system status remains among the most important principles in user interface design. Users want to know their current context in a system at any given time, and an app shouldn’t keep them guessing — it should tell the user what’s happening via appropriate visual feedback. Data uploading and downloading operations are great opportunities for functional animation. For example, an animated loading bar shows how fast a process is going and sets an expectation for how fast the action will be processed.

Image Source: xjw

• Navigational transitions. Navigational transitions are movements between states on a website — for example, from a high-level view to a detailed view. By default, state changes often involve hard cuts, which can make them difficult to follow. Functional animation eases users through these moments of change, smoothly transporting them between navigational contexts and explaining changes on the screen by creating visual connections between states.

Image Source: Ramotion

• Branding animation. Suppose you have dozens of websites that have the same exact features and help users to accomplish the same tasks. They might all offer a good user experience, but the one that people really love offers something more than just a good user experience. It establishes an emotional connection with users. Branding animation plays a key role in engaging users. It can support a company’s brand values, highlight a product’s strengths and make the user experience truly delightful and memorable.

Image Source: Heco

Mobile considerations

Today, almost 50 percent of users access the web from mobile devices. What does this mean for us web designers? It means that we must have a mobile strategy for every website we design.

Practice responsive web design

It’s essential to optimize your website for the vast landscape of desktop and mobile browsers, each of which has a different screen resolution, set of supported technologies, and user base.

• Aim for a single-column layout. Single-column layouts usually work best on mobile screens. Not only does a single column help with managing the limited space on a small screen, it also easily scales between different device resolutions and between “portrait” and “landscape” modes.
• Use the “Priority+” pattern to prioritize navigation across breakpoints. Priority+ is a term coined by Michael Scharnagl to describe navigation that exposes what’s deemed to be the most important elements and hides away less-important items behind a “more” button. It makes use of available screen space. As space increases, the number of exposed navigation options increases as well, which can result in better visibility and more engagement. This pattern is especially good for content-heavy websites with many different sections and pages (such as a news website or a large retailer’s store). The Guardian makes use of the Priority+ pattern for its section navigation. Less important items are revealed when the user hits the “All” button.

The Guardian employs the Priority+ pattern for its section navigation. Image Source: Brad Frost

• Make sure images are sized appropriately for displays and platforms. A website must adapt to look perfect on all devices and in all resolutions, pixel densities, and orientations. Managing, manipulating and delivering images is one of the main challenges web designers face when building responsive websites. To simplify this task, you can use tools such as Responsive Image Breakpoints Generator to generate breakpoints for images interactively.

Responsive Image Breakpoints Generator helps you to manage multiple sizes of images, enabling you to generate responsive image breakpoints interactively.

Going from “clickable” to “tappable”

On the mobile web, interaction is done via finger taps, not mouse clicks. This means that different rules apply when you’re designing touch targets and interactions.

• Properly sized touch targets. All interactive elements (such as links, buttons and menus) should be tappable. While the desktop web lends itself well to links whose active (i.e. clickable) area is small and precise, the mobile web require
  s larger buttons that can be easily pressed with a thumb. When a tap is used as a primary input method for your website, refer to the MIT Touch Lab’s study to choose a proper size for your buttons. The study found that the average size of finger pads are between 10 and 14 millimeters and that fingertips range from 8 to 10, making 10 × 10 millimeters a good minimum-touch target size.

Smaller touch targets are harder for users to tap than larger ones. Image Source: Apple

• Stronger visual signifiers of interactivity. On the mobile web, there is no hover state. While on a desktop, it’s possible to provide additional visual feedback when a user hovers the mouse over an element (for example, revealing a drop-down menu), a mobile user would have to tap to see that response. Thus, users should be able to correctly predict how an interface element will behave just by looking at it.

Create Your Own Website: Step-by-Step Guide to Building Online

Today’s products must be accessible to everyone, regardless of a person’s abilities. Designing for users with impairments is one way that designers can practice empathy and learn to experience the world from someone else’s perspective.

Users with poor eyesight

A lot of websites use low contrast for text copy. While low-contrast text may be trendy, it’s also illegible and inaccessible. Low contrast is especially problematic for users with low vision and who struggle with contrast sensitivity.

Gray text on a light-gray background is hard to read. The experience will be far from good, and the design simply won’t work.

Low-contrast text is hard to read on a desktop, but it becomes even more difficult on mobile. Imagine trying to read low-contrast text on a mobile device while walking in bright sunlight. This is a good reminder that accessible visual design is better visual design for all users.

Never sacrifice usability for beauty. The most important characteristic of text and other vital elements on a website is readability. Readability requires sufficient contrast between text and background. To ensure that text is readable by people with visual impairments, the W3C’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) has a contrast-ratio recommendation. The following contrast ratios are recommended for body text and image text:

• Small text should have a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 against its background. A ratio of 7:1 is preferable.
• Large text (at 14-point bold and 18-point regular and up) should have a contrast ratio of at least 3:1 against its background.

Bad: These lines of text do not meet the color-contrast ratio recommendations and are difficult to read against their background. Good: These lines of text follow the color-contrast ratio recommendations and are legible against their background.

You can use WebAIM’s Color Contrast Checker to quickly find out whether you’re within the optimal range.

Color blind users

It’s estimated that 4.5 percent of the global population experience color blindness (that’s 1 in 12 men and 1 in 200 women), 4 percent% suffer from low vision (1 in 30 people), and 0.6 percent% are blind (1 in 188 people). It’s easy to forget that we must also design for this group of users, because most designers don’t experience such problems.

To make design accessible for these users, avoid using color alone to convey meaning. As the W3C states, color shouldn’t be used as “the only visual means of conveying information, indicating an action, prompting a response, or distinguishing a visual element.”

One common example where color is used as the sole means of conveying information is alerts in forms. Success and error messages are often colored green and red, respectively. But red and green are the colors most affected by color-vision deficiency — these colors can be difficult to distinguish for people with deuteranopia or protanopia. Most probably, you’ve seen error messages like, “The fields marked in red are required.” While it might not seem like a big deal, this error message appearing in a form like the one below can be extremely frustrating for people with a color-vision deficiency. Designers should use color to highlight or complement what is already visible.

Bad: This form relies only on red and green to indicate fields with and without errors. Color blind users wouldn’t be able to identify the fields in red.

In the form above, the designer should give more specific instruction, like, “The email address you entered is not valid.” or at least display an icon near the field that requires attention.

Good: Icons and labels show which fields are invalid, better communicating the information to a color-blind user.

Blind users

Images and illustrations are a significant part of the web experience. Blind people use assistive technologies such as screen readers to interpret websites. Screen readers “read” images by relying on alternative text attributed to the image. If that text is not present or is not descriptive enough, blind users won’t be able to get the information as intended.

Consider two examples — first, Threadless, a popular t-shirt store. This page doesn’t say much about the item being sold. The only text information available is a combination of price and size.

The second example is from ASOS. This page, selling a similar shirt, provides accurate alternative text for the item. This helps people who use screen readers to envision what the item looks like.

When creating text alternatives for images, follow this guideline:

• All “meaningful” images require descriptive alternative text. (A “meaningful” photo adds context to the information being conveyed.)
• A text alternative isn’t needed if an image is purely decorative and provides no useful information to the user to aid them in understanding the content of the page.

Keyboard-friendly experience

Certain users navigate the internet using their keyboard, rather than a mouse. For example, people with motor impairments have difficulty with the fine motor movements required for using a mouse. Make the interactive and navigation elements easily accessible to this group of users by enabling interactive elements to be focused with the Tab key and by displaying a keyboard-focus indicator.

Here are the most basic rules for keyb
oard navigation:

• Check that keyboard focus is visible and obvious. Some web designers remove the keyboard focus indicator because they think it’s an eyesore. This hinders keyboard users from properly interacting with the website. If you don’t like the default indicator provided by the browser, don’t remove it altogether; instead, design it to satisfy your taste.
• All interactive elements should be accessible. Keyboard users must be able to access all interactive elements, not just the main navigation options or primary calls to action.

You can find detailed requirements for keyboard interaction in the “Design Patterns and Widgets” section of the W3C’s “WAI-ARIA Authoring Practices” document.

Testing

Iterative testing

Testing is an essential part of the UX design process. And like any other part of the design cycle, it is an iterative process. Gather feedback early on in the design process, and iterate throughout.

Image Source: Extreme Uncertainty

Test page-loading time

Users hate slow-loading web pages. That’s why response time is a critical factor on modern websites. According to Nielsen Norman Group, there are three response-time limits:

• 0.1 second: Feels instant for users.
• 1 second: Keeps the user’s flow of thought seamless, but the user will sense a slight delay.
• 10 seconds: Pushes the limit for keeping the user’s attention focused on the operation. A 10-second delay will often make users leave the website immediately.

Obviously, we shouldn’t make users wait 10 seconds for anything on our websites. But even a few seconds of delay — which happens regularly — makes an experience unpleasant. Users will be annoyed with having to wait for the operation.

What usually causes slow loading time?

• Heavy-content objects (such as embedded video and slideshow widgets)
• Unoptimized back-end code
• Hardware-related issues (infrastructure that doesn’t allow for fast operations)

Tools like PageSpeed Insights will help you to find the causes of slow times.

A/B testing

An A/B test is ideal when you’re struggling to choose between two versions of a design (such as an existing version and a redesigned version of a page). This testing method consists of showing one of two versions randomly to an equal number of users and then reviewing analytics to see which version accomplished your goal more effectively.

Image Source: VWO

Developer handoff

UX design process has two important steps: prototyping the design and developing a working solution. The step that connects the two is called a handoff. As soon as the design is finalized and ready to be moved to development, designers prepare a specification, which is a document that describes how the design should be coded. A specification ensures that the design will be implemented according to the original intention. Precision in the specification is critical, because with an inaccurate specification, the developers will have to either rely on guesswork when building the website or go back to the designer to get answers to their questions. But assembling a specification manually can be a headache and usually takes significant time, depending on the complexity of the design.

With Design Specs (Beta) feature in Adobe XD, designers can publish a public URL for developers to inspect flows, grab measurements and copy styles. Designers no longer have to spend time authoring specifications to communicate positioning, colors, character styles or fonts to the developer.

Adobe XD’s design specs feature (in beta).

Conclusion

As with any aspect of design, the tips shared here are just a start. Mix and match these ideas with your own for best results. Treat your website as a continually-evolving project, and use analytics and user feedback to constantly improve the experience. And remember that design isn’t just for designers — it’s for users.

For regular UX insights sent straight to your inbox,sign up for Adobe’sexperience design newsletter!

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by Brian Dean · Updated

In this post I’m going to show you EXACTLY how to rank your YouTube videos.

In fact, this is the exact process that I used to grow my channel to 295,347 views per month:

So if you want to get more views, subscribers and traffic from YouTube, then you’ll love this new YouTube SEO tutorial.

Let’s dive right in…

How I Grew My YouTube Channel From “Oh No!” to “Heck Yeah!”

Before we get into today’s video SEO tutorial, a quick backstory:

When I first launched my YouTube channel I struggled to get ANY views.

Fast forward to today, and my videos rank for all sorts of competitive keywords, like “on page SEO”:

“Link building”:

Heck, I even rank in the top 3 for “video SEO”:

And because I know how to rank my videos, my channel now generates 295,347 views and 9,193 subscribers every single month.

Now that you can see that I know what I’m talking about, let’s dive into the steps that I used to get these results.

The YouTube SEO process begins with video keyword research.

Here’s exactly how to find the right keywords for your YouTube videos:

First, generate a list of keywords ideas.

Your first step is to generate a big list of potential keywords. Then, in the next step, I’ll help you find the best keyword from your list.

Here’s how to find keywords for your YouTube Videos:

One of my favorite strategies is to use the YouTube’s Search Suggest feature.

All you need to do is head over to YouTube and pop in a word or phrase…

… and YouTube will hand you a bunch of keywords related to what you typed in:

These suggested keywords are GREAT.

Why?

Because these are terms that people actually type into YouTube. So there’s no need to wonder if they’re popular or not. If YouTube suggests them to you, they 1000% are.

You can also go to a popular video in your niche… and copy the same keywords that video is optimized around.

As you probably know, keyword optimization is a KEY part of YouTube SEO. So if a video has lots and lots of views, chances are, that video is optimized around a popular keyword.

To execute this step, go to another channel in your niche.

Then, sort their videos by “Most Popular”

This will show you their videos that have generated the most views:

Next, choose a video from the list. Obviously, you want to pick a video that you can create an awesome video around (more on that in step #2).

But in general, if the video is in your niche, it’ll work.

Finally, see which keywords that video is optimized around. This is easy.

Just check out the keywords that video uses in its title, description and video tags:

(To see a video’s tags, I recommend the VidIQ Chrome extension. It shows you a video’s tags right on the page)

You can also find some excellent keywords in your YouTube “Traffic Source: YouTube search” report. This report shows you all the keywords that YouTube users have searched for to find your videos.

In many cases, these are keywords that you already know about (because you optimized your videos around them).

But sometimes you’ll find a handful of keywords that you never would have thought of.

For example, here’s an example of a keyword I found in my “Traffic Sources” report:

This is a keyword I would have NEVER found using any other strategy. But I know that people are searching for it in YouTube, so it makes for a great keyword to add to my list.

Second, find the best keyword from your list

Now that you’ve generated a list of keywords, it’s time to choose the best one from your list.

Specifically, you want to target low-competition keywords.

This is ESPECIALLY important if your channel doesn’t have that many subscribers. If you swing for the fences and go after competitive keywords, your video is gonna get buried in the search results.

Instead, you want to find keywords that don’t have a lot of competition.

How do you check?

All you need to do is:

Search for your keyword in Google.

And check out the “About results”:

This number represents the total number of videos in YouTube about that topic. The higher this number, the more competitive a keyword is. So you want to targe
t keywords that have a low “About results” number.

(How low should you go? Every industry is different. So I can’t give you a specific number to shoot for. Just focus on choosing keywords that have low competition for your niche)

For example, when I search for “YouTube SEO”, there are 10,700,000 results:

That’s a lot.

So if I was just starting out, I’d try a few other keywords, like “YouTube ranking factors”.

Bingo! That keyword only has 26,800 results.

And that means that this keyword MUCH less competitive.

Finally, a bonus tip: search for your keyword in Google.

Here’s the deal:

Most views on YouTube come from within YouTube’s platform.

But don’t stop there. Your video can get 2-5x more views if you can ALSO get it to rank in Google.

How?

The trick is to optimize your videos around keywords that already have video results in Google.

You see, Google only includes videos in the search results for certain keywords.

Unlike a “normal” first page with 10 webpage results, for certain keywords Google reserves a good chunk of the first page for video results:

In general, Google tends to use video results for these types of keywords:

• How-to keywords (“how to make cold brew coffee”)
• Reviews (“beats by Dre review”)
• Tutorials (“Setting up WordPress”)
• Anything fitness or sports related (“Cardio kickboxing”)
• Funny videos (“Cute animals”)

Why is this important?

Well, let’s say you optimize your video around a keyword that doesn’t have any video results in Google. In that case, you’ll ONLY get traffic from people searching on YouTube.

But if you optimize for a video keyword, you’ll also get targeted traffic to your video directly from Google’s first page.

The question is:

How do you find these magical keywords?

All you need to do is search for one of the keywords you found in the last step.

Then see if any of the keywords you searched for have YouTube video results, like this:

Simple, right?

Once you’ve found a Video Keyword, it’s time to see if there’s any search volume for that keyword. Otherwise, you might rank in Google for a keyword that only gets 20 searches per month. That’s not worth it.

So make sure target keyword gets at least 100-1k searches per month in Google (you can find this information using the Google Keyword Planner):

Why 500 searches per month?

If you can get that video to rank in Google, then a lot of those searchers will click on YOUR video in the results.

That means you’ll get more high-quality traffic to your video, and ultimately, your site.

Here’s a real life example:

Because Backlinko is in the SEO niche, I’m going to look for video keywords using searches like “keyword research tips”, “how to build backlinks” and “SEO tutorial”.

Bingo! The keyword “SEO tutorial” brings up 3 YouTube results in Google:

Sure enough, that keyword exceeds our minimum of 500 monthly searches:

So that would be a great keyword to create a video around.

In fact, I already did

Speaking of creating your video…

Step #2: Publish a High-Retention Video

Here’s the truth:

If you want your videos to rank, you need to keep people watching.

The amount of your video that people watch is known as Audience Retention.

And YouTube has gone on the record saying: “Audience Retention” is a HUGE ranking factor. To quote YouTube:

In other words:

If your video keeps people on YouTube, YouTube will rank your video higher in the search results.

(After all, YouTube wants people to stay on the platform so they click on ads. And if you help them with that goal, they’ll promote your video).

The question is:

HOW do you create a video that keeps people engaged?

(Also known as a “High-Retention Video”)

Here are 3 simple steps that work GREAT. I had to learn these 3 steps the hard way. But thanks to this short video, you can start pumping out High-Retention Videos right away.

As you can see, High-Retention Videos DON’T require a fancy camera or microphone. Actually, you don’t really need to sweat production value that much.

As long as your video is valuable and interesting to watch, you’re good to go.

The bottom line?

If your video stinks, it won’t rank…no matter how optimized it is for SEO.

Unlike Google (uses backlinks and other signals to evaluate the quality of a piece of content) YouTube has no such luxury. So they rely on Audience Retention.

That said, Audience Interaction is one of several ranking signals that YouTube uses in its algorithm.

So let me show you the 5 other important YouTube ranking factors:

Video Comments

If someone leaves a comment, it sends a strong message to YouTube that they probably enjoyed the video (or at least engaged with it).

In fact, when I recently analyzed 1.3 million YouTube search results, I found that comments STRONGLY correlated with ranking highly in the search results:

So make sure to encourage your viewers to comment on your video… and reply to comments that you get.

“Subscribes”After Watching a Video

If someone subscribes to your channel after watching your video that sends a HUGE signal that you have an amazing video.

The best way to get more subscribers on YouTube? Ask people to subscribe. Seriously, I’ve found that asking viewers to subscribe at the end of my videos significantly boosts my monthly subscribers numbers:

Video Shares

How many people share your video on social media sites like Twitter and Facebook?

Think about it this way: people don’t share crappy videos, right? So when YouTube sees that people are spreading the word about your video, they think: “This must be an awesome piece of content!”. And they’ll give you a rankings boost.

(Also, social shares bring more people FROM those networks to YouTube… which they like).

Click-Through-Rate (CTR)

When someone searches for your keyword in YouTube, which result do they click on?

Your video… or someone else’s?

As it turns out, YouTube pays VERY close attention to this user behavior. The percentage of people that click on your result is known as “click-through-rate” (CTR). Obviously, the higher your CTR, the better.

In other words, you want YouTube searchers to click on your result.

And YouTube notices that lots of people are clicking on your result, they think: “We need to rank this video higher up in the search results!”.

On the other hand, if people are skipping over your result, they’ll drop your rankings.

The best way to boost your CTR? Create compelling thumbnails and titles.

For example, you can see that my title and thumbnail stand out from the other results for this keyword:

Thumbs up/Thumbs down

Self explanatory

Video Length

Like with text-based articles in Google, longer videos rank better.

I consistently see longer videos outperform shorter videos in YouTube and Google search.

And the data supports this. The YouTube ranking factors study that I mentioned earlier also found that longer videos have an edge over short videos (at least when it comes to YouTube SEO):

For example, if you search in YouTube for the keyword “WordPress”, 2 out of the top 4 videos are an hour long.

How long should your video be?

I wouldn’t sweat this too much. Just focus on creating the best video possible.

If it makes sense for your video to be 20+ minutes, go for it. Don’t worry about your video being too long. If it’s awesome, people WILL watch it.

The coolest part about all of these stats is that you can track all of them in the new YouTube Studio:

That way, you can see how you’re doing… and improve your videos over time.

OK so you’ve created your High-Retention video, it’s time upload and optimize it for SEO.

Step #3: YouTube Video Optimization

Here’s how to extract the most SEO value from your video:

SAY Your Target Keyword

You’ve probably noticed that YouTube now automatically transcribes your videos. And they’re pretty darn accurate:

So if YouTube sees that you mention your target keyword in your video, they’ll “hear” it. And because you’re actually SAYING the keyword that your video is optimized around, YouTube will better understand that your video is about that term.

Video Title

The title of your video should be at least 5 words long. That way, you can include your full keyword without keyword-stuffing.

For example, this video title from my channel is 10 words …only 3 of which are my target keyword (“higher Google rankings”):

Power Tip: Like with a blog post, I’ve found that you get a slight video SEO boost by putting your keyword at the beginning of the title.

So if you were trying to rank for “surfing tutorial” you’d want a title like: “Surfing Tutorial: Learn How to Ride a Wave Today”.

Description

Your video’s description is super important.

Your video description helps YouTube and Google understand the context of your video. And the better they understand your video, the higher you’ll rank (and the more often you’ll show up in the Suggested Video sidebar).

Here are the basic guidelines for the description:

• Include your keyword in the first 25 words
• Make the description at least 250 words
• Include your keyword 2-4 times

This SEO-optimized description helps tell Google and YouTube what your video is about without being spammy.

Here’s an example of a description for a video of mine that’s optimized around the keyword “On-page SEO”:

Notice how I include my keyword a couple of times… without being spammy? That’s what you want to do.

Tags

Tags aren’t super-important…but they help.

Here’s how I use video tags for my videos:

1. My first tag is my exact target keyword (Example: “Google SEO”).
2. I also include a few variations of that word or phrase (Example: “Google search engine optimization”)
3. Finally, I make a few of my tags other topics that my video covers (Example: “Link building”, “Content marketing”)

In short: just include a few keywords to help YouTube and Google learn what your video is about.

Pro Tip: Targeted tags not only help you rank for your target keyword…

…but get you to you show up more often as a related video in the sidebar area of YouTube:

So don’t be afraid to use the same tags that your competitors use. In fact, it’s a YouTube marketing best practice that has worked for YEARS.

When your video’s tags match a video that someone’s watching, you have a good chance of showing up in the Suggested Video section.

And that’s all there is to optimizing your video to rank in YouTube.

With that out of the way, it’s time for a step that many people skip over: video promotion.

We talked a lot about creating videos that maximize Audience Retention and user experience signals. Which is important.

But for YouTube to measure these signals, you need to get views on your video!

Here are some strategies you can use to get targeted views to your video:

Mention Your Video on Quora and Other Q&A Sites

Quora, forums and other Q&A sites are some of the most popular sites on the web (in fact, Quora is one of the most popular sites online).

But if you try to go in there and spam your blog content, you’re going to get banned. That’s why you want to link to YouTube videos.

And not only can you get a high quantity of views… but the views you get from Q&A sites are high-quality too.

(In other words, high-retention views)

Think about it:

You’re posting your video in a place where people are desperate for information on a given topic. So the people that watch your video will watch a good chunk of your video to help them learn more about that topic.

To execute this step, just search for a keyword that describes your video’s topic. Then, find a question that you can answer.

When you find a question that seems like a good fit, answer the person’s question as best you can. Finally, link to your video at the end of your answer.

Here’s an example:

Link To Your Video In Your Email Signature

People that email you (like your mom) generally like you.

And if you’re like me, you get A TON of emails.

So when you add a link to your latest video in your email signature, you just set up a pipeline is high-retention views.

Embed Your Videos in Blog Posts

Whenever you write a blog post (on your site or as a guest post for another site), think to yourself:

“Where can I embed a YouTube video into this post?”

For example, when I mentioned “The Skyscraper Technique” in this guide, I embedded a video to explain how the strategy worked:

This INSTANTLY got my video a few hundred high-quality views.

Use Playlists

Playlists are one of the BEST ways to get more views on your videos. After all, playlists automatically play every video in the playlist… which can lead to thousands of extra views every month.

Here’s how to set them up:

First, look over your videos. And identify 4-5 videos that have a common theme or topic. For example, when I look at the videos I’ve published on my channel, I notice that I have quite a few that cover the topic: “link building”.

Then, create a playlist that includes that set of videos.

Finally, include that playlist on your channel page. Rinse and repeat until you have at least 3 playlists on your channel.

Speaking of your channel page…

Optimize Your Channel Page

An optimized channel can help your videos rank better in two ways:

First, your channel itself can rank in YouTube. Here’s an example:

Second, a great channel page=more subscribers. And getting more subscribers can indirectly improve your rankings.

First and foremost, you want your channel page to look nice and professional. In fact, when I updated my channel page to look like this…

…I noticed an uptick in views and subs.

Also, include keywords in your channel’s about section. Here’s an example:

See how I use terms like “white hat SEO”, “link building” and “search engine optimization” in my channel description?

These are all keyword that I want to rank for in YouTube.

Obviously, you don’t want to use keyword stuffing or any shady stuff like that. Just naturally sprinkle in words and phrases that you want your videos to rank for.

Here’s What To Do Next…

OK so I hope this guide helped show you how to rank your YouTube videos.

Now I’d like to hear from you:

What’s helped you rank your videos in YouTube?

Let me know by leaving a comment below right now.

639 Comments

Next-level SEO training and link building strategies

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Windows Update exists to keep Windows and other Microsoft software updated, usually with little intervention from us. This includes security updates that are pushed out on ​Patch Tuesday.

Unfortunately, sometimes one or more of those patches will cause a problem, ranging from serious ones like error messages preventing Windows from starting or freezing the update process to less serious ones like video or audio problems.

Colleen Tighe / Lifewire 

If you’re confident that the problem you’re experiencing began only after one or more Windows updates, whether manual, automatic, on Patch Tuesday, or otherwise, continue reading for help on what to do next. This might also be a good time to look over our Windows Updates & Patch Tuesday FAQ page if you haven’t already.

Any of Microsoft’s operating systems could experience problems after Windows updates are installed, including Windows 10, Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP, and Windows Server versions.

Please read the How to Use This Troubleshooting Guide and Are You Sure This Is an Issue Caused by a Windows Update? sections below before moving on to the troubleshooting steps! To get your computer running again, you need to understand how this troubleshooting is organized, as well as make sure that your problem really was most likely caused by a Windows update.

We wouldn’t normally explain how to use a troubleshooting guide, but since you have the great fortune of a theory about the cause of your problem, the help we provide below is structured a bit differently than other tutorials we’ve created where you work through some other problem with a completely unknown cause.

Blue Screen of Death in Windows 10.

That said, the first thing you need to do is read the Are You Sure This Is an Issue Caused by a Windows Update? section below.

Even if you’re 100 percent certain that an update from Microsoft caused the problem you’re having, do us a favor and read it anyway. If you spend the next hour or two trying to fix a problem using the wrong assumption about its cause, it’s unlikely that you’re going to walk away with a working computer.

Once you’re fairly certain that your issue is directly related to the installation of one or more Windows updates, the second thing to do is decide which set of troubleshooting steps to follow: Windows Starts Successfully or Windows Does Not Start Successfully.

Just to be clear, here’s what we mean:

• Windows Starts Successfully: You have normal access to your Desktop or Start Screen. Certain programs may not work properly, you may not have access to the internet, moving around Windows may be slow, etc., but you do get all the way in.
• Windows Does Not Start Successfully: You do not have access to your Desktop or Start Screen. You may receive a Blue Screen of Death, a black screen with nothing on it, a frozen login screen, a menu of diagnostic options, etc., but you never get all the way into Windows.

To summarize, read the section immediately below this paragraph first and then scroll down and follow the correct set of troubleshooting steps for your problem, determined by how much access to Windows you have right now.

STOP! Don’t scroll down past this section because you’re beyond sure that these Microsoft updates crashed or broke your computer somehow. You’re probably right, considering that you found yourself here, but you’re wise to consider a few things first:

1. Are you sure the updates are fully installed? If the Windows update installation itself is frozen, you might see a “Preparing to configure Windows”, “Configuring Windows updates”, or similar message for a very long time.

   The troubleshooting in the two sections below is most helpful if your problem is caused by fully installed patches. If Windows is stuck during the update installation process, see instead our How to Recover From a Frozen Windows Update Installation tutorial.

2. Are you sure the update that was installed was a Windows update? The help provided below is specific to problems caused by patches made available via Windows Update by Microsoft, for Microsoft products.

   Other software companies often push updates to your computer via their own software and so have nothing to do with Microsoft or Windows Update, and would be outside the scope of this troubleshooting guide. Some popular companies that do this include Google (Chrome, etc.) Adobe (Reader, AIR, etc.), Oracle (JAVA), Mozilla (Firefox), and Apple (iTunes, etc.), among others.

3. Is your problem outside the scope of an operating system? An update to Windows can’t possibly impact an area of your computer that no operating system, including Windows, has control over.

   For example, if your computer no longer powers on at all, powers off immediately after powering on, turns on but displays nothing on the screen, or has some other problem prior to the beginning of the Windows boot process, then a recent Windows update was simply a coincidence. See How to Fix a Computer That Won’t Turn On (items 2, 3, 4, or 5) for help working through your problem.

   If you’d like to settle this question for sure, physically disconnect your hard drive and then turn on your computer. If you see the exact same behavior with your hard drive unplugged, your issue is in no way related to a Windows update.

4. Did something else happen, too? While your problem could certainly still be due to issues caused by a Windows update, you should also at least keep in mind other likely variables if any come to mind.

For example, around the day you think the update was installed, did you also install a new piece of hardware, or update a driver, or install some new software, or receive a notice about a virus that was just cleaned, etc.?

If none of the above apply to your situation, continue trou
bleshooting your problem as a Windows Update/Patch Tuesday problem by following either Windows Starts Successfully, or Windows Does Not Start Successfully below.

Follow this troubleshooting guide if you’re experiencing a problem after one or more Windows updates but you’re still able to access Windows.

1. Restart your computer. Some problems seen after Windows update installations can be corrected with a simple reboot.

   

   While it was more an issue in older versions of Windows like Windows XP, sometimes one or more updates won’t fully install on a single computer restart, especially when a large number of updates are installed simultaneously.

2. Some issues experienced after Windows updates are less “problems” and more annoyances. Before we move on to more complicated steps, here are a few relatively minor issues that we’ve encountered after some Windows updates, along with their likely solutions:

3. Complete a System Restore to uninstall the Windows update(s). This solution is very likely to work since all the changes made by the updates are reversed.

   

   During the System Restore process, choose the restore point created just prior to the installation of the Windows updates. If no restore point is available, then you won’t be able to try this step. System Restore itself must have had some issue prior to the Windows update that prevented a restore point from being automatically created.

   If System Restore fixes the problem you’ve been experiencing, see How to Prevent Windows Updates From Crashing Your PC before you do anything else. You’ll need to make changes to how Windows Update is configured, as well as follow some best practices in regards to installing the updates again, or you might experience the same exact problem when the patches try to automatically install again.

4. Run the sfc /scannow command to check for issues with, and replace if necessary, important Windows files that may be corrupted or removed.

   System File Checker (the name of the tool run by executing the sfc command) isn’t a particularly likely solution to a post-Patch-Tuesday or other Windows update issue but it’s the most logical next step if a System Restore doesn’t do the trick.

5. Test your memory and test your hard drive. While no update from Microsoft is capable of physically damaging your memory or hard drive, the recent patches, like any software installation from any company, could have been a catalyst that made these hardware issues apparent.

6. If none of the above suggestions worked then it’s very likely that the Windows updates left your computer is such a mess that you have to take more drastic, and at least somewhat destructive, measures to get it working again.

   

   Choose a repair method based on the version of Windows you have. If there’s more than one option for a given version of Windows, the first is the least destructive option, followed by the more destructive one. If you try the least destructive one and it doesn’t work, you’re left only with the more destructive option:

   Windows 10:

   You could also Clean Install Windows 10 if Reset This PC doesn’t work.

   Windows 8:

   Use Refresh Your PC to reinstall Windows 8, retaining personal files and Windows Store apps only.

   Windows 7:

   Windows Vista:

   Reinstall Windows Vista, retaining no personal files or programs. See How to Clean Install Windows Vista for help.

   Windows XP:

7. At this point, your computer should be working fine. Yes, you should still install everything listed in Windows Update, but don’t fear the same problems so long as you follow the advice in How to Prevent Windows Updates From Crashing Your PC.

Follow this troubleshooting guide if you’re unable to access Windows normally after one or more Windows updates were installed.

1. Chances are you’ve already done this several times but if not, give it a try.

   If you can tell your computer is “running hot” thanks to all the work it’s been doing trying to boot, try powering it off for an hour or so before starting it up again.

2. The Last Known Good Configuration option is only available on Windows 7, Vista, and XP.

3. If you can’t start in Safe Mode, don’t worry, just move on to the next troubleshooting step below.

4. Complete an offline System Restore to uninstall the Windows update(s). Be sure to choose the restore point created just prior to the installation of the Windows update(s).

   A typical System Restore is completed from within Windows but since you can’t access Windows right now, you’ll need to complete an offline System Restore, meaning from outside of Windows. This option is not available in Windows XP.

   Since all of the changes made by the updates are undone during this process, it’s likely to fix your problem. However, as soon as you get back into Windows, see How to Prevent Windows Updates From Crashing Your PC before you do anything else. You could experience the same problems again soon unless you make the preventative changes outlined in that article.

5. Test your memory and test your hard drive. No Windows update can physically damage your memory or hard drive but their installation, like any software installation, may have been a catalyst that brought these hardware issues to light.

6. There are a few more ideas in that troubleshooting guide that might apply to your situation, especially if you suspect that there might be a non-Windows-update reason for this error.

7. If all previous troubleshooting has failed, you’ll have to take some more invasive measures to get your computer back in working order.

   Find your version of Windows below and perform the repair task listed. If your version has more than one option, try the first one first since it’s less destructive:

   You need to know which Windows version you have to know which set of instructions you need to follow.

   Windows 10:

   You could also Clean Install Windows 10 if Reset This PC doesn’t work.

   Windows 8:

   Use Refresh Your PC to reinstall Windows 8, retaining personal files and Windows Store apps only.

   Windows 7:

   Windows Vista:

   Reinstall Windows Vista, keeping nothing (no personal files or programs). See How to Clean Install Windows Vista for help.

   Windows XP:

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January 24, 2020

in Digital Marketing, Strategy

6 Comments

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When it comes to digital marketing strategies, you can create a lengthy scroll of every available technique or technology available today. While you’ll likely hear plenty of suggestions that all or some digital marketing strategies are better than others, which ones are the most essential?

To compete in the overly competitive digital landscape of 2020, you’ll need to focus on twelve specific areas.

While you’ve probably heard about these, how many details do you really know to make each one effective? They’re all the standards for this year and into the coming decade.

Take a look at each one and see how much you really know. Then assess what elements of them you need to hone in on. These all range from SEO to landing pages. In-between, you may learn some new things about local search marketing and the ever-popular format of video.

1. SEO

There isn’t anything more important to digital marketing than SEO, something that might still mystify you in its ongoing complexity. While it’s true Google’s algorithms can still become confusing, you can better grasp how it works when you work more with the concept.

It’s always better to have an expert to manage SEO for you if you want to truly succeed. While you can learn some basics, you’ll want someone who’s worked in it a while to fully help you realize the best strategies.

One recent strategy involves new HTTPS requirements already impacting SEO results. If you’re used to using HTTP pages, Google now suggests you to switch to a HTTPS format. The reasoning behind this is many contact forms using HTTP pages aren’t deemed secure enough.

Now that Google is going to label these “non-secure”, it’s essential to update your website with the HTTPS designation. Otherwise, having a “non-secure” stamp on your site could become a new scarlet letter for your placement on search engines.

An expert SEO and digital marketing specialist helps you make this change.

2. Search Engine Marketing

If you’re new to search engine marketing, you’ll usually see it abbreviated as SEM. It’s a form of Internet marketing where you increase your SERPs through paid advertising methods.

You’ll want an expert to help you in this field as well, especially one who’s worked with Google Ads and search/display ads. In the case of Google Ads, you’ll want to educate yourself first on how the process works.

What you’ll appreciate the most is Google makes its Google Ads easy to use through their attention to customization. They let you choose whether you want graphic display ads, YouTube video ads, text-based search ads, or in-app mobile ads. All of these are going to depend on your business style and the targeted customers you need to reach.

Google makes it even easier with localized ad capability, plus superior metrics to track how well your ads work.

Don’t forget about other paid ad opportunities, especially Facebook Ads. The latter gives you ample opportunity to customize to multiple ad formats.

3. Local Search Marketing

You’re seeing a lot more attention on local search marketing in the last few years. It’ll continue being important far into the coming decade as local businesses realize the value of being found by local consumers.

To get started with local search marketing, you can again utilize more gifts from Google. Through Google My Business, you’ll be able to have your listing turn up the second someone does a Google search based on the user’s keywords. This includes your business appearing on Google Maps.

Google makes it easy to update your listing as well so nothing becomes out of date.

Don’t forget about how important online reviews are, as well as your social reputation. You’ll want to inspire customers to write positive reviews on places like Yelp. On social media, starting conversations and posting targeted content helps you utilize inbound marketing. Inbound techniques attract customers to you rather than you seeking them.

4. Content Marketing

As a connective string to inbound marketing above, content marketing is a big part of attracting a targeted audience. What’s essential about content marketing is that you need to make your content valuable, relevant, and consistent to make it worth the time of those consuming it.

In today’s time, you need to focus on creating content that can solve pain points and stay evergreen. Using shortcuts or black hat SEO tactics just to move to the top of search engines won’t work thanks to Google’s all-seeing eye.

So always keep “content is king”, as many like to put it. To make content marketing work well, you need to focus on mobile content, native advertising, influencer marketing, and marketing automation.

Think seriously about mobile content because smartphones are already making up 50% of all global devices. This is going to affect digital advertising, and how influencers promote your brand.

Automation tools send content to prospects on their mobile devices at just the right times.

5. Remarketing

Another critical aspect of digital marketing is going after prospects again with marketing content if they didn’t respond to your site’s banner ads the first time. This works by tracking these visitors through cookies and creating new ads on related sites.

You can also create new ads on your site to better target your prospects. The information you get from your site visitors gives you valuable data to tweak your ads to their pain points.

Ultimately, remarketing helps you stay more engaged with prospects, aids in brand awareness, and increases conversions. You can also gain the customers of your competitors, helping pay back any investment you place in creating new ads.

6. Responsive Web Design

Reaching customers by mobile is more or less the standard now, and that’s going to go on into the coming decade. Making your website conform to mobile screens is one of the most essential parts of digital marketing. The only way you can make this work successfully is through responsive web design.

With responsive programming, you can make your website automatically conform to all mobile screens. This is going to mean more than one format, including tablets and increasing use of smartwatches.

While you’ll have to work with a web designer to make this work, you’ll want an SEO expert for another aspect of RWD. AMP (or Accelerated Mobile Pages) is a new open-source code helping to make mobile web pages load faster.

Google gives precedence to websites using this, so take it seriously. It’s especially useful if you have a publishing site or post content to your website on a regular basis.

7. Email Marketing

No doubt you’ve done some email marketing, but how effective is it in reaching your intended targets at the right times? Email marketing is already a great tool for generating more leads than possible through any other marketing method. You can also increase your sales and conversion rates.

If you’re already suffering from overspending on other digital marketing, email marketing is one of the most affordable methods out there. In some cases, it’s free, unless using outsourced services.

Since you can combine it with other media, it’s also one of the most integrated marketing methods. You can add social share icons, plus referral reward systems. Email marketing ultimately helps you shorten your sales cycles when using compelling content.

8. Social Media Marketing

No doubt you’ve posted content to social media already. Yet, what can you do to make it more effective this year and the next?

To capture today’s audiences, Forbes notes various things, including automation to post your content when you know your audience is reading. Using tools like Hootsuite for post scheduling helps immensely when reaching users in other time zones.

You’ll also want to curate some content if possible to prove your clout. Don’t be too proud to do this since it adds luster to your expertise and brand. When you curate content from others, they’ll likely reciprocate.

Plus, don’t forget about hiring influencers to post content for you on popular social media channels.

9. Marketing Automation

As you can see, marketing automation is an important element in a lot of digital marketing techniques. Knowing more about it, in general, should become a top priority as it becomes a standard for businesses around the globe.

With 91% of successful businesses now saying automation is very important to their success, you can get a vision of what the present and future of marketing is.

To become successful with this, try looking for a CRM platform with marketing automation built-in. These can work together well because your CRM already has contact information. Automating marketing content directly to your contact list helps you integrate your marketing all in one place rather than using disparate sources.

What’s most important with automation is to keep your content consistent across all channels to avoid brand confusion.

10. Influencer Marketing

Have you thought about how you can take on a digital marketing campaign without having to spend a fortune? While you can save money doing email marketing and inbound techniques, hiring influencers does the same.

If you think hiring influencers to promote your brand online is all about hiring celebrities, think again. An influential person on social media doesn’t always have to mean being a celebrity. It can simply be someone with a lot of followers and a good track record of promoting products.

Forbes notes you need to identify top influencers first, which is going to involve a little research. You can do this by doing hashtag searches on places like Twitter to see what people are saying about topics related to your industry.

Reach out to these influencers on social media and ask them if they’d be willing to promote your brand. Some may offer to do it in exchange for free products. However, most are going to demand a fee.

Be sure to track your results to assure your ROI. Keep in mind those with fewer followers can have just as much influence as those with ten times the amount of followers.

11. Video

Over the last decade, we became a more visual culture attracted to imagery in the digital realms. A lot of this comes in various forms, but there isn’t any question video rose to the top.

We’re at the point now where more consumers of content prefer video above any other visual medium. Recent statistics show 87% of all online marketers now use video content of some sort.

A lot of this comes from massive viewership on places like YouTube. Regardless, where you post videos isn’t going to matter without compelling content.

The personalized video has become a norm lately, or at least ones directly addressing pain points of targeted viewers. The same goes with making your business look more human.

Successful video marketing can mean behind-the-scenes tours of your business, or testimonials to show the human side of your brand.  This means paying attention to one major trend in video marketing: Storytelling.

When you can tell a compelling story about your business and prove you can solve the pain points of customers, you have a can’t-miss formula.

It’s also smart to keep your videos as short as possible, if not in a series. Attention spans are as short as ever, and you’ll need to tell your story in a compact way with a compelling hook.

12. Revisiting Your Landing Pages

If you’ve already created a landing page as part of your digital marketing campaign, are you sure prospects who visited before are going to come back?

This is a question that should become the central core of your digital marketing efforts. All marketing experts reiterate how landing page traffic is the nucleus of successful inbound marketing.

The problem is your landing page perhaps isn’t very enticing at the moment. Solving this (in part) comes down to web design, including where you place your Call to Action and advertising.

It goes beyond what you place on your website, though. You’ll want to invest in PPC advertising (pay-per-click) to place ads for your site on related digital channels.

Other options include buying sponsorships with other companies, or just simple email marketing. In the latter case
, placing a link that takes the reader to your landing page for further content is a common strategy.

For CTA’s, be sure to include one on your homepage to avoid complications. Even a CTA at the end of your blog gives a connective string to your content to entice another visitation.

Plus, pay attention to the “above vs. below the fold” debates. Kissmetrics once noted that CTA placement depends on the length of your landing page. A shorter page means you should place the CTA above the folder.

Final Thoughts

Follow these twelve steps, and you’ll be off to a good start in digital marketing for the rest of the year. Expect these to stay relatively the same well into 2020 as well.

Don’t be afraid to work with digital marketing consultants (especially in SEO) so you don’t make mistakes after weeks or months of hard work.

digital marketingdigital strategyemaillocal seoseo

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Google has launched a Google Guarantee program targeted towards local businesses in the Home Services segment. This affects local businesses that offer services where they need to enter the customer’s home to render the service offering. Examples of such businesses being, plumbers, locksmiths, handymen, etc.

While this program is currently in beta and applicable only to a few cities, It’s important to be aware about how this program works since it’s something that could roll out to more verticals and locations in the future. The impact it would have on local businesses would be phenomenal.

The criteria seems to be quite strict to get accepted but once you’re in, you’re bound to get a lot more leads than anyone else who’d just be doing the regular Google Ads.

This Google Guarantee program for Home Service Businesses is still being tested out at this stage and from the signs of it so far, it seems like they’re currently looking to expand to other locations.So do keep a watch out, especially if you run a local business or manage such clients in any of the selected cities.

If you liked the video, do consider subscribing to our channel.

Transcript – 

Today, I want to talk about something interesting. Google has come up with this new advertising program which will affect a lot of local businesses. And that could change the way local businesses have to think about advertising. Now, the traditional way that you would go about advertising for your local business like a plumbing, locksmith and other businesses is you would go about AdWords.

But now, Google is coming up with something called Home Service Ads or it’s called Google Guaranteed Program. It’s currently in beta and it affects only a few cities but it’s very interesting and can change the whole dynamics of how people in the home services space, at least for now, will be affected.

So, let me walk you through some of the features and how they’re going to show the ads and may be you will get a better idea and then we can debate on what we should be thinking about if you are a local business right now.

So, as you can see this is the Google Home Service Ads page. Here they talk about okay finding customers when they need you the most, attracting you customers, built trust online, quality leads without a legwork. This is all part of the AdWords program so that’s to be noted. This is an advertising program and it’s already in beta and it’s already launched.

As you can see out here, I have searched for “locksmith San Francisco”. Now it’s interesting to note that you can see the “Google Guarantee” symbol out here. Now this is new and bound to attract a lot more clicks just by virtue of having the Google Guaranteed logo.

Now when I click on a listing out here… what happens? You come to this page saying – find the right locksmith for the job. And then now not only you get a list of all the other locksmiths you also get the “Google Guarantee”. Now, what does the Google Guarantee say? This pro is backed by the Google Guarantee which means they’re licensed, insured and pre-screened. Any job you book with them is guaranteed to be done right or your money back.

Now that’s interesting and they do background checks, whether you are insured, whether you have a license. So, essentially to be a part of this Google Guaranteed Program, you need to pass Google’s criteria. They look at your ratings, reviews, your background check… It’s super interesting.

And how it works is, you as a customer would potentially “send requests” to one or more people. And then, I am guessing Google would charge the advertiser based on the lead. And if you look through the Google Guaranteed Program, what they say is.. “You as a customer can activate the Google Guarantee and then you can submit the claim if you are not happy. And what Google does is that they will cover you with a guarantee up to $2000.

Now that’s very interesting.. How it will work, it’s still in beta so we are not sure and it’s limited to a very few categories of businesses.

Right now as you can say it’s limited to the plumber, house cleaner, locksmith, handyman, contractor, electrician, general contractors, painter, garage door pro, heating, ventilation, air conditioning and some other categories. And it’s only limited to these select few cities San Diego, Sacramento, Stockton and San Francisco Bay Area. Verticals may vary by location.

So, now what’s interesting is that Google is constantly evolving. They’re constantly looking at ways in which to make their end customers happy. Now, if you are a customer looking for locksmith or a handyman.. You are typically going to search for Google or there are other apps in various countries where you can find such handymen. But I am thinking Google wants to be a replacement in that space. And how they’re trying to build USP around it is, to not only be the source of leads but they’re also giving you a guarantee.

Now, I think that is going to attract lot more users in that space. So, as a local business, I think how you can be prepared if you fit in to one of these verticals is..In Google, if you look through their criteria they have, they will go to background checks, they will go to ratings and reviews. You need to have the appropriate licenses with appropriate authorities.

So, you need to be prepared from that end. And if you don’t have an online presence, if you don’t have good enough reviews, I think you got to start focusing on them right away. You need a web presence essentially. So, you do need to start thinking about those things.

There is not too much information available right now at this stage, so there is only so much I can hypothesize. Well all I can say is that if we have to think I think that Google will roll this out may be into more verticals and into more locations, if it works.

It’s been in beta for the last six months and apparently from the reviews that I have read, the vendors who have got a Google Guaranteed listing have got about 1800% growth in leads. As compared to other vendors who are just advertising normally. So I think it could be phenomenally impactful in terms of how much effect it will have on any one’s business.

So I think you definitely do need to research and look this up and if I do find out more information, I will post about it in future videos. So yeah just keep a watch out for “Google Guaranteed Home Service Ads segment”.

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Sameer Panjwani

Sameer Panjwani is the CEO & Founder of Mondovo.com, an online marketing toolset that helps you track your rankings, monitor your site stats and research your competitors’. A man of many talents, Sameer occasionally writes about social media marketing, content marketing and SEO. In his free time, he loves reading about the latest trends in SEO as well as spending time with his two little daughters.

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Lesson 19: Basic Troubleshooting Techniques

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Troubleshooting

Do you know what to do if your screen goes blank? What if you can’t seem to close an application, or can’t hear any sound from your speakers? Whenever you have a problem with your computer, don’t panic! There are many basic troubleshooting techniques you can use to fix issues like this. In this lesson, we’ll show you some simple things to try when troubleshooting, as well as how to solve common problems you may encounter.

General tips to keep in mind

There are many different things that could cause a problem with your computer. No matter what’s causing the issue, troubleshooting will always be a process of trial and error—in some cases, you may need to use several different approaches before you can find a solution; other problems may be easy to fix. We recommend starting by using the following tips.

• Write down your steps: Once you start troubleshooting, you may want to write down each step you take. This way, you’ll be able to remember exactly what you’ve done and can avoid repeating the same mistakes. If you end up asking other people for help, it will be much easier if they know exactly what you’ve tried already.
• Take notes about error messages: If your computer gives you an error message, be sure to write down as much information as possible. You may be able to use this information later to find out if other people are having the same error.
• Always check the cables: If you’re having trouble with a specific piece of computer hardware, such as your monitor or keyboard, an easy first step is to check all related cables to make sure they’re properly connected.
• Restart the computer: When all else fails, restarting the computer is a good thing to try. This can solve a lot of basic issues you may experience with your computer.

Using the process of elimination

If you’re having an issue with your computer, you may be able to find out what’s wrong using the process of elimination. This means you’ll make a list of things that could be causing the problem and then test them out one by one to eliminate them. Once you’ve identified the source of your computer issue, it will be easier to find a solution.

Scenario:

Let’s say you’re trying to print out invitations for a birthday party, but the printer won’t print. You have some ideas about what could be causing this, so you go through them one by one to see if you can eliminate any possible causes.

First, you check the printer to see that it’s turned on and plugged in to the surge protector. It is, so that’s not the issue. Next, you check to make sure the printer’s ink cartridge still has ink and that there is paper loaded in the paper tray. Things look good in both cases, so you know the issue has nothing to do with ink or paper.

Now you want to make sure the printer and computer are communicating correctly. If you recently downloaded an update to your operating system, it might interfere with the printer. But you know there haven’t been any recent updates and the printer was working yesterday, so you’ll have to look elsewhere.

You check the printer’s USB cord and find that it’s not plugged in. You must have unplugged it accidentally when you plugged something else into the computer earlier. Once you plug in the USB cord, the printer starts working again. It looks like this printer issue is solved!

This is just one example of an issue you might encounter while using a computer. In the rest of this lesson, we’ll talk about other common computer problems and some ways to solve them.

Simple solutions to common problems

Most of the time, problems can be fixed using simple troubleshooting techniques, like closing and reopening the program. It’s important to try these simple solutions before resorting to more extreme measures. If the problem still isn’t fixed, you can try other troubleshooting techniques.

Problem: Power button will not start computer

• Solution 1: If your computer does not start, begin by checking the power cord to confirm that it is plugged securely into the back of the computer case and the power outlet.
• Solution 2: If it is plugged into an outlet, make sure it is a working outlet. To check your outlet, you can plug in another electrical device, such as a lamp.
• Solution 3: If the computer is plugged in to a surge protector, verify that it is turned on. You may have to reset the surge protector by turning it off and then back on. You can also plug a lamp or other device into the surge protector to verify that it’s working correctly.
• Solution 4: If you are using a laptop, the battery may not be charged. Plug the AC adapter into the wall, then try to turn on the laptop. If it still doesn’t start up, you may need to wait a few minutes and try again.

Problem: An application is running slowly

• Solution 1: Close and reopen the application.
• Solution 2: Update the application. To do this, click the Help menu and look for an option to check for Updates. If you don’t find this option, another idea is to run an online search for application updates.

Problem: An application is frozen

Sometimes an application may become stuck, or frozen. When this happens, you won’t be able to close the window or click any buttons within the application.

• Solution 1: Force quit the application. On a PC, you can press (and hold) Ctrl+Alt+Delete (the Control, Alt, and Delete keys) on your keyboard to open the Task Manager. On a Mac, press and hold Command+Option+Esc. You can then select the unresponsive application and click End task (or Force Quit on a Mac) to close it.
• Solution 2: Restart the computer. If you are unable to force quit an application, restarting your computer will close all open apps.

Problem: All programs on the computer run slowly

• Solution 1: Run a virus scanner. You may have malware running in the background that is slowing things down.
• Solution 2: Your computer may be running out of hard drive space. Try deleting any files or programs you don’t need.
• Solution 3: If you’re using a PC, you can run Disk Defragmenter. To learn more about Disk Defragmenter, check out our lesson on Protecting Your Computer.

Problem: The computer is frozen

Sometimes your computer may become completely unresponsive, or frozen. When this happens, you won’t be able to click anywhere on the screen, open or close applications, or access shut-down options.

• Solution 1 (Windows only): Restart Windows Explorer. To do this, press and hold Ctrl+Alt+Delete on your keyboard to open the Task Manager. Next, locate and select Windows Explorer from the Processes tab and click Restart. You may need to click More Details at the bottom of the window to see the Processes tab.
• Solution 2 (Mac only): Restart Finder. To do this, press and hold Command+Option+Esc on your keyboard to open the Force Quit Applications dialog box. Next, locate and select Finder, then click Relaunch.
• Solution 3: Press and hold the Power but
  ton. The Power button is usually located on the front or side of the computer, typically indicated by the power symbol. Press and hold the Power button for 5 to 10 seconds to force the computer to shut down.
• Solution 4: If the computer still won’t shut down, you can unplug the power cable from the electrical outlet. If you’re using a laptop, you may be able to remove the battery to force the computer to turn off. Note: This solution should be your last resort after trying the other suggestions above.

Problem: The mouse or keyboard has stopped working

• Solution 1: If you’re using a wired mouse or keyboard, make sure it’s correctly plugged into the computer.
• Solution 2: If you’re using a wireless mouse or keyboard, make sure it’s turned on and that its batteries are charged.

Problem: The sound isn’t working

• Solution 1: Check the volume level. Click the audio button in the top-right or bottom-right corner of the screen to make sure the sound is turned on and that the volume is up.
• Solution 2: Check the audio player controls. Many audio and video players will have their own separate audio controls. Make sure the sound is turned on and that the volume is turned up in the player.
• Solution 3: Check the cables. Make sure external speakers are plugged in, turned on, and connected to the correct audio port or a USB port. If your computer has color-coded ports, the audio output port will usually be green.
• Solution 4: Connect headphones to the computer to find out if you can hear sound through the headphones.

Problem: The screen is blank

• Solution 1: The computer may be in Sleep mode. Click the mouse or press any key on the keyboard to wake it.
• Solution 2: Make sure the monitor is plugged in and turned on.
• Solution 3: Make sure the computer is plugged in and turned on.
• Solution 4: If you’re using a desktop, make sure the monitor cable is properly connected to the computer tower and the monitor.

Solving more difficult problems

If you still haven’t found a solution to your problem, you may need to ask someone else for help. As an easy starting point, we’d recommend searching the Web. It’s possible that other users have had similar problems, and solutions to these problems are often posted online. Also, if you have a friend or family member who knows a lot about computers, they may be able to help you.

Keep in mind that most computer problems have simple solutions, although it may take some time to find them. For difficult problems, a more drastic solution may be required, like reformatting your hard drive or reinstalling your operating system. If you think you might need a solution like this, we recommend consulting a professional first. If you’re not a computer expert, it’s possible that attempting these solutions could make the situation worse.

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Backlinks are links created on other sites that link to your site. As such, you don’t always know when they are created. In a previous article, “So You Want Backlinks,” guidelines were given on backlink building. When it comes time to build backlinks, you don’t have to do everything from scratch. Rather, you can analyze your site’s URLs, determine what backlinks already exist, and tap into existing best practices for link building, which improves your search engine optimization (SEO).

More importantly, a lot of bad practices were mentioned in the previous article. These were practices that can hurt your site including getting links from spammy sites, having broken links to your site, and more. Find these potential toxic backlinks on other sites can be easy if you have the right tool! In fact, there are a number of tools that can help you work with backlinks.

A Caution on Backlinks and Tools

In addition to helping you structure backlinks, they can also help you with suggestions on backlinks you should ask to be removed. Automated tools are not perfect. You should review any suggestions to remove (or even keep) backlinks. There are times when it might make sense to keep a link that is flagged as having an issue. There might also be times when a tool doesn’t catch that a link really isn’t appropriate.

There are tools that focus specifically on backlinking. There are also SEO tools that have sections focused on backlinking as part of a larger overall SEO approach. Both types of tools can be effective. The key benefit of the tools is to get a list of existing backlinks to your site or a page on your site as well as to get insights on the benefit or toxicity of each link. If the tool can help you with getting links removed, that can be a benefit as well.

You want to avoid tools that offer to build automatic backlinks for you.

The Backlinking Tools

The following are four tools that can be used to identify and manage backlinks. These are tools that have been identified as useful for backlink analysis. There is a brief description of each of these below.

• SEMRush
• AHrefs
• Open Site Explorer
• OpenLinkProfiler

Note that there are a multitude of other tools marketed for backlink analysis and building. Many of the tools suggested to me for this article included features for selling backlinks, building automated backlinks, and for tracking backlink trades. As such, they were dropped from this article. These are bad practices, and thus worth avoiding.

Backlink Tool 1: SemRush

SEMRush provides a multitude of tools including a Backlink Audit tool that will give you deep insights into the links coming to your site. You can configure it to look at backlinks in a number of ways as well see individual backlinks. In addition to providing data such as backlink types, domain distribution, top anchors, country sources, and a list of linking domains, SEMRush also provides a toxicity score for each backlink that lets you know the potential for negative impact.

Basic features of SEMRush can be used at no cost.

Figure 1: SemRush Backlink data for MSN.com

Backlink Tool 2: AHrefs

Ahrefs is another of the more popular SEO tools known for its backlink tools. Ahrefs provides competitive analysis, keyword research, backlink research. Within the backlink data, you can get information on the new and broken backlinks, referring domains, anchor tags, top referring content, and more.

Ahrefs is not a free tool, but they do provide a low-cost trial.

Figure 2: Ahref backlink data for HTMLGoodies.com

Backlink Tool 3: Open Site Explorer

Open Site Explorer is a part of the Moz Pro SEO tools. Like the previous two tools mentioned, Open Site Explorer provides tools to help you identify and optimize your backlink strategy. This includes showing backlinks to your site, providing spam scores, showing a spam score (similar to SEMRush’s toxicity score) for links, and more. Open Site Explorer helps you identify which of your pages are most valuable, which domains are best of those linking to your site, what text is being used to build the links, and more. It also provides linking opportunities and helps you to avoid penalties by showing you which links to clean up.

You can access a limited portion of Open Site Explorer’s functionality online. There is also a 30-day free trial. Otherwise, you need a subscription to Moz to continue to use the product.

Figure 3: Moz Open Site Explorer

Backlink Tool 4: OpenLinkProfiler

OpenLinkProfiler is a free online tool that can be used to do backlink analysis. You can go to the website as shown in Figure 4 and simply enter a site URL. Once you do, you’ll get a backlink analysis similar to what is shown in Figure 5.

Figure 4: OpenLinkProfiler page for entering a domain

As you can see in Figure 5, OpenLinkProfiler provides information on active links relative to the domain you entered. You can get anchor text, when the link was added as well as the industry and topic of some of the links. A Risk score similar to the toxicity and spam scores from other tools, can also be found to determine which links are potentially harmful. While SEOLink Profiler comes at no cost, to use some of the features, such as link notifications the exporting of a PDF report, you will need to set up a free account.

Figure 5: OpenLinkProfiler review of HTMLGoodies.com

Dealing with Bad Links

What do you do if you find bad backlinks on another site? There are generally two approaches that are taken. One is to ask that the link be removed. The other is to ask that the link be tagged with a ‘rel=nofollow’ tag. If a link already has a ‘rel=nofollow’ tag included, then no further action is really needed unless the site containing the link is really one you don’t want to be associated with.

Dealing with the removal of links to disavow them from your site is a process in itself that is worthy of its own article. In general, using a disavow tool should be a last resort for spammy backlinks. You can use the Google Search Console to disavow links. Additionally, most of the tools mentioned in this article not only show you how bad a backlink might be for your site, they generally include tools to help you disavow them as well. Look for an article on disavowing bad backlinks in the near future!

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In my line of work I get many calls about the below common problems and if I was to estimate I would say that at least 25% of them could be solved using the list below to troubleshoot the cause. Not only will this get you up and running quicker with a sense of achievement it will also save you the cost of a  technician coming out and charging you to just change a fuse for example. It could be that a cable has been accidentally pulled out or maybe your dog has chewed it all these things are worth checking before calling someone to take a look.

Just because your computer monitor won’t come on or your mouse won’t work does not mean that you have a virus or you need a new computer the solution could be much simpler. If you don’t find the solution here remember these are only very basic checks that all of us can forget to do before panicking about it been a more severe problem. It is not intended to be an advanced guide to computer problems but hopefully it will help before you decide what you need to do next.

Problem	Possible Solution/Cause
Computer will not start	Check all cables are plugged in and switches turned on. Check monitor is turned on and plugged into the computer. Change fuse in cable.Check extension if using one. Try a different known working socket. Change power lead. Check no buttons or switches are stuck.
No sound coming from computer	Check that your speakers are on and plugged in Check that the speaker is connected to the right port (Green to Green) Check the volume is turned up Check you don’t have sound muted (icon in taskbar) Try plugging in ear phones to rule out broken speakers
Monitor screen blank	Check monitor is correctly connected Check monitor is plugged in and turned on Check connection to computer is not loose
Computer Boots but wont launch windows	Can you boot into safe mode? (F8 on start-up) if yes the problem is likely to be something software related rather than hardware. Run malware, virus scans If you can’t boot into safe mode try booting into your computers repair my computer mode to fix start-up issues Try using system restore if you can boot to safe mode or recovery to restore to a previous date
Slow internet	Reboot your router and restart your computer (reboot router by unplugging and plugging back in after 5 minutes) Check for malware and spyware infections. Check there are no problems with your provider Check other reasons for slow internet speeds here
Wireless connection dropping	Reboot both the computer and the router Change the wireless channel Move the router to a more central location Extend your network using powerline adapters Extend your wireless network with a Wireless N Range Extender If your aerial is removable replace with a TP-Link TL-ANT2405C 2.4GHz 5dbi Indoor Omni-Directional Antenna or similar to increase range.
Mouse wont work or wont work correctly	Ensure mouse is connected correctly to the back of the computer. If wireless change mouse batteries. Ensure mouse is being picked up by receiver (likely a red button on bottom of mouse). Check that receiver has not fallen out of range
Keyboard wont work	Check batteries in Keyboard Check it is connected properly Ensure it is being picked up by the receiver (red button on bottom)
No internet connection or Local only	Check all connections to router and that they are correctly plugged in Check none of the cables are damaged Restart router and restart computer Check for red lights on the router (indicates there is a problem with the router) Check all sockets have an ADSL filter connected Change ADSL filters Connect router to master phone socket Check with service provider that your service is not disrupted Try another router
Computer running very slow or sluggish	Check that no antivirus scans are running Close some programs if running multiple programs Malware and virus check Low memory Many more reasons with deeper explanations can be found at – Reasons for your computer running slow

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