So one of the things I've always wanted to do is use an Analytics tools API to enrich the data about a visit. Clicky is one of the few tools out there that have a well detailed API that allows you to push in extra data during the visit. The extra data bit I really [...]
Tweaking websites is what we do here at Yoast, from search engine rankings, to speed to user experience.
Yoast founder Joost de Valk and guests provide tips on optimizing WordPress, Magento, search engine rankings, analytics and website performance. We also offer the SEO tools, Magento extensions and WordPress plugins to make it all possible!
Practical Guide to 404 Error Pages: What WordPress is Missing
I make mistakes. You make mistakes. We all do. And some of these mistakes end up providing our readers with a 404 page. Chances are that page says "Error 404: file not found". How does that help your visitor?
Instead of just identifying the problem, your 404 page needs to offer a solution.
In the default [...]
Clicky Tracking for WordPress
The guys at Clicky recently wrote a post asking someone to re-develop their WordPress plugin. Since I have quite a bit of code lying around for what they needed, I emailed them and told them I'd be happy to build it. If you don't know Clicky, you really should check it out, it's a pretty [...]
Categories: WordPress
Plugin Compatibility data now crowdsourced
One of the things Mark Jaquith and I talked about when Mark was on Press This a month back, in the episode aptly titled the Future of WordPress, was that Automattic would be adding a way for people to indicate whether a certain plugin was working for them or not, regardless of what the plugins [...]
Categories: WordPress
Quick WP tip #2: Conditional Thickbox loading
Another quick tip to help you optimize your site: sometimes you want to load one or more images in a post in a nice Thickbox or Lightbox. But in most cases, you don't need to load these scripts, wouldn't it be cool if you could load these scripts only when you want them to load?
I [...]
Categories: WordPress
WordPress Debug Theme
Warning: major geekery ahead! Sometimes you need to see what's wrong with a WordPress install, and you need to see it fast. I've had a set of hacks around for a while to do that, but finally started combining it into a WordPress Debug Theme. This theme is quite simple for now, as it only [...]
Categories: WordPress
Upgrading issues with WordPress MU
I was upgrading a WordPress MU site we work on and came across an annoying issue: core update wouldn't work the way it's supposed to. I got the following error:
Unpacking the update.
Could not copy files.
Installation Failed.
After a bit of Googling I found a thread in the WordPress forums that contained a gem of a fix:
In [...]
Categories: WordPress
VideoPress: Web Video, WordPress Style
This morning I was pleasantly surprised to find a new advertiser had signed on to my blog. The guys at Automattic have placed an ad for VideoPress, and I had to admit that I had briefly looked at the service but hadn't done anything with it yet. I guess this was a good time to [...]
Categories: WordPress
Quick WP tip: pagination classes
One of my colleagues was working on a site for a client of ours, and needed to apply styling to the previous and next post link. As in most of our sites we use Lester Chan's excellent wp-pagenavi plugin so I dove into that to check how I could style it.
Turns out Lester is [...]
Categories: WordPress
Searching Without Result
Justin Cutroni wrote a great post a while back on Tracking Zero Result Searches in Google Analytics. Tracking zero result searches on your website (corporate site, e-commerce website or your blog) is vital to get a glimpse of what your visitors are looking for but can't find on your website.
Beneath you will find more info [...]
Categories: Analytics