File size

This morning I was asked by a third party agency I'm working with to reduce the file size of an image I had supplied. It occurred to me that I haven't thought about file size's in a long time; it's just one of those things I assume happens. The image, a small image in terms of dimension (slightly smaller than the highly relevant larger woman below) was 700kb. It got me wondering in a world where most people have fast broadband on their PC's but slower connections on their mobiles exactly what is a good file size these days? It used to be the smaller the better, but then again there must be a balance between byte saving and quality.

I'm sure designers and site-builders do think about file-sizes. If they don't they should be  Search engine's will penalise slow sites in their rankings so having a 700kb image is just stupid. If you downloaded that on your phone it would practically be indescent (my poor inadequate tarriff).

 

So what is a good size? What can you do make things smaller (and I don't mean stand in the cold). I thought it was probably just smaller image sizes, good compression, simple design. A quick Google search tells me that, as usual, things have moved on since 1995.

Check out Yahoo's tips on speeding up your site.

It talks about everything from managing cache, using content delivery networks,  how you code, etc. Optomising images is just a tiny tiny bit of it. 

Anyway check it out and consider if you need to start putting your website on a diet.

SEO

I found this a useful 15 minute insight into SEO... basically it tells me what I knew anyway; but it's easily digestible. Probably a bit old now, but still helpful.

The great click debate

I recently had a debate with some colleagues about the effictiveness of banner advertising (which personally I hate - but I also understand they are the means to a free internet).

Here's an interesting article on the great click debate one of them just forwarded to me.

I think my conclusion was these ads are fine if they aren't invasive and are relevant. By invasive I mean in two ways, 1) not in my face - if it sits there being an ad then fine, if an exploding helicopter flies across my screen or a pop up is produced then it can cock off! 2) It respects my privacy, I don't mind if the ads served to me are done so due to my surfing behaviour - just as long as I'm not being tracked or havin bots and malare installed to do so.

SEO

I've been asked a classic question, "How do we appear at the top of Google?" The response they want is "For £30 per month you'll appear at the top".

I'm vaguely aware of the reality which is you can't gaurantee anything.

I'm going to start by reading:
http://www.2createawebsite.com/traffic/search-engine-traffic.html 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_engine_optimization#Relationship_with_search_engines