I’ve had multiple conversations in the past few days about the foundations of web design in a marketing-centric world, and it’s very interesting to hear other people’s take on the effectiveness of web site design.  I’ve talked to one who was completely downplaying site design and instead focusing on content mostly, and on the other extreme, I’ve had back and forth discussions with one whom site design is the key to a relevant marketable site.  So, is there a right or wrong answer?  While I believe that relevant content is definitely going to keep the user in the site, the design plays a role in determining whether or not the user is going to even want to try to stay there.   Here’s my 2 cents:

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Now that I have had more time to spend on playing around with Google, there are a handful of things that I can see working well for them in comparison to the other browsers.

I noticed that opening new tabs in Google now function similarly to how FF does now, where a new tab will open up at the very end of the set of tabs open.  From what I remembered initially, a new tab will open up next to the current open tab available, which I liked a lot.  I’m not fond of tabs being opened at the very end, as I usually have multiple tabs open simultaneously, and having to scroll to the tab I opened can be a pain.  With FF, to offset having to scroll to view the tab I just opened, I can just click on the FF tab showcase plugin to view all the tabs, and I’m unsure if there are similar plugins for Chrome.

I do like how, on an existing tab, if you right-click a link and select open in a new tab, it goes directly next to that existing tab that you clicked from.  FF/IE doesn’t function that way, and that sucks.

When I sign in to my web-based emails, I love how Chrome has my login highlighted and ready for me to enter my information.  It beats having JUST that blinking text line, which doesn’t help much on both FF and IE.  However, I’m still seeing some quirks on my yahoo account when I access it on Chrome.  Not as much as I have seen before, but still… something to think about.

I do like how Google has the recently viewed sites at the very first opening of the browser, which I think is very helpful if you don’t have an existing home page.  Again, it reminds me of a plugin that I have for FF.

I don’t like how I have to hold down the “back” button to get the history of the sites I have browsed.  FF and IE both have that dropdown arrow that lists my visited sites, which I can just click instead of having to hold a button.  I think from a user standpoint it makes you work harder for what you want to do versus providing the user as much ammo as possible to do little work in order to be more productive.

Downloading files can also be somewhat mundane with Chrome.  Chrome’s download functionality, while it does seem seemless when downloading individual files, does not seem to be user-friendly when it comes to collecting all the downloaded files simultaneously.  You have to open up each download file window or double-click on that file within the download file window to be able to access that specific file.  FF has a download window which stores all downloaded files and items for you, which provides all downloaded files in one location versus multiple windows.  I have not yet tried downloading multiple files within multiple tabs to find out if I have to click on each individual tabs to get to the download file window, but that is something I would definitely investigate.

I don’t believe that Chrome will take over IE or FF anytime soon, but give it a few more years and I can see that there may be some shift in the browser market share.

I recently read an article from WebProNews.com about how blogging success takes a few months (i.e. time and work) to generate links and traffic to that specific blog. “Content is king, but not always the case in blogs,” they say, “especially when someone with more experience and knowledge can do it bigger and better.” I guess you can say that this is old news to experienced bloggers and online marketers. But in reality, this is not necessarily common knowledge to the masses. Why? Because most bloggers blog to share what they have to say, regardless of any marketing intentions, agendas or lack thereof. Whatever opinions you have, you can voice it, and who cares what people think. Right?

So if other people [bloggers] can do it better than you, then you should care what people think, especially if those people happen to be the same audience that other people are addressing to. I love my pastor’s statement that words are very important because it means EVERYTHING. Making one mistake can alter a word’s meaning, which then alters the whole sentence and changes the meaning and direction of every statement you want to portray. And in online marketing, it is making words count that will generate your audience’s attention and ultimately links and traffics to your site. It boils down to market share, and what you have to say can affect how your site generates rankings and traffic. That, in turn, will affect the way your online brand value and overall online authority are projected to your audience. And THAT will affect your bottom line.