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Aarron Walter

XHTML | CSS |

My Book: Building Findable Websites

Building Findable Websites: Web Standards, SEO, and Beyond
Building Findable Websites: Web Standards, SEO, and Beyond
Aarron Walter
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Companies waste fortunes seeking a magic bullet for Search Engine Optimization. But the keys to honest, effective web findability are appropriate writing and semantic markup. Aarron Walter’s wonderfully lucid and informative book tells everything you need to know to get your web content (or your client’s) in front of as many appreciative readers as possible.

- Jeffrey Zeldman, founder, Happy Cog Studios author, Designing With Web Standards, 2nd Edition

Now playing on my computer

Cool Hunting, Gregory Mitnick – CH Video - How to M... Track | Artist
Amon Tobin – Sultan Drops Track | Artist
Darrell Banks – Beautiful Feelings Track | Artist
Little country Giants – Come Go With Me Track | Artist
The Killers – The World We Live In Track | Artist
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Recent Photos From Flickr

DSCN7577, Sat, 13 Feb 2010 07:32:38 -0800 DSCN7574, Sat, 13 Feb 2010 07:32:14 -0800
DSCN7573, Sat, 13 Feb 2010 07:31:50 -0800 DSCN7572, Sat, 13 Feb 2010 07:31:26 -0800
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Win a Free Pass to HTML5, CSS3, Microformats, and Findability Online Workshops

05 Jan . 2010

The fabulous folks at Environments for Humans are presenting four separate online workshops on January 14-15 topics on some great topics relevant to all web designers and developers: HTML, CSS3, Microformats, and Findability. The Workshop Summit Series lets you build your skill set without having to leave your computer. Each Summit is a virtual conference—all you need is a computer and broadband internet connection to attend. The Workshop Summit Series consists of four three hour sessions spread over two days. Attendees can chat with each other and ask questions of the presenters throughout the day.

Here’s who will be speaking:

Want to attend all of these workshops for free? Simply tweet the following message by noon (ET/-5 GMT) Jan 13 for your chance to win a free pass (that’s a $749.00 value in case you’re counting):

Get 10% off HTML5, CSS3, Microformats, and Findability online workshops with discount code WKSHOPAARRONW http://ow.ly/T1xh /via @aarron

I will announce the winner on Twitter on January 13. Follow @aarron to see if you won.

See Me Speak in 2009

19 Jan . 2009

2009 is shaping up to be a busy year for me. I’m going to be speaking at a number of conferences around the United States, and I hope to meet you at one of them to share a beer and conversation about our craft. 

Here’s where I’ll be speaking:

February 3, 2009: Web Directions North at Denver, CO 

Ed Directions, a highly focused, in depth whole day symposium aims to address the challenges of educating web professionals, by helping teachers, trainers, course and curriculum developers, and others in the education field keep abreast with the latest developments in standards and best practice, and to develop and deliver the best possible curricula and courses.

 

March 16th, 2009: No Web Professional Left Behind at SxSW Interactive

Far too often, students aspiring to be web professionals leave school with a degree yet without adequate training to prepare them for the real world. The Web Standards Project (WaSP) announces a living curriculum to help schools, colleges and universities bridge the gap between educators and industry best practices.

 

April 28th, 2009: Social CMS at Voices That Matter: Web Design

Rather than locking down your content by publishing in one place, learn to use the power of social networking tools to broadcast your content widely and improve findability.

 

May 5th, 2009: Findability Bliss Through Web Standards at An Event Apart Seattle

Connecting with your audience is objective number one for any website. Findability—the discipline of helping users discover the content they seek—not only helps businesses get their message out, but it improves the user experience, too. The secret to attaining findability bliss, both with search engines and beyond, lies in the wisdom of web standards.

 

June 23th, 2009: Findability Bliss Through Web Standards at An Event Apart Boston

Connecting with your audience is objective number one for any website. Findability—the discipline of helping users discover the content they seek—not only helps businesses get their message out, but it improves the user experience, too. The secret to attaining findability bliss, both with search engines and beyond, lies in the wisdom of web standards.

Findability/SEO Cheat Sheet: Quick Guide to Web Standards SEO

28 Jul . 2008

When I was researching my book, I asked a group of my students at The Art Institute of Atlanta what sorts of content they’d hope to find in a book exploring findability and SEO through web standards. Thinking like students with limited time to work on their projects, they all agreed that “the book should include coverage of what needs to be prioritized, and what can be done later if you run out of time”. Brilliant idea! I never would have thought of that. Well it’s covered in chapter 9 thanks to them.

As I was running through my table of contents with them, they pointed out that it’s all useful info, but it would be nice if there were a quick reference that you could just print out and keep nearby as you start new projects. That way you don’t miss any of the important stuff you should be doing to make your site findable.

I’ve created what I think is a pretty comprehensive findability strategy cheat sheet that will guide you through all of the stuff you should be doing when creating new websites or even redesign existing ones. All of the advice follows industry best practices and web standards, and have references to the places in my book or in the 5 free online chapters where you’ll find detailed explanation and examples of how to do this stuff.

I hope you find it useful!

download free findability strategy cheatsheet [PDF 200k]

Book Review: Designing the Obvious, Designing the Moment

13 Jul . 2008

User Experience Designer Robert Hoekman Jr has written a pair of wonderfully lucid books that examine best practices in interaction design. In Designing the Obvious, and Designing the Moment, Hoekman extolls the virtues of understanding specific user tasks rather than generalized user personas. It’s easiest to design usable interfaces when the activity it serves is clearly understood.
Read on »

Findability in A List Apart Issue 255

27 Mar . 2008

A List Apart recently published an article I wrote entitled Findability, the Orphan of the Web Design Industry. It’s a story of a sadly neglected little boy named Findability whose siblings―Information Architecture, Usability, Project Management, Design, and Development― all garner ample attention from folks in a web design agency while he remains unnoticed despite his essential role to the success of all projects.

Read on »