However, there are endless possibilities for us in the web design world – it is quite easy to grow both in skills and personal experience. Each one of us has a life planned and a path he wants to follow, even if there are many overwhelming challenges to get through.

But sometimes you just have to ask yourself, what is it you want to achieve during your career?

Image by DoBeRaGi.

Answering this question is not easy to do and to get the best answer you need to look back at how you started. What feelings did your first job give you? Did you become a designer by accident, or was it something you always planned? Do you want to work as a designer for your whole life, or is it just something you want to use to get a bigger role in the future? It is important to answer these questions because each aspect brings about different outcomes. Some future outcomes bring much more than the others and if you always wanted to become a web designer, then it is highly likely you will always be happy with your career choice. Designing only for the money might not make you so proud of yourself – Steve jobs once declared he would rather go to bed every night knowing he did something great the previous day than being the richest person in the cemetery.

There are lots of reasons why an individual wants to be a designer. You might be a creative person, like the fact that you have the opportunity to work freelance, enjoy mixing both left and right brain work by coding and designing at the same time or enjoy working in a sector that is growing. Of course there are many other reasons, but these seem to be the most popular.

If you still need to plan your career path, then there are two things you should do. First, make a list of things that make you get up all excited in the morning when you go to work. Then, make a list of things you think should be improved. Afterwards, make a short narrative about how your career has been to this point. Clarify your roles and what you like and don’t like about your career. Lots of new job descriptions are written every year, so you might as well be the creator of your new job if you feel like it, but you first need to know where you want to head to in order to reach that point.

Image by Mr. T in DC.

If you are in the field because you are a creative individual, then design is definitely for you. You can be the creative director of a company because creative people tend to do really well when being in charge of a focused area of work. They might not be the best managers or business people, but they are definitely great at managing teams in their field.

If your main skill is flexibility, you are most likely what every company owner looks for. You can be everything, from outsourcing partner to company partner. You probably have the highest chance of living the dream and creating your own business. You probably like managing people, being in charge and taking care of every small detail – then this is for you. You can step by step decrease the number of hours worked for others and increase the hours spent on building your own company. In a few years this company might bring you money without you having to lift a finger.

If coding and designing are what you’re in for, you are great for working in a company or even freelance. You can develop interfaces, applications and even advise people in regards to what might be best for them when they decide to create a website. If you want to aim as high as possible, right now that would probably be Apple. I doubt there is better design out there, both for their web identity and for their products. I am sure there is a reason behind many Product and Industrial Design programs using Apple’s products as case studies.

If you’re in it for the money, you can pretty much accomplish this everywhere. However, I advise you that being in something for the money only brings short term enjoyment and you might have to change careers several times throughout your working life. In the design field you would be suitable for an executive staff job more than a regular day to day coding job. You can also start your own business and if you are flexible and good enough, this will make good money for you.

Image by Doug88888.

What you want to achieve depends also on what you want to focus on. Do you want to provide for your family and make sure they have everything they need? Do you want to offer services for the small companies who need start-up help? Do you want to provide services for specific communities only? I have a friend who owns a company that focuses on churches. They only design for churches and they have quite the portfolio. It is totally up to you what you focus on, but remember every decision you make will reflect upon you later in your career.

To give you a more specific answer, Mark Zuckerberg makes donations. Google’s co-founders have become philanthropists. Adriana Huffington wrote about how to maintain your health if you live and work in a fast-paced digital environment. Every one of those is a legacy they left behind. What is it you want to leave behind?

Some other questions you might ask yourself are: do you want to design for you or for others? Do you want to take direct responsibility for your actions? What kinds of websites do you like to design? Are you more excited about coding or actually building interfaces? Do you want to write about design or actually do it – or both?

Image by espy786.

Working as a web designer is hard work, and many times you will have to spend more than 60 hours per week forcing ideas out. Challenges are out there at every step and it is purely impossible not to run into  them now and then. If you know what you want from life and mostly from your web design career, and you are ready to work hard for it, it is difficult not to enjoy great times. Before making a decision, think about what you want to achieve – then work for it, and sooner than you think you will find yourself on the right path.

Until next time, let’s hear your opinions on this topic. Do you think you made the right choice? Is there something you would like to change in your approach?

Unfortunately, without a boss or supervisor breathing down your neck, the accountability starts to decrease and freelancers can become entangled in a web of distractions and procrastination without even realizing it.

Facebook, emails, Twitter, blog comments, your mother calling to gossip about the family —all of these and more vie for your attention.

Distractions

Image credits

Distractions are all around you, from your telephone and your neighbor’s barking dog to Facebook and a YouTube video that has been calling your name.

Do any of these distract you too? I know I have fallen prey to these types of distractions more than once.

• Your mother calls and you pick up the phone while in the middle of a client’s project…how can you leave your mother hanging?

• Your friend emails you about his latest accomplishment…how can you not call him back? He deserves a quick congratulations. You can finish your work later.

• A client emails you about a project but it is not a rush. You feel obligated to answer even though you need to finish what you are working on. You will finish the project later. The email will only take a few minutes.

LATER

This word will take on a life of its own if you do not omit it from your mind’s vocabulary. Trust me, distractions always last more than a few minutes, even if they are only one minute long. If you add that time up, it will amount to money you could be making doing more projects.

Friends and Family

Consider your workday similar to how you would work for an employer. Our friends and family don’t seem to understand that just because we work from home doesn’t mean we are available during the day. When I started freelancing, I often was asked to help family and friends with tasks during the day. Because I was working from home I decided it was not a big deal. I soon realized that these activities were stealing my productivity. It was time for me to consider my workday the same as anyone else in corporate America or anyone who works for an employer.

How do you resist these distractions?

First, create a daily schedule…

Scheduling

Image by iotdfi

If you don’t set daily goals, you will open up the door to many distractions. It’s nearly impossible to stay focused if you don’t have a clear idea of what you need to accomplish and when.

Break up your weekly goals into daily tasks. At the end of the day, you will feel great for accomplishing your goals and you will also not be struggling at the end of the week to get your work done because you were distracted.

Here is a rundown of some tips and the steps I take to create a daily schedule:

• Every Saturday or Sunday, compile your tasks by weekly goals and client deadlines.

• Break up your tasks into daily increments. Your goals should reflect the time you have in the day, not overwhelm you or give way for multiple distractions. For example, every other Monday I have a personal commitment so I know on Mondays I cannot complete as much work as I can  on Tuesday. I factor this into the equation instead of just randomly filling out the schedule.

• Don’t forget about miscellaneous tasks. For me, this equates to lead generation, social media updating, responding to project inquiries and emails, crafting proposals. Some other miscellaneous job-related tasks could include writing a blog post, researching a competing website, watching a design tutorial, etc. Factor these tasks into your week as long as they are applicable to the work you are doing. You can research training tips for your dog during breaks or after work hours.

• Schedule your miscellaneous tasks. Pay attention to how much time you are spending on them. You may need to adjust your schedule as you move along, but this is a great starting point. I currently spend about 30 minutes to an hour on miscellaneous tasks daily. How do I know this? Stay tuned to learn about a cool time tracking tool below!

• Your work schedule doesn’t have to be 9-5. As a freelancer you have the ability to create your own schedule. If you are a parent, your hours may be different than someone who is single. The goal is to ensure you meet your daily goals whether your day starts at 12 pm or 7 am.

• Breaks and Fun Stuff – Make sure to schedule breaks because they are very important. Your mind will need time to re-energize. I schedule a few small breaks during the day and one lunch break. On your breaks you can do fun stuff like going on Facebook for pleasure, watching cool videos or taking a walk in the beautiful weather (yes, I live in sunny Southern California).

• Tip: If you have trouble staying on one project for more than 30 minutes, schedule your breaks in smaller increments. You may need 5-10 smaller breaks during the day instead of 2 large ones.

• To beat those urges to procrastinate, write out your weekly schedule and post it in front of your computer. As you finish each goal, check it off and go on to the next one.

Tips to Deal with Procrastination

Project Completion

When you are working on a project, try not to step away from it until it is complete. If you are like me, you have 25 windows open at the same time and any one of them can be a distraction. Email is my biggest challenge. To combat this, I tell myself I can only check my email once a project is complete and I cannot answer any emails until my miscellaneous time or after work hours. The only emails to which I respond are pressing client projects or deliverables.

Boredom

We all know how boring a task can become if it is dragging on and on. Instead of running to Facebook or texting your friend, switch to another project or start doing some of your miscellaneous tasks. Resist the urge to go off your schedule unless it is close to break time. Sometimes your brain just needs something different to do.

Accountability

If you feel like you will have a hard time sticking to your daily schedule, ask someone you trust to make you accountable at the end of every day. Put your schedule up for all to see so you can be held to it.

Use a Time Scheduling Tool

Chrometa is an amazing free tool that tracks your every move on your computer. It will show you exactly what you do each day from how much time you spend on Facebook to the hours you put into a client’s project.

The image above is what a day would look like in its simplest form. As you can see I was away for 2 hours and 51 minutes (you can pause the tool when you step away from your computer) and it breaks down my tasks into the sites and programs I visited. If I click on each entry, it will display a detailed summary of specific information. For example, if I click on Mozilla Firefox, it will show me the 32 sites I visited and how much time I spent on each.

You can also categorize by project and create invoices for clients. If you are working on a project paid by the hour, you can send your client an invoice directly from the interface with a detailed description of your time (this is a paid service). You can personalize the entire system to your freelancing schedule and projects.

This tool helped me realize how much I was procrastinating and how much time I was spending on frivolous tasks. I realized that one minute away led to ten and when I added up all of my one minute distractions, it amounted to hours of procrastination…not a good business model by any means.

Other Awesome Tools:

• Wunderlist - to keep track of your tasks
• RescueTime – to save you from wasting too much time by telling you what you did

Be Honest

In the end, if you want to beat procrastination, you must get honest with yourself. Look at your daily activities as if you were someone else looking over your shoulder. In the end, it is YOUR success that is being affected.

No one is perfect so take a load off…but don’t allow yourself to become complacent in the process. We all face procrastination in one form or another. If you really want to become efficient and grow your freelancing business by accomplishing your goals, you must take a close look at what you are doing daily.

Also…please don’t think you can’t do this. I was the queen of procrastination. I used to do my work whenever I felt like it and was constantly distracted by Facebook and emails. If I can become more efficient and productive, so can you.

Take it from a fellow procrastinator…if you put the effort in, you will get the same reward back. And eventually, finishing tasks will feel more rewarding and something you will want instead of something you dread.

Do you ever procrastinate as a freelancer? Share with our readers how you beat procrastination or if you need more help accomplishing your goals.

This is when one takes inspirational work, and directly takes aspects from it for your own. This was something that was understandable and was just brushed off when it was only a few young naive designers doing it, you really couldn’t fault them too much for only wanting to create something like a designer they admire. However, today it really does seem as if this act of using inspiration is a valid reason for taking the work of another and calling it your own.

Since that seems to be the case, in this article we’re going to go over a few things that will help give insight on how to turn inspiration into original creative works.

What Does Stealing and Inspiration Look Like

Before going to deep on this topic, it is best to first illustrate my point visually for a better understanding of my argument. So below you will find a few quality websites, and then examples of how they have been imitated in our community.

Apple

I don’t think that there is another website around today that has been more influential than that of Apple.com. It is quite easy to understand why, even if you aren’t a creative you’ll find yourself appreciating the simplicity and excellent use of white space. With all that being said, the Apple website has been imitated by pretty much everyone in our community. Whether consciously or not, the inspiration is clear as day. Below you’ll find several articles showcasing Apple.com inspired websites:

• 60 Apple Inspired Websites – Why Apple Design Works? via 1stwebdesigner.com 
• 22 Website Designs Inspired by Apple.com via Web Designer Depot
• Web Design Inspired by Apple.com via Inspiration Magazine

Fiverr

Well in accordance with anything, when you do good work expect it to be cloned and see other people profited off of it. Right now, the highlighted design that’s been stolen is Fiverr.com. There is a WordPress theme available for those looking to have a website with all the same functionality, and similar design, of Fiverr.com.

Groupon

If anyone is just cruising around the internet is looking for some good local deals, 10 times out of 10 you’re going to end up on Groupon’s website. It is quite clear to understand why too, it has a clean interface that gives clear direction to what is usually thought of as a messy and unorganized scavenger hunt. Because of the success of this site’s design, there have been many interpretations of it and tutorials available to get that Groupon design down for yourself. Below you’ll find a few links to what I’m referring to:

• Create An eCommerce Site Inspired By Groupon With JQuery Slider via pvmgarage
• The Groupon-Style Website Trend: Why and How it Works via Onextrapixel

Where is the Problem

As shown in some of the above examples, there can be inspiration found from looking at anothers design and used with a positive original result. However, there has also been shown that it is quite easy, maybe unknowingly perhaps, to just take parts from other sites and put them into your own. Some have been so bold as to deliberately duplicate the design, seemingly pixel for pixel, and expect it to be viewed in the same light as the original. Now for the rest of this article, we are going to go over a few key things to consider when finding inspiration and stop yourself from taking it to far.

Think of how it would Feel if Your Work was Stolen

Feels like having a fever because of that Rage you're trying to keep.

*Image Credit: hang_in_there

The phrase “do unto others as you would have them do unto you” relates perfectly to this situation. It is a common occurrence for a designer who has stolen the work of another designer have someone steal from them, and then feel offended by it. This is pretty funny when you think about it, a thief calling someone who steals from them a thief. When someone is taking an aspect of someone’s design, there isn’t too much thought of how it would feel to be on the other end. All the countless hours of just wondering how you can give your design that ‘wow’ factor, and then you finally figure it out. The next thing you know, someone just took your idea that you spent hours thinking about, and labeled it theirs.

Remember Originality Brings the Best Rewards

*Image Credit: Viral~

The designers that are regarded as the top professionals didn’t get to where they are by taking from others until they reached the top. The respect they have achieved in their career came from hard work, consistent remembrance of self, and pushing for individuality and originality. Sure taking things here and there from others will make you some money, but you’ll never truly be recognized for the talent you have because all you’re doing is copying what you see and making an appealing collage in your work.

Missing Out on the Feeling of Accomplishment

*Image Credit: Slightlynorth

For many people involved in a creative profession, the monetary gains they receive are not that great. Actually, those that major in art related fields in college have one of the lowest average annual salaries around the world. So why would anyone even bother getting into a field like this? What sense does it make to be in a career that does not have good salary growth in comparison to other fields?

To those in creative fields, things like that don’t matter. The only thing that does is being able to make a living doing what you love, creating. Now if that is the mindset of the majority of our industry, why would you forgo that feeling. Personally, one of the best feelings I get is when I complete a cool project that took me an awful lot of time to get exactly right.

In Conclusion

When someone takes on a creative field as their career choice, they are making a statement. A statement that declares that they prefer self-fulfillment by taking their respective creative talents as far as they can go, and make a living while doing so. This is a bold and powerful statement, which somewhat distances the creative spectrum from the rest of the world to a degree. So for someone to take on a career that represents the aforementioned statement shows complete disrespect to the creative community and themselves when they go out and steal from others. Gaining inspiration from a design is completely normal and great; just remember that inspiration is not a plausible cause for stealing.

Do You Have Any Thoughts To Add To Help End Inspiration Leading to Stealing?

This block is not something easy to get past and it can come around exactly when you need inspiration the most. It might be right before a deadline or just after you landed a huge project, most importantly is that if (more like when) it happens to you, you need to make an effort to get past it.

The more you fight surpassing it with the techniques that seem useful at a first glance, the deeper in trouble you will find yourself. Unlike what many think, getting past a designer’s block can be done with the help of some easy and natural procedures.

Use music

Many of us use music to get rid of day-to-day stress, while others listen to it all the time, wherever they are. Music relays different emotions to people and, if you are very creative, it also relays different colors and shapes. If you ever listened to a song and created a video for it in your mind, then you are one of those who can get a lot out of music – it creates positive images in your mind, which you can use for inspiration.

Image by Doug88888.

However, this does not always work. The reason behind it is simple: we always listen to the same music, bands and artists. The same music creates the same images in your head, therefore you might not get too many new ideas if you listen to your everyday tunes. You probably know the feeling of a song which always brings back the same memories.

Find new music in the genre you like, try searching for your favourite artist’s old songs, go out there and experiment. Otherwise music, something which is so accessible to us, will not be too much of a help.

Go outside

This is something I recommended before, in my article targeting freelancers that get distracted. Going out is probably the cheapest and easiest way to relax. This is also when and where creativity can hit you right away. Many times a short walk in the park or a tour to the zoo can give you ideas. You can find them all over out there, from color schemes to shapes. Only being outside on a great summer day gives you a feeling of liberty and happiness – if you haven’t experienced this yet, make sure you do it soon – this is a must for creative individuals.

Image by Mike G. K.

If nature can’t help too much, then there is still hope outside home. Use architecture for this purpose. I bet the New York architecture inspired many designers in building grandiose designs. Pretty much everything you are passionate about (which is outside the house) can inspire you.

I, myself, love airplanes and airports. If I lived near La Guardia, Schiphol, Charles de Gaulle or John F. Kennedy, I would be there the whole day. I would just sit and watch airplanes landing and taking off. That would give me a huge boost of inspiration. If there is something out there you are inspired about, go and check it if you find yourself dealing with a designer’s block.

Deal with it some other time

This happens mostly when we work on multiple projects and we feel there is no inspiration left for one of them. If the deadline isn’t two days away, push the project longer down the queue. Not focusing on it and working on something else will allow you to come back later on and will free your mind for a period. Many times a designer’s block comes from lack of relaxation and for people who work way too much and exhaust themselves. You will notice that you will come back with new ideas when you take some time away from a project.

It doesn’t always help to think too much about something that isn’t there. Ideas usually come up in conversations and actions that have no relation to your project so if you stay home and think of your project, it is highly unlikely you will get past the block. It may sound weird or false, but the best ideas I have had were generated through diverse discussions; they just popped into my mind. I am sure some of you experienced this as well. Forcing ideas out is the worst thing you could do.

Get inspiration

Now I am not saying you should steal or copy other people’s work. I am just saying it’s never a bad idea to go out there and see how others are doing similar assignments. There is no harm in this and at the very least you get ideas that you can use some other time. I think it is highly unlikely to spend time researching and looking over inspirational examples and not get anything out of it.

Image by Mighty Crumble.

However, getting inspiration from the internet is something you should do carefully. Using something another designer used before is not only illegal, but might also be a poor decision for your project. If, for example, you found a design and liked the use of  italic text and a serif typeface, it doesn’t mean you can just take it and attach it to your project. Perusing others work is something you should think twice before doing.

When looking for inspiration, you might want to use this as a way to understand your website’s problems, not as a way to find solutions. If you see a webpage that sends a powerful message, learn how they do it and adapt it to your solution – don’t copy. Adapting is a different concept than copying.

Relax

The key to getting over designer’s block (as well as writer’s block) is relaxation. As fast as you can achieve this, you will become better at what you do and will be able to get past this block. If deadlines are approaching fast and you feel the block, you naturally get stressed and nervous. The simple step in solving this issue is the following: just relax.

Image by Nakic.

It sounds superficial, but this is the only way to get past such an issue. It is something natural which can only be solved by taking natural steps. Your mind will not start to execute at command – you need to relax it in order for it to deliver.

Conclusion

Yes, there is such a thing as designer’s block and it is also quite dangerous. It can destroy careers, make people miss deadlines or get fired; that’s how bad can it get. However, as just presented, getting past it doesn’t require years of training – it requires you to be able to relax and take your mind off the project for a while. Sure, I agree that this is not always possible because of deadlines, but whenever you can, take these steps and you will notice an improvement in the way you handle the block.

Today, we will go through the basic semantics of header image design and how the very default looking header images are still sitting on most websites. We will try to figure out what web designers can do to create jaw dropping header images and use examples to understand how designers are actually implementing original ideas.

Old is no more the gold

Gone are the days when a regular rectangular header image design will be good enough for your upcoming website design. Notice that if your website is very old and has its own fan following then you might not have to experiment with header images, but if you are new in business then you have to do something different so as to attract visitors. I am sorry to say, but the wrapper of the chocolate is an important reason behind you buying that chocolate. Get it?

There are plenty of default designs and plugins available that make it super easy for website designers to come up with a basic header image but that just isn’t helping you out. If you want to be part of this business then get real. Think. Out. Of. The. Box!

It will sound a bit weird if we tag something as default design in today’s website design industry, but unfortunately it is true. The structure that you see above has become, more or less, the default website design for those who want to go live real quick. Register a domain, pick up a template and you will be live within minutes. But, is that of any use? The ready-to-go designs help you go online but don’t help you get the attention of internet surfers. True?

So, how can we actually take our first step toward out-of-box looks? What can one really do with the default header shapes, sizes and designs? Aren’t they supposed to be what they are? Well, they are supposed to be the way they are, but with a little tweaking we can actually make them look super attractive. Here are my suggestions when it comes to tweaking your header images:

Submerge!

Don’t compare this tip with something that pops out of the screen due to its amazing design. Rather, what I am trying to suggest here could well be a simple but unique way to make your headers look different from the rest. This is actually the easiest too, once you are into it.

Look at the header image of Gary Nock. It is more or less merged with the rest of the website design. You will never find such kind of rectangular in shape header images. Rather, such header images submerge with the rest of the design which as a result gives the website design the clean and riveting look. So, when I say “submerge” then I mean merge your header image design with the rest of the website design in a fashion that the old rectangular look of the website is not around to turn off your readers.

Break The “Text Book” Definition of Dynamic Headers

Enough of  the jQuery codes to make your headers look dynamic. Can’t we make them look a bit different considering the fact that almost everybody is either using a jQuery based header or a (good old) flash header.

Check out the above header design from Raskulls. The website has done well to balance the looks of a dynamic header with a clean header image. The end result is a sleek looking header image that does justice to the niche of Raskulls. See, I am not asking you to give up on jQuery or Flash either. What I want you to understand is that it is high time that we start looking for header image designs that are sleeker and different from the rest. You’ve got to stand out to attract visitors.

Ditch the Rectangle

I won’t give you an example in this case as my first tip of submerging the header image with rest of the website design was almost similar to this. See, we are used to the usual rectangular looking header images. As I said before, they have become part of the default website design which is of no use. What if you ditch the rectangle shape of header images and look for something which is different. This is when you will attract attention and that is the sole purpose of your website. True?

Ditch the Header Itself!

OUCH! What was that?

Well, that was getting rid of something that confuses you the most. If you are not happy with your rectangular looking header image design and you are not sure of anything different then why not just ditch the header itself? Why can’t we start with the content directly and use a small square in the sidebar for the name of the website? What is the real problem? There isn’t any hard and fast rule suggesting that headers are a must for a website design, and if it isn’t a rule why do we actually have to stick with them?

Have a look at Sony’s portal displaying its tablets. Sony has smartly left only a little  amount of space on top for the name and menu while the rest acts as the place where content is displayed. Really, if you are not sure about the kind of header that you should use then you will be better off ditching the header. Try it!

Keep Thinking Different. Don’t Give Up!

This is supposed to be the usual tip of any inspiration pointers and it applies here too, but with a slight difference. The point that I want you to understand here is that if you keep trying the different looks for your header image then you are bound to come up with something which is a lot better than the rectangular looking header images. And, trust me on this one, any header shape will look better than a rectangular header image design.

Your hard work and your honesty should be reflected in your out-of-box header image design. This is when visitors understand the seriousness of your purpose and end up giving more time to your website. Also, keep changing your header images. Experiment with different looks and see what leads to a jump in your traffic. Try. Fall. Getup. Try. Succeed. Continue Trying.

Inspiration

Juan Diego Velasco – Web Designer Portfolio

Giancarlo Fajardo – Creative Graphic Design Portfolio

Duirwaigh Studios

N.Design Studio

Octwelve – Blog of designer MeryLuc Melgar

Pixel Cool

Shaun Groves

Conclusion

Header images have come a long way. I know plenty of websites that have successfully experimented with header image designs, but I know so many who still go live without proper design plans. Please remember that you might be better off with a simple looking header image design if your website is old with huge visitor numbers. In that case, the visitors are aware of the quality of content that your website produces and this is when an attractive header image is not that important. But, if you are new in business then better take care of the looks of your website design otherwise be prepared to end up nowhere.

With that understanding in mind, it is clear that both creative paths differ by one being a creative for the people and the other for oneself. As designers, there is always some level of artistic input that must be imputed into a design for it to be affective. The problem many designers have is trying to incorporate the desires of their inner artist into their work as a designer. There can’t be too much artistic perspective used because then it will lean away from the intended audience, however too little and the design will likely look very generic and uninspired. That is why we are going to go over how a designer can find that inner balance between artist and designer.

What is Your Favorite Style of Art?

Image Credit: jiruan

In the design world it is the popular choice to renounce ones own true favorite artistic style and to design according to whatever style is currently trendy. An current example of this would be the universal fascination over minimalism. This is a great artistic style, with a really engaging philosophy behind it. However it is still not a perfect mesh for everyone.

So with that in mind, let’s go over a couple of questions that can lead anyone to the art style that best represents them.

What Does Your Personality Say About You?

Art is nothing more than an outward manifestation of the current mental state, and personal qualities, of the artist creating the work.. This makes artwork personal, and the need for a personal connection from a viewer of the work and the artist must be able to be formed from the art. Understanding this about art puts better perspective onto how and why some artwork appeals more so to some than it would to others.

So before anyone can go around looking at artwork to find what suits their creative palettes, there must be an understanding of oneself. That way when passing by and viewing artwork, the true connection with the work and yourself can be established.

Can You See Yourself  in the Artwork?

As already mentioned, art is very personal and allows for the inner workings of an artist to come out onto their canvas. It is important to be able to sense a connection with the artist  through looking at their work alone, however it is more so important when aiming for inner balance between artist and designer to be able to see oneself in the work.

This isn’t so much literally seeing yourself of course. It’s about looking at something and being able to see the inner workings of your mind, person, past, future, and/or soul in the work you are looking at.

How to Incorporate Your Taste into Your Work

Image Credit: Fifth World Art 

As designers, it is our predetermined thought that our craft has no real room for personal creative interpretation, surrendering our individual tastes for that of the masses at large. It is quite easy to see how this thought process came to be when considering how community driven we are. From creation to final product, our main goal is to create something that is liked by a vast amount of people. If that happens to lead to something that we like, then that is just a little extra bonus in the project.

Now with that ideology thriving in anything designers create, it is quite hard to see ways in which any true personal artistic preference can be placed. Here are a few tips on how to awaken your inner artist in your designs.

Look for that “One Thing” when Finding Inspiration

Everyone takes that walk, or surfs the internet, trip, etc., to find inspiration for what they are working on. However, often the case is that instead of looking for that one thing in particular that stands out, the object of attention is the environment at large. That is of course fine for any other instance, but specifying your hunt for inspiration will lead to better results. This result should then lead you to an ample amount of creative thoughts that will easily lend themselves to your design project.

Ignore Best Practices…to an Extent

There is no such thing as a proven theory for success in the art world, so there shouldn’t be any perceived one anywhere near your mind when trying to bring out the artist in yourself. With so many proven success methods, guides, tutorials, and things of that nature, it’s hard for anyone to actually want to be adventurous. We design for financial gain after all, so this really isn’t such a bad thing. It’s just from the artistic standpoint, the only thing you’re doing by blindly adhering to these is suffocating your artistic expression. Understand the ones that make sense for what YOU are trying to do, and just leave the rest alone.

Lessen the Community Input

It is quite tempting to want to post what you’re working on to a social network full of creatives eager to see what everyone is doing, but it is not necessarily the best move. The vision for what you are to create can’t be translated to anyone perfectly, no matter how hard anyone tries. So of course there is no way that anyone elses input can actually lead to a better way of bringing out your inner artistic vision. Just leave this aspect for down the line when the project is close to completion, and needs that designer touch.

Don’t be Afraid

We all are afraid of creating something that is not well received, or easily understood by anyone else. This is so because art is not mean to be understood, only to express the thoughts of the artist. Don’t worry about the fear of rejection and just create, you could end up with something that the rest of us will be personally interpreting for years.

In Conclusion

Image Credit: fiveforefun

The work of an artist and designer is nothing alike, only the means they go about in creating their work. A designer can learn many things from art and artist like personal expression, relieving oneself of the fear of rejection, and the drive to fulfill one’s creative vision among other things. Just make sure as a designer you don’t let your inner artist consume your work too much, your job description still says that you create for the community at large.

Revamping your site is a mega-headache, redesign is necessary at one point in the web site’s life cycle. You will need to revamp your site at some point in time, and the sooner, the better. You need to know when it is high time to revamp your site by looking into a few signs.

Sign number 1: The Metrics are Down

Have your metrics gone down over the past few months? Then it may be high time to revamp your site. Metrics are the number one indication that you should redesign your web site. Metrics give you an immediate indication that something needs improvement. To better understand your visitors, you need to speak to them using surveys and usability testing. A face to face conversation with your customers allows you to learn more than simple surveys and questionnaires. Conversations will reveal attitudes towards your website, brand, and overall company image.

Sure, there may be other reasons as to why your metrics are down. Be sure to look into them first and fix any problems you can see. Converse with your users, as only through dynamic conversation will you be able to know if your site needs redesigning, and to what extent. But if the sales, traffic and general user participation of the site are still down, it may be that your web design has ‘disconnected’ with your users.

Image by iamwahid

Sign number 2: Change of Brand Image

Changes in your brand image or company image may require changes to be implemented and reflected on your website. Update your logos as soon as possible, to be in tune with the shift of image or branding. Remember that the website is like the face of the company, where people get their first impressions and make assumptions.

Even if you’re not, establish yourself as the industry leader and adopt new technology and introduce innovative aesthetics to the site. Always provide relevant content to your audience.

Sign number 3: Your web site just looks tired.

Websites are like fashion trends–they can get old. What was really cool a few years ago can now look cliché and old. For example, 3D buttons and interfaces were so cool a while back, then beveled and embossed styles were all the rage. Flash intro pages were popular at one time, and most users enjoyed it. But soon web users got tired of it and wanted to skip and go straight to the content. Flash introductions were great then, but now they look old and pointless.

George RR Martin sure writes good books, but his website looks like something from 1995.

Thing is, what was new and innovative a few years ago will start to look tired soon enough. Nowadays,  the shelf life of the site’s aesthetic is only one year. If it has been more than a year since your last revamping, it’s time to do it now.

So if your website looks old and tired, it’s time for a makeover. Aesthetics eventually evolve, and an old design can destroy a company’s whole image. A fresh and new design will refresh your loyal users’ experience, and at the same time attract new ones. Your focus on revamping the site is to keep your brand image fresh.

Other Questions to Ask

From the perspective of the web user or customer, ask yourself the following questions:

• Does the website give me a favorable user experience?
• Is the website entertaining and interactive?
• Can I navigate through most of the web content within three clicks?
• Can the web users get an idea of the company’s branding and image through the web design aesthetic?
• What are the drawbacks and weaknesses of the site?
• Would you return to the website often–and for what reasons?

Provide relevant content on your website. Be sure that when people come to your website, they get what they’ve come for–information, education, and maybe some entertainment and interaction. Avoid unnecessary elements such as flash intros and annoying banner ads. The web site should be easy to navigate with a user-friendly interface.

Educate and entertain to keep your visitors coming back again and again. Always have new and fresh content on your web site. And, provide information with blogs, articles and pictures. Be sure your web site is searchable by increasing your SEO. Nowadays, content is king, so build on relevant content related to the company’s product and industry.

Content is King

Image by enimal

In the end, the web site you made should be something that you’re proud of. It is the online storefront to the company or business. It is where your current and potential customers go to seek information, and engage in a relationship with your business. For you to survive, you must constantly adapt and go with the flow of the most recent technological and aesthetic trends. Invest in being up-to-date rather than being safe all the time. Ride the wave!

My friends, it has come to this. Many have asked for help and now I will walk you through it all, even without knowledge of coding you will be able to create a website in just one hour after reading this.

Say you have already grown tired of your Tumblr, Blogger, and WordPress.com blogs and you want to move up the scale. What do you do next? Yes, you read this guide!

Remember, you can start your own blog/website now for as low as $10!

Things to know:

Before anything else, there are some small details that you will need to think about. Do you want to have a totally free website that has a fixed set of features? You probably want more power and the option tp tweak things, but are you willing to pay for these options?

First you need to decide whether to create a self-hosted website or not.

Free websites are hosted under a parent domain. For example, there are a lot of websites, or in this case blogs, out there that are used by people for their private ramblings like sampyourname.wordpress.com or testwebsite.blogger.com. These blogs are totally free, but the irony is you really do not have the freedom of bending it to your will. There are limitations involved. But the good thing here is that they are totally reliable and free, also you won’t need any technical knowledge of HTML and CSS, everything is already designed for you.

If your goal is to keep an online diary for your personal life or craft, just the basic things, then using free website/blog services like WordPress.com and Blogger.com, or even Tumblr.com, is highly suggested. You can keep your files safe, no worrying about down time, and most of all they’re totally free. But since they’re free, your site will always have the service’s name (site.blogger.com) attached to your domain and it doesn’t look very professional.

If your goal is to appear strong and professional, and have more control over most things, then your best option is to host a website yourself. Unlike a free website, a self-hosted website requires some technical knowledge, and that is the point of this whole guide.

When should you self-host a website? As mentioned, when you want to have a professional look and feel to your site. Most likely they will know that you are serious about running that website and updating it, since you’re paying for it. Most self-hosted websites are owned by people who are using it for their business, either to promote their skill and services or to make money with it. Just like 1stwebdesigner.com. This is exactly the reason why I decided to write this guide, because people with WordPress.com and Blogger.com blogs have contacted us about shifting to a .com blog. Admittedly, I only replied to a couple of them briefly pointing them to the correct services and websites to read. But now it is different, to avoid further confusing our first time readers I have written a guide to solve this problem!

If you’re still serious about creating a self-hosted website and spending some money, then continue reading.

Before Purchasing Anything

Before you purchase anything, please be sure that you have already decided on what to do. I know that many of the people that will read this are considering it and are not entirely sure about spending money. I know some students both here in the Philippines and elsewhere who are considering spending money to get a website, some have failed and regretted their decision.

Ask yourself, do you need a premium website design?

Choose a Content Management System (CMS)

As the name implies, CMS is software that manages a website’s content. This is actually one of the best inventions of all time. I daresay that 90% of websites in existence today are built over a CMS. Websites like 1stwebdesigner, TheNextWeb, TechCrunch, and a lot more.

I won’t delve too much into what a CMS is, since you’ll more than likely end up using WordPress. 1stwebdesigner is using WordPress to manage all of the photos, articles, and plugins used in this website. Without WordPress it would actually be hard to grow it as big as it is now. But this is just my opinion.

You can, however, choose a different CMS depending on your preferences.

Check out:

• 17 Free Content Management Systems For Better Content Handling
• Showcase of Small But Useful Content Management Systems

Choose a Domain Name and Web Host

Technically, you should be looking for a Domain Registrar to register a Domain name of your choosing. Usually domain names and hosting are purchased together, but in case you want to find cheaper solutions you can buy them separately.

Suggested Web Hosts

These are web hosting companies that I have firsthand experience with. No matter what you do, do not go to GoDaddy.

Below are three of my recommended web hosts. The process is linear. First you will be prompted to select a domain name of your choosing (the name of your website), then the package type, some add-ons, and finally the checkout process where you will pay.

HostGator –  cheap and has a one-click-install for WordPress and other CMS’s. The cheapest plan boasts unlimited bandwidth and unlimited disk space, and hosts one domain. The main take-away for HostGator is that you can actually host your website here for only $0.01 for one month! Provided you have already purchased a domain name which can cost from $8 to $10. Succeeding monthly bills would be around $8. But you can host your website here for one year for only $75.

Use coupon code: “1stwebdesigner” without the “” to get a $9.94 off of your bill!

Currently hosting 1 website here, no problems so far.

WPWebHost – priced just a little higher than HostGator, but the service is absolutely stunning. Their customer support can solve just about anything you can throw at them related to WordPress. One-click-install for WordPress is also available.

Hosting 1 website here too, still happy with it.

ASmallOrange –  for as low as $25 a year you can host a website. For $25 you will get 150MB of disk space and 4.5GB monthly bandwidth. Not bad if you’re planning on a text-based website with few images.

Use coupon code: “1stwebdesigner” without the “” to get a 15% discount!

Also happy with ASmallOrange.

After choosing your web host it’s time to wait. Yes, you need to wait for some time, at best your account is activated within 10 minutes, at worst it will be available after 48 hours (but trust me, I haven’t experienced this yet).

After your account has been activated, an email from the service should be sent to you with the account information with all of the login details for FTP, MySQL, cPanel, and some links to your dashboard. For now just focus on the cPanel.

Setting Up WordPress

First Step: Login onto your Control Panel

HostGator Control Panel

This is what HostGator’s control panel looks like. Do not worry, if you think this is too much to handle and there’s too many icons to click, you only need to worry about one..wait, no, you don’t need to worry at all.

That one icon you need to find? It’s the QuickInstall, just scroll down until you can see this:

After clicking QuickInstall you should see the image below. To the left is a list of software you can install, but our main goal now is to install WordPress. It’s the third item to the left. Just click on it and it will prompt you to continue, simply click on “Continue”.

After this you will receive an email with your login details for your WordPress dashboard. In order to login, go to www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin. You will then be prompted with a login form. Just fill in the form and you’re good to go.

WPWebHost Control Panel

This is how WPWebHost’s control panel looks like.

In order to install WordPress, find Softaculous:

Click on it and a page similar to the screenshot below will load.

Click Blogs and the following will appear. Click on where the red arrow is pointing at.

Then the following page will load, and all you need to do is click the blue button saying “Install”.

Everything onwards is pretty easy to understand. A form will appear, asking for some information. I will no longer post a screenshot of it here because you will not need to change anything. Just change the Admin Account details for your user name and password, and an email address so that the system can send your details.

After this you will receive an email with your login details for your WordPress dashboard. In order to login, go to www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin. You will then be prompted with a login form. Just fill in the form and you’re good to go.

ASmallOrange Control Panel

If you notice, most of the control panels look the same with only minor changes on the software/services available.

Once you can see the image above, scroll down until you find Fantastico De Luxe.

Click Fantastico De Luxe and you’ll be redirected to the page below. Click on WordPress, pointed by the amazing red arrow.

Click on “New Installation”.

Then you will be redirected to this page. Just fill in the user name and password, an email address and choose the domain you want to install WordPress to. Don’t forget to read!

After this you will receive an email with your login details for your WordPress dashboard. In order to login, go to www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin. You will then be prompted with a login form. Just fill in the form and you’re good to go.

Congratulations! You have successfully installed WordPress by navigating through your web host’s control panel!

At this point everything is pretty much finished. But you will need to install a theme and some plugins to get your blog rolling!

Second Step: Configuring Themes

Why do you need to install themes? What are themes? Themes are like clothing for your website, each having their own design and features that you can use. There are hundreds of free themes out there that you can use for free, but don’t expect many features from them. Most likely if you are willing to spend more for the best themes you’ll go for premium themes.

Choose and download Free Themes here:

• Hot WordPress Themes For Freelancers For Personal Branding
• Graph Paper Press
• WordPress Free Themes Directory
• Fresheezy
• See more here (this is no longer updated, but most of the links shown here are still working)

For Premium Themes:

• 20 Premium WordPress eCommerce Themes
• 40 Premium Magazine WordPRess Themes
• The World’s Best Corporate WordPress Themes You Can Actually Afford to Buy
• 50+ WordPress Themes for Video BLoggers (contains Free and Preimum themes)
• ElegantThemes
• ThemeForest

Installing Themes

First login to your WordPress dashboard by going to www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin. You will be greeted by this sweetheart, which you should familiarize yourself with because you’ll be seeing it often. Hover on Appearance and click on Themes.

It is important to note that all the themes that you will be downloading are zipped/rar-ed files. Just keep them that way. When the page loads, click on Install Themes and then click on Upload. Happily navigate through your folders to find the theme you downloaded, select it then upload it. After activating it, check your website and it should have a new design.

Congratulations! You have just installed a new theme! Now, what comes next is also crucial to your website’s success: installing plugins.

Third Step: Setting up Plugins

First let’s talk about the necessary plugins that you need to download and install. Note that this is only based on my preference. You can find your own plugins to install, but I’m just giving you an idea as to what kind of plugins to use. So, let’s begin!

Needed Plugins:

• Digg Digg or SharebBar for the social media buttons.
• All in One SEO Pack for SEO purposes. In the most simplest of all explanations, it enhances your visibility on Google.
• Quick Cache to speed up your page loads.
• Google Analycticator to easily install your Google Analytics to your website. Don’t have an account yet? Simply go to Google Analytics and sign up for one! By using this service you will know how many people are visitng your website, from where, and which content is visited by the readers.
• Search 1stwebdesigner for more plugins.

How to Install a Plugin

It’s very easy to install a plugin, either by uploading or searching the WordPress.org plugin directory. First go to the Plugins page by clicking on Plugins.

If you have downloaded a plugin, then you will need to click on Upload and upload the zipped file. If you want to search for the plugin, simply input the name on the search bar and search for the plugin. If you will use the search function, you will be greeted by this:

Simply click “Install Now” and the plugin will be installed. Don’t forget to check the Details to see if the plugin is compatible with your current WordPress version. Talking about that, be sure to always keep your WordPress updated! After installing, just activate the plugin and if settings are available, adjust the settings to your preference.

Congratulations! You have just installed your first plugin! Next and final step would be to add your content!

It’s not a website if it doesn’t have content. Be sure to write valuable information that people can actually use. Never steal content from other websites!

What do you think about this guide?

As always, don’t forget to share this with your friends who are in need, instead of telling them to “Google it!” And also share tips and techniques. Did I make an error somewhere? Please feel free to point them out!

If you are having trouble just write a comment below and I will be glad to help you. :)

Note: Consider this article to be a very basic discussion on Ruby (the programming language) and Rails (an application framework). My basic goal is to introduce you to Ruby and give you that initial push which is required when learning a programming language.

What is Ruby?

Ruby, as I said before, is a refined combination of various programming approaches. Ruby is the perfect mixture of python’s easy to understand flow, Smalltalk’s elegance and Perl’s easy to learn syntax style. Ruby is a high level object-oriented programming language (as is the case with most of the programming languages these days) which came into existence in mid 1990s in Japan. With time Ruby has started to become more dominant in the U.S. and Europe too.

Ruby is famous for its dynamic type system and automatic memory management. By dynamic type I mean that most of the type checking in a Ruby program is done during run time which means you don’t have to worry about integer and string types. Ruby will do that for you. We will see more about this in a short example later.

The basic purpose of launching Ruby was to make it easy for humans to interact with machines and understand codes. Yukihiro Matsumoto, the father of Ruby, insists that Ruby was designed for programmer productivity and not for machine optimization.

Often people, especially computer engineers, focus on the machines. They think, “By doing this, the machine will run faster. By doing this, the machine will run more effectively. By doing this, the machine will something something something.” They are focusing on machines. But in fact we need to focus on humans, on how humans care about doing programming or operating the application of the machines. We are the masters. They are the slaves. – Yukihiro Matsumoto

What is Rails?

Rails is an extremely productive application framework written in Ruby by David Heinemeier Hansson. It is said that developing a web application on Rails is ten times faster when compared to that of a Java based web application framework. Rails is open source (of course!) Ruby based framework that can be used for easy (and fast) database integration.

Rails is famous for over-the-top ideas which resulted in shunning conventions and picking up dynamic programming structure. The basic application code and the updated database will always contain everything that Rails will require to execute a program from start to finish.

A Basic Ruby Program

See how interesting (and easy) things will get after this:

Code:
personal = “I don’t love my girlfriend”
puts personal

Output:
I don’t love my girlfriend

Yep! That will actually be it to print an output in console. No initialization, semicolons and main methods.

Now, let us see a quick difference in programming between PHP and Ruby when we have to reverse a string:

PHP:
strrev(“string”);

Ruby:
“string”.reverse

Voila! Your string will be reversed in no time. See the difference in effort in both the programming languages. A Ruby based programming language will make it easy for you to write a program. It is more like writing in English than in coded language. It is the future of programming languages.

Advantages of sticking with Ruby (and Rails)

I know the world of Ruby is big and I haven’t scratched the surface of it but a blog post will prove to be overly small to dive into the world of Ruby. Henceforth, let us directly go through the advantages of Ruby:

• Elegant - As I have pointed out before, this happens to be the strength of Ruby. As a programming language Ruby is super elegant and almost like English. It is this similarity to English that makes it easy for noobs to take on Ruby without being afraid of it.
• Concise and Powerful - Our example above itself explains how concise a Ruby code can be. As short as it can get. Also, Ruby is as powerful as any other language as it is Object Oriented High Level Programming Language just like other trendy programming languages.
• Never Reinvents the Cycle - Rails (based on Ruby) is one programming interface that will never let you reinvent the cycle. It generates codes that can be reused over and over.
• Built in Testing - Rails is famous for its harness and fixtures which act as supporting codes that will make it easier for programmers to write their test cases. Also, Rails creates simple test stubs that can be extended by programmers.
• Dev, Test and Prod Environments - Rails smartly starts your project in three different environments namely Dev, Test and Prod. All three environments behave a little differently from each other and each complement the original software development life cycle.

The Showcase

Now, let us go through some of the websites (really famous ones) that are using the overall strengths of Ruby. You will see how designers are taking their websites places with the help of Ruby.

43Things

A List Apart

Basecamp

CrunchBase

Github

Groupon

Hulu

Scribd

Slideshare

Yellow Pages

Conclusion

You are not done yet. You really aren’t. Hang around with Ruby and keep riding the journey on Rails. Someday you will call yourself a Ruby Pro and who knows, your article might just come in handy for me. Ruby has its disadvantages and the most obvious of them all is the that it is very new to this game. It is still evolving and has a lot to prove. Still, we know that it is going to go places. Now, it is in our hands. Either we can wait and let it grow or else jump in and evolve as an expert when their is high demand for Ruby professionals.

Actually you lose 7% (maybe even more!) of sales without even noticing… Sounds bad, huh?

I mean, you work carefully to put things in the right place, good call-to-actions, nice design, spend a few bucks with ads.. And then you lose 7% of sales just because you forgot to minify your CSS. We’ll, this is not going to happen again.

We’ll put every future project that you work on a diet. And this one, won’t wait for next monday, or next january :)

Here we’ll see amazing tips to reduce your files size and increase your site performance without affecting important things like image quality or a files readability for future edits.

Grab your meter and let’s rock!

Every Second Counts

Before the practical stuff, I would like to share with you a few numbers about page loading X users satisfaction.

I saw this infographic several months ago, but it’s still amazing. Click on it to see all the data, here’s what I liked most:

• If you hit 4 seconds of page loading you have 25% abandonment increase
• About 80% of users expect mobile pages to take almost the same amount of time as the desktop version

Credits: Kissmetrics

Image Optimizing – File formats & Tools

So, the best way to optimize images starts with using the right file format. Basically we have 3 common formats for web (no, I won’t talk about .bmp, .svg, .tiff or anything else):

• JPEG – Really good for photos and bigger images
• GIF – Good for icons and images with fewer colors
• PNG – Good for small images with a lot of colors or when alpha channel is needed

This is really just the basics, there is a lot of particularities for each image type that we won’t be talking about (right now). But you should be good with this, when you are exporting a psd to code a layout you should use .jpg for photos or bigger backgrounds, use .gif for smaller elements or elements with a restricted color palette (like simple icons or replacements for common inputs) and png where you can’t lose any data or small colorful images.

I know many people say that png are bad and too big, but actually if you know how to use them they can give you a better effect (exactly what you designed) AND smaller or similar file size as gif or jpg.

Let’s see some tips for each image type:

JPG Minimizing

JPG does “lossy compression”. That means that its algorithm stores data using much less disk space but will also save less info about your original file. Once compressed it’s impossible to decompress .jpg files. Your best choice in this case is to always keep the original file safe and just save copies.

Ideal quality for jpg is pretty tricky, but most times you’ll be good with 60-80.

When you take photos your camera stores metadata about the photo that you may not use in future. Also image size is often bigger than your entire screen. So get rid of useless data and reduce your image to what you really need.

Irfranview is a small tool that can do this for you even as batch conversion for lots of files.

Recently I heard about an amazing tool, called JPEGmini. They have an amazing compression algorithm that works pretty much like our eyes do, so it makes what gets our attention higher quality and what doesn’t, lower. You should give it a try!

GIF Minimizing

GIF files have a really small color table, ranging between 2 and 256. 256 may sound a good figure, but when you realize that jpg has up to 16 million colors, 256 isn’t that good, huh?

What you can do to cut files size is to reduce their color palette. Above is an example where reducing a file from 128 to 64 colors we saved almost 30% of file size.

PNG Minimizing

PNG compression is similar to gif compression. You reduce the color palette and gain a few kbytes. In above example, png-24  instead of png-8, would be a huge file since it’s completely lossless, so you would have a perfect image, but pretty big.

The best part of png-24 is full alpha channel, but we can handle that. Image Alpha gives us full alpha channel over PNG-8, so we have much smaller files but pretty good-looking for overlays and advanced effects.

Code Compressors – HTML, CSS, JS

Actually I’m not too much a code-compresser type. But images aren’t the only thing we should care about in our websites, HTML, CSS, JS files should be compressed too since they can eat precious bytes from your diet.

Let’s take a look at a few options:

minify – PHP solution

HTML Compressor

YUI compressor

HTML Minifier

Server caching

Another good way to improve site loading is server-side caching. If you don’t use cache your page needs to be processed by the server every time it’s accessed, even if you don’t change your site for ages.

So, here are the best WordPress Caching plugins:

WP Super Cache

W3 Total Cache

DB Cache Reloaded Fix

GZip, a.k.a. Compression Like a Boss

I’m pretty sure you’ve heard about zip files. Or maybe .rar files or .7z files. Well, GZip is an implementation of GNU Zip, which does pretty much the same thing as ZIP files, but gives you a really good compression rate.

The crazy idea here is to drastically reduce download time by sending users compressed files, instead of the uncompressed original ones, and their browser will handle the decompressing in much less time than if it had to download original files.

Your hard work here is to paste this code into you .htaccess file:

#Gzip
<ifmodule mod_deflate.c>
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/text text/html text/plain text/xml text/css application/x-javascript application/javascript
</ifmodule>
#End Gzip

Then you’re done! Well, hope it doesn’t take you more than 5 minutes :)