Thank you, Internet Explorer, for another gray hair. As if I needed that. But there you go, rolling out another version of your web browsing software and forcing all of our clients to upgrade from IE7 or IE8 to your new IE9. IE9 is the primary browser on 36.2% of Windows 7 machines, and it’ll keep growing.

When Browsers Make Websites Look Bad

Now all of our clients’ websites will look funky, and they’ll wonder why.

Then the phone will start ringing. I’ll have to explain that their websites were built before your new browser appeared. I’ll have to tell them that a website doesn’t automatically update to match new browsers. I’ll have to find a way to explain why IE9 is a web designer’s nightmare.

In other words, I’ll have to explain what cross-browser compatibility is, and why the same sites look different depending on which browser someone is using.

What is cross-browser compatibility?

For this, I rely on NetMechanic, who describes the way browsers interpret information with this analogy:

Your Web browser is a translation device. It takes a document written in the HTML language and translates it into a formatted Web page. The result of this translation is a little like giving two human translators a sentence written in French and asking them to translate it into English. Both will get the meaning across, but may not use the same words to do so.

When we roll out a new website, we’ve got it covered. We test all of our new sites in the most used browsers to make sure they display pretty much the same in each. We also build our sites to “degrade gracefully.” In other words, if some new and unidentified browser or device comes out that doesn’t support the way we’ve built the site, it still looks reasonably OK. We do all of this before we even launch.

Sometimes, though, a new Internet browser pops up, and all sites need to be tested against it. It’s always a good idea for anyone with a website to make sure their site is usable across all the most popular browsers (old and new), mobile devices (like iPads or iPhones), or any other web browsing devices.

The web browsers that matter

How does one find out what browsers are most important for testing a site? Start with looking at an analytics account, something like Google Analytics or Clicky. Another handy technique is to check usage share for most browsers. According to StatCounter, here’s how they’re breaking down for February 2012:

• Internet Explorer – 35.75%
• Chrome – 29.84%
• Firefox – 24.89%
• Safari – 6.76%
• Opera – 2.03%
• Other – 0.73%

Cross-browser testing tools

Then it’s a matter of downloading all of those browsers and seeing how it looks. There are also a number of useful tools that make this job a little bit easier, especially because it’s time-consuming to install all of the major browsers.

Here’s a brief run-down of cross-browser testing services from Noupe:

Adobe Browser Lab
Adobe Browserlab offers an awesome solution for viewing on demand screenshots of your site.

Browsershots
Makes screenshots of your web design in a lot of different browsers. After you submit your URL, it gives you a url where your screenshots will be loaded up.

Browser Sandbox
Runs an application to view your site in a variety of browsers.

(More tips on what to check on the healthy website checklist.)

My guess, IE, is that this nonsense isn’t going to end any time soon, especially since your share of the market is on such a sharp decline. So I’ll just keep an eye on the grays and do my best to keep on the treadmill.

(While I’m at it, thanks to you too Firefox, for all of your upgrades, and a tip-o-the hat to Chrome and Safari for keeping up the guesswork.)

[Image: Flickr user bottled_void]

These are the things I wish clients would ask when they’re looking to start a new project. You can use this as a punch list of questions to ask a web designer, web development agency or someone to develop an online course:

1. Do you have any case studies?

Case studies are a really great way to see what an Internet developer or graphic designer has done for another client. Good ones take you through the problem, solution and introduce the technology. We’re careful to create case studies that are framed to show how work we’ve done for one client is applicable to many. People can find case studies on our website, but they don’t ask for them enough or ask for ones that are specific to the work they need.

2. Do you have references?

It’s a little odd how many people don’t ask me for references. They should, because talking to someone we’ve actually done work for is invaluable. An outside perspective is exactly what someone hiring a designer should be looking for, too.

3. How does your process work?

I’ve worked on enough projects to know how valuable it is to have a capable person managing the process. You’re not only hiring someone who knows about the technology and design, but who also knows about how to manage a project, how to schedule milestones, and make sure deadlines are met.

4. How did you get into the web design industry?

This is an easy question that will give you an idea of how passionate a person feels about the work they do. It will also give you an idea of the values of the web developer and what kinds of hidden skills they bring to their cache of talent. It always sparks a good conversation, and anything that opens up conversation in an exploratory call helps.

Notice that nowhere on this list is, “How much will this cost?” Everybody has a budget, but without preliminary research into what a client needs, it’s virtually impossible to give a price estimate. Plus, if you’re working on a tight budget, a good development agency can help figure out how to solve problems you have rather than cut features you can’t afford. Plus, value is not the same thing as cheap. With interactive design, you get what you pay for.

Anything I missed? If there are other questions you’ve found useful in initial conversations with web designers, add them in the comments below.

We have an online course that consists mainly of students who know each other. The rest participate minimally and do not seem engaged. How do I level the playing field and make the new students feel welcomed?

Darren

People learn better in teams

It’s always tough to be the new kid, whether it’s your first day at an elementary school or an online course. It’s understandable that a smaller group of people is finding it difficult to relate to a bigger group that already knows one another.

Engaging learners is always a challenge, but it’s critically important in an online training format. Here are a couple strategies that will help learners join the group and get to know the other participants.

Have learners introduce themselves

The first step is to make sure you’re having introducing students to one another. I often make the first exercise in an online course a personal introduction, where people have to answer a few questions about themselves, where they come from, their goals for the course, and usually something irreverent like where they’d like to go on vacation, which can spark conversation.

I’ll often make this a two-part exercise, in which students have to respond to one or more other student’s postings, which helps get them talking with each other.

It also helps to have learners post pictures of themselves, write a bio, or share social media, so the others can start to make a connection with them outside of the class structure.

Create opportunities for partnering

Creating groups is a helpful tactic to have students talk throughout the course. Think about pairing the way you would seating at a dinner party: match up the quiet folks with the chatty ones.

Also structure partner exercises, like role-plays, where you pair up the new people with the others.
This overview of creating and facilitating online role-plays from Australian Flexible Learning Framework provides a good overview. Here’s how role-plays work, according to them:

• participants are allocated roles to act out within a scenario
• participants solve problems that are introduced within the course of the roleplay
• participants and facilitators take part in a debriefing stage, either online or in a face-to-face situation.

The site gives sample exercises targeted to different groups of learners and also gives instructional design tips for integrating role-plays into your courses.

Have a look at this discussion that carefully breaks down a role-play in an online course from the Articulate forums. In this situation, a participant is asked to do a role-play with someone in their office,
but the idea can be adapted to a purely online format.

Check out more articles on making your online course better.

[Have a question you’d like answered? Ask on the comments form at the bottom of this page, on Twitter @talance, or on Facebook. We’ll review your question before posting (don’t be shy about asking!) and get back to you with a response.]

Lina Arsenault

[Silicon Valley marketing executive Lina Arseneault is our guest writer today, offering perspective on generational diversity in marketing, including your web strategy.]

By Lina Arseneault

Embrace generational diversity

Are you a for-profit organization looking for people who will help make more money than they will cost the business? Are you a nonprofit employer seeking employees with passion for the cause you serve? Does your workplace use the full breadth of talent available to it? Are you attracting the right candidates?

The key to making the most out of these challenges lies in embracing generational diversity. It will foster a culture of flexibility and collaboration in which everyone is responsible for the high quality and timeliness of the final product.

Fuse: Making Sense of the New Cogenerational Workplace by Jim Finkelstein with Mary Gavin, includes a bonus chapter from Ayelet Baron.

I love to read! A few weeks ago, I went to visit my parents in Northern Canada. Not only was I looking forward to spending time with them but I was also looking forward to the long plane ride from San Francisco so I could indulge in uninterrupted reading time. For this trip, I selected a few books including “Fuse: Making Sense of the New Cogenerational Workplace“. My colleague and friend Ayelet Baron, VP Strategy for Cisco Canada, contributed a bonus chapter to the book and I wanted to check it out.

Fuse isn’t just another generations book. It’s a thought provoking, entertaining and useful read that will have you questioning your beliefs about how to get the most out of generational diversity. It shows you how to weave together the experience of Boomers and the techno-smarts of Millennials in ways that benefit you and your organization. Authors Jim Finkelstein and Mary Gavin suggest that common points of fusion exist in all of us.

Pop quiz

Find out if your organization is cogenerationally savvy, take the Fuse quiz.

There are vast differences between employees fresh out of school and their more seasoned counterparts. As a team, working in more flexible ways gives you a chance to leverage the best qualities of each generation. That means young people can learn how to be professionals at the same time that older or less knowledgeable team members can come up to speed on their technological skills.

To find out whether your organization is cogenerationally savvy, take the Fuse quiz. Your results might surprise you.

The right kind of job descriptions

Are you attracting the right candidates? How much time and effort do you put in crafting the right job description? Does it have the correct tone?

Resist the temptation to save time by recycling a generic job description. Instead, you should consider an extra step. The Fuse authors explain the importance of tone and positioning in job descriptions.

A Millennial won’t read past the first sentence of a job description unless it hooks her. If the first line doesn’t explain why the organization is great and how it’s making a difference in the community, city, county, state, country, world, or universe, chances are the Millennial won’t bother applying.

Contrast that with the old approach of leading with the laundry list of all the job responsibilities. It might be worth taking the time to audit your job description template to ensure that you include the emotional hook in that key first sentence. In doing so, you’ll have a better chance of enticing high potential candidates to read beyond the first sentence. Consider emphasizing employees, community, and environment. Other considerations (as long as it’s true) are the promise of meaningful work and access to technology.

Reverse mentoring

Does your organization have a reverse mentoring program?

Reverse mentoring was first popularized by former GE Chairman Jack Welsh and it’s been around for about a decade. It’s a relatively new type of mentoring where the traditional roles are reversed and junior employees take on the role of teacher to their more experienced co-workers. The Millennials are coming into the workforce with networking and global-mindedness skills from which older generations can learn. In addition, Millennials are technology natives who can drive a role reversal by mentoring technology-challenged Boomers.

Read about how Nitin Kawale, President of Cisco Canada benefits from reverse mentoring.

If you don’t have a program in place, the good news is that reverse or reciprocal mentoring can take place within existing company mentoring programs. What you’re looking to do is match up employees of different generations and encourage them to meet on a regular basis to exchange ideas. Mix and match: don’t restrict mentoring relationships to people of the same gender or same fields. There so much to learn from people who are different from ourselves.

Cogenerational communication

How frequently do you communicate with your team and how do you do it?

Millennials expect management communication to be:

• Positive
• Respectful
• Motivational
• Electronic
• In person, if the message is really important
• Timely

From Fuse on “How Millennials view communication”:

There is no need to take time to listen to a voice-mail when you see a number on your smartphone – just hit redial.

Gaming = entertainment + work

Millennials are fast becoming an influential factor in the workplace and an increasingly important part of its future. They grew up with computers and cell phones the way Boomers and Gen Xers grew up with typewriters and corded telephones. Boomers see technology as a tool, or even a toy, while younger workers see it as an extension of themselves. Millennials see themselves as “technology natives,” sensible multitaskers who get a lot done. Most of them mix entertainment and work.

The Kids Are Alright: How the Gamer Generation Is Changing the Workplace by John C. Beck and Mitchell Wade, is an excellent reference on the impact of video games on young people. The authors argue that gamers collect valuable knowledge from their entertainment and that they’re poised to use that knowledge to transform the workplace.

Move over Stephen Covey, these are the 7 Habits of Highly Typical Gamers:

1. Everyone Can Succeed

Gamers grow up in a world where literally everyone can succeed at just about anything. By working hard enough (and long enough), it is possible for every player to win these games.

2. You Gotta Play the Odds

This generation grows up playing games of chance. There has been a probability algorithm built into almost every game they’ve played.

3. Learn From the Team, Not the Coach

Whenever you can, resist the urge to dint; often you “teach” better by introducing a group of gamers to a problem and then just getting out of the way.

4. Kill Bosses: Trust Strategy Guides

Share hand-won knowledge. Position yourself as a fellow player who has been there and can offer some strategy tips, not as a boss.

5. Watch the Map

Gamers count on the “meta-map” that shows where they are in relation to other players, goals, obstacles, and resources.

6. Can’t See It; Ignore It

The action is all on the surface. This generation can become confused, baffles, even furious when thwarted by unseen forces in organizations.

7. Demand the Right Team

Good gamers flee places where there aren’t enough high-quality players. They do the same in other parts of life as well.

Why not help the gamers you care about find teams that match their level — and their passion for a particular challenge — and you’ll be amazed at what they can do.

Are you beginning to see how you can make Millennials’ habits work for you and for the gamification of the business (it will happen whether you like it or not)? Respect is the starting point of any relationship. All it takes is the genuine desire to learn from each other.

You Fuse, You Win!

It’s not always easy to get along… That’s because we all see things differently. And different is not bad! In fact, it can be very good! Successful businesses cultivate new and innovative ideas. From those ideas come ways to expand the business by offering new services, working more efficiently, and marketing more effectively.

As a team, working in new and more flexible way gives us a chance to leverage the best qualities of each generation. That means young people can learn how to be professionals at the same time that older or less knowledgeable team members can come up to speed on their technological skills.

You fuse, you win!

• Benefit from the best qualities of each generation
• Give young people the opportunity to learn how to be professionals as well as business leaders
• Let young people to teach others how to use technology more effectively
• Use the full dimension of available talent

Fuse: Making Sense of the New Cogenerational Workplace is a great read. I especially like the call-out features of the book. These include “fuse tips” – helpful suggestions for connection opportunities and “fusions” – bulleted list summaries that conclude every chapter.

A fused workplace can provide tremendous benefits in terms of improved morale, outside-the-box thinking, greater teamwork, and an atmosphere of mutual understanding and respect. In such an environment, there is less focus on the specific schedule of when or where the work is accomplished. The benefit to the business is a more nimble and efficient organization with increased capacity to effectively meet client needs.

Use ALL your talent

Are you creating a workplace that uses the full dimension of talent available to it? Remember that “you snooze, you lose” and “you fuse, you win”.

If you happen to be on a long flight, you might enjoy reading Drive and A Whole New World by Daniel H. Pink.

About the author

Lina Arseneault is Millennial at heart. Follow her on Twitter, read her blog.

Hey, I get it. You’re a dedicated board member and you are invested all the way from your hair follicles to your bunions in your nonprofit organization’s mission. You want everyone to know how awesome your nonprofit is. For whatever reason, what comes naturally is to emblazon your mission statement everywhere you can: annual reports, brochures and, in a streak of misinformed enthusiasm, your website homepage.

Oh, no. No, no. You are sorely mistaken there. Your mission statement does not belong on your homepage. I would argue that thing shouldn’t be within throwing distance of your website. Your site is not a place where you need to talk about how you’re meeting your organizational vision. In fact, the words “vision,” “mission statement” and “statement of purpose” have no business anywhere on your website.

Why? Because nobody cares. I’m not trying to be mean here, there’s just no other way to say it. I guarantee the people you’re serving care more about what you’re doing for them than looking at your gobbledygook mission statement.

I’ll tell you now that no pregnant teen, no neglected pet, no activist, congregant, health worker, educator, mentor, counselor or any other type online audience member visiting a nonprofit’s website ever needs to know the mission statement. Not one!

I’m writing to you directly, dear board member, because you’re the unseen reverser of many a good decision about website homepages. I know this because in my work at a web development firm, I lead our clients through a painstaking process of identifying the most important information for the homepage. We look for something that will keep them there longer than 10 seconds. Too often a board member steps in during final approval to insist on the mission statement going front and center. So back we step.

Listen, I’m not a board member. I don’t know what goes on behind doors when choosing a mission statement. It could be a mixed martial arts battle over which words to choose (“innovation” or “enrich”? “Potential” or “realize”?). You might have bloody lips and bruises that prove your mix of bizpeak is the best. Respect, man. That’s got to be tough.

Still, though. It doesn’t change that no one cares.

So for pity’s sake, pretty please stop insisting your mission statement appears anywhere on your website homepage.

Respectfully yours,

Frustrated web developers everywhere

The key to success is consistency. Hard work and luck help too, but just knocking it out on a regular schedule is incredibly important. Web site promotion is no different; you have to tell people to visit it consistently and continually.

Now, saying, “I’m going to be consistent,” is quite different from actually doing it. Otherwise, everyone would keep their New Year’s resolutions instead of letting them fizzle out by March.

So it helps if you can attach your marketing reminder to something you give out all the time. That way you don’t have to always remember.

Here’s an example from a price label on a dress I recently bought. Notice how Calvin Klein stamps their website on every label. That’s an easy and consistent way for them to remind people they have a website.

Calvin Klein's web address is on every price tag

Look at the back of this price tag from REI. They’re using it to consistently remind people they have a member reward program.

REI reminds customers of its member program on every tag

Yes, you need to be consistent with your SEO and your online newsletter, but look around you and note the other missed opportunities to mention your organization and its website. Start with your website and see how it can promote itself. Your business cards? Outgoing voice mail? Car bumper? Attach it to something else that’s always being distributed that you might never have considered, and it will make your job that much easier.

Want more ideas? Our task-a-day web promotion checklist gives you many ideas you can use to promote your site.

Have ideas? Leave them in the comments below.

Apple's Interactive Digital Textbook

A year ago, skeptics were doubting the value of learning through a cell phone. When McGraw-Hill released its “mConnect” open-standard mobile learning platform aimed at emerging markets, some tech pundits, presumably who sit at computers all day, were finding it difficult to think in any way other than sitting in a classroom or staring at a monitor for instructor-led education.

That’s before everyone became addicted to their iPads and education apps started multiplying by the thousands. On January 19, Apple kicked off its education event in New York releasing iBooks 2 and highlighting its iTunes U app, which made the limitations of traditional textbooks – namely that they’re dry enough to be a fire hazard, terribly dated and incredibly one-dimensional – painfully clear.

Textbook traditionalists might not have been like me, spending more time doodling in the margins than reading the copy between them. They might have been able to memorize the dates and formulas they read as printed in chapters. But a decade of working with online students has proven that you have to meet them where they learn best. Active learning is always the best kind of learning.

Even if you’re not ready to fill your professional development training program with iPads, remember the classrooms of 20 years ago were different places than they are now. New learners learn differently and expect to have access to information and quick feedback. As you think about the way you present information to students, be ready to meet their expectations and embrace the innovations that are proven to keep them engaged.

If there’s one takeaway from 2011, it’s that the economy is haywire and technology is evolving faster than an oiled bullet. In that kind of nutty atmosphere, it can be a challenge to predict what will happen to web-based technology in the coming months.

What does 2012 hold for nonprofit websites?

We do see a few trends emerging for the next year, however. Here are our predictions for 2012 web trends. Take note for when you next talk to your web design firm about and also pay attention to so you can to succeed in your NGO or company.

1. More design for mobile devices.

Look around you. What’s in the hands of the people surrounding you, including your own? An iPad or iPhone? Nook? Kindle? Tablet? Blackberry? Everybody’s using some kind of handheld device. While corporate websites have been mobile-compliant for years, nonprofits will finally start to catch up. Want to peer into the future of mobile design? Read Mobile Web Design Trends and Best Practices.

2. App-lification of websites.

All those people with mobile devices are getting used to responsive design that they can manipulate with their fingers. Move over “point and click,” and make way for “touch and swipe.” People are beginning to expect interactive design with websites, so expect to see websites look and behave more like they came from the app store.

3. Websites focused on user experience.

Since people are spending so much time with their heads bowed over their handheld devices, they also expect to understand what to do with an app without having to guess. This means websites will be built with careful attention to user experience design (UX), in other words, built with humans in mind. Nonprofit leaders might finally understand that the less people have to think about a website, the more likely they’ll donate, sign petitions, volunteer or otherwise participate. Finally!

4. Less Flash.

We’ve long believed Flash to be big and clunky plug-in, with way too many distracting splash screens and blank spaces on the iPad. There are other technologies out there that make web movies and play on a host of devices, so expect to see more of these letters in the alphabet soup: AJAX, CSS3 and HTML 5.

5. Move to online donations.

Smart charities are already asking for money online with little more than a click. Many smaller nonprofits have been slow to relinquish check-cashing for ecommerce web design. We see some of that fear waning, and expect more nonprofits that don’t allow online donations to begin earning some electronic cash.

What do you think will be trending in 2012? Give your vote for one of these five in the comments below or tell us what you think we’ll see in the future.

[Image: Flickr user rjrgmc28]

We spend all year coming up with advice and insight into how you can run a better website, hold a more effective online training program. Here are the top 12 most useful, entertaining and indispensable we covered over the last year.

(Make sure you don’t miss any of the good stuff coming up in 2012 – and yes, we’ve got a good year planed so far. Sign up for updates by RSS feed or by e-mail using the box to the right.)

Definitive Website Pre-Launch Checklist

Ready to launch a new site? Run through this before you flip the switch.

4 Risk Management Steps That Could Save You

Things go wrong with websites. Expect the unexpected.

Welcome to Our Website! (Except for You)

We know you’d never intentionally close your website to anyone, but without appropriate accessibility, that might be just what you’re doing.

Save Your Sanity AND Get the Logo You Love (Yes, You Can!)

You can get through an image rebranding without rehashing past mistakes or subjecting yourself to the pain of collaboration. Here’s how.

John Rochford Talks About Accessibility

John Rochford, Director of Technology at New England INDEX a project of UMass Medical School, is one of those people who takes accessibility seriously and makes websites better for everyone.

10 Ways to Be a Jackass in Online Discussions

Please apply the following rules to discussion boards, comments entries, and Facebook and Twitter postings if you wish to raise collective blood pressure.

Digesting All That Alphabet Soup

Here are a few tips on dealing with letter overload online.

20 Free Icon Sets for Non-Profits

The quickest shortcut to making your website look polished is to use icons. These pictures are nice and free.

Guest Post: Five Musts for Pictures That Pop

Morgan Ione Yeager shares some simple tricks to capture better images and using images online.

Reader Question: How Do I Get Feedback on My New Website?

A reader wants to know how to get honest feedback from her website visitors.

What Is the Coolest E-learning Video You Have Seen Online?

A few great examples.

Frankenspeak Contest with the Content Rules team

Share the words and phrases that you’d like to ban from marketing, sales, corporate communications, business schools, blogs and boardrooms, and you’ll be entered to win a copy of Content Rules, by Ann Handley and C.C. Chapman.

Be a better blogger

Here’s a nauseating mix of nonsense terms that are far too common on the web, in blogs, in e-mail newsletters, in online training or in writing in general. They’re collectively called “Frankenspeak,” according to Ann Handley and C.C. Chapman, authors of the book Content Rules. The term is described on the Content Rules book website as “convoluted text that doesn’t sound like it was spoken by a human, but instead sounds like it was created in a laboratory.”

Handley and Chapman have launched a campaign to ban these words and phrases from “marketing, sales, corporate communications, business schools, blogs and boardrooms.” Handley reveals what she considers the 10 most horrendous examples on the MarketingProfs Daily Fix Blog. Take note whether you’re a blogger or in charge of writing anything, and never use these phrases again:

1. Impactful
2. Leverage
3. Synergy
4. Revolutionary (or innovative)
5. Email blast
6. Proactive
7. Solution
8. Buy-in (or other mashed up words like mission-critical or best-of-breed)
9. Run it up the flagpole (or other ridiculous corporate-speak phrases like “eat your own dogfood” or “at the end of the day”)
10. Nazi (when not actually describing a Nazi member, i.e., “brand Nazi”)

Looking for more advice on writing better? Check out 10 Commandments of Writing for the Web and request our free Perfect Blogging Checklist.

Win a Copy of Content Rules

Contest time

[Update! Congratulations to Julie, who won the drawing for a signed copy of Content Rules by Ann Handley and C.C. Chapman. This contest may be over, but you're still welcome to keep sending examples of frankenspeak.]

Make the leap from marketing-speak to respectable publisher on the web by following the advice in Content Rules, which you can win as part of Talance’s Customer Appreciation Month festivities. We’re taking the chance to say thanks for letting us work with you on your web and e-learning design and development. Entering is easy: just tell us below in the comments your favorite example of Frankenspeak, and your name will automatically go into the hat for the book drawing.

Note: If you want even more hand-holding, you should check out our grammar gaffes contest, where we’re giving away two hours’ free communications consultation with Kyla Cromer.

Deadline for entries is Jan. 30, 2012. We’ll pick one winner at random from all entries on Jan. 31, 2012 and will notify the winner via e-mail. You must leave your name and a correct e-mail address to qualify.