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Designing for the Social Web
 
 

Designing for the Social Web [Kindle Edition]

Joshua Porter
4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

Digital List Price: £22.66 What's this?
Print List Price: £28.99
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Product Description

Product Description

This is the eBook version of the printed book.

No matter what type of web site or application you’re building, social interaction among the people who use it will be key to its success. They will talk about it, invite their friends, complain, sing its high praises, and dissect it in countless ways. With the right design strategy you can use this social interaction to get people signing up, coming back regularly, and bringing others into the fold. With tons of examples from real-world interfaces and a touch of the underlying social psychology theory, Joshua Porter shows you how to design your next great social web application.

Inside, you’ll discover:
• The real reasons why people participate online and the psychology behind them
• The Usage Lifecycle—or how people use your web application over time
• How to get people past that trickiest of hurdles: sign-up
• What to do when you’ve launched a web application and nobody is using it
• How to analyze the effectiveness of your application screens and flows
• How to grow your social web application from zero users to 1000—and beyond

Designing for the social web is about much more than adding features. It’s about embracing the social interaction of the people who make you successful—and then designing smartly to encourage it.

From the Back Cover

No matter what type of web site or application you’re building, social interaction among the people who use it will be key to its success. They will talk about it, invite their friends, complain, sing its high praises, and dissect it in countless ways. With the right design strategy you can use this social interaction to get people signing up, coming back regularly, and bringing others into the fold. With tons of examples from real-world interfaces and a touch of the underlying social psychology theory, Joshua Porter shows you how to design your next great social web application.

Inside, you’ll discover:
• The real reasons why people participate online and the psychology behind them
• The Usage Lifecycle—or how people use your web application over time
• How to get people past that trickiest of hurdles: sign-up
• What to do when you’ve launched a web application and nobody is using it
• How to analyze the effectiveness of your application screens and flows
• How to grow your social web application from zero users to 1000—and beyond

Designing for the social web is about much more than adding features. It’s about embracing the social interaction of the people who make you successful—and then designing smartly to encourage it.

Product details

  • Format: Kindle Edition
  • File Size: 3411 KB
  • Print Length: 192 pages
  • Publisher: New Riders Press; 1 edition (7 April 2010)
  • Sold by: Amazon Media EU S.à r.l.
  • Language English
  • ASIN: B0015DWIQ0
  • Text-to-Speech: Enabled
  • Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #94,131 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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More About the Author

Joshua Porter
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Invaluable 27 May 2008
Format:Paperback
I attended Joshua Porter excellent panel session, 'Social Design Strategies', at SXSW 2008 and was keen to read his book. The book does not disappoint. The title is misleading it's about more than just social networking; and this is a good thing. For example, there's some excellent stuff on how to design a good sign-up process and how to respond to customers on service failures. Joshua details a hierachy covering different levels of customer engagement and how to move them up the value chain. All in all brilliant.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By DrGren
Format:Paperback
This is one of the most useless books I bought since university (12 years ago).

I simply cannot understand WHO would benefit from it. For sure, there is nothing wrong, it is not outdated with regard to the facts. But it is simply non revealing. There is nothing in this book that a serious internet professional does not already know about. You would tract more benefit listening to my wife explaining the workings of the circle of friends of Winnie the Pooh to my 3, 5 and 7 year old boys than reading this book.

I am sorry. A complete waste of money and a big disappointment.

And on top of it... It is truly DULL. Not one wit or passage with humour. Crisp and boring.

Could fit first year undergraduate of digital marketing or information technology just for the sake of it. But those kids will probably already be a lot more familiar with the Social Web than Mr. Porter is.

This book goes into the the bottom shelf of the library, together with some "Teach yourself Javascript 1.1" and "Building your Business with Google for Dummies". Never to be consulted.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By jakeone VINE™ VOICE
Format:Paperback
As a web developer, I love this book. I wouldn't have believed it possible to cram so much useful information into 180-ish pages but the author does an amazing job. I approached the book having built many rather boring-looking sites and always knew they weren't quite right but couldn't put my finger on it - this book put that right.

The book is basically a step-by-step guide to designing websites that meet the needs and expectations of today's surfer - rather than the surfers of the '90s (which my sites were guilty of). Just take a look at the Contents page. The author walks you through the "Usage Lifecycle" - users start off unaware of your site, then they become interested, then they're first-time users, then regular users and finally they become passionate users - and shows you, step-by-step, how to design for each phase. The author tells you the "best practice" for each stage, what works, what will make users abandon a stage (and how to design to avoid this), what will kill your site.

I have one observation - the final chapter, "Funnel Analysis" is pretty boring - not at all like the rest of the book - but this is probably my own natural aversion to anything involving testing, statistics or anything analytical!

If you are a web developer I recommend you get this book to ensure you are building professional sites that work. If you're thinking of getting someone else to build you a site, you also need to get this book to make sure the developer is designing to best principles and that there is an excellent reason behind every design choice you make.

My only criticism of the book? I wish the author would stop telling my competitors these secrets ;)
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Popular Highlights

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&quote;
Relying on social networks is how the vast majority of decisions are made! &quote;
Highlighted by 23 Kindle users
&quote;
Group interaction is what separates a web application from a social web application. &quote;
Highlighted by 21 Kindle users
&quote;
The applications people find most compelling allow them to excel at a single activity. &quote;
Highlighted by 20 Kindle users

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