Yesterday, I wrote that I was cleaning up the website a bit, specifically post labels. I also announced that I was probably gutting the alternative share widget and relocating the reload comments link. Not only did I do that, I basically reduced or eliminated widgets that offers little to no benefit to users, therefore speeding up page load times.
Here's some of the changes I made:
- I reduced the size of the "Recent Posts" widget. It now shows about 15 posts, which reduces the size of the page slightly, while taking minimal user experience impacts, if any.
- The Twitter follow buttons widget is gone, as Twitter options can be found on the social page.
- The "People Online" widget is now gone, since the analytics were never accurate. For example, I had over 200 views on the Bitdefender review post within 2 hours yesterday, and the people online widget reflected a very little amount of actual viewers, ~4 at the most the last time I checked.
- I reduced the "Top Posts This Week" widget from 5 posts to 3 posts, which has surprisingly increased actual analytical accuracy as far as views are concerned.
- The reload comments button/link was relocated.
I know, it's not that much fun as my previous posts, but this was a last second idea that I had. Otherwise I probably wouldn't have made a fun Friday post.