45 days after theme upgrade: taking stock of the change
Finally, I think (or hope? 🙂 that the website has finished 98% of the upgrade.
I started changing theme at the beginning of November (1st of November I think), and until some days ago, I was still fixing issues that I considered "important".
And some issues that I considered critical lingered for several days (password reset, login not always working).
There are still some things I am working on, but I consider them "minor".
That's not a smooth or easy transition by any means, and it lasted for a very long time.
It also cost lots of time and quite some money (Ali the former developer chose the worst time possible to decide not to work on this website anymore :).
On the other hand, among the advantages:
- Far better login & registration experience
- Far better profile page
- Better design for the course, providing a better customer experience
- Faster website
- Fewer plugins in use
Initially, there was also a surge in organic traffic, which was unexpected and possibly happened as a consequence of the new theme. But it then reverted after Google's latest search algorithm update around a week ago (those algorithm updates lead to random traffic surges or drops, and are often independent of actual quality of content / experience).
Overall, bar any future major issues, I can say that I'm very satisfied with the change.
In the future, I might go for a fully customized theme, and hire a company to do it from scratch. But that's in the future, for now, I aim at keeping things as they are, and running smoothly, so I can focus on new content / content updates / research.
It's awesome indeed.
There is definitely a speed difference. Much smoother and faster.
I have been going through Power University again with your new theme.
The quizzes are smooth as well.
It also cost lots of time and quite some money (Ali the former developer chose the worst time possible to decide not to work on this website anymore :).
Huge thanks man, this really benefits the current subscribers and Power University learners like myself.
I did read the forum post on the former developer. That was really unfortunate.
Looks like a newly furbished site before the end of 2020.
Initially, there was also a surge in organic traffic, which was unexpected and possibly happened as a consequence of the new theme. But it then reverted after Google's latest search algorithm update around a week ago (those algorithm updates lead to random traffic surges or drops, and are often independent of actual quality of content / experience).
Interesting with the spikes. Google's algorithms can be a mystery.
I like very much all the changes except 2:
1. It’s more difficult for me to find your best books review. I think this has lots of value to me.
2. It’s not possible to embed videos in posts anymore
So feed-back from me: I would say it’s 98% success. Congrats!
Matthew: Interesting with the spikes. Google's algorithms can be a mystery.
Yes, that makes businesses heavily dependent on organic traffic quite risky -or, at least, unpredictable-.
Some people say it's a concerted effort by Google ot push people to spend money on advertising.
John: It’s more difficult for me to find your best books review. I think this has lots of value to me.
It's in "Resources" on the top menu.
I'm still not sure whether to leave it there, or to swap with the full list of reviews here. But in any case, both of them will still be in the top menu.
I really liked the old format of sorting through the books by rating and genre, but... You gotta admit when it's only you who likes something, and nobody else :). And it looked like very few people were using that option, so... Scrapped it (and deleted two plugins).
John: It’s not possible to embed videos in posts anymore
Yes it is:
You won't see the preview while you're still typing, but it's there once it's posted.
I really liked the old format of sorting through the books by rating and genre, but... You gotta admit when it's only you who likes something, and nobody else :). And it looked like very few people were using that option, so... Scrapped it (and deleted two plugins).
That's too bad because I liked it a lot. Actually I saved the pages on my computer. I think both would be great. The "short" list and the "long" list.
I really liked the old format of sorting through the books by rating and genre, but... You gotta admit when it's only you who likes something, and nobody else :). And it looked like very few people were using that option, so... Scrapped it (and deleted two plugins).
Honestly, I really liked it as well.
And similarly to John, I saved some pages on my computer for book references.
At the same time, we should go with what the majority would like.
John: It’s not possible to embed videos in posts anymore
I should add this to my forum post on images.
I struggled to find this out a bit because I thought that I should embed the HTML within the post.
Then I realised that I was overthinking it and putting the link works.