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Get rid of useless badges

13 Comments

“Get rid of those RIDICULOUS social media links at the bottom of every post. The only people who have the power to get any of your posts ranking well in Social Media Networks don’t need the little buttons to do it. If they think you’re worthy, they’ll submit regardless.” [via mass-automation]

If your site visitors use tools like del.icio.us, Mister Wong, Digg, Stumble Upon, Netvibes or any similar websites on a regular basis, they already have a browser-plugin or scriptlet in use to add links or content to the described services.

The same goes for SnapShots — Apart from the “monetizing-my-blog aspect” I have no clue why websites like Read/WriteWeb or TechCrunch implemented those services. It’s just annoying. The moment I try to click a link, a layer is popping up, making it almost impossible to me to follow the original link. If I need additional information, I simply visit the site. If I really want to use this service I install the plugin for my favourite browser.

There is absolutely no use for your visitors to see a horde of “badges” and “buttons” on the sidebar showing off your technorati ranking, displaying who’s on your site or presenting the five rss-readers. If your users like your content, they like it because of the useful content and not because of your technorati-ranking. Make your sites usable again and remove those silly badges, plugins and add-ons. Emphasis on “useless”.

11 Comments

  1. oliver gassner wrote on 27 November, 2007 at 6:46 pm | #1239

    right you are, removeing my silly buttons as we speak (I was unhappy anyway cause they were a pain to customize…)

  2. Kila Morton wrote on 29 November, 2007 at 8:13 am | #1242

    Well, I have to tell you that I am a member of several of those sites and I do submit sites, but, with the exception of delicious, I always use the buttons :-( I think that it may be better to leave some of those links for some people who don’t have browser plug-ins. Although I’m a software engineer and web designer, I like to do things the old fashioned way when it comes to submitting an article. It may seem silly, but, I know I’m not alone.

  3. oliver gassner wrote on 29 November, 2007 at 2:58 pm | #1245

    well maybe then it would make sense just to offer some of those services or to use a ‘universal’ 2-click service that interfaces to a list of services. cause those differ widely from country to country…

  4. Tommaso Farina wrote on 30 November, 2007 at 5:50 pm | #1248

    Hello, I’m a very happy user of your Cordobo Green Park theme. I want to notify a website that use this theme removing your credits in the footer section: [link removed by admin]
    Best regards.

  5. Artis Cordobo wrote on 30 November, 2007 at 6:05 pm | #1249

    @Tommaso:
    Thanks for your information.
    Although I don’t encourage people to do so, I don’t force anybody to leave the credits.

    Best regards

  6. Rafa wrote on 30 November, 2007 at 6:22 pm | #1250

    Bueno Cordobé.
    Ya no se te ve por la universidad. Sigues los estudios? Los seguirás uno de estos anhos que vienen, o los has dejado ya? No pregunto por acojonarte, sino por interés (espiritual)…
    hasta pronto

  7. Kila Morton wrote on 20 December, 2007 at 8:34 pm | #1292

    You could use the AddThis.com little icon at the bottom of each post. You just place a small little bit of code in your php file and then it automatically ads one little icon. When a user mouses over the icon, it changes to a drop down with all of the social icon items listed. That way you don’t have to clog up your blog. Take a look at AddThis.com to see the icon or take a look at a post on my blog to see what I’m talking about.

  8. Feanwulf wrote on 28 December, 2007 at 10:11 am | #1318

    I am using your Cordoba-green Theme with my new Website. And I totally agree with your statement, that these badges and even many ad banners are useless.

    I removed many of these useless services from my Blog.

  9. Micah Baldwin wrote on 16 January, 2008 at 7:33 am | #1408

    Have you tried either sharethis.com or madkast.com? Both are clean and easy on the eyes.

  10. Artis Cordobo wrote on 16 January, 2008 at 11:49 am | #1409

    Micah,

    in my opinion, both of them are quite good and small badges - and sometimes even useful ;)

  11. Ian wrote on 8 June, 2008 at 10:14 am | #1568

    I personally don’t like the pop-up share icons that load up every single social site on the planet. I do however like to have the ones that are relevant to the site. I also disagree that everyone has plugins for this. Like another poster already already said, I also manually add to my delicious and the icons help. I am a web designer and I do have plugins like web developers tool kit, but I don’t want to clog up my browser with 9 million plugins. I would rather just have the most important icons on the site. That said, if the site is really that worthy I will usually go to delicious and bookmark it, but, if the author makes it easy for me, I am even more likely to bookmark it.

    I think it’s all about moderation really. Show the social sites that you are into and that are relevant to you. Some people do go overboard.

2 Trackbacks

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