Insights by Justin Downey

October 2014

Zombie-Proof Your Website

With big-name website hacks in the news and Halloween just around the corner, we thought it time we talk a little bit about website security. Here are 8 basic tricks to zombie-proof your website or blog. 1. Buy Sucuri We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again. The best defense is a good offense …

1,315 Views

October 2014

3 Cool Things You Can Do with wp-config.php

One of the most important files in your WordPress installation is the wp-config.php file, located in the root of your installation. WordPress users might think it’s just a place for database configuration stuff, but there are a LOT of options there. Here are three cool things you can do to modify some of the core …

1,945 Views

October 2014

Our 2nd Award Nomination in 2 Weeks

We didn’t go through the gut-wrenching process of renovating our website and our brand to win awards, but we’re not complaining. I’m proud to announce, JDM Digital’s website has just been nominated to be included in the FWA’s Public Shortlist. That’s , for anyone counting. The Favorite Website Awards, or FWA, is widely recognized as …

1,688 Views

October 2014

Our 2014 Awwward Nomination

We worked very hard on our new website and refreshed brand. Today, we’re proud to announce it’s been nominated for an international website award. The site is being evaluated over the next 6 days. View our award nomination and consider voting for us. The Awwwards recognize the talent and efforts of the best web designers, …

1,311 Views

October 2014

Should you allow reposting?

Even professional copy writers are familiar with how intimidating a blank sheet of paper can be when you’re trying to create great content. But, once that content has been produced and published, should you allow other people to repost your hard work? What are the impacts from an SEO perspective? I received a question from …

1,261 Views

October 2014

Link Structure Methods for SEO

The link structure is one of the most important factors in SEO because it heavily affects Rankings, PageRank flow, and user experience (UX). Let’s take a look at 4 of the most popular Link Structure methods used today, discuss their advantages and disadvantages, and see how to optimize each method for user experience and SEO. …

1,787 Views

September 2014

4 Free CDNs for a Faster Website

A content delivery network (CDN) increases page loading speed by decreasing latency, but did you know there are a handful of wicked-fast, free CDNs out there hosting popular libraries like Twitter Bootstrap, jQuery and Font Awesome? Well, there are. Here are 4 of them compiled by our friends at jHost. What is a CDN? A …

3,478 Views

September 2014

WOT: Crowdsourced Web Safety

Web of Trust (or WOT) is a website reputation and review service that helps people make informed decisions about whether to trust a website or not. WOT is based on a unique crowdsourcing approach that collects ratings and reviews from a global community of millions of users who rate and comment on websites based on …

1,395 Views

September 2014

SMTP for WordPress Email Notifications

Many PHP websites and web applications, including WordPress, send notification email via PHP mail()–a function which creates server-generated emails. Unfortunately, that’s exactly how spammers do it too. Configure WordPress to use SMTP instead to take the strain off your web server and increase deliverability. A study last year found that 19% of all permission-based email …

1,222 Views

September 2014

DuckDuckGo is what Google was

I’ll never forget the day I fell in love with Google. With my US Robotics dial-up modem tying up the phone line, I discovered their elegant and uncluttered home page. A search box and a logo–what else do you need? A lot has changed since that day and Google’s no longer as clean and trustworthy …

1,335 Views

August 2014

A Brief History of IE Compatibility Mode

Microsoft introduced “Compatibility Mode” to allow really old websites built for Internet Explorer (IE) to display correctly in more standards-compliant versions. Since then, IE users and web designers have had the almost impossible challenge of “backwards compatibility.” Here’s a brief history of how we got stuck with Compatibility Mode.

5,020 Views

August 2014

JDM Offers Clients Free WordPress Update

WordPress and Drupal have both released a big security update to prevent XML Quadratic Blowup Attacks. Everybody is reporting on it, but nobody seems to want to help. JDM Digital is offering clients a FREE upgrade. Nir Goldshlager, a security researcher from Salesforce.com’s product security team, has discovered an XML vulnerability that impacts the popular …

1,345 Views