Blog
Abstruse ramblings of a corporate web developer gone freelance
Doodlekit was reviewed by PCWorld this morning, but with one caveat - it's the Danish PCWorld! Hey... we are not complaining! The very first few sentences (translated) read:
"The time's most beautiful, quickest and mostly advanced web page gets one with Doodlekit . Next month a new web service has maybe taken over the leading position, but just now Doodlekit is the enough strongest online web page programme."
Read the translated article yourself (scroll down a bit).
Yesterday TechCrunch did a write up on the Doodlekit Online Website Builder. The article compared it to some other online website builders and pointed out some of the more advanced features that Doodlekit has over its competitors.
The only thing that was a little disappointing about it was that you could tell from some of the comments that a few people thought Doodlekit was just another website building tool like every other service provider has. This is not true. Doodlekit has a lot more advanced CMS features than those static website creators do. Not to mention the ease of use compared to these tools.
But that’s OK. A lot of other people mentioned the fact that there was a need for businesses websites to have more advanced features beyond static page creation. Advanced tools for collecting data, organizing users, etc. that Doodlekit provides that these other companies don’t.
Then there was the web traffic. Wow! We have already more than doubled our traffic since a few weeks ago when we first released the latest version of Doodlekit. We have been pretty excited about that. But the last 30 hours since the posting of the TechCrunch write up has generated us over 6000 extra visitors and 600+ new Doodlekit websites!
The past few days have been pretty exciting for us and there is more to come! We have some interviews lined up for next week so we will see how those go. Watch out world… here comes Doodlekit!
The last few weeks have been a whirlwind. I have been super busy. I have been dealing with the following:
- Doodlekit’s fast growth
- Working a large custom website contract
- Working Google / Yahoo / Other advertising issues
- Visiting friends and family for the holiday
- Picking up some extra chores around the house for my wife (she’s 5 month’s pregnant – with twins)
- Fixing up the house to sell (we need a bigger house for the twins)
- Selling both our vehicles and getting new ones that accommodate two child safety seats
- Jury Duty (they didn’t pick me thank God)
- Oh yeah… and working on Heathbits’ new design.
Any guesses as to which one got the lowest priority?
Needless to say, I finally finished up Heathbits’ new design and pushed it to production today. I picked a unique color theme I liked and went from there. This took a long time to create. I designed, and redesigned, and redesigned again. Creativity comes with a price – time. Once the final design was complete, it only takes a few hours to convert into valid XHTML/CSS. The hard part is always coming up with a unique design.
Anyway, I hope you like it!
With the new version of Doodlekit having been successfully released, I thought I would turn my attention back to Heathbits for a while. The new upgraded version of Doodlekit required that I make lots of changes to my original website design. Instead, I opted to use this as an excuse to make a new design for Heathbits!
For those of you who know me, this is probably not a big surprise. Knowing how much I love web design, the new Doodlekit release afforded too much of an opportunity for me to pass up.
The new design will be out in a few days. I just finished up the index page and am now working on the main layout. I will probably be including an extra section that shows my favorite website designs. I will be posting some rules on how to submit designs to me for review. Of course, as always, all designs will be required to be W3C compliant in XHTML/HTML and CSS.
Now that the hard work is over releasing Doodlekit – it’s time to have a little fun!
Ben and I are very excited to officially announce the biggest Doodlekit release to date. We've packed it full of new goodies and gave it the expected DK polish.
What does this mean?
Even if you have little or no web-building experience, or simply don't want to spend any time writing code, you can have a personal or commercial, fully-functional web site at your fingertips in no time.
- Open an online business
- Blog to your heart's desire
- Sell products
- Create a narrated photo album to share with friends or family
Here's what's new:
Advanced Content Editor
- Upload just about any image or file
- W3C compliant HTML so your site loads faster than ever
- Style formating so you have an instant professional look and feel
Shopping Cart
- Use your own Paypal account
- Simple to create
- Start selling immediately
Google Adsense Integration
- Just enter you Google ID and start making money
- Ads match your color theme
New Layout & Themes
- More colors
- More backgrounds
- Change your entire look and feel with a click
Stock Photos and Image
- A huge new library of photos and images
Plan Changes
- The basic web site is FREE! Just give us a try
- Personal site with all the bells and whistles
- Commercial site with a fully functional, easy to use shopping cart
Check it out for Free. We know you'll have fun using it.
Doodlekit Free Website Builder Created by my business partner and I in 2006.
Garbage Burrito - The online blog of Ben Kittrell, Ruby On Rails guru and Doodlekit co-owner.
- 12/17 - Heath Huffman - Doodlekit Makes PCWorld!
- 12/01 - Heath Huffman - Doodlekit Gets TechCrunched
- 11/27 - Heath Huffman - Heathbits (Version 2) Complete
- 10/28 - Heath Huffman - New Heathbits Design
- 10/17 - Heath Huffman - New And Improved Doodlekit Launches!
- more...
subscribe- 08/19 - Jack - Header And Repeatable (Tile) Background Images wanted in Photoshop ...
- 04/25 - Justin Briggs - Doodlekit Makes PCWorld!
- 02/11 - Heath Huffman - Heathbits (Version 2) Complete
- 02/03 - stoica marian - Heathbits (Version 2) Complete
- 11/30 - brian - Heathbits (Version 2) Complete
- more...
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