Top 10 Mistakes

With years of website expertise, we know mistakes happen. Here is a list of the most common site editing mistakes, and how to fix them.

1. Forgetting that "content is king."
   We've worked hard to ensure that your site is well designed—and we hope you're pleased! And you've worked hard to make sure that the pages are laid out carefully and artistically. Just don't forget that your site visitors are primarily interested in the content of your web site. Make sure you keep your content fresh and accurate. Nothing kills a web site as fast as out-of-date content.

2. Editing your web site using an out-of-date browser.
   We know that a lot of folks still use IE6 as their primary browser. But if you're one of them, you'll notice a warning when you log in to edit your web site. Proceed at your own risk. While we are maintaining support for the public side of your web site in many older browsers, the administrative side of your site requires more modern browsers. There are just too many great features that the older browsers don't support. You can review the list of browsers supported by Radius here.

3. Pasting content directly from Word
   It seems as easy as copy and paste. But when you copy text out of a word processing document (such as Microsoft Word) along with the text you can see, the "copy" command also loads a bunch of HTML code onto your clipboard that you can't see. Unfortunately, the HTML that makes your word processor work so well, will gum up your web site. Learn how to avoid this common mistake.

4. Using tabs, spaces, or line returns incorrectly.
   If you first learned how to type using a typewriter, chances are good you've had to relearn how to use tabs, spaces, and line-returns when you made the move to computers. If you've never made the transition (or have just been a little undisciplined), this would be an excellent time to take a careful look at how tabs, spaces, and line-returns can either enhance or mess up your web editing. Click here to learn more.

5. Trouble with tables.
   No, we don't mean that thing in the dining room. We're talking here about tables made of rows and columns and, let us just say, tables can be challenging to work with. However, they are a powerful tool for page layout on your web site — particularly in building enewsletters. A table that is set up correctly is a highly-reliable way to make sure your page content aligns the way you intend it to. However, a table that is set-up incorrectly, can spell disaster for even the best web page. Click here to learn more.

6. Uploading images to your site.
   While uploading images is actually an amazingly simple process, it does involve a number of steps. More importantly, an image that looks great on your digital camera, or even on your computer desktop, may not look so great on your web site. Review our images page to ensure perfect pictures, logos, and graphics.

7. Forgetting that a page is listed on a menu.
   Just because you delete or deactivate a page, doesn't mean that pre-existing menu items linking to it know to delete or deactivate themselves.  Remember to clean up your menus when you clean up your page list and your site will stay coordinated. Read more.

8. Confusing "Publish" and "Save as Draft."
   Make sure after you edit a page on your site that you click the "Publish" button. This button is the only one that actually publishes the changes you made to the live site. The "Save as Draft" button saves your changes, but doesn't publish them to the live site. Read more.

9. Failing to document changes to a page.
   This common mistake won't create an immediate mess. But for sites with multiple editors or a site with infrequent (less than weekly) updates, the change comments provide a history of page revisions which can be immensely helpful when you need to revert to a previous version of a page. Read more.

10. Forgetting to click the refresh button.
    The changes you make to a page of your site through Radius are immediately viewable to the rest of the internet public on your live site. We recommend that you have the admin side of your site open in one window and the live site open in another. This will allow you to quickly flip from one to the other to see what changes have been made. This is all well-and-good, but unless you remember to click the "refresh" button on your browser, your most recent changes will not be reflected.