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The highest converting traffic I've ever seen...

2010-01-14T02:50:00.001-08:00

Traffic Buddha is a new site that says it guarantees more web visitors and online advertising with very little effort or cost. More importantly, it promises higher CONVERSIONS--signups and sales. So I decided to put it to the test...

My first impression was the site looks professional and clean, with an attractive look and feel. It is easy to read and understand. Joining the site was easy and painless--they do offer 2 upgrade options but they are not required to gain the benefits.

The Members Area is very well laid out and intuitive--I could figure out what to do after only a few minutes and was able to get up and running in less than 5 minutes. Inside the site, you create links and ads--the links you simply enter any URL links you use into the generator and it transforms them into "Traffic Buddha" links. You create ads for anything you want to promote using the Traffic Buddha Ad Generator, which is very easy to use. You can create as many links and as many ads as you like. And they are organized in a logical way--links are displayed in the order you create them but also your 5 most recent links appear on the main page for quick reference. Also, since the link generator is the tool you'll use most, it is also right at the top of the main page when you login. Very smart!

After you've created at least 1 link and 1 ad you can start to generate traffic. Just use and promote the new Traffic Buddha link instead of the original source link you had. Every time the Traffic Buddha link is clicked, the page loads followed by a small ad window in the lower right corner. It displays 3 ads PLUS an image with your affiliate link that goes back to Traffic Buddha. So if anyone clicks the Traffic Buddha image they see the site, and if they signup they become your referral. It's a great viral feature because you can build referrals without even trying to just by using the site.

Now every time the ad window displays (your Traffic Buddha links get clicked) you earn credits that get YOUR ad displayed in the ad windows when other members' links get clicked. So the more clicks, the more times your ads get displayed.

And this works virally--meaning as you make referrals into Traffic Buddha (either by promoting it or just using it and visitors click the Traffic Buddha image on the ad window to join) you also earn ad credits on THEIR link clicks. And this works up to 5 levels deep. So you can create a massive amount of free ad views and web traffic by referring others to Traffic Buddha also.

I didn't get to test the full effect of a big downline yet (I just got the tool) but I can tell you the rest of the site works exactly as stated--my links got clicked, I earned credits, and my ads got displayed. Traffic Buddha even tracked my results so I know how many clicks and how many ad displays. That was an impressive unadvertised extra feature.

There is one more benefit and feature which might be the best of them all--downline emailing. You can email your downline with offers, promotions, or whatever you like, and here is where Traffic Buddha really shines. They took time to make the emailing often enough that it's valuable as a user, but no so often that it's a burden to your downline. But the best part about this feature (and actually the credit earning too) is that it tells you exactly how long until you can mail again. Now THAT's cool.

Overall I have to say I am impressed with Traffic Buddha. It is simple yet powerful, and delivers on its promises. Highly recommended to anyone who wants to increase traffic and advertising.

See it and join here:

http://tinyurl.com/yjzdtwm

Cloud computing – Basic knowledge

2009-12-07T02:29:00.001-08:00

We begin with a basic understanding. What is Cloud Computing really is. It would be very helpful if we understand that. The challenge ahead is very exciting for us in this cloud computing. Many service providers will be free and that paid well. We can choose which ones fit our needs

Cloud computing is Internet- ("cloud-") based development and use of computer technology ("computing"). In concept, it is a paradigm shift whereby details are abstracted from the users who no longer need knowledge of, expertise in, or control over the technology infrastructure "in the cloud" that supports them. It typically involves the provision of dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources as a service over the Internet.

The term cloud is used as a metaphor for the Internet, based on how the Internet is depicted in computer network diagrams and is an abstraction of the underlying infrastructure it conceals. Typical cloud computing providers deliver common business applications online which are accessed from a web browser, while the software and data are stored on the servers.

These applications are broadly divided into the following categories: Software as a Service (SaaS), Utility Computing, Web Services, Platform as a Service (PaaS), Managed Service Providers (MSP), Service Commerce, and Internet Integration. The name cloud computing was inspired by the cloud symbol that is often used to represent the Internet in flow charts and diagrams."

Tags : Cloud Computing,Basic,Introduction

Why VOIP Can Save a Business Thousands

2009-12-04T06:01:00.001-08:00

For over 100 years the only possible way to carry on a conversation over a long distance was to use the regular telephone lines. The problem is that for every user, a business would need a separate telephone number. These numbers are costly for any large company and can be difficult to manage. The difficulty lies majorly in the lack of extendability of the system itself. For example, if you have purchased the a class of numbers, and would like to assign a block to a specific department, once the whole block is consumed, you could no longer provide a number in the same range. Think of it as a city street. Once you have built and numbered the houses, it would be difficult to add another number in-between the already built houses. The only solution is to either re-number every single house, or to provide the new house with a number outside the regular range.

For this reason, extension addressing was a primary feature when the VOIP protocols were established. The current addressing allows for a company to address any amount of extensions to its users as well as make it transparent to the customers. This comes as a huge benefit to companies that no longer need to have a dedicated employee solely for its communication system. The addressing is done automatically by the PBX (Private Branch Exchange).

This is one of the many reasons why Voice -Over-IP has had a tremendous success with business implementations. A company could use a single phone number and re-route all the calls to extensions. This is in fact a very popular way of attending to customers through numerous departments. Other features such as the auto-attendant will allow the customers to direct themselves to the particular department and not having to speak with a costly concierge or a receptionist. The VOIP technology has increased in popularity through the business world. But un-surprisingly residential customers are ditching the old system and joining the VOIP world.

Cloud Computing

2009-12-04T02:42:00.001-08:00

Cloud computing, What exactly is It. We now hear much about it. The starting point of changing the way with computing has begun . Could it be after this desktop will disappear. At least the next few years. I think not that easy. For countries with low cost access to high speed internet with easily available it could happen soon. But for countries with rare for good Internet infrastructure that's impossible.

Cloud computing is all the rage. "It's become the phrase du jour," says Gartner senior analyst Ben Pring, echoing many of his peers. The problem is that (as with Web 2.0) everyone seems to have a different definition.

As a metaphor for the Internet, "the cloud" is a familiar cliché, but when combined with "computing," the meaning gets bigger and fuzzier. Some analysts and vendors define cloud computing narrowly as an updated version of utility computing: basically virtual servers available over the Internet. Others go very broad, arguing anything you consume outside the firewall is "in the cloud," including conventional outsourcing.

Cloud computing comes into focus only when you think about what IT always needs: a way to increase capacity or add capabilities on the fly without investing in new infrastructure, training new personnel, or licensing new software. Cloud computing encompasses any subscription-based or pay-per-use service that, in real time over the Internet, extends IT's existing capabilities.

Cloud computing is at an early stage, with a motley crew of providers large and small delivering a slew of cloud-based services, from full-blown applications to storage services to spam filtering. Yes, utility-style infrastructure providers are part of the mix, but so are SaaS (software as a service) providers such as Salesforce.com. Today, for the most part, IT must plug into cloud-based services individually, but cloud computing aggregators and integrators are already emerging.

InfoWorld talked to dozens of vendors, analysts, and IT customers to tease out the various components of cloud computing. Based on those discussions, here's a rough breakdown of what cloud computing is all about:

1. SaaS
This type of cloud computing delivers a single application through the browser to thousands of customers using a multitenant architecture. On the customer side, it means no upfront investment in servers or software licensing; on the provider side, with just one app to maintain, costs are low compared to conventional hosting. Salesforce.com is by far the best-known example among enterprise applications, but SaaS is also common for HR apps and has even worked its way up the food chain to ERP, with players such as Workday. And who could have predicted the sudden rise of SaaS "desktop" applications, such as Google Apps and Zoho Office?

2. Utility computing
The idea is not new, but this form of cloud computing is getting new life from Amazon.com, Sun, IBM, and others who now offer storage and virtual servers that IT can access on demand. Early enterprise adopters mainly use utility computing for supplemental, non-mission-critical needs, but one day, they may replace parts of the datacenter. Other providers offer solutions that help IT create virtual datacenters from commodity servers, such as 3Tera's AppLogic and Cohesive Flexible Technologies' Elastic Server on Demand. Liquid Computing's LiquidQ offers similar capabilities, enabling IT to stitch together memory, I/O, storage, and computational capacity as a virtualized resource pool available over the network.

3. Web services in the cloud
Closely related to SaaS, Web service providers offer APIs that enable developers to exploit functionality over the Internet, rather than delivering full-blown applications. They range from providers offering discrete business services -- such as Strike Iron and Xignite -- to the full range of APIs offered by Google Maps, ADP payroll processing, the U.S. Postal Service, Bloomberg, and even conventional credit card processing services.

4. Platform as a service
Another SaaS variation, this form of cloud computing delivers development environments as a service. You build your own applications that run on the provider's infrastructure and are delivered to your users via the Internet from the provider's servers. Like Legos, these services are constrained by the vendor's design and capabilities, so you don't get complete freedom, but you do get predictability and pre-integration. Prime examples include Salesforce.com's Force.com, Coghead and the new Google App Engine. For extremely lightweight development, cloud-based mashup platforms abound, such as Yahoo Pipes or Dapper.net.

5. MSP (managed service providers)
One of the oldest forms of cloud computing, a managed service is basically an application exposed to IT rather than to end-users, such as a virus scanning service for e-mail or an application monitoring service (which Mercury, among others, provides). Managed security services delivered by SecureWorks, IBM, and Verizon fall into this category, as do such cloud-based anti-spam services as Postini, recently acquired by Google. Other offerings include desktop management services, such as those offered by CenterBeam or Everdream.

6. Service commerce platforms
A hybrid of SaaS and MSP, this cloud computing service offers a service hub that users interact with. They're most common in trading environments, such as expense management systems that allow users to order travel or secretarial services from a common platform that then coordinates the service delivery and pricing within the specifications set by the user. Think of it as an automated service bureau. Well-known examples include Rearden Commerce and Ariba.

7. Internet integration
The integration of cloud-based services is in its early days. OpSource, which mainly concerns itself with serving SaaS providers, recently introduced the OpSource Services Bus, which employs in-the-cloud integration technology from a little startup called Boomi. SaaS provider Workday recently acquired another player in this space, CapeClear, an ESB (enterprise service bus) provider that was edging toward b-to-b integration. Way ahead of its time, Grand Central -- which wanted to be a universal "bus in the cloud" to connect SaaS providers and provide integrated solutions to customers -- flamed out in 2005.

Today, with such cloud-based interconnection seldom in evidence, cloud computing might be more accurately described as "sky computing," with many isolated clouds of services which IT customers must plug into individually. On the other hand, as virtualization and SOA permeate the enterprise, the idea of loosely coupled services running on an agile, scalable infrastructure should eventually make every enterprise a node in the cloud. It's a long-running trend with a far-out horizon. But among big metatrends, cloud computing is the hardest one to argue with in the long term.

8 Disposable Email Address Services

2009-12-01T05:29:00.001-08:00

If you give web sites and new contacts a disposable email address instead of your real one, you can selectively disable a disposable address as soon as you get spam through it, but continue using all other aliases.

All disposable email address services provide this basic functionality, but some have other neat features that make life with email less spam and more fun.

1. ZoEmail - Disposable Email Address Service
ZoEmail restores email as it must have been before spam. Easily accessible via the web and POP, ZoEmail lacks IMAP access, however, and could offer more online storage. The spam-free existence of ZoEmail also comes at the price of a bit of management.

2. Emailias - Disposable Email Address Service
Create disposable email addresses for use on the Web with Emailias, a flexible and feature-packed disposable email address service, and reduce the amount of spam you get.

3. Spamex - Disposable Email Address Service
Spamex provides a solid, useful, and almost feature-complete disposable email address service.

4. Spamgourmet - Disposable Email Address Service
Before you choke on all that spam, try the feature-rich and flexible disposable email addresses from Spamgourmet for protection.

5. E4ward.com - Disposable Email Address Service
E4ward.com is a down-to-earth and very useful disposable email service that makes it easy to prevent spam to your real email address with easily erasable aliases. You can use your own domain with E4ward.com, but address masking in your replies is a bit cumbersome and auto-expiring aliases are not offered.

6. GishPuppy - Disposable Email Address Service
GishPuppy is a disposable email address service that shines with simplicity and functionality. Unfortunately, GishPuppy's functionality does not encompass replacing your real email address with the appropriate alias in replies.

7. Mailinator - Disposable Email Address Service
Mailinator lets you use any email address @mailinator.com and pick up the mail at their site. Since there's no connection to your real address, you sure won't get spam from using Mailinator addresses. Keep in mind that all mail sent to Mailinator is made public.

8. Yahoo! Mail Classic - Disposable Email Address Service
Yahoo! Mail Classic is a comfortable, reliable and secure email service with unlimited storage. A pretty good spam filter (including disposable email addresses) keeps the junk out.
Note that disposable addresses are deleted when you cancel your Yahoo! Mail Plus account.

Source: About.com

Recent Facebook Demographics

2009-11-19T00:17:00.001-08:00

If you get a chance, check out the latest statistics from InsideFacebook.com. Please keep in mind that these are only number for the United States. But there are some things that stand out:

Looking at percentages, the highest growth rate is coming from the over-45 demographic:

While the absolute number of members is smaller in that group, the growth rate is fascinating to watch. I would imagine this will eventually slow, as we've seen with the younger demographic, until it normalizes. In anecdotal conversations, I'm finding that many people from this demographic are using Facebook to connect with high school and college friends (especially as we move into reunion time), stay in touch with children and grandchildren, and even begin to use it for some business networking purposes.

Another worthwhile graph from the post breaks down current U.S. users by age:

If you bundle up the groups, you'll find that the 35 and older crowd makes up 38% of Facebook's population here in the U.S. Pretty cool when you consider that Facebook started about five years ago as a college-based tool.

And finally, looking at gender, we find that - in every single segment - there are more female users than male users of Facebook:

While we know that overall women use social networks more than men, I wonder how many of us are using that knowledge to effectively feed our marketing and communications programs? Seems like there's a good opportunity there.

Do any of these data strike you differently? Can you draw any conclusions or make inferences that I've missed? Let me know.

Chart credit: InsideFacebook.com

Facebook and Twitter Go Live on Xbox 360

2009-11-19T00:03:00.001-08:00

As expected, November 17th is indeed the day that Xbox Live goes social with its latest big update. The popular online console service now has integration into leading social sites Facebook and Twitter.

Currently, the integration for Facebook is not the complete version, so you won’t be playing any FarmVille on your high definition television. However, the Live rendition does incorporate all of your major Facebook site features. From your TV, you can view pictures (which was a personal favorite), see updates, and post to your feed. Granted, it is a bit obnoxious to type with a controller, and not a keyboard, but it is still pretty cool from what we’ve played around with so far.

Another interesting feature is that you can see all of your Facebook friends who are on Xbox Live and all of your Xbox Live friends who are on Facebook (once they have installed it on their console). Of course, this doesn’t mean that your normal Facebook friends list is forsaken. On the contrary, you can see all of them and view all their updates, news feeds, and pictures right from your couch. It’s nothing different, really, from what you can do on the web… except the whole 1080i thing.

Now, if Twitter is more your thing, then that is here too. From here, the integration is a little fuller (but then again, there is a lot less to Twitter than Facebook). Users can tweet directly from their console, see the latest tweets from whom they are following, and even view what trending topics are out there.

Beyond, Facebook and Twitter, the new Xbox Live update has also included Zune and Last.fm. The former allows users to watch high definition, 1080p, television and videos with up to seven friends. Seems minor, but with the digital age bringing people together across the world, it really adds another great means to connect with them. Last.fm, on the other hand is a program that allows you to customize and listen to various radio stations wrought with free music. Users can choose to skip, “ban,” or “love” a myriad of tracks that will allow them to create a mix of music that is perfect for them. In fact, stations can be browsed based on popularity, artists, and for those in the UK and U.S., a gamers-only station filled with popular game soundtracks.

Overall, the new additions to Xbox Live are a phenomenal boost to the console’s social endeavors. Quite frankly, just setting up some gamer music stations led us to an exorbitant amount of procrastination. And that doesn’t include the time it took to play around with Facebook and Twitter. However, the new updates only seem to be available if you own a Gold Membership and not the free Silver Membership. Frankly, this sort of kills a lot of the update.

Microsoft wants the Live service to be more social. To have people do more than just play games on it. However, the people that play games all the time are there to play games, not so much use these new social features (save Zune, perhaps). The people they want to attract – the more casual crowd – is not going to pay for a Gold account when they can get the same social networks for free on the computer. At the very least, Facebook and Twitter need to be made for the free Silver account; otherwise… what is the point? Hopefully that will change, but as it stands, it is still a very cool addition.

Facebook Adopts Updated Privacy Policy After Relatively Few User Comments

2009-11-19T00:01:00.001-08:00

http://www.insidefacebook.com/

Last night, Facebook announced that after a week-long “notice and comment” period, it has decided to adopt the updated privacy policy it initially proposed in late October.

Because the proposed policy did not receive over 7,000 comments — the threshold Facebook laid out in its latest Statement of Rights and Responsibilities — the new policy did not go to site-wide user voting as happened earlier this year. In fact, the English version of the draft only got about 1,000 comments total.

What changes does the new policy bring about? As we detailed when the new policy was proposed, part of the intent with this draft was to provide a “clearer and more comprehensive” description of what the policies actually mean.

Facebook also added a blurb on “location” in which Facebook says it will treat your location as subject to your overall privacy settings (share with “everyone,” just “friends,” etc.). So Facebook is preparing, at least legally, for more location-based services:

Location Information. When you share your location with others or add a location to something you post, we treat that like any other content you post (for example, it is subject to your privacy settings). If we offer a service that supports this type of location sharing we will present you with an opt-in choice of whether you want to participate.

In terms of advertising, Facebook has included language that allows it to provide general statistics about users who interact with ads, but not personally identifiable information. Facebook also says:

We may institute programs with advertising partners and other websites in which they share information with us:

We may ask advertisers to tell us how our users responded to the ads we showed them (and for comparison purposes, how other users who didn’t see the ads acted on their site). This data sharing, commonly known as “conversion tracking,” helps us measure our advertising effectiveness and improve the quality of the advertisements you see.

We may receive information about whether or not you’ve seen or interacted with certain ads on other sites in order to measure the effectiveness of those ads.

Other notable reiterations of previous policies include what Facebook has to say to developers. “We do not guarantee that Platform will always be free,” according to the document.

Overall, the new policy does not represent any major shift in Facebook’s privacy philosophy, but is a part of its overall effort to simplify its privacy and legal documentation.

More politicians and watchdog organizations are paying attention to Facebook’s privacy policies too. The Privacy Commissioner of Canada has pushed the company to adopt more detailed rules about a number of practices, including better informing users what data they are sharing, and with whom.

And just today, Jim Gamble of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, criticized Facebook for not placing the CEOP “report” button on its website. Facebook responded, “We are confident that the Ceop button is an excellent solution for sites that have not invested in as robust a reporting infrastructure as Facebook has in place and one we continue to improve.”

Five Tips for Getting Traffic From Stumble

2009-11-18T22:56:00.001-08:00

money.bigbucksblogger.com

StumbleUpon drives a lot of traffic, and the traffic, and as DoshDosh reports, StumbleUpon traffic is generally focused and of great quality. So, it’s worth trying to discover how to generate plenty of traffic without spamming the site and getting banned.

Naturally, I’ve been reading a large number of “to do” tips and I’ve hit on five I’m going to try over the next month. I’ve selected these because they are easy, and not too time consuming.

I encourage you to try them too.

All require you to join StumbleUpon and to make things easy, you should install the StumbleUpon toolbar which you can download at StumbleUpon’s main page — look in the right sidebar. After you install, you will see an bar whose left edge looks like this:

Ok, so now what am I going to do? Here’s my list, I encourage you to give it a try too:

Stumble people who link you! Do this by regularly visiting your dashboard, visiting their blog, and then clicking the “thumbs up” icon in the Stumble toolbar. If you are the first to Stumble, you will have a brief form to fill out. It’s quick– just do it.
Why do this? When you Stumble someone else, they get traffic. If they linked you, some of those visitors will click the link to your post. (I tried this: it worked.)
Link and befriend bloggers who Stumble your posts! Why? Because bloggers tend to read posts that appear in their trackbacks. You can’t make them like your post or Stumble you. But remember, these are people who do Stumble what they like. So, it’s worth a shot!
(If you want to read more about gaining visibility with the “right” Stumblers, read My StumbleUpon Friend.
Stumble your friend’s and commenter’s blog & Stumble posts you link. Do watch for your friends’ best posts– because other Stumblers will trust you more and your Stumble profile will improve more if you give a thumbs up to good posts.
Why do this? Well, your friends and commentors visit your blog, right? Showing them the power of Stumble will make them want to join and get Stumbling too.
When they do, encourage them to install the toolbar. Make them your “Stumble” friend. (You tell me your profile in comments, I’ll befriend you. )

Give them your Stumble profile link. Hopefully, they will make you their StumbleUpon friend and will Stumble your best posts (especially when you link them.) Then, you will both increase your reputations with Stumble and get more traffic. (To read more about how Stumble rates stumblers, visit Stumble Upon Mathematics.
Thank people who stumble you. This tip comes from Liz of Successful Bloggers. How? Find the white conversation balloon in the Stumble toolbar; (it’s on the right in the image I show.) Click that– you’ll see who stumbled you. Next, find the “meet so-and-so” link. Click to open their profile.
Now, look at the right sidebar. See the “Send a message?” Click that. Then send a message and thank them!

Why? People who stumble tend to stumble a lot. Thanking them is gracious. It also may make them remember to visit your blog again and Stumble you again.
After someone Stumbles you, go stumble a post they stumbled! How? Once again, visit the Stumbler’s profile and look at the right sidebar. See “Stumble his favorites?” Click that.
Read a few posts– use the “stumble” icon on the far left of your Stumble toolbar to scan past the ones you don’t like. Within 5 posts, you’ll probably find one you like. So, give it a thumbs up! You are done.

Why do this? Because a person’s stumble profile is strengthened when they posts they Stumble are given thumbs up by others — including you. So, if people who like your posts develop good reputations, you get more traffic when they stumble you.

Those are the tips!

How about adding friends and fans?

Of course I’m going to add friends and fans etc. But right now, I don’t know everyone’s Stumble profile name. So, I’m going to concentrate on doing things that will make others discover my profile and want to become my fan.

To do that, I need to Stumble others, attract the attention of people who already Stumble, then cross my fingers and hope they like my posts.)

Will I be reading more tips? Absolutely. This is just a start– but it’s easy. With luck, I’ll accumilate stumbles, friends and fans as I learn how to better use StumbleUpon. (And you will too.) Maybe we’ll both soon find ourselves reciting An Ode to StumbleUpon.

Some Considerations About Domain Registration And Hosting

2009-11-17T23:11:00.001-08:00

A domain registrar is a company that supplies domain names, and sometimes hosting as well.

After deciding on your domain name, you would go to a domain registrar to purchase it.. You will get your desired name if it is available. If not you may have to modify it, or choose another name.

The domain registrar checks the name chosen is not already taken, and collects information about the domain name purchaser (name, address, phone number, email address and fax number). They hold the information for billing, administration and technical contacts for the domain purchaser. The admin. contact and the owner are usually the same person, or company.

Your domain name points to your hosting space. The domain name makes the space look more professional and makes it easier to remember. Your domain name would look like, for example, YourName.com or YourName.net, or YourName.org etc. Nowadays domain names are quite cheap to purchase. The DNS (domain name servers) is information also held by the domain registrar and consists of the primary and secondary name servers that let internet traffic know where the internet host is for the domain name they are searching for.

Hosting - you need your domain/website hosted, and there are several hosting companies out there like One.com and HostGator. There are also many that do hosting and domain names. GoDaddy and CheapDomainSeller.com does both hosting and supplies domain names, and if you take both with CheapDomainSeller.com, they give you a discount. They have different packages, but the Economy Plan gives 5 Gb space, 250 Gb transfer, 500 email accounts, free software, 10 MySQL databases, 50 email forwards, forums, blogging, photo galleries and no ads.

Bandwidth - each hosting plan has a bandwidth limit per month. You need to ensure you have a package with sufficient bandwidth for your purposes. Big video files take up more bandwith so make smaller files if possible.

You can upload to your website/blog using programs like Microsoft FrontPage or other ftp programs. There are many ftp programs like Smart FTP or Filezilla. A Google search for 'FTP Programs' should give you a good choice.

Other factors to consider when registering a domain name and getting hosting are:

The cost of setting up, like purchasing a domain name, renewing it every year, the yearly cost of hosting etc. The other costs to factor in are SEO (search engine optimisation), advertising and marketing, etc. Research web hosting companies before you decide on one, compare prices and services with other web hosting companies.

Time in which you can be up and running. Most hosting companies can have you up and running within 24 hours.

How much space does your website need? A simple static space with small files, or a site that requires large database storage? If your site needs special software to run scripts or if your site requires a database, you should check with the web hosting company first.

You should try and visualise what you want your site to be like and what its purposes are. Write down all the functions of the links on your website. Make sure you have met all your requirements for your site so there are no complications after it is up and running caused by things you have omitted accidentally.

Remember, forums are also a great place to look for lots of good advice and information.

MojoPortal A Solid CMS Option For .NET Shops

2009-10-02T17:38:00.001-07:00

by Peter Hagopian

While there are plenty of options to choose from if you're looking for free, open source PHP-based content management systems, the list is much shorter for organizations using Microsoft's .NET framework and coding in C#. While DotNetNuke has received the lion's share of attention over the past year or so, it certainly isn't the only game in town.

That brings me to mojoPortal, an ASP.NET-based content management system that's been quietly building a solid, mature platform for nearly 5 years. While mojoPortal is primarily developed and maintained by Joe Audette, there's an active community of users and contributors and a solid set of documentation to help new users get up to speed.

It's a surprisingly flexible platform. Although it's written in C#, mojoPortal can actually run on a number of different platforms, including Microsoft's .NET framework or the open source .NET alternative, Mono. On the database side it can run on SQL Server, MySQL, PostgreSQL, and a handful of other options.

In terms of features, mojoPortal covers most of the basics that you'd expect from a content management system platform that's been around for five years. As stated on the site:

You can think of mojoPortal as a Starter Kit for Advanced ASP.NET Web Sites and Portals. Out of the box, mojoPortal provides dynamic database-driven Web site(s) with an XHTML compliant Content Management System and community features like Blogs, Forums, Image Galleries, etc.

The most recent version of mojoPortal (2.2.8.2) was released earlier this month, but the team behind it has a rapid development cycle -- it seems as if it has been putting out a new release every two to three weeks. Based on the road map and what ends up in each release, it's clear the team is reading its feedback and responding to requests quickly.

Having more options -- particularly when it comes to choosing a content management system -- is a good thing, and mojoPortal is well worth adding to your list for evaluation.

Write Search Engine and user Friendly Content

2009-07-16T07:28:00.000-07:00

With the huge number of sites now available on the internet, it can be difficult to stand out and you really need to promote and market your site so people know you are out there. That is also why your site needs to be properly optimised and search engine friendly.
Getting people to notice your site can really be a challenge, because most web users search for information using search engines. This means that your website needs to be user friendly as well as search engine spider friendly. A site not indexed on a main search engine like Google can be dramatic for companies that now spend thousand on their sites.
That is one of the main reasons why you need to write carefully the content of your pages. It is not about stuffing your target keywords into a page so it looks horrible. You need to remember that you are first writing for human beings and then for search engine spiders. Any SEO company or SEO specialist should tell you that when you talk about writing search engine friendly content as part of your internet marketing strategy. The aim of being top of the search engines for particular keywords is so that web users can find your site. But if your site is not user friendly, it will not convert and you will finally end up with a useless site.
When writing content for your site, you need to keep a few things in mind that will help the user read through a page. Short paragraphs and bullet points are best because they will more easily attract the eyes. On the contrary long paragraphs that make a page look like one block will scare people away.
Like a salesperson, if you want to sell something on your site, you need to list the main interesting points and put calls to action at strategic points to ensure that you will capture as many sales as possible.
In the end, try to remember that even if you are trying to attract the search engines spiders, your website is first designed for human beings. Usually, a site properly written and designed well for people will also be search engine friendly. Just try to be careful not to use flash too much as it is not well read by the spiders. It is also important not to compromise your message to your human audience simply because you want to make your pages more reachable to the search engines.

Easy touch

2009-06-09T06:52:00.001-07:00

Easy touch theme is another CMS template by NattyWP. With this theme you can easily create a unique location for your business. Flexibility of the template helps to adjust the main page with the specially designed NattyWP widgets, so that it meets your requirements. The blog page itself is a WordPress blog, with all its functions.

e-commerce - the basic

2009-06-09T06:45:00.001-07:00

Electronic commerce or e-commerce means buying products or services via the Internet. One way to do that is by using a credit card and the manner in which this process is shown in the diagram below.
Consumers visiting the online shop to purchase your merchandise. The transaction data via a secure connection, or SSL, the web host server.
The encrypted credit card data are handled by the Payment Processing Gateway, which is responsible for the transaction.
The movement of funds is handled by the merchant account.
The funds are then charged to the credit card buyers.
Followed by the funds being deposited in the seller bank.
Managing E-commerce
There are several ways to manage e-commerce transactions on your website. Perhaps the simplest method by which third party such as Paypal, to handle all your e-commerce process or any other method is by including all your website pages.
For all through your website, your site will be designed for your merchandise.
You can use the shopping cart system.
Alternatively you can use one of your own system with a customized website and a database.
If you accept credit card transactions through your website, it is important you Secure Socket Layer, or SSL, encryption in place. This ensures all transaction data is encrypted as they travel between the buyers and the PC server. When using an SSL secure system, a small padlock symbol is shown on your web browser at the bottom right of the screen.
There are two ways to integrate SSL into your website.
You can set the SSL field to the hosts.
You can create your own SSL certificate. This costs about $ 100 per year and requires a Hosingen account and a unique IP address. This method is certainly more professional than using third party such as Paypal.
If you decide to handle e-commerce transactions through your website, instead of third party to manage them, you should also set up a Merchant Account and a processor account.

tags: E-commerce ,Make Money On Line,credit card

Bing - The Google Killer.

2009-06-06T08:01:00.001-07:00

The new search engine from Microsoft and hotly Bing is on 3 June officially at the starting line. Microsoft describes its new search engine search is not in the conventional sense, but as a decision aid, the growing World Wide Web, navigate to find ...
The already published a video showing in fact that Bing less a web sorting machinery as a complex structured interface represents, which is arranged by categories in processed information search and concrete intentions and actions can make.
Even when Bing is, like all new search engines, according to the question whether the new search as a potential Google killer is. White man to the dismal failure of candidates such as former Wikipedia Search, is it with the statement, Bing is not a killer without a doubt on the safe side.
With high probability it will actually be the case that even the Bing search giant Google is in the best case a few more percentage points decline, but never its market leadership in Internet search can really threaten.
To the question after a killer status precise answer, you should first think about what about a Google-killer is. Is only a search engine, which Google from the throne of the leader will face a killer, or should we simply a better search engine as Google killer called?

Bing: Microsoft has launched new search engine

2009-06-06T07:58:00.001-07:00

Microsoft stated on Thursday (local time) its new browser Bing, which was the meaning of queries to better understand and should provide more precise results than the competitors. Search engines evaluate today usually only the match between search terms and the concepts on web pages, but do not understand meaning of questions. Microsoft now wants to change and thus results, the searchers are really interested, said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. Bing is earlier than expected in Germany on Whit Monday as a beta version went online. Some other languages or regions can change the address bing.com already use.
Bing was a "decision engine", said Microsoft. The search results will be queries are divided thematically. When a query to a city could be the results, for example, separately for tourist information, government contacts and economic data are listed. Bing also had a feature that allows users the most interesting results as the "best hits" are shown.

Microsoft’Bing

2009-06-06T07:50:00.001-07:00

Filter and display options to refine the result
Thousand words can be easily found on the Internet, but the search for the right picture can sometimes be painfully long. Whether it according to the latest snapshots of their favorite stars rummage up for the next holiday or want to inspire her weblog want - with a good image search, they will quickly find it.
In addition to a simple, intuitive usability, the success of a image search in particular of the possibility of starting their search to be. Bing offers numerous filters and display options.

It’s not bed idea to try Bing

The first real Google alternative : Microsoft’s Bing

2009-06-04T00:27:00.001-07:00

Bing has had the courage to say "to hell with eking out the last millisecond of page load time," which both Google and, historically, Yahoo have always emphasized. In today's world, and moving forward, it's just not that important (mobile being an exception, but for that you can provide a custom experience).

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Download WordPress 2.8 Beta 1

2009-05-21T06:46:00.001-07:00

I found this fascinating quote today:

WordPress Testers and early adopters can now download WordPress 2.8 Beta 1 and test the new features that promise to make WordPress better and more powerful than before.Cindy, Download WordPress 2.8 Beta 1, May 2009

You should read the whole article.

Mozilla looks to enable Web personalization

2009-05-21T06:16:00.001-07:00

San Francisco - Mozilla Labs on Wednesday afternoon unveiled an open source project intended to explore new ways to extend and personalize the Web via Firefox browser add-ons.

The Mozilla JetPack project features an add-on creation process for the browser that is more accessible technically. Anyone who can build a Web site can participate in making the Web as a place to work, play, and communicate, a Mozilla representative said. Developers can build features that are secure, easy to install, and faster to review, according to Mozilla. The features can be added to a browser without restart or compatibility issues, thus resulting in little or no disruption to an online experience.

China Clears Bloggers Who Criticized Government

2009-05-20T08:57:00.001-07:00

Two Chinese bloggers separately detained for writing online about government corruption have had their charges dropped by police in recent weeks.

The cases reflect a possible move by Beijing to allow more free speech, though within clear limits. Corruption has long plagued China's government, especially in rural areas, and allowing victims to express grievances online and elsewhere could help curb the problem.

Police in northern Henan province have dropped defamation charges against a man they detained earlier this year for posting online about a corrupt village election, state media said Wednesday.

The man claimed that the number of votes for his rival in the election exceeded the size of the village, the China Daily said.

The police who detained the man were disciplined after he gained public support by posting again about the poll, the report said.

Last month, a police official from the province apologized for the detainment of another man who blogged about illegal government land seizures, according to the paper.

A provincial police officer in Henan reached by phone confirmed both cases had occurred, but declined to give details.

China's Internet is heavily patrolled. Sensitive political content is often deleted immediately by authorities, or by companies who could be punished if the content stays on their Web sites.

Beijing may believe a higher level of free speech will serve its interests, said Joshua Rosenzweig, a senior researcher at the Dui Hua Foundation, a human rights advocacy group.

In recent weeks a number of people detained for criticizing local governments have seen their situations improve after news of their cases spread through the press or online, said Rosenzweig.

But any easing on free speech is unlikely to extend to criticisms of the overall government system, Rosenzweig said.

"It looks like it's limited to criticism of local officials," Rosenzweig said. "Despite the small progress, there will continue to be serious limitations."

Yahoo Shifts Gears on Mobile App

2009-05-20T08:56:00.001-07:00

Smartphone browsers are good enough to deliver Yahoo Mobile, so the search provider has killed off an on-device software version of the product that it was beta testing.

Yahoo Mobile was introduced earlier this year and came in three versions: an application for the iPhone, a browser version and an application that ran across hundreds of smartphones, said Adam Taggart, head of product marketing for Yahoo's mobile group.

After running a beta test of the smartphone application, Yahoo has decided to discontinue the product.

"Instead of launching an all-in-one app for general smart phones, what we'll do is continue focusing on the browser version and the iPhone app," he said. "We found that most smartphones have great browsers these days, and so we're finding that the experience we're able to provide in the browser is similar to the experience in an app."

Yahoo Mobile is a single page that connects users to services from Yahoo and others, such as e-mail, IM, Facebook and search.

Rather than continue to develop and support the smartphone application, Yahoo will focus on building vertical applications for specific platforms, including BlackBerry and "most likely" Android, he said. "When you have finite resources, you want to say, 'Where can I give the biggest bang for the buck?'" he said.

As an example, a smartphone user might connect to Yahoo Mobile through the browser, but download a specific application for following fantasy sports that offers more than a browser application would, he said.

Reports this week suggested that Yahoo was discontinuing its individual mobile applications for the BlackBerry, which include Yahoo Mail, IM, search and Flickr. In fact, Yahoo plans to continue to support its BlackBerry applications, Taggart said.

Simple Mail

2009-05-08T09:06:00.001-07:00

One thing that make me nearly not to touch browser other than firefox is a firefox’s AddOns collection. Simple Mail client is an example. Lifehacker.com said as follows. Firefox only: Somewhere between web-based email and a standalone desktop client there's Simple Mail, a Firefox extension that embeds an email client right inside a Firefox tab. Manage all your messages in Simple Mail, which can notify you of new incoming messages at a rate you define for any number of POP or IMAP email accounts. Simple Mail lists your messages in a familiar three-paned view where you can read, compose, and send messages, as well as maintain an address book. I had trouble getting Simple Mail to work with Gmail and IMAP in Firefox 3 on the Mac, but all went well in Firefox 2/Windows, so Mac users, proceed with caution. Simple Mail is missing features you'd expect in a full-blown client—in fact, I couldn't get it to see the folders on Gmail's IMAP server. However, it does give you that desktop feel without having to run or switch to a separate application. Simple Mail is a free download for Firefox only. Thanks, Masa!

Relevant Tags: Firefox,Browser,Email client,Firefox Addons,Addons,Browser Addons,best browser,Internet,browsing,email,read email

Top 5 Magazine iPhone Apps

2009-05-08T03:47:00.001-07:00

It has been a while since we warmed up the old iPhone (it runs on teeny tiny vacuum tubes, you know) and checked out what magazines are trying to do with the cuddliest gadget on the planet. The iphone offers print publishers a remarkable palette. In miniature, it is more like a printed page than any other digital device. It is portable and handheld, mimicking the magazine in those respects better than Web sites. It is lushly colored and sharp as a pin, far superior aesthetically to that Kindle thing Amazon keeps trying to sell us. And it has a newsstand, the app store, that allows for some degree of merchandising – albeit not enough. And yet, few magazine brands really have leveraged the iPhone very effectively. The earliest entry, Conde Nast’s Style.com, probably remains the best. Visually striking, it gives the user a very simple interface that uncovers a trove of multimedia assets that play very well on a small portrait screen. We won’t include Style.com in this review because we have praised it before. Instead, lets look at some good ideas that could be better.

1. Epicurious: This newly launched foodie app is as stylish and smart as you expect from the Condé design crew. Drilling into the main menu of quick meal suggestions gives you too many recipes to swipe through (5670 “Decadent Desserts?!). But the search engine is magnificent. You refine results by tapping ingredients, meal type, cuisine, etc in a fun interactive way. The interstitial page that comes up while your results load is a snooze and a relentless reminder of the Via sponsorship. No one should see a full page takeover ad after every search query, let alone the same one. Get that credit card out of my fondue.

2. Spin: It may not be fair to beat up on a brand that isn’t trying that hard to be a breakout iPhone app anyway. Spin takes a pedestrian approach that is not half bad. Three buttons: reviews, news, galleries. Nuff said. In principle the less is more approach is wise. The down side is forgetting to communicate anything about the brand. Could you load the latest cover at start? Something to distinguish this from an illustrated RSS feed?

3. ELLE Astrology: This is one of the few magazine-branded apps that makes you pay, and even at the low rate of a few dollars, it feels overpriced. It is pretty much a standard feed of astrology info segmented by categories: today, this week, numerology and love matching. A lot of text, a lot of pink. Not a hint of ELLE. The AstroTwins who are doing the readings are associated with the magazine but the brand is just absent here.

4. Lucky at Your Service: This is the most unusual magazine app so far. It is just a relentless set of images of handbags and shoes that you drill into by brand, style or color. Is it shopping or a weird fetish? Forget we said that. Choose one item and it will link to an online vendor or try to find a store near you. That part is cool, as is the magazine cover that flashes as you first open the app. We understand the point. Lucky = shopping, so just make an app that lets people browse. We also like the full page ads that are judiciously tucked between screens as you swipe through. It feels like the magazine experience and the ads are noteworthy. But how about some more editorial? A little comment on style. Yes we like to shop but we like to think a bit too. Okay, forget we said that, too.

5. Car and Driver: While Car and Driver has one of the nicer mobile web sites among magazines, it chose to go to the iPhone with a wallpaper dispenser. This is not the worst idea. After all, the magazine is about cars in the same way Vogue is about fashion. You’re not really buying this stuff so much as salivating over it. C&D understands aspirational auto media and piles on the images of glass-like car finishes and dramatic poses. You just save any of the images to your iPhone library and turn it into phone wallpaper. Ok. But again, the app somehow fails to communicate the magazine’s sensibilities or tone or voice or personality. Slapping your magazine brand on something like this is serviceable enough, but it seems like a missed opportunity to connect with new potential readers.
The wonderful thing about the iPhone is that the realtively open App marketplace is a great playground for brands like these to experiment with new ways of representing themselves on mobile. How they miss in these early days is as important as how they hit.

U.S. regulators think Google occupies too much place in the Internet market

2009-05-07T01:12:00.001-07:00

Google is facing a tough scrutiny of the U.S. government as its rapid growth and success made it almost sole player in the market of internet search and online advertising. The company attracts attention of antitrust enforcers concerned with the possible abolition of competitive market that may result from Google’s exorbitant extension.

"In some ways people think of them as potentially becoming the next Microsoft," attorney Beau Buffier, with Shearman and Sterling LLP, said of Google.

Evan Stewart of Zuckerman Spaeder LLP notes that while America is the leading country in the market of hi tech this position should not be backed by the fact it allows one company like Google to become an absolute monopolist. Steward said that measures should be taken to preserve competitiveness of the industry.

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IBM Buys Exeros Data-discovery Software

2009-05-06T01:22:00.001-07:00

IBM has bought the data discovery software assets of Exeros, and will use them to enhance the services offered by its business analytics consulting division, it said Tuesday.

Exeros makes software that can automate the search for relationships between different databases, something the company says is a prerequisite for successful data quality or data integration projects.

IBM plans to integrate the Exeros tools with other elements of its Information Management Software range, it said. That range includes software from Cognos, which IBM acquired for US$5 billion in November 2007.

The Exeros software can cut the cost of data warehousing and master data management, IBM said. Among the software's users will be consultants at IBM's Business Analytics and Optimization Services division, created last month following a reorganization of its Global Business Services consulting activities.

IBM did not disclose the terms of the acquisition.

Exeros, founded in 2002, is a privately held company funded by two venture capital firms, Globespan Capital Partners and Bay Partners, and by investment management company AllianceBernstein. Its CEO and cofounder, Piyush Gupta, is a former employee of IBM, where he helped develop an enterprise information integration tool called DataJoiner.

Mozilla Firefox, Portable Edition 3.1 Beta 3

2009-05-05T03:39:00.001-07:00

I was a fan of firefox. One thing that is a feature of firefox.Firefox has a lot of Addson. I can choose which AddOns accordance with my need. At this time I want to try Firefox version 3.1 beta portable.

Somebody said that the firefox version is not as fast as before. Do things happen on the last version of let's try.

Download

Sun deal poses challenges for Oracle

2009-05-04T12:18:00.001-07:00

Oracle Corp., which announced plans last month to acquire Sun Microsystems for $7.4 billion, should benefit from the merger but will face significant marketing challenges in communicating the combined brand, industry analysts say.
In announcing the deal April 20, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison emphasized the strength of the end-to-end solution that Oracle will now be able to offer its customers as a result of the acquisition.
“Oracle will be the only company that can engineer an integrated system—applications to disk—where all the pieces fit and work together so customers do not have to do it themselves,” he said. “Our customers benefit as their systems integration costs go down while system performance, reliability and security go up.”
Under the terms of the deal, software company Oracle is acquiring the entire Sun portfolio, which includes hardware, software and services.
Most notably in the software category, Oracle will pick up Sun's Java open source software development platform, its Solaris operating system and MySQL, its open source database software. It will also own Sun's hardware business, which comprises servers, storage devices, desktop workstations and peripherals.
“The first big thing is the cachet, or lack of cachet, that Oracle has had in open source,” said Ray Wong, VP-principal analyst at Forrester Research. “They now have the crown jewels of open source with Java and MySQL.”
Another big advantage of the merger, Wong said, is the end-to-end solution Oracle will be able to deliver. “It used to be just application and database software,” he said. “Now they are trying to make the case that they can deliver hardware, software, middleware and database software all in one-stop shopping, which will help their customers reduce costs.”
Wong added: “The challenge is to figure out the perception of Oracle being in the hardware business. What does it mean, and can they successfully convince people to buy the whole stack from them?”
He noted that Oracle has already been successful in managing and marketing other acquisitions. For example, in 2005 it acquired CRM software company Siebel Systems, and last year it bought enterprise software company BEA Systems.
Jean Bozman, VP-research for IDC's enterprise platforms group, said one of the greatest assets Oracle will get is Sun's installed base of customers and the service contracts and upsell opportunities that go along with that.
“They have at least 1.6 million servers [installed worldwide] and also storage and service contracts,” she said, noting that about 40% of Sun's revenue now comes from services. “From a holistic view, they have a large installed base, the opportunity for new offerings and things like upselling.”
For example, Bozman said that although MySQL is a database product, it does not necessarily compete with Oracle database products. “Oracle has always been about cross platforms and running on as many platforms as possible,” she said. “It may be that the MySQL offering, which is widely used, could bring additional business for other Oracle products.”
Bozman said one of the biggest challenges for Oracle will be integrating Sun into its operations and ensuring that it runs a profitable business.
Bozman also noted that because of the downturn, spending on big IT projects is being cut or deferred but, as conditions improve, IT investment should pick up. That will benefit Oracle in the long run.
Other industry experts, however, were not as bullish on the deal.
Jim Gregory, CEO of brand strategy firm CoreBrand, noted that Sun had a brand score of only 16 on a scale from 1 to 100 in CoreBrand's 2008 Brand Power report, while Oracle had a brand score of 30. “In terms of what they are buying, it is not a heavyweight brand,” Gregory said.
“It seems like it made a lot more sense for IBM [Corp.] to make the acquisition. That seemed like a much better fit,” he said, noting that IBM had a brand score of 76.
In April, IBM made a bid to buy Sun for an estimated $7 billion but was outbid by Oracle, according to people familiar with the talks.
Gregory said one of the immediate challenges for Oracle is to communicate its strategy for the acquisition and what it means to its customers.
“What they will need to do is tell a story very quickly,” he said. “Otherwise, Oracle's image might be hurt. They have to communicate clearly why they made this acquisition, why it fits as a company and what they intend to do with it. They have a short window of opportunity.”

Who's Running Facebook?

2009-04-25T00:19:00.001-07:00

What do Facebook users really want? The site makes unilateral changes, and users get up in arms. So Facebook invites user participation before changes are made, but voter turnout is abysmal. Just how much should Facebook let users run its business? And how much time do users really want to spend poring over the minutiae of the social network's policies?

Apparently, all that small type that recently appeared at the top of your Facebook page -- directly above the "What's On Your Mind?" status box -- was actually about something important.

That may sum up the feelings of many of the social network's members after Facebook on Thursday announced the results of a community vote regarding site governance. The notices that ran for a week on members' pages had announced that the network was asking users to vote on new rules that would replace the former terms of service agreement. Yet judging from user comments and a low voter turnout -- 600,000 out of more than 200 million registered users -- many Facebook members were either unaware or chose not to participate.

Facebook wanted a minimum 30 percent turnout. "We'd hoped to have a bigger turnout for this inaugural vote, but it is important to keep in mind that this vote was a first for users, just like it was a first for Facebook," General Counsel Ted Ullyot wrote Thursday on the Facebook Blog. "We are hopeful that there will be greater participation in future votes. In the meantime, we're going to consider lowering the 30-percent threshold that the Statement of Rights and Responsibilities establishes for a user vote to be binding."

The vote itself was the result of an earlier controversy regarding a terms of service change that many users felt took away their rights to uploaded data and images. However, a user protest over that change and a recent flap about design changes that seem to emulate rival social network Twitter have prompted questions not only about Facebook's processes for adopting changes, but also its ability to adapt to its stunning rate of growth.

The Need for Community Management

Facebook sought counsel on its terms of service controversy from the likes of Jonathan Zittrain, codirector of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard, as well as the network members who set up the largest Facebook group to protest the previous terms of service changes. However, what Facebook may really need is a dedicated community manager, according to Jack McKee, chief strategist for Ant's Eye View, a customer experience strategy practice.

"It's easy to get overwhelmed by complaints," McKee told TechNewsWorld. "It's one reason why you don't have community management as part of the function of the executive team. You have to break it out separately and have the ability of that manager to be an advocate for both sides of the story. It's not just about transparency; it's about the ongoing discussions. My mantra is that everybody goes home happy -- maybe not that they all get what they want, but they at least get a resolution."

Facebook's rapid growth has resulted in lost connections with what the users wanted in the social network in the first place, according to McKee, whose clients include Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) . It may also have to do with how the vote was presented to members; even though the announcement was at the top of the page, many members may not have actually read through the text or may have viewed it as just another "click and forget" boilerplate message that gets in the way of the network experience.

"That's what community management comes down to: If you had a robust system in place, they would have immediately said, 'The way we're presenting this is something they have to get past in order to get back to what they're doing.' The style is telling them you don't need to care about this," McKee said.

The New Way of Doing Business

Facebook is part of a new business culture -- social media -- that gives the customer more say, said Caroline Dangson, IDC's social media analyst. However, she doesn't think the inmates are running the social network asylum.

"They are certainly at the forefront of empowering users -- consumers want control of what they purchase, and this taps into that," she said. "But I [would] be naive to say that Facebook is going to say, 'You guys run the show.' But it is a new way of operating -- not old-school, old-business hierarchy. They've always said they want to take advice from and empower the customers, and that's what keeps ... customers."

That's a standpoint with which McKee agrees -- up to a point. "Integrating yourself with a community isn't about putting the workload on them," he said. "It's about making your job easier with their help. What they are there to do is help you refine your thinking. You still get paid eight hours a day to come in and do something; they don't. This all requires better engagement, a channel of conversation."

That said, bad marketing of the vote and an aspect of crowd dynamics -- many members might think others will take action on something and one's own participation isn't necessary -- may have combined to depress voter turnout, Dangson told TechNewsWorld. "This clearly shows that [members] really want Facebook to take the lead on this. They don't feel a social responsibility for voting and actually writing the terms of service."

Three-quarters of those who did vote approved new rules of governance that do indeed provide more power to customers over the old terms of service, Ullyot wrote. The new rules make it clear that Facebook does not own user content and won't share it with applications providers or anybody else without getting permission first

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Relevant Tags: Social Bookmark,Friends,Internet,News,Tech,Blogging,Page Rank,Traffic,

What is SMF?

2009-04-25T00:09:00.001-07:00

Simple Machines Forum — SMF in short — is a free, professional grade software package that allows you to set up your own online community within minutes.

Its powerful custom made template engine puts you in full control of the lay-out of your message board and with our unique SSI - or Server Side Includes - function you can let your forum and your website interact with each other.

SMF is written in the popular language PHP and uses a MySQL database. It is designed to provide you with all the features you need from a bulletin board while having an absolute minimal impact on the resources of the server. SMF is the next generation of forum software - and best of all it is and will always remain completely free!

Broadband Britain: who'll pay?

2009-04-24T00:57:00.001-07:00

For American readers this is probably a bit of an ordinary day - you go about your business and there's every chance that when you wake up tomorrow things will be much the same as they were when you woke up today. In the UK that's not the case. In the UK the chancellor of the exchequer (the head of our Treasury department, or its equivalent) has been delivering his annual budget speech.
Not all of the changes are IT-specific of course, but one caught my eye. He's promised that by 2012 there will be ubiquitous fast broadband in the UK.
OK, we can take it as read that what counted for fast broadband ten years ago pretty much already is in the UK, and what counts as fast by 2012 won't count as any great shakes a decade later. This sort of pickiness aside, I do wonder who's going to pay for all this.
It's worth noting that many of our phone lines over here are years old. Granted they're not quite Victorian but neither are they as shiny or adaptable as many of their counterparts in America. And yet apparently we're going to upgrade the lot over the next three years.
This is of course going to cost money. Although our higher taxes are going up, I can't see how they're going to end up paying for even half of this. Contrary to what several wise voices in the press will tell you, nobody's certain exactly how long this recession is going to last. We've been overinflating the world economy for quite some time and are now paying the price. America and the UK are among those countries which have put a lot of resource into addressing the shortfall, propping banks and industries up. It's not been pretty and it'll need paying back.
And here we are talking about spending more on an infrastructure which, although not the whizziest or shiniest in the world, actually does the job for which it was designed pretty well.
I can't see how this is going to be affordable. I'll look forward to being proven wrong. I hope.

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IBM: Who Cares About Sun/Oracle, Anyway?

2009-04-21T07:14:00.001-07:00

Talk about IBM buying the company spanned weeks. Despite initial talks falling through, Sun had allegedly told IBM they would agree to breathe new life into old discussions as long as Big Blue made a solid commitment to buy. Two days later, it was all over and apparently, IBM couldn’t care less.
IBM was going to get a ton of press either way. If it had purchased the struggling Sun, we’d want to know why and what the company had planned for its newest acquisition. If someone else purchased Sun, we’d want to know why IBM let the company get away and what the company thought Sun’s chances were under its new parent company. CFO at IBM Mark Loughridge did what ZDNet describes as, “the conference call equivalent of a shoulder shrug,” yesterday.
“What’s really changed? I think nothing,” Loughridge stated boldly.
We don’t even know where to start with that one, except to say Sun and Oracle, along with nearly everyone else in the industry, disagree.
Yesterday Oracle described Java as the most important piece of software the company had ever acquired. President Safra Catz also detailed just how lucrative the Sun purchase would be for Oracle. Sure, that might mean squat to IBM, but try this: Recent rumors say Oracle may hold on to Sun’s software and shed or sell its hardware divisions to the likes of HP. However, until that day comes, Oracle has entered the hardware market and over night has become a huge player in the game. To say that kind of acquisition changes nothing is the equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears and shouting, “Lalalalalalala.”

Source : Tom's Hardware US

301 & 302 Redirect in htaccess

2009-04-09T19:12:00.000-07:00

"Is canonicalization sabotaging your website's performance? Find out how to fix/avoid this common issue with 301's & .htaccess"
Moving pages or remodelling? Have you decided to move your site to another domain? Do you want to move a cluster of files to another directory within your domain? Or do you want to move an entire directory to another location on your server? For example maybe you have a blog incorporated into your site and would like to move it to a subdirectory? URL redirecting is really about the art of sending a visitor (spiders and humans) to another location, often a new URL location.
For many reasons, it's becoming more common these days for webmasters to want to update their sites - some for seo purposes, much of which involves restructuring a sites architecture. Usually when a sites architecture changes, pages and directories move to different locations on the server. When pages get removed from their previous location and no page is left to replace it, the location becomes non existent. Visitors to the location will have no where to go (the nasty 404 error messages) and for your human visitors it can become frustrating, resulting in leaving your site to the point of no return. And this is of course not what you want, so to avoid this type of issue learn to setup a 301 redirect. Below we'll examine what they are and how you can use them on your site(s).
Before we begin it's important to note there are two types of redirects; 301's and 302's both of which share a common purpose however are distinctive of one another. Basically a 301 redirect refers to a permanent redirect, or what other experts may refer to as a hard redirect, whereas a 302 redirect refers to a temporary redirect, or soft redirect. One of the most effective ways to redirect your visitors from a location on your site that no longer exists to where you intended for them to land is to implement a 301 redirect. Don't be discouraged by its technical label, although it does sound kinda cool, as it's really quite simple. 301 redirects serve to inform visitors to your site that a requested page has been moved permanently and is now situated at a new location.
How do you implement a 301 redirect? First there are several ways to implement a 301 redirect and this can depend on what type of server your hosting is operating on. For example 301 redirects are setup differently if you're working with an Apache web server or a Microsoft IIS Web Server. To complicate things a little more, 301 redirects can also be written differently if you're setting it up in PHP (hypertext preprocessor) or in ASP (Active server pages). To find out how to do 301 redirects in Apache .htaccess, IIS, PHP, ASP, and Cold Fusion I'd suggest following the link. I've done the homework for you and cross referenced these scripts with W3 Schools and they are very identical. Thus, if implemented correctly they do work.
To configure a 301 redirect for an entire site in .htaccess include the following code in the .htaccess file in the root of the old site:
Redirect 301 /http://www.newdomian.com
This will allow all URL's pointing to the old domain to be redirected your new domain. However if you wish to only redirect a single page or a set of single pages you can also use the following 301 redirect in .htaccess.
redirect 301 /old/old.htm http://www.domain.com/new.htm
Advanced SEO technique tip: Did you know that a lot of webmasters and site owners out there are oblivious to the fact that much of their websites content is unnecessarily duplicated by the search engines? In fact there seems to be a consensus among other SEO experts about such SEO best practices. It seems that many have unanimously adhered to the fact that the top search engines have not yet correctly fixed the canonicalization issues with the [www] and [non-www] version your site (i.e. the search engines still consider http://www.amanticode.com and http://amanticode.com to be separate which can lead to the problem of duplicate content.
Canonicalization: "The process by which URL's are modified and standardised in a consistent manner"
This can mean that link 'juice' to these (same) pages is actually split between them which can mean lower search engine rankings. How can you correct or avoid this common issue?
Simply put, utilising .htaccess to redirect specific requests for pages on (or no longer) on the server aims to find that request and if so, forwards the visitor to the page you have specified. In order to correctly execute this, I would highly recommend implementing the following 301 redirect to your .htaccess file.
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^yourdomain.com [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.yourdomain.com/$1 [L,R=301]
This code will instantly and automatically eliminate the potential problem of duplicating your webpage's content by informing the spiders that both URL's reach the same webpage.
Server side SEO experts suggest;
"While implementing 301 redirects on Linux/Unix servers using .htaccess be careful, as sometimes even a small mistake can be hazardous to your site, you will also have to keep patience as spiders take time to understand the changes in your URL structure to register in search engines. After applying a redirect you should inform the change to your link partners so they can make any necessary adjustments"
To implement a 302 redirect in .htaccess file, assuming the web server allows it, it is easy to implement a 302 redirect in .htaccess. Just implement the following code(s):
Redirecting a page
Redirect /file-name.html http://www.yourdomain.com/tempdirectory/temporary-file-name.html
Redirecting a directory
Redirect /directory http://www.yourdomain.com/tempdirectory/
Redirecting an entire site
Redirect / http://www.temporary-yourdomain.com/
Overall for the best Google and SEO results it's best to use a '301 redirect' rather than a '302 redirect' although it depends on the reason and intention for your redirects.

Here's Why Google and Twitter Belong Together

2009-03-26T03:07:00.001-07:00

Not as though it's ever going to happen, but suppose I were at a party one night and Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google happened to be there. I would love to corner him and get him a glass of wine or scotch or whatever it is that CEOs at large corporations drink, and suggest to him that he buy Twitter.

I know, I know. I'm not the first one who has ever come up with this idea, but to me, it's not about the ridiculous growth of Twitter or the millions of eye balls on the Twitter site or the opportunity to stretch out those Google Ads into social networking. It's not even about search in the direct sense. It's because the two systems would complement each other so well.

Can I Call You, Eric

I have the feeling Eric Schmidt doesn't really stand on pretense, so maybe I would call him Eric (or Mr. Schmidt; that's cool too) and I would give him my elevator pitch. Google is great for doing research, right? You enter a few keywords and get back a site, picture, video, blog, whatever you're looking for that will get you on your way. But what if you have a specific question? In fact, just the other day on Twitter, Pete Yorn wanted to know how to make turkey burgers that weren't dry. He got his answers and tweeted a few minutes later:

•

ahh thanks....twitter...better than google? it' like "ask the audience" lifeline.

That's when it hit me, Eric (er...Mr. Schmidt, sorry) that you should buy Twitter. Sometimes you want to do general research, but sometimes you just want to ask your friends (the virtual equivalent of the studio audience) and Twitter gives you that ability.

Twitter is more than that...

But Twitter is great for so many things like communicating and publicizing, for information gathering and making friends. It's so powerful and if you put it together with Google, you could have something really special. (Can I freshen that drink for you Eric?). If you doubt me look at the Facebook redesign. They are clearly trying to capture that conversation of Twitter inside their social network.

Of course, they have a mini rebellion on their hands from users who don't like the new design, but I like it. In fact I like it a lot. Why? Because it reminds me of Twitter.

I know you said on the Charlie Rose show recently that you weren't interested in buying Twitter. I get your stock value is down. Your ad revenue is down. The economy kind of sucks right now, but you have a rich company there and when it comes down to it, it's all about the ad revenue isn't it? And what better way to get more of it than to combine your powerhouse with this growing phenomenon.

I know you probably get a pitch about every five minutes. Can't go to a party without someone giving you their next big idea and I apologize for intruding, but I hope you'll give the idea some thought. Catch you later. I think I see Mark Zuckerberg over there and I've been dying to talk to him.

Google AdSense Top Paying Keywords - How to Make Money With AdSense

2009-03-24T00:34:00.001-07:00

By Ricky Lim

One of the best ways to make passive income when you are first starting out is with Google AdSense. AdSense pays you by the click and if you have doing this for a while, you will realize not all topics pay the same.

There are certain niches or topics that pay out much better. Different AdSense publishers are always on the lookout for keywords that can provide easy money. This only means that the higher the advertiser pays for a certain keyword, the more they will receive when they click the link.

So if you own a site or blog and would want to make money though Google AdSense, the first thing you need to do is choose the right keywords and phrases to be put in your site's content.

It is important that before you achieve greater traffic and greater income, choose the right keywords because this will determine how much money you will earn. Once you've discovered the top-paying keywords in Google AdSense, you can earn in as much as $3 per click while the lowest earning could be $0.01 per click.

From my experience, the top paying AdSense keywords are mostly related to financial services and insurance such as mortgage, life insurance, car insurance and student loans etc.

Of course, there are other topics that do pay out quite well such as in education, some medical terms. Below are 10 keywords that have always pay out more than others.

1. mesothelioma

2 cheap auto insurance

3 consolidate student loan

4 life insurance quote

5 cheap car insurance

6 refinance home

7 car insurance quote

8 refinancing

9 online car insurance

10 online insurance quotes

Google does not tell AdSense publishers how much each click you will get for each topic. In the past, it was more or less a trial and error thing. However, Google has a keyword tool that does provide the cost per click for AdWords advertisers.

From there, you can gauge the average payout per click based on the highest CPC shown. Do note, you are almost unlikely to get that amount but it will still provide you with a rough indication of how much you should get on average per click.

Discover how to find Google AdSense top paying keywords. Learn which are the high paying AdSense keywords online

Make the Most Attractive PPC Publishing Ad Possible

2009-03-24T00:33:00.001-07:00

You can make the most attractive PPC Publishing ad by keeping it simple. Make sure you use keywords and write your own ad. Ensure it truly fits with the image you want to portray to your customer.

Ask yourself, what pleases your eye? How do I want my brand to be portrayed? Decide whom you want to reach through PPC Publishing. Analyze your product, or business services and realistically look at whom you are trying to reach? Then step into their shoes and ask how can I reach them?

Make a list of approximately 20 keywords you believe are relevant to your service or product. When you think about your business, what are the words that you would use to ideally describe what you want your business to be known as? Now, picture your ideal demographic. Are they old, young, male, female? Do they like sports, fine dining, or money? Do they have families? Are they single? For each of these categories write down additional keywords, then go over all of them and pick out your top ten, only ten.

Begin now to picture your ad, keep it clean, and simple, not plain, just simple, but always make it look professional. Make sure your entire brand is tied together. Choose a color scheme you believe properly represents your company, and may appeal to your customer. Do not underestimate the power of simplicity. Flash is sometimes just that, flash, and it can be unappealing.

Write your ad based upon those keywords. Draw people in by creating a unique look and voice through your words that your consumer will recognize as distinctly your own.

Are you really interested in driving massive traffic to your website? Here's the answer:

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Get Rich Using Google AdSense - Tips to Make Money Online With AdSense

2009-03-24T00:32:00.003-07:00

By Bryan Burbank

If you want to make a lot of money and possibly get rich then you may want to try Google AdSense. It allows you a way to build a website and put ads on your website to make money. The Internet has been around now for about 12 years and it used to be very difficult if you have a website to get ads placed on it. Now with a service like ad sense provided by Google it is very easy for you to make money with advertising. The best part about it is you do not have to go and find the advertisers yourself because Google already has them.

What happens is you place a small piece of code on your website and the ads will display on your site and will match your content. The great thing about this is for instance if you have a website about horses and all of the ads on your site will be horse ads. You will be able to make more money when the ads or related to the content that people are searching for. Many people have made millions of dollars because they have websites that generate customers and they have used accents to generate income. Make sure that you take advantage of this opportunity today.

Remember if you want to make a lot of money with your website one of the best ways to do that is use Google AdSense. More people are finding out that with placing ads on their websites they can generate a lot of income. The advantage to doing this is that you will increase your revenue and also have a website that is more about you to sell.

Get Rich Using Google AdSense - Tips to Make Money Online With AdSense

2009-03-24T00:32:00.001-07:00

By Bryan Burbank

Can I Really Make Money With AdSense?

2009-03-24T00:31:00.001-07:00

By Shawn Lovett

With the job market the way it is, each of us is looking at every opportunity to provide additional income. Many of you have lost your job or fear losing it; some of you have just graduated and are looking for that first full-time employment opportunity. Still, others of you are looking for a summer job or some part-time work to earn extra cash.

If you search for opportunities to make money, sooner or later you will discover Google’s AdSense. There are many similar opportunities out there, but AdSense is one of the largest and best known. It is also very easy to configure and costs nothing to join. Once you start reading about AdSense you will see the Google ads on many of the web sites you frequent. More than likely you have also clicked on some of the more interesting of the ads and even purchased a product from one of the advertisers.

If you create a website or even several websites you will learn a few things. First, that when someone clicks on your ad you will actually make money! It might not seem like a lot at first, but if you can grow the number of visitors to your websites and your content draws new visitors, the amount of money you can make will grow. You will also learn that it takes a lot of hard work, patience, and persistence to produce and maintain excellent content that will keep both old and new guests coming back. You might get lucky with the right type of content and grow very quickly; most likely it will be a slow and at times painful process. If you make the commitment and put in the effort, you can expect much better results.

Here are some steps to get you started with making money with AdSense:

1. Read about it.

Visit Google.com/AdSense to create an account, learn about creating ads, and understanding the program. Also search for other articles about AdSense to learn more.

2. If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.

Trust your instincts. You will likely find numerous websites that contain books, start-up kits, article generation software, and guaranteed methods to make money from AdSense. In most cases the website selling the product is making the money, not you. If you are still tempted than try some of them, but remember you have been warned.

3. Which sites do you enjoy most?

Think of the sites you like to visit. Are they usually the same ones, or do you like to surf to find new sites on whatever topic interests you at the moment? Create a site similar to the ones you most enjoy, and make sure it is a topic you will enjoy writing fresh content for your website.

4. Which sites have made money?

There are plenty of sites that say they have make millions with a kit they sell for $29,99. Believe them only if you want. For better information go to http://websiteoutlook.com and type in the name of any website. It will provide you with an estimate of the value of the website, based on the number of hits over time. You will find some websites worth hundreds or thousands of dollars, and several in the millions (Google and eBay come to mind). I have found this to be one of the best motivators, as you can see which sites are making money based on hits and which ones are not. You can also track your website from the time it doesn’t show up until its value slowly grows (or shrinks if you don’t put the time into it).

5. Start small

Start small with just AdSense, and expand your advertising as your site grows and you learn your own formula for success.

If you are going through some tough times it is a great way to focus your energy. Once you find your formula you can expand to multiple websites and increase the number of ads you host. The best part about it: you can work from home and the sky is the limit!

Can Anyone Make Money Using Google AdSense?

2009-03-24T00:29:00.001-07:00

Amanda Isbitt

Website owners can use Google AdSense to advertise their site and make money. Anyone can make money-using AdSense by placing his or her product or service website advertisements there. When internet viewer clicks your link, you make money. It sounds simple enough. It is a straightforward economic model that can increase your earnings.

Anyone will find this beneficial when he or she follows the particular terms and conditions of using Google AdSense.

First, you must read, understand and agree to Google AdSense terms of service. This is the first step of joining the program and it offers a lot of potential for anyone. However, many individuals either seem to overlook the terms of service or forget the rules, which can cause problems. It is essential that you read, understand and then take proper advantage of the program as it is provided to you.

- Prohibited or Banned

If you are prohibited from using the site, you may never be able to restore your account. Google depends on the strength of their advertisers. They gather information about the advertising pages they feature and then use this information and then capitalize on the income that is generated by the campaigns that are placed on AdSense. They will teach you how to place your campaigns so that you can be successful.

- Website Contents

You will need to pay attention to the various issues concerning your website contents.

- Keywords

Google AdSense integrates various characteristics of advertisements, which are appropriate to the contents of your WebPages. If they are not able to determine the content topic of your page, you may end up with advertisements that do not relate to your topic at all or display various advertisements for public services that offer you no profits.

- Traffic Types

The type of traffic that you have will depend upon the content of your pages. You will need to generate a great deal of traffic on a daily basis in order to make money with AdSense. You can determine the amount of money that you make by clicking may be in cents rather than dollars if your traffic is small. You will begin to understand that more traffic means more money.

- Search Engine Traffic

Search engines look for your keywords, in order to make money you will need to use high quality keywords. This will make a big difference in the money you can make with AdSense. Search engine traffic is adaptable since an internet surfer will enter in the words that they are searching for and your site will show up on the ranks of the pages concerning the ranking on Google.

- Larger Websites

Understandably, larger websites tend to get more clicks on AdSense when you compare them with websites that feature only four or five pages. Therefore, it is imperative for you to choose the best keywords or keyword phrases that relate to your topic in order to compete with large websites by attracting new clients to your web pages. You need to find the best keywords to fit your website. Remember to maintain your website and keep the information you provide current and fresh, as this will also aid you in making money while using Google AdSense.

Cell phone, smartphone -- what's the difference? 3

2009-03-21T20:35:00.001-07:00

A Sprint spokeswoman said the Rumor2 might seem to qualify as a smartphone but that Sprint has avoided using the term "just because there's not a good definition of smartphone" that is widely agreed upon.

An LG spokeswoman came up with a fairly specific reason why the Rumor2 is not a smartphone. In an e-mail, she wrote, "This particular device [the Rumor2] is not considered a smartphone. There is not a true definition of a smartphone, but it is generally accepted that a 'smartphone' is one that can sync more than one email account (Webmail, Gmail, etc.) onto your phone. This phone, while it does have Internet access, does not sync email onto the desktop."

Reith said LG's reasoning supports IDC's finding that the Rumor2 doesn't have a high-level OS in the sense that its OS does not allow applications to run entirely on the phone separate from the network. Sprint notes in its specifications sheet for the Rumor2 that access to Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes comes through Sprint's Mobile Email Work.

With the addition of software, Sprint could have changed that capability but chose not to, Reith noted.

In summary, just about everyone agrees that there is no precise, standard definition of the smartphone. Llamas said IDC's take has been criticized and praised alike from many parties.

Even though there are disparities in some definitions, analysts tend to report roughly the same numbers for shipments of smartphones, Reith said. Part of the reason is that analysts pay attention to one another's numbers and to what the vendors call a smartphone, Reith and Llamas said.

Reith said he couldn't think of a single device categorized by IDC as a smartphone to which Gartner or other major analyst firms wouldn't agree.

Still, the analysts acknowledged that the question of what a smartphone is can be confusing and even mysterious for the public. One analyst said that the CTIA's definition "probably needs to be updated," but Llamas said picking a proper definition can be a delicate matter.

"I'll respect others' definitions, and I'll stick with mine," Llamas said, laughing. "I'm being diplomatic."

Cell phone, smartphone -- what's the difference? 2

2009-03-21T20:34:00.001-07:00

Cell phone, smartphone -- what's the difference?

2009-03-21T20:33:00.001-07:00

Even industry watchers say there's still confusion over the terms

By Matt Hamblen
What is a smartphone? The answer is not so simple, judging by the number of definitions available. In fact, it can be a bit of a mystery.

All the popular definitions rely on the fundamental understanding that a smartphone brings together a computer with a wireless voice device. Everyone agrees on that.

But there are many nuances that separate a smartphone from a standard wireless phone, which also can incorporate some kind of a computer with wireless voice capability.

Mobile industry analysts use these subtle distinctions to determine how to count smartphones separately from other wireless phones. For example, they are able to say that a wireless phone, such as the LG Rumor2, which goes on sale by Sprint Nextel Corp. on Sunday, is technically not a smartphone, although it provides access to e-mail, Internet browsing and a Qwerty keyboard.

The iPhone, just about any BlackBerry, and Nokia N or E series devices are considered smartphones, at least according to Gartner Inc. and IDC, the biggest market research firms monitoring wireless phone and smartphone shipments.

The CTIA, an industry association representing hundreds of wireless device makers and wireless carriers, uses a simple approach (possibly the simplest) in its glossary. It defines smartphones as "wireless phones with advanced data features and often keyboards." It adds, "What makes the phone 'smart' is its ability to manage and transmit data in addition to voice calls."

However, a CTIA spokeswoman said there is apparently no industrywide standard definition for a smartphone and that the CTIA's glossary definition is "general."

Four industry analysts interviewed for this story said the word smartphone is indeed a term of art, subject to the many changes that have been made in wireless handhelds since 2000, when Palm Inc. started adding voice capabilities to its personal digital assistants.

"Smartphone is one of those terms of art that gets bantered about so often," said Ramon Llamas, an IDC analyst.

IDC conducted a survey of consumers last summer and discovered many different interpretations. For some people, a smartphone has to be able to access the Internet wirelessly, while others think it has to handle text messaging or allow typing on a touch screen or actual keyboard, Llamas said.

"When you talk to the folks on Mainstreet U.S.A., it's a real can of worms," he said. "There is still a lot of confusion as to what counts as a smartphone."

IDC first coined the term converged mobile device in 2002 to avoid using the term smartphone, which Microsoft Corp. was using to describe enterprise-focused wireless handhelds, Llamas said. The definition IDC developed has gone through several updates since then, with a key change in 2006 that added the requirement that a converged mobile device include a "high-level operating system."

Millions expected to cut back cell phone costs in recession

2009-03-21T20:32:00.001-07:00

Many have already stopped service due to recession fears, survey shows

By Matt Hamblen
A new survey says millions of Americans expect to cut back on their cell phone costs to save money if the recession continues as expected.

The New Millennium Research Council (NMRC), a Washington think tank, today released results of a survey of 2,005 Americans that was conducted March 5-9.

Thirty-nine percent of those customers with monthly contracts said they are likely to cut back. That percentage represents more than 60 million consumers who are expected to cut back on monthly service or extras such as texting, according to the Opinion Research Corp., a polling company that performed the survey for NMRC. The margin of error in the survey is plus or minus 2 percentage points.

Opinion Research, which conducts polls for CNN and other organizations, also found that many users have already cut back. "The change in thinking and purchases is clearly already taking place and has been for months," said Graham Hueber, senior researcher for Opinion Research, in a call with reporters.

Hueber said that 19% of those surveyed reported that they had discontinued cell phone service in the past six months because of job loss, fear of job loss, the recession or other related financial concerns. He said that percentage represents 35 million Americans.

The findings suggest that a "recession-related shift in attitudes and purchasing habits is already under way," Hueber said.

Allen Hepner, a scholar at the NMRC, said the survey also shows that consumers will move from monthly cell phone plans to prepaid plans as a result of the downturn. He described four prepaid plans that were far less costly than monthly plans, putting them more in the reach of lower-income Americans. "Consumers are looking for savings," he said.

Hepner would not say whether the NMRC receives funding from prepaid carriers, saying that the group's donors are kept anonymous. He did say that some of the donors are telecommunications companies. Many carriers offer both prepaid and monthly subscription plans.

Citing the cellular phone industry group CTIA, Hepner said that monthly phone service costs the average consumer $60 per month, while several prepay plans can bring the costs down to $20 per month or even $20 for three months, with a wide range of maximum minutes. Still, he acknowledged that "prepay is not for everyone" and urged consumers to "get the plan that's right for them."

Even though Hepner cited several reasons consumers might consider prepaid phone usage, he said the NMRC is not planning to use the survey data to support a political agenda or marketing campaign. "It's phenomenally neutral," Hepner said, "showing just how the American people feel today." He said that the NMRC will use this survey as the first in a series of annual surveys on cell phone usage.

"There always will be people who use statistics to buoy a position or use it to damage an opponent, but that's not the intent," Hepner said.

He noted that users who move to prepay plans are not getting rid of cell phones altogether. "The good news is there are options," Hepner said. However, he added, a new era of "penny-pinching is here."

Other data in the survey shows that of those who have discontinued cell phone service in the past six months, 28% live in households earning $35,000 or less. Of those likely to cut back if the economy gets worse, 44% are age 18-34, 54% live in households earning $35,000 annually or less, and 55% are African-American.

Overall, 80% of those surveyed still own a cell phone, while 84% of the 18-to-34-year-olds have at least one. Just 68% of those age 65 or older have a cell phone.

The survey found that 91% of households earning $100,000 or more have cell phones, while 65% of households earning $35,000 or less have them.

About 17% have a prepaid cell phone plan, while 84% have a contract-based cell phone. The overlap is due to individuals with both types of plan.

New IE8 still the slowest browser

2009-03-21T20:16:00.001-07:00

Microsoft's final code comes in dead last in JavaScript benchmark tests

By Gregg Keizermay be talking up the performance boost it gave to its just-launched Internet Explorer 8, but the new browser remains the slowest of the top five on the market, benchmark tests show.

According to JavaScript rendering tests run by Computerworld, the final version of IE8 is only slightly faster than the browser's Release Candidate 1, which Microsoft delivered in January.

Computerworld ran the SunSpider benchmark tests in Windows XP three times for each browser, then averaged the scores.

Google Inc.'s Chrome led all browsers in the SunSpider tests, making it more than four times faster than IE8. Coming in second was Mozilla Corp.'s Firefox 3.0.7, followed by Apple Inc.'s Safari 3.2.2 for Windows and Opera Software's Opera 9.63.

Firefox proved to be 59% faster than IE8, while Safari was 47% faster. Opera, the slowest non-Microsoft production browser, was still 38% faster than IE8.

Microsoft, however, has continued to downplay benchmarks such as SunSpider, and instead has promoted page-load time trials that pit browsers against each other in rendering the Web's top 25 destinations. Last week, Microsoft claimed that IE8 loaded more sites faster than either Chrome or Firefox.

At the time, Microsoft's James Pratt, a senior program manager for IE, conceded that the differences were slight. But in an interview yesterday, Pratt called IE8 "highly competitive" with other browsers, and dubbed it "the fastest version of IE that we have ever released."

But he also acknowledged that speed is important to users. "We know that speed is critical to people who are using browsers today," Pratt said, "and we recognize that users have a choice when it comes to browser."

IE8 launch bumps browser's market share by 30%

2009-03-21T20:03:00.001-07:00

Analyst takes Microsoft to task for low-key release

By Gregg Keizer
Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) received a small bump in market share yesterday as the company launched the final version midday, according to Web measurement company Net Applications Inc.

IE8's market share averaged 1.63% for the day Thursday from noon Eastern time onward -- when Microsoft posted the new browser for download -- a 21% increase over March's daily average of 1.35% through Wednesday. Net Applications has posted hourly market share numbers for IE8 on its Web site.

The browser's share climbed again today, to an hourly average of 1.75% through 11:00 a.m. Eastern time, bringing IE8's total increase to 30% over the month's daily average.

Even with that kind of increase, Vince Vizzaccaro, Net Applications' executive vice president of marketing, was critical of Microsoft's low-key launch. "I was a little surprised that there wasn't any advanced warning," said Vizzaccaro, "and no marketing push from Microsoft about IE8. At the minimum, there should have been something for IE users that popped up and said 'there's an upgraded browser available ... download it.'"

IE8's market share climbed above the 1% mark for the first time last month, when it accounted for 1.2% of all browsers used. That boost had been fueled by the last January launch of the browser's release candidate.

By comparison, Google Inc.'s Chrome, which debuted last September, had a 1.15% market share during February, while Mozilla Corp.'s Firefox -- IE's biggest rival -- owned 21.77% of the business.

"Chrome got off to a fast start," said Vizzaccaro, "but it really hasn't moved much since then. And they had a low-key approach when they launched it, too. On the other hand, Mozilla made lots of noise about Firefox 3.0, with a special download day, and they got millions to download it.

"Microsoft is doing the same thing that they've done with browsers in the past, but that didn't work for Chrome," Vizzaccaro said. "If I were Microsoft, I would do something more on the Mozilla model. I'd be a lot more optimistic [about IE8's chances] if there was a large public announcement that it was available."

Microsoft released the final edition of IE8 for Windows XP, Vista, Server 2003 and Server 2008 Thursday, upgrading the browser for first time in two and a half years.

Overall, Internet Explorer controls 67.5% of the browser market, according to Net Applications' numbers, which are collected from the systems that surf to some 40,000 sites that the company tracks for clients. Almost three out of every four IE users run 2006's IE7, while nearly all of the remainder run the even older IE6.

Currently, IE8 is available only as a manual download from Microsoft's main download center and the IE8 page. The company will begin automatically installing the new browser on machines now running IE6 or IE7 at some unspecified future date, at which point its market share will undoubtedly climb.

Facebook puts privacy controls in hands of its users

2009-03-21T19:57:00.001-07:00

Facebook is giving its users greater control so they can specify just how private they want their profiles, updates, photos and videos to be. Want to keep your latest endeavor between you and your network of Facebook friends? Done. Want to open your pages up to public viewing? Well, now you can do that, too.

"One of the top priorities at Facebook is offering privacy controls that let you choose exactly what you share with whom," said Mark Slee, an engineer at Facebook, in a blog post Monday afternoon. "Starting today, you can choose to make your profile and any of your content available to everyone on Facebook. None of your existing privacy settings have changed. This is an additional setting for those of you who wish to share with a broader audience."

Yesterday's change comes on the heels of several recent changes to the Facebook social network.

For example, Facebook fired a shot across Twitter's bow earlier this month with the announcement that its public profiles have been updated to allow users to share personal information with an unlimited number of friends. And the new Facebook setup also will enable businesses, organizations or even celebrities to blast out information to customers, members or fans.

The site recently showed off a controversial redesign that has upset many users. "Please bring back the old Facebook," wrote one user responding to Slee's blog. Yesterday's announcement drew more negative than positive comments from users responding to the blog post.

With this latest change, users now can go to their privacy page and change the setting to "Everyone" if they want to open their content up to the public.

"I think this is a good thing," said Dan Olds, principal analyst at Gabriel Consulting Group Inc. "It gives people on Facebook much more granular control over what they show or don't show the public. Giving customers more control over how they use your product is almost universally a good thing. It helps people get more use out of it. There are some people who will make many more connections because of these new features."

This doesn't mean it will be easier for people to Google your content, but it does mean that it will be easier for other Facebook users to find you and the photos of your new house or your dog's birthday party.

By opening up your privacy settings, Slee explained, people who see one of your posts or who find you through a search on Facebook will now be able to see any part of the profile opened by the user for public viewing. "While some special rules remain in place about who can see your profile if you are a minor, people generally won't need to be friends with you or share a common network in order to view your content if you choose the new "Everyone" setting," he wrote.

Users of Sony e-readers gain free access to classics via Google

2009-03-21T19:56:00.001-07:00

Deal boosts digital titles at Sony eBook Store to 600k

Sony Electronics Inc. said users of its two e-book readers can now access more than 500,000 free public domain classic books from Google Inc. through the Sony eBook Store.

The announcement yesterday boosts the available titles at Sony's eBook Store to more than 600,000 titles. Amazon.com Inc.'s Kindle library, in comparison, has more than 250,000 titles.

The books from Google can be transferred to Sony's PRS-505 and PRS-700 readers by clicking on a button on the front page at Sony's eBook Store. Those new to the store need to set up an account and then download Sony's free eBook Library software.

Terms of the deal with Google were not announced. Adam Smith, Google's product management director, said in a statement that the Google Book Search was founded "on the premise that anyone, anywhere, anytime should have the tools to the explore the great works of history and culture. ... We believe in an open platform for accessing and reading books, and we're excited to partner with Sony to bring these public domain books to more people."

Steve Haber, president of the digital reading division at Sony Electronics, said Sony is committed to offering an open e-book platform that makes it "easy to find as much content as possible -- from our store or others -- whether that content is purchased, borrowed or free."

Free books from Google include titles by Mark Twain and Jane Austen, with many books in French, German, Italian, Spanish and other languages.

The PRS-505 from Sony sells for about $300 and, as of yesterday, the PRS-700 was available for about $350.

Opinion: Is the Internet killing the news media?

2009-03-21T19:50:00.001-07:00

Newspapers are having a tough time adapting to a digital world

By Scott Bradner
he latest Pew Project for Excellence in Journalism report on the state of the U.S. news media makes for sobering reading if you're a student thinking of pursuing a career in journalism or if you're already in the business. The bottom line is that the business is toast unless you're on the Internet side -- and even there, it's toast.

The report's first few sentences tell most of the story:

Newspaper ad revenues are down more than 20% in the past two years.
Twenty percent of the journalists who worked in newspapers have lost their jobs in that time period.
Ad revenues were down last year in local TV news more than 5% (even in an election year).
The traffic at the top news sites went up more than 25% last year.
The ad-based model for funding journalism is unlikely to work in the future.

It's not a pleasant picture if you're in the journalism biz. And it's not a pleasant picture if you like to read newspapers -- one of the two newspapers that I get delivered to my house is on the list of the 10 papers most likely to fold in the next few years.

The report makes for very interesting, if a bit depressing, reading. There are a number of observations that portend a fundamental restructuring of the way people get their news. The three most important observations are that power is shifting from institutions (like newspapers) to individual journalists; people increasingly want news "on demand" rather than scheduled, like the evening news; and there has been a rise in importance of "minute-by-minute judgment in political journalism." Those trends greatly benefit the Internet and Internet-based journalists. The latter two trends also benefit the full-time cable news channels, but only when the cable is available. And, in the office, cable is not generally available.

So far, most newspapers have had a hard time figuring out how to move to the Internet. Overall, the report says, online ad revenue for newspapers fell slightly in 2008 and represents less than 10% of newspaper revenue. Search engines, such as Google, are doing fine -- they are getting much of the growth in ad revenue (up almost 15% in the first three quarters of 2008). Local sites, like newspaper Web sites, are seeing a bleak outlook.

The report also notes it's unlikely that the news business of the future will be able to support the current worldwide news-gathering with revenue from banner ads.

My overall take from the report is that the news business -- like the music and movie businesses -- will need to completely rethink its business model. Newspapers that try to block search engines to preserve obsolete models, as the ones in Belgium did a few years back, will just ensure that they will have fewer readers and go out of business sooner.

In any case, there may just be a lot fewer dots on the Newseum map by this time next year, when the next edition in the excellent series of Pew reports comes out.

Disclaimer: With all the financial issues, it's hard to predict how many dots there will be on Harvard's map a year from now, but the above is my report review, since I know of no university one.

Bradner is Harvard University's technology security officer. Reach him at sob@sobco.com.

Chrome only browser left standing after day one of Pwn2Own

2009-03-21T19:48:00.001-07:00

Browser vendors often make strong claims about their responsiveness to vulnerability reports and their ability to preemptively prevent exploits. Security is becoming one of the most significant fronts in the new round of browser wars, but it's also arguably one of the hardest aspects of software to measure or quantify.

A recent contest at CanSecWest, an event that brings together some of the most skilled experts in the security community, has demonstrated that the three most popular browser are susceptible to security bugs despite the vigilance and engineering prowess of their creators. Firefox, Safari, and Internet Explorer were all exploited during the Pwn2Own competition that took place at the conference. Google's Chrome browser, however, was the only one left standing—a victory that security researchers attribute to its innovative sandbox feature.

The contest awards security researchers with hardware and cash prizes for finding efficient ways to trick browsers into executing arbitrary code. During the first day of the competition, the contestants are required to do this in default browser installations without plugins such as Flash or Java, which are commonly used as vectors for attacks. Researchers typically prepare for the event far in advance by finding zero-day exploits ahead of time.

Early this month, prior champion Charlie Miller told reporters that he would be attempting to exploit a Safari vulnerability on Mac OS X. Safari, he said, would be the first to succumb to the contestants. As he promised, Safari went down first: he was able to execute his prepared hack in only a matter of seconds. Another security expert known only as Nils took longer, but was able to successfully exploit all three of the most popular browsers.

These contests contribute to the growing culture of commercialism that surrounds the art of exploitation. In an interview with ZDNet, Miller said that the vulnerability he used in the contest was one that he had originally found while preparing for the contest last year. Instead of disclosing it at that time, he decided to save it for the contest this year, because the contest only pays for one bug per year. This is part of his new philosophy, he says, which is that bugs shouldn't be disclosed to vendors for free.

"I never give up free bugs. I have a new campaign. It's called NO MORE FREE BUGS. Vulnerabilities have a market value so it makes no sense to work hard to find a bug, write an exploit and then give it away," Miller told ZDNet. "Apple pays people to do the same job so we know there's value to this work."

Miller also told reporters that he targeted Safari on Mac OS X because he believes that it is the easiest to exploit. Windows, on the other hand, he claims is tougher because of its address randomization feature and other security measures. As for Chrome, he says that he has identified a security bug in Google's browser but has been unable to exploit it because the browser's sandboxing feature and the operating system's security measures together pose a formidable challenge.

The game isn't over yet. During the second day of the event, the focus will turn towards Chrome. Nils, who demonstrated impressive skill during the first day by conquering the three most popular browsers, might have a few more tricks up his sleeve. According to the official rules, the participants will be permitted to use plugins during the second day.

Internet Explorer 8 released

2009-03-20T01:13:00.001-07:00

The final build of Internet Explorer 8 has been released in 25 languages. You can also grab the download directly from these links: Windows XP 32-bit (16.1 MB), Windows XP 64-bit (32.3 MB), Windows Server 2003 32-bit (16.0 MB), Windows Server 2003 64-bit (32.3 MB), Windows Vista 32-bit (13.2 MB), Windows Vista 64-bit (24.3 MB), Windows Server 2008 32-bit (13.2 MB), and Windows Server 2008 64-bit (24.3 MB). The final build number is 8.0.6001.18702.

The public Windows 7 beta is not being updated, and although Microsoft released an update for IE8 for Windows 7 in February, the next update is not likely to arrive until the Windows 7 Release Candidate next month. For everyone else, in the coming weeks Microsoft will put IE8 out as an optional download on Windows Update and then later roll it out to users via Automatic Updates. A quick note to all the IT administrators out there reading this post: the IE8 blocker toolkit is already available, so make sure you get acquainted with it if you're planning on avoiding IE8 when it's released via Microsoft's update channels.

Dean Hachamovitch, general manager of Internet Explorer, will be announcing the release of IE8 to the masses at MIX09 today. You can watch his one-hour keynote live right now over at live.visitmix.com but it will also be available on demand later in the day on the same site. Ars had a chance to talk to Dean yesterday about IE8's release, and he touted the fact that IE8 uses fewer resources than earlier versions and said he was "excited about how people will respond to IE8." Hachamovitch also laid to rest any speculation that IE8 would be the final version of the browser or that IE9 would switch to WebKit.

The news about IE8's resource usage is promising: despite all the new features and tweaks to the browser, Microsoft still kept performance of the actual program under scrutiny during development.

Improvements

Putting browser standings aside though, why is Hachamovitch excited for the public response to IE8? Well, the lengthy feature list is one thing, but what really needs to be emphasized here is that IE8 puts Microsoft back in the game. IE7 was a catch-up release, there's no question about that. However, with IE8, which is bigger leap from IE7 than IE7 was from IE6, Microsoft is pulling out the big guns and offering features which other browsers have yet to adopt. It's good to see Microsoft fight back with a vengeance, but the company has more competition than ever before, from the likes of Firefox, Safari, Chrome, and Opera.

There are three areas of improvement that are worth underlining with Internet Explorer 8: speed, security, and improved standards support.

Speed

IE8 feels significantly faster than IE7; no surprises there, given the focus on speed. In terms of actual rendering, Microsoft made a bold move last week when it announced performance tests that showed IE8 trumping Firefox 3.05 and Chrome 1.0. This wasn't your typical synthetic JavaScript speed test though; Microsoft trumpeted real-world usage of websites and demonstrated how IE loaded the most (out of the top 25) websites faster.

At the same time, Microsoft is also pushing features like Accelerators, Web Slices, and visual search suggestions, which improve how quickly users can get typical browsing tasks done. Accelerators allows users to get—or pass on—information like a map or a definition by right clicking a word on a website and choosing a service from the drop down menu, without ever leaving the page. That means getting directions to the party, figuring out what your friend means when he says he's an "aficionado," or even sending something on the page to a friend via e-mail, all from the right click menu.

A Web Slice grabs specific information from a website (like the top stories from Digg or the weather forecast) and puts it in a drop-down menu, eliminating the need to browse to the actual website. "It's about making it as easy for sites to extend and blur into the browser," Hachamovitch told Ars. This is a brilliant feature but it is completely lost if developers ignore it. So far, few sites actually do, but Microsoft is hoping that with IE8 going final, that will all begin to change.

The third one is an improvement to the search box in the top right: users can get their answers without ever hitting enter, thanks to the drop-down menu that grabs information from the search engine without ever going to the site. The address bar also looks through favorites and history, and opening a new tab shows you a list of tabs you've closed recently, making it easier to find the site you visited earlier.

There are currently about 1,200 add-ons available for IE8, and while Microsoft emphasizes that they are very easy to develop and that it made sure the developer tools are not a separate download, that number is nowhere near as close as the number of extensions for Firefox. Again, enough users have to adopt IE8 before these add-ons have a chance of taking off.

Security

Security in IE8 is very different from its predecessors. Internet Explorer is still by far the most targeted browser for security exploits. Microsoft has again made improvements to reduce the attack surface for ActiveX controls, added ClickJacking prevention, and made sure that Data Execution Prevention (a security feature that can help prevent damage to computers from malware by preventing certain types of code from writing to executable memory space) is on by default in Windows Vista SP1.

InPrivate Browsing (aka, porn mode) ensures that history, temporary Internet files, and cookies are not recorded on a PC after browsing. Further, InPrivate Filtering allows the user to filter content coming from third parties that are in a position to track and aggregate their online behavior. At the same time, the domain of the current website is now highlighted in bold text to help clue users in as to what site they are visiting. There's also a SmartScreen Filter which takes IE7's Phishing Filter to a new level by taking the user to a page that warns them the page they were trying to get to is a confirmed badware site.

Standards

In terms of improved standards support, IE8 now passes the Acid 2 test completely, although it still fails Acid 3 miserably. Microsoft is brushing that aside for now though, touting that out of the 7,200 CSS 2.1 tests that are on the w3.org, IE8 passes more of them than any other browser.

That said, Microsoft still has to deal with the realities of IE6 and IE7, which are significantly less standards-compliant. Even if the company could get all of its users to move to version 8, there would still be the problem of websites detecting Internet Explorer and trying to use hacks that are no longer needed—and often detrimental to correct rendering in IE8. Microsoft's solution is a compatibility button that users can press to make IE8 render the page similarly to how IE7 would.

During IE8's development, Microsoft compiled data for the button and made up a list of sites that genuinely looked and performed better in compatibility-mode (IE7-like) as opposed to the standards mode in IE8. Hachamovitch told Ars that there are a couple of thousand sites on the list today (which you can download now) and that Microsoft is in discussion with these sites so that once they make the changes necessary to no longer require the compatibility button, Microsoft can take them off the list.

While this is an annoying process both for end-users and website authors, it's a necessary evil if Internet Explorer is ever going to make a comeback in standards-support. It's one thing to support standards, and it's a completely different thing to support standards after having neglected them for years.

It's a different game now

As we mentioned earlier, IE7 was a catch-up release, adding tabs and filing in holes that were left open for years as Microsoft ignored the browser landscape. In the 30 months since IE7's October 2006 release, the browser landscape has undergone a seismic shift. Firefox isn't just a small threat anymore, it's a competitor that Microsoft acknowledges and supports in most of its services and online offerings. Google has entered the market with Chrome, and the search giant not only has the obvious advantage of plastering links to its browser via Google.com and its online services, it also had the benefit of writing its browser completely from the ground up. Even Apple is competing against IE, releasing the solid Safari for Windows last year.

All of that adds up to a browser market in which Microsoft no longer sets the standard; the company might still have the largest market share, but it's no longer Redmond's way or the highway. Microsoft is still only starting to get a grip on this new market, so it's little surprise that company isn't confident that it will be able to regain lost market share. As if that wasn't enough, the mobile browser space is still completely up for grabs, and Microsoft's position there is even more mournful.

Microsoft's has tethered Internet Explorer to long development cycles with huge changes. This strategy is driven in part by the fact that it has businesses to keep in mind; the company does not want to overwhelm them with frequent minor releases. The leaps Microsoft has taken between IE6 and IE7, as well as between IE7 and IE8, are arguably larger than those any other browser maker has made in its major versions. Now that it is back in the game though, Microsoft needs to step it up and start delivering more quickly. The progress that Microsoft's competitors are making—both in terms of features and standards—is still outpacing Redmond's development effort. To truly compete with Opera, Safari, Chrome, and Firefox, the software giant is going to have to match their release cycles—early and often instead of slow and steady.

Search Engine Over Friends and Family

2009-01-17T07:54:00.001-08:00

These days it is more important than ever to market your business online. A recent survey showed that an amazing 80% of shoppers now choose to visit a store's website before heading to the actual store, and 58% of people claim to do all their product research online before buying instead of consulting with friends and family. Combining this information with the fact that increased fuel prices and other costs are convincing more and more people to stay at home and shop, and you can easily see that online marketing and a strong website is vital for your company's success.

Website Content
One of the key aspects of online success in e-commerce is to ensure the customers value your website. Having incomplete product descriptions or none at all will result in customers quickly going elsewhere to find out more information about the product they are considering. You should also consider paying for some form of search engine optimisation (SEO) which customises your website and content to gain a better rank in the search engines.

A large part of SEO involves getting other sites to link with yours so submitting your site to web directories will be another important part of this area of your online marketing strategy. Some search engines will penalise you for things like having too heavy keyword saturation or other more subtle "cheats", so it really pays to hire a professional to handle your search engine optimisation needs.

Search Engine Marketing
One of the very best ways to raise awareness of your company and increase traffic to your website is with a structured search engine marketing (SEM) campaign. One of the simplest forms of SEM involves paying a search engine to put your website in a prominent position on the search results page, often as a "featured" link, this is known as paid placement.

Another great service offered by the search engines is pay-per-click (PPC) advertising. As the name implies, this means that the search engine distributes your advert across its network of websites and you pay for the referrals this generates. With PPC, everyone's a winner; you get large coverage with your advert and only pay for the increased traffic (the clicks to your site) and the person who ends up with your advert on their website earns a cut of what you pay.

While pay-per-click schemes can seem a little expensive, there are some keywords that can still get you traffic but might be cheaper, so it pays to invest a little time researching search terms. You can also consider some of the smaller search engines that will have lower priced keywords. Whichever you choose, the costs of marketing when offset against your increased traffic (and hence revenue) will make it worthwhile.

Disadvantage of Free Domain Name

2009-01-15T04:07:00.001-08:00

Everyone likes a bargain. It's even wise to keep one's costs down. On the other hand, you can be so cheap that you cut your own throat.
Here are two ways to register a domain name for free and some reasons why you might not want to.

You Must Have Your Own Top Level Domain (TLD) Name
Your business website should definitely have its own top level domain (TLD) name. This means a name like yourcompany.com. It doesn't mean a subdomain of someone else's domain name, such as yourcompany.someisp.net. Sometimes persons hesitate to register a proper domain name because of cost, lack of knowledge, or indecision. However, paying the nominal fee charged by the domain registrar for your own domain name can reap rich dividends. A Uniform Resource Locator (URL) or Internet address like (ignoring the http part) someisp.net/hosting-accounts/yourco/, or yourcompany.someisp.net, just doesn't look as professional as yourcompany.com. It might be free (as in included with your web space) but it just doesn't cut it. Consider: If you put your URL on your letterheads, business cards, signs, et cetera, which Internet address looks more professional?
If you mention your URL on your radio advertising or to a customer over the phone, which one will be easier to remember? As well, what if your web host goes out of business or you decide that you want to change to another provider. Now, you need to notify everyone that you have now changed to yourcompany.someotherisp.net. You will also need to change all your stationery, signs, and advertising to reflect the change. On the other hand, the domain name yourcompany.com, could be transferred from one web host to another simply by informing your domain name registrar of the change. So, to avoid losing business and incurring unnecessary additional costs, be sure you have your own top level domain name.
Should You Get a Free Top Level Domain?
It is possible to get a free top level domain from Dot TK (@www.dot.tk). (You may also get paid dot tk (.tk) domains from them.) However, there can be disadvantages to using a free top level domain name. Here are some of the restrictions noted on the Dot TK website. You may register no more than three free domain names. The ownership of the free domain remains with Dot TK. This means that you can't sell it. (Of course, if you pay for the domain you do own it and can transfer it to a new owner.) Also, if you don't have 25 visitors come to your home page within a ninety day period, your free domain name registration is cancelled. You need to have existing web content somewhere so that your dot tk name can be forwarded to it.

There may well be other disadvantages.

Apparently, Dot TK uses frames to show your website. This being the case, you may have issues with navigation (bookmarking or finding specific pages) and search engine friendliness.
Therefore, for serious business use, consider carefully the true cost of free domain names

SEO WordPress Theme Ad Flex Niche

2009-01-15T03:14:00.001-08:00

Ad Flex Niche 0.8.9.8w is a free, advanced, fully customizable, SEO, AdSense and Widget ready WordPress theme for users who seek for an inexpensive and straight forward way to publish niche content web sites.

We're still working on the latest version of Ad Flex Niche 0.9. In the meantime, we've decided to publish the intermediary version 0.8.9.8w for WordPress 2.0.x, 2.1.x, 2.2.x, 2.3.x, 2.5.x, 2.6.x and 2.7.x.

Ad Flex Niche 0.8.9.8w is flexible and customizable. It comes out-of-the-box with an exhaustive list of more than 150 customization parameters that can be graphically managed using the WordPress Dashboard. You can modify most of the layout items of the theme without touching a single line of code.

Ad Flex Niche 0.8.9.8w is SEO (Search Engine Optimization) ready. It permits your web content to adhere to a set of important SEO rules that are known to make your web pages rank better in Search Engines. You can focus more on your content and let Ad Flex Niche handle the more technical on-page SEO part.

Ad Flex Niche 0.8.9.8w is AdSense ready. It permits your web site to easily display your AdSense banners. You simply add the code of each of your AdSense banners using the WordPress Dashboard.

Ad Flex Niche 0.8.9.8w is Widget ready. The theme comes with a set of sidebar Widgets. You can also extend the theme by adding other WordPress Widgets of your choice.

The Ad Flex Niche theme can be set to 1 or 2 columns depending on your preference, with the sidebar on right that can be hidden. The theme layout can be set to narrow or wide. The header can display random banner images and random background images. There're 8 random images that can be displayed to decorate your web site and make it more attractive.

You can also add easily other useful items like your custom RSS feed code, your own sidebar and footer links, your stat counter code, your custom sidebar and footer section and of course other WordPress Widgets.

Ad Flex Niche 0.8.9.8w is compatible with WordPress 2.0.x, 2.1.x, 2.2.x, 2.3.x, 2.5.x, 2.6.x and 2.7.x.

You can also look at the Wordpress theme Ad Flex Blog that shares the same design and features than Ad Flex Niche but more ready for blogs and blog oriented web sites.

Here are the most recently added features that is provided with Ad Flex Niche 0.8.9.8w:

    * META Description feature, that is dynamically built based on the content of the post/article.
    * Non-Duplicate Content prevention feature. It's very important to have such feature to avoid your WordPress web pages to be penalized by Google and eventually placed in Google Supplemental Index.
    * WWW / non-WWW Redirection.
    * AdSense Banner management.
    * Blocking Cookie.
    * Theme layout can switch between narrow and wide. It permits you to switch to a wide theme layout.
    * Now you can control about 180 customization parameters via the dashboard of WordPress, and perform all the changes from there without having to touch the code.
    * WordPress Widgets ready.
    * Other features you'll discover by yourself when playing with AdFlex.

Download the latest Ad Flex Niche 0.8.9.8w

Please feel free to subscribe to our mailing list that will send you a release notification when a new version is released. You can join using the form below:

We would like to emphasize that we will never give your details to other companies.
The Unofficial Blog of AdFlex

We had to postpone the launch of The Official AdFlex Blog due to some other urgent development activities.

In the meantime, you can visit The Unofficial AdFlex Blog and there you'll be able to ask questions regarding Ad Flex and related other topics.

The unofficial blog for AdFlex is located at URL:
http://www.askvk.com/adflex/the-unofficial-adflex-blog.php
Easy Straight Forward SEO AdSense

This WordPress template with AdSense is easy to use and provides you with a straight forward way to increase your AdSense CRT, and a nice looking design for your blog. It can be used to combine AdSense and WordPress as well as other Ad banners like Amazon shop or any other affiliate products from affiliate programs.

This WordPress template with AdSense is easy to use and provides you with a straight forward way to get well ranked in search engine, increase your AdSense CRT, and a nice looking web site design. It can be used to combine AdSense and WordPress as well as other Ad banners like Amazon shop or any other affiliate products from affiliate programs.

The AdSense friendly WordPress theme Ad Flex Niche is free to use and it comes with the following techie features:
SEO Search Engine Optimized

Ad Flex Niche and AdFlex Blog are both SEO Search Engine Optimized to target the best rank possible in Google search engine. The target is of course the Google Top 10.
AdSense Ready

Ad Flex Niche is AdSense Ready. You can easily add 2 AdSense banners and 1 AdSense Link Unit and without any WordPress plugins. Putting AdSense on WordPress is as easy as installing the WordPress theme.
Niche Content

Ad Flex Niche is more appropriate if you want to use WordPress to host pure content articles like niche content articles. With Ad Flex Niche, only the list of articles is shown. There're no list of categories. You have just monthly archives folders.So the WordPress theme Ad Flex Niche is not appropriate to be used as typical WordPress blog as the post comments are never displayed.

If you're looking for a typical blog with the features as Ad Flex Niche, you'll be more pleased with the WordPress theme Ad Flex Blog. There're also other WordPress templates and WordPress themes adsense ready that you can see at VK Labs - WordPress theme for Internet Marketers.
AdSense Adjacent Images

Ad Flex Niche lets you easily add 8 images (or more) adjacent to your AdSense banners to increase your AdSense CRT. The 8 images are randomly sectionned from your own set of images (10, 20, 50 images or more). It's as easy as dropping your images in a folder to have them taken into account by Ad Flex Niche.
Random Banners

Ad Flex Niche displays random banner images. Everytime the page is displayed or refreshed, a new banner image is randomly displayed takenfrom your own set of banner images.
Random Backgrounds

Ad Flex Niche displays random background images. Everytime the page is displayed or refreshed, a new background image is randomly displayed from your own set of background image.
Stat Counter

Ad Flex Niche eases the inclusion of a stat counter. You can add the code for your stat counter(s) via a user friendly administration interface and your stat counter is just integrated to Ad Flex Niche.
RSS Feeds

Ad Flex Niche lets you easily add RSS feeds. You can add the code for your RSS feeds via a user friendly administration interface and it will be displayed in a fully integrated way with the Ad Flex Niche theme. Your RSS feeds will appear just at the end of your article/post content.
Newsletter Ready

Ad Flex Niche is read to be integrated with your own Newsletter service. You just need to add the Newsletter code to have it appear instantly as the first section of the sidebar.
Exhaustive Customization Parameters

Ad Flex Niche comes with an exhaustive list of more than 100 customization parameters that can be managed via the WordPress dashboard.

You'll see the special tab Ad Flex Niche Options located accessible via your WP Admin / Presentation lets you customize the Ad Flex Niche to fit your taste, colors and needs. You can for instance set the following parameters via WP Admin::

    Site Title
    Short Site Description
    Long Site Description
    Site Name
    Page Title Prefix
    Page Title Postfix
    Page Title Separator
    Layout Format
    Page Border Color
    Page Border Size
    Page background Color
    Custom Stylesheet
    Custom Stylesheet Code
    Search Engine Options
    Search Engines Access Permission
    Search Engines Duplicate Content Prevention Mode
    META Description Enabled
    Header Options
    Top Bar Visibility
    Top Bar Height
    Top Bar Background Color
    Top Bar Text Color
    Top Bar Text Visibility
    Top Bar Text
    Top Bar Text Alignment
    Banner Image Height
    Bottom Bar Visibility
    Bottom Bar Background Color
    Bottom Bar Color
    Bottom Bar Text Visibility
    Bottom Bar Text
    Bottom Bar Text Alignment
    Bottom Bar Height
    Link Unit Bar Visibility
    Link Unit Bar Background Color
    Link Unit Bar Color
    Link Unit Bar Text Visibility
    Link Unit Bar Text
    Link Unit Bar Text Alignment
    Link Unit Bar Height
    Ad Banner Link Unit Visibility
    Ad Banner Link Unit Code
    Headline Title Bar Background Color
    Headline Title Bar Color
    Headline Title Bar Height
    Headline Title Bar Text Alignment
    Images Top Bar Visibility
    Images Top Bar Background Color
    Images Top Bar Color
    Images Top Bar Border Color
    Images Top Bar Border Size
    Ad Banner Top Options
    Ad Banner Top Visibility
    Ad Banner Top Code
    Ad Banner Top Background Color
    Ad Banner Top Color
    Content Options
    Content Background Color
    Content Color
    Content Link Color
    Content Title Color
    Content Title Link Color
    Post Comments Form Visibility
    Post Pings Form Visibility
    Post Category Visibility
    Post Date Visibility
    Post Time Visibility
    Post Author Visibility
    Post Comments Summary Visibility
    Post Edit Visibility
    Post Content Display on Homepage
    RSS Code Visibility
    RSS Code Background Color
    RSS Code Color
    RSS Code Link Color
    RSS Code
    Sidebar Options
    Sidebar Visibility
    Sidebar Alignment
    Sidebar Border Color
    Sidebar Border Size
    Sidebar Background Color
    Sidebar Color
    Sidebar Link Color
    Sidebar Title Color
    Sidebar Width
    Search Code Visibility
    Search Code
    Sidebar Navigation Section Name
    About Text Visibility
    About Text
    Newsletter Code Visibility
    Newsletter Code
    Recent Posts Section Visibility
    Recent Posts Section Name
    Recent Posts Number
    Archives Section Visibility
    Archives Section Name
    Categories Section Visibility
    Categories Section Name
    Links Section Visibility
    META Section Visibility
    Custom Section Visibility
    Custom Sidebar Code
    Images Bottom Bar Options
    Images Bottom Bar Visibility
    Images Bottom Bar Background Color
    Images Bottom Bar Color
    Images Bottom Bar Border Color
    Ad Banner Bottom Options
    Ad Banner Bottom Visibility
    Ad Banner Bottom Code
    Ad Banner Bottom Background Color
    Ad Banner Bottom Color
    Footer Options
    Footer Bar Border Color
    Footer Bar Border Size
    Footer Bar Background Color
    Footer Bar Color
    Footer Bar Link Color
    Footer Bar Height
    Custom Footer Code Visibility
    Custom Footer Code
    Stat Counters Options
    Stat Counter Code(s)
    And other customization parameters that are added very week...

Version Status

You can find the info about the current version and availability of a new version that is displayed in real-time at the level of the footer.
WordPress theme Ad Flex Niche demo

If you want to see Ad Flex Blog in action, go to our demo web site http://www.hqarticles.com where we've listed some of the web sites run that run AdFlex.
WordPress template Ad Flex Niche version

The current version is 0.8.9.8w released on December 30, 2008.

We're still currently working on the version 0.9.
Release Notification

We've put in place a handy mailing list that we'll send a release notification to when the new version of Ad Flex Niche 0.9 is out. You can join using the form below:
WordPress template Ad Flex Niche author

The WordPress theme Ad Flex Niche was developed by VK Labs, a creativity, tech and wellness research laboratory owned by VK Solutions Co., Ltd.
WordPress theme Ad Flex Niche support

Basic support of this WordPress template is free as a courtesy to you, so if you have installation issues, just send us an e-mail and we'll answer you quickly.

Advanced support requests for this WordPress theme and all customization work are for-hire services.

Donations are always welcome.
WordPress theme Ad Flex Niche License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence. For the attibution requirement, you must leave the credits and link backs in the footer intact with the link backs active and unaltered for this work and any derivative works.
WordPress template Ad Flex Niche disclaimer

Use of this application will be at your own risk. No guarantees or warranties are made, direct or implied. The creator cannot and will not be liable or held accountable for damages, direct or consequential. By using this application it implies agreement to these conditions.
WordPress theme AdFlex Blog installation

This page provides you with the installation instructions and useful information to exploit the full potential of this AdSense ready WordPress theme Ad Flex Niche and discover other features of Ad Flex Niche.
Download WordPress template Ad Flex Niche

Download the latest Ad Flex Niche 0.8.9.8w

If you want to be notified when the new Ad Flex Niche 0.9 is out, please subscribe to our mailing list that will send you a release notification when the new version is released. You can join using the form below:

Below, you'll get the steps to follow to install Ad Flex and configure it.
Install Ad Flex Niche
Extract WordPress theme Ad Flex Niche

Extract the files from the archive ad-flex-niche.zip on your hard disk.

You will end up with the new directory:
Your_Hard_Disk\ad-flex-niche
Upload WordPress template Ad Flex Niche

Upload your local folder ad-flex-niche located on your hard disk to the folder WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes on your web server.

You will end up with the new directory:
WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-flex-niche
Activate WordPress theme Ad Flex Niche

Now you'll need to activate the Ad Flex Niche adsense wordpress theme as follows:

Go to your WordPress admin.

Click on the Presentation tab.

Located the WordPress template Ad Flex Niche among the list of WordPress themes, and click on it.

You have now installed Ad Flex Niche and you already have a running WordPress web site.

You'll see the tab WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options where you'll find an exhaustive list of cutomization paramters. Most of Ad Flex Niche items can be customized via WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options.
AdSense Images

The wp adsense theme Ad Flex Niche comes with several images that appear adjacent to the AdSense banners.

If you want to have your own images, you can upload at least 8 of your images under the directory:
WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-flex-niche\images\ad

Note:

    * The format of the images has to be GIF, JPG or PNG
      The recommended image size is of 144x104 for best CRT effect
    * The filenames of the images are not important but the extensions have to be .gif, .jpg or .png
    * The images will be displayed randomly
    * It is recommended to put at least 8 images

Random Link Images

If you wish, you can make an AdSense image pointing to a specific URL, so your image behaves like a link image.

For instance if you have the image in the folder WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-flex-niche\images\ad\your_image.jpg (or your_image.gif, or your_image.png) and you want to add a URL link, you just need to do as follows:

   1. Create a new text file with the same filename followed by the extension .ini. In this case, you’ll create the new text file WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-flex-niche-version-number\images\ad\my_image.jpg.ini. The file name must be my_image.jpg.ini and not my_image.ini.
   2. Open the file you’ve just created. So open WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-flex-niche-version-number\images\ad\my_image.jpg.ini and add a simple line that contains with your URL like for instance:
http://www.yourdomainname.com/yourarticles/index.html
   3. Finally, just save the file, and that's it.

Random Banner images

If you want to have your own banners to the WordPress template, you can upload your banner images under the directory:
WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-flex-niche\images\banner

Note:

    * The format of the images has to be GIF, JPG or PNG
    * The banner image width is 770 pixels if you use the default norrow skin, or 970 pixels if you've selected a wide skin.
      The default banner image height is 150 pixels but you may change the height value via WP Admin \ Presentation \ Ad Flex Niche Options panel.
    * The filenames of the images are not important but the extensions have to be .gif, .jpg or .png
      Now in term of SEO, it's good to put your keywords as filenames but do not use white space or special chars in the filenames
    * The images will be displayed randomly

You can find some sample banner images in the directory:
WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-
flex\images\banner-samples
Random Background Images

If you want to have your own background images, you can upload your background images under the directory:
WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-flex-niche\images\background

Note:

    * The format of the images has to be GIF, JPG or PNG
    * The filenames of the images are not important but the extensions have to be .gif, .jpg or .png
    * The images will be displayed randomly

You can find some sample background images in the directory:
WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-
flex\images\background-samples
AdSense Link Unit

You can simply add your AdSense Link unit by putting the 728x15 AdSense Link unit code in the field WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options / Ad Banner Link Unit Code.

The AdSense Link unit code will look similar to the following:

Ad Flex Niche is a WordPress theme banner ad that permits you to add your AdSense banner or any other type of banner ad at the top of the page.

If you want to add one of your AdSense banners at the top of the page, you just need to put your 728x90 AdSense banner code in the field WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options / Ad Banner Top Code.

The AdSense banner code will look similar to the following:

Ad Flex Niche is a WordPress template banner ad that permits you to add your AdSense banner or any other type of banner ad at the bottom of the page.

If you want to add one of your AdSense banners at the bottom of the page, you just need to put your 728x90 AdSense banner code in the field WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options / Ad Banner Bottom Code.

The AdSense banner code will look similar to the following:

You can simply add the content for each of your posts/articles by using the WordPress posting feature:

    * Go to your WordPress admin
    * Click on Write
    * Select the tab Write Post
    * Enter your title in Title field
    * Enter the article content
    * Click on Publish

The title will appear as H1 and H2. The right column will list automaticall your articles. The order of the list is sorted based on the publishing date. So you can change the publishing date is you want to change the order of the articles.
Friendly URL

The ads wordpress theme Ad Flex Niche works more effectiently if you activate the WordPress Friendly URL to have URLs like
http://www.yourdomainname.com/articles/articles-title.html instead of
http://www.yourdomainname.com/?p=xxx.

This will ensure Google will like your web pages and other search engines will see well your articles.

    * Go to your WordPress admin \ Options \ Permalink
    * Select option Custom, select below
    * Add in the field Custom structure: /articles/%postname%.html
    * Add in the field Category base: /category
    * Click on the button Update Permalink Structure located at the bottom of the page

You will need to update your .htaccess file manually if wordpress cannot get permissions to do it itself.

You can find the .htaccess file in the root directory of your website. If the file .htaccess doesn't exist, you can create it

If you cannot see it via your FTP program (which is likely) try going into your the Control Panel provided with your web hosting and accessing the file direct from there. Then simply copy the code from the bottom of the permalink page and paste it into your .htaccess file.

Check that all is working by clicking on an article title, if it takes you to the article page all is well done.

This may seem to be confusing but when you'll do it, you'll understand much better.
About and Contact Pages

It's important to have at least the About and Contact pages on your web site.

It makes your web site looks serious and gives more confident to your visitors.

To create the About page:

    * Go to your WordPress admin
    * Click on Write
    * Select the tab Write Page
    * Enter "About" in title field
    * Enter the page content
    * Click on Create New Page

To create the Contact page:

    * Go to your WordPress admin
    * Click on Write
    * Select the tab Write Page
    * Enter "Contact" in title field
    * Enter the page content
    * Click on Create New Page

Terms Page

If needed, you can also create the Terms page for your web site.

To create the Terms page:

    * Go to your WordPress admin
    * Click on Write
    * Select the tab Write Page
    * Enter "Terms" in title field
    * Enter the page content
    * Click on Create New Page

Privacy page

If needed, you can also create the Privacy page for your web site.

To create the Privacy page:

    * Go to your WordPress admin
    * Click on Write
    * Select the tab Write Page
    * Enter "Privacy" in title field
    * Enter the page content
    * Click on Create New Page

If you need a Privacy content generator, have a look at the following URL:

* http://www.the-dma.org/privacy/creating.shtml

Sitemap Page

If needed, you can also create the Sitemap page for your web site.

To create the Sitemap page:

    * Go to your WordPress admin
    * Click on Write
    * Select the tab Write Page
    * Enter "Sitemap" in title field
    * Enter the page content
    * Click on Create New Page

Installation completed!

Normally after you've done all the above steps, you should have a nice results when you access your web site.

If you want, you do other things to customize your web site like changing the default colors that come with the WordPress template, adding RSS feeds, adding a custom footer content, and/or adding a stat counter. All those steps are described below.
Extra Customizations / Features

Most of Ad Flex Niche items can be customized via WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options.

You will find some instructions below but the document has to be completed. So we invite you to go through the exhaustive lists of item that can be customized via WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options.
Stat Counter with Ad Flex Niche template

If you want to add your stat counter(s), you just need to put your start counter code(s) in the field WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options / Stat Counter Codes.

Your stat counter code will be added just below the footer bar and before the </body>.

It's recommended to have an invisible stat counter.

You can find a free stat counter at URLs:

* http://www.statcounter.com

RSS Feeds to Ad Flex Niche WordPress theme

You just need to add the code of your RSS Feeds to the file:
WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-
flex\syndication\syndication_custom_rss.php

Then you have to activate the visibility of the RSS feed code in the field WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options / RSS Code Visibility.

Your RSS Feeds will be added just after your post/article content.

TO BE COMPLETED...
Adding Newsletterto Ad Flex Niche WordPress theme

You just need to add the code of your RSS Feeds to the file:
WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-
flex\syndication\syndication_custom_newsletter.php

Then you have to activate the visibility of the RSS feed code in the field WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options / Newsletter Code Visibility.

Your Newsletter code will appear as the first section of the sidebar.

TO BE COMPLETED...
Adding Custom Footer items

You just need to add the code of your footer items (your own links or extra information) to the file:
WP_ROOT\wp-content\themes\ad-
flex\syndication\syndication_custom_footer.php

Then you have to activate the visibility in the field WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options / Custom Footer Code Visibility.
Changing the default Ad Flex Niche Colors

You can change most of the color used by Ad Flex Niche via the WP Admin / Presentation / Ad Flex Niche Options.

Internet Domain Registration - Establishing and Transferring Your Domain Name

2009-01-13T04:39:00.001-08:00

f you're in business, one of the most important things to you may be your ability to establish an internet presence. Operating some type of functional web site for your business helps your customers find you, can present additional marketing opportunities through e-commerce, and offers advertising opportunities that you can not get elsewhere. Companies that do not have a web site lose business to companies that do all the time.

Of course the real key to your web site is the internet domain registration. Everybody wants mybusiness.com - the problem is that domain names are unique and can be taken by anyone. If you don't register your desired domain name right away, someone else could take it. The fact is that internet domain registration can turn into a sneaky competitive game. In many cases business owners have gone to register a domain name and found that it had been registered years before they every started the company by some group that is in the business of registering domains and then turning around and selling them for exorbitant rates.
A humorous story came from the 2005 municipal election in North Las Vegas, Nevada when one candidate realized that the incumbent mayor had not registered an internet domain name. The incumbent registered the mayor's name dot com and as many variants of it that he could come up with, literally stealing the Mayor's plans for a web site out from under him. The tactic didn't win him the election, but the candidate managed to annoy the mayor quite a bit and still owns the internet domain registration names to this day.
The key to avoiding these sorts of problems lies in early registration of your desired domain name. If you find the one that you want (or a close variant of it), register it immediately. Even if you're not prepared to set up a web site yet or won't be for several years, register the domain right away anyway.

Registering a domain name before being ready to set up its web site will require the domain name being transferred to the servers of your desired host when you are ready to establish the site. Transferring the domain name once you have selected a web host is a very simple process, but does require you to establish the change with both the registration company and the new host. The new host will provide you with the server information that you, in turn, will need to provide to the company with whom you originally registered the domain. There may be a short waiting period (typically 24 to 72 hours) while both servers get the information updated. Once that process is complete, you'll have your domain safely residing on your host's servers and your site (as long as it's been built) will be ready to go.

The internet domain registration and transfer for your business web site is a simple process and can be completed through automated online systems in most cases. Clearly the most important part of this process is the registration of the domain name and this should always be done as soon as possible, even if it is going to be years before you're ready to get the actual web site up and running.

Adding Social Bookmarks to your Blogger site

2009-01-13T04:37:00.001-08:00

All bloggers struggle with one important question, How to drive traffic to our blog ?
We need to have quality content and backlinks to drive traffic to our blog and occupy first place on google search engines and create goodwill.

The most important factor is the quality of post (The Material). Secondly, you need to put the main keywords/Tags for the article in the post for easy search (Tags).

One of the very effective ways is to have bookmarks in various social bookmarking sites like Reddit, Digg, StumbleUpon, Furl etc. But the author just can’t just submit each and every post to bookmarking sites as its very time consuming.

The below post will guide you through the step by step to add these links to your blogger site so that the visitors/readers can submit our article to bookmarking sites

This Social bookmarking widget contains Post Link submission to major bookmarking sites like Digg , technorati , Blinklist , Del.icio.us , Furl , Stumble Upon , Reddit & Yahoo.

Just Follow these simple steps to add social bookmarking sites widget to blogger:

Step 1 :
Log in to your Blogger Account and navigate to Layout Section. Then go to Edit HTML Page and check the Expand Widgets box.

Step 2:
Now search this code : <p><data:post.body/></p>

Step 3:
Copy and paste the below code immediately below <p><data:post.body/></p>.

Note: If this code has worked out for you- please digg, reddit, stumble, Mixx this post and leave a comment as well.

THE CODE:

Add Post To: |

<a expr:href='"http://digg.com/submit?phase=2&url=" + data:post.url + "&title=" + data:post.title' target='_blank'><img alt='Digg' src='http://shaisoku.software.googlepages.com/digg.png'/></a>|

<a expr:href='"http://technorati.com/faves?add=" + data:post.url' target='_blank'><img alt='Technorati' src='http://shaisoku.software.googlepages.com/technorati.png'/></a>|

<a expr:href='"http://del.icio.us/post?url=" + data:post.url + "&title=" + data:post.title' target='_blank'><img alt='Delicious' src='http://shaisoku.software.googlepages.com/delicious.png'/></a>|

<a expr:href='"http://www.stumbleupon.com/submit?url=" + data:post.url + "&title=" + data:post.title' target='_blank'><img alt='StumbleUpon' src='http://shaisoku.software.googlepages.com/stumbleupon.png'/></a>|

<a expr:href='"http://reddit.com/submit?url=" + data:post.url + "&title=" + data:post.title' target='_blank'><img alt='Reddit' src='http://shaisoku.software.googlepages.com/reddit.png'/></a>|

<a expr:href='"http://www.blinklist.com/index.php?Action=Blink/addblink.php&Url=" + data:post.url + "&Title=" + data:post.title' target='_blank'><img alt='Blink' src='http://shaisoku.software.googlepages.com/blinklist-16x16.png'/></a>|

<a expr:href='"http://www.furl.net/storeIt.jsp?t=" + data:post.title + "&u=" + data:post.url' target='_blank'><img alt='Blink' src='http://shaisoku.software.googlepages.com/furl-16x16.png'/></a>|

<a expr:href='"http://myweb2.search.yahoo.com/myresults/bookmarklet?t=" + data:post.title + "&u=" + data:post.url' target='_blank'><img alt='Yahoo' src='http://shaisoku.software.googlepages.com/yahoo.png'/></a>|

How to Choose a Web Host ?

2009-01-13T04:36:00.001-08:00

There are some simple rules to follow when looking for a web host.

The first rules is to avoid free hosts whenever possible, it is easy to think that a free service is preferable to paying a monthly fee however with web hosting this is defiantly not the case. Of course not all free hosting is bad . I prove it with 000webhost.com. This web hosting serve me best. I actively use it’s mail service and it’s wordpress host.

Paid hosting has several important advantages over free hosting. Firstly you will receive more useful features with paid hosting. Technical support will be much better with help available when you need it. Generally speaking Paid hosts will have much faster connections to the internet so your site will appear quicker. Most importantly with paid hosting you won't have to display a banner on each page advertising the Hosting Company and advertising to the world that you are on a free host. With excellent hosting packages starting from $6.99 per month there is no reason why you shouldn't go with a paid host.

The second simple rule concerns what operating system to choose. You will find hosts offering you Windows Hosting or Linux Hosting, it is tempting to choose windows as it's a name everyone knows and many people mistakenly believe that because their PC runs windows they need a Windows Host but in this case they'd be wrong. Whichever hosting package you choose you will receive a control panel through which you administer your site these are graphical environments through which you can control many aspects of your website from configuring your web mail and installing forum software to creating a database. Take a lead from the marble halls of business most major companies host their websites on Linux Servers. Linux Servers generally runs faster and are more secure than a windows server. This is partly due to how the operating systems are built. Windows try to include every possible function in the base package whilst Linux allows the host company to add the functions they need.

The final thing to consider when choosing a host is the list of features they offer. If you don't know much about html you can look for a host that supplies you with free website building software and some of the better ones will even supply free Domain names. You should look at a number of different companies and compare what they offer as standard with their hosting plans. Technical aspects to consider are; the amount of disk space available to you and how much monthly bandwidth you have to use. Look at how many email accounts you can have the more the better. Customer support features should not be overlooked check to see what their response time is and if it's anymore than an hour look elsewhere, also consider if they offer a money back guarantee.
Look to see what additional services they include in the package for example do they offer daily backups? Make sure that they offer support for PHP as this is quickly becoming the programming language of choice with web programmers.
To conclude when choosing a website Host look for a paid host with Linux hosting and then compare the packages on offer from a variety of companies.

Best Free Hosting with no Banner Ads

2009-01-12T02:59:00.001-08:00

000webhost.com

If you need to have a professional shared hosting quality in a free hosting package, come and host with 000webhost.com and experience the best service you can get absolutely free.

Founded in December 2006, 000webhost.com has a trusted free hosting members base of over 60,000 members and still counting! Offering professional quality hosting, support, uptime and reliability, we have a great community of webmasters, you'd love to be a part of!

1500 MB of disk space
100 GB of data transfer
PHP and MySQL support with no restrictions
cPanel control panel
Website Builder
Absolutely no advertising!

Let’s Compare Free Blogging Software

2009-01-10T04:43:00.001-08:00

With the increased interest in Blogging (web Logging), many web hosting providers now provide an assortment of free usage, open source blogging software packages. Among the most popular of these blogging tools are B2evolution, WordPress and Nucleus. Each of these programs offer similar basic features, so the question arises as to which one is easiest to use and would be appropriate for the requirements of your particular website.

The answer lies in the true purpose of your blog website. If your primary goal is to share your opinions and ideas with the general public, you would want to utilize a different blogging tool than a user who was creating product blogs as a commercial sales effort. A blog for search engine promotion would have entirely different requirements. All of these uses are viable reasons to create a blog, however each requires different features to be successful.

WordPress Blogging Software
Available for free download at: http://wordpress.org/
It is hard to beat WordPress for general personal blogging. WordPress is an open source, state-of-the-art personal publishing platform with a focus on presentation and usability. Everything related to creating and updating your blog is available through an intuitive graphical interface. With WordPress there is no need to compile your work. You simply write your column. You then select the features you want and your blog is instantly created and published to your website.
If you are on vacation, you can schedule your uploads for some date in the future or even email your column to the server! The system allows multiple users with multiple blogs divided into categories and sub-categories. This allows multiple family members or friends to create their own blogs along with yours.
Easy customization and the availability of many "plug-ins" that provide more functionality (add new features as you learn) makes this software a very good choice for most individuals.

B2evolution
Available for free download at: http://b2evolution.net/
B2evolution is another advanced web log tool that features an integrated XHTML validator. It supports recursive subcategories, cross posting and has a really cool integrated "skinning" system.
The "skinning" system allows you to create multiple blogs in separate categories with different appearances for each blog. You simply "change the skin" for the blog to create a totally new look and feel.
The "skinning" feature, combined with the built in multi-user administration management tool, makes the system robust enough for more commercial endeavors, such as product promotion blogs. If you have much to publish with multiple themes, this is the software you are looking for.

Nucleus Blogging Software
Available for free download at: http://nucleuscms.org/
Though Nucleus is an extremely robust blogging tool in its own right, it also contains some powerful features that can provide benefits in promotion of your blog.
Nucleus offers the ability to optimize its URLS, creating simple page addresses that do not have and "&" or "=" characters. This makes the pages search engine (and user) friendly. Another great feature is the ability to show the contents of multiple weblogs on one page. This could allow a website owner to manipulate the optimum text / keyword balance on pages for better search engine rankings.
Nucleus also provides RSS and Atom feeds that can be extremely helpful when promoting a website. If part of your blog's function is to work as a search engine marketing and promotion tool, Nucleus is an exceptional software package.

Each of these blogging software packages offer the basic tools that you would need to create a successful blog and all three are PHP - MySQL open source (free to use) packages. You should try to select the software that helps you achieve the long term goal that you have in mind for your website based on the unique extra features offered by each.

The Four Smartest Ways to Spiral Your Website Traffic

2009-01-09T03:14:00.001-08:00

People are paying pretty significant dollars for website traffic these days. Pay-per-click charges of $1-10 are not uncommon for top search terms. Multiply that by the 300 unique visitors per day that my log furniture website gets, and you are talking at least $300 per day, or $9,000 per month—depending on how many days are in the month.

There Must Be Some Easier Way

Following are some of the best ways to grow website traffic:

#1: Website Optimization
A local business magazine recently ran an article calling SEO (search engine optimization) the equivalent of “hocus-pocus”. The author of the article, who apparently worked for an SEO firm, described optimization as a somewhat “shady” activity that’s impossible to get a handle on. I say “Baloney!”
SEO is not pseudo-science. It is a very tangible and real way to increase website traffic. If you haven’t taken care of the basics—e.g. making sure your website has a relevant title, focuses on the right keywords, avoids practices that are disdained by the search engines, etc., you can be sure that, once found, your website will not rank as highly (or get as much traffic) as it otherwise would. Begin your traffic-garnering efforts by making sure your website is up-to-snuff.

#2: Publish Helpful, Relevant Content
Publishing helpful articles on the Net with a link back to my log furniture website seems to result in traffic spikes nearly every time. Notice the emphasis is on “helpful” articles. There is plenty of useless drivel out there by people who are being paid $5 to write an article. Not to insult anyone, but I spend 2-8 hours on the articles I write—depending on how much research is required and how technical the article is—and that costs more than $5. It doesn’t seem to matter what you write about. My topics so far have included SEO, the simplicity of Amish life, improving your bottom line, and understanding Google operators. The key is to make them relevant, short and helpful.

#3: Add more products to your website
Our experience has been that adding more products to the website helps us to come up in the search engines more often. A person who finds a rustic night stand at our site might notice that we have log bunk beds. Somebody who is shopping for an unfinished pine dresser might not be thinking of rustic furniture at all, stumble across one our products, like the whole site, and end up furnishing their cabin. Each product is like a fishing line cast in the sea. The more well-described bait you have out there—the more “fish” will bite.

#4: Improve your website conversion rate
Five years ago, we used to get one log furniture order for every 100 website visitors. Now it seems like closer to one order for every 300 unique visitors. Part of the reason for this, we believe, is that the web has become more competitive. But we also pay attention to our conversion rate. We are in the process of making a change right now that might really help. Someone pointed out that when you click on an item to buy it within Miva Merchant’s standard interface, there is no confirmation that the item has been added to your shopping basket. This might lead some customers to believe that the website isn’t working properly. They might not be savvy enough to check the shopping basket. They might even leave the site without ordering (perish the thought!) These “glitches” can really hurt website sales. We went to the Miva Merchant site for third-party modules and found a script that displays the shopping basket after each item is added. We purchased the script and install, and are watching to see how it affects website sales and conversion rate. Our guess is that this will have a positive impact on sales.

10 Ways Bloggers Can Use Twitter

2009-01-08T02:56:00.001-08:00

Twitter is a fun and useful way to promote your blog and drive traffic to it. While it might seem that micro-blogging through Twitter might just be a fun thing to do, you can actually use Twitter to grow your blog. Remember, building relationships is a key part of growing your blog, and Twitter is an excellent tool for building relationships.

Take a look at the suggestions below for how you can use Twitter to drive traffic to your blog.

Drive Traffic
Twitter has a viral marketing effect to it wherein your tweets could spread quickly across the Twitter community if they are interesting. For example, if you're hosting a blog contest or launching a new feature on your blog, send a tweet to let your followers know. Chances are they'll spread the word as well. As word gets out, more and more people will visit your blog to check out what all the hype is about.
Network with Like-Minded People
Twitter is set up inherently to act as a networking tool. People "follow" users whose tweets they enjoy or interest them. As such, you'll be able to connect with like-minded people by using Twitter which could lead to more traffic to your blog and much more.
Make Business Contacts
Just as Twitter is a great networking tool for finding like-minded people, it's also very effective with connecting users with business contacts. Whether you're looking to hire someone to help you with your blog or business (or both), looking for a new job, or just looking to bounce ideas off your business peers, Twitter can help.
Establish Yourself as an Expert
Twitter can help support your efforts to establish yourself as an expert in your field or blogging niche to the online community. By communicating through tweets about subject-matter you're knowledgeable in, answering questions via tweets, and searching out new contacts, your efforts to be viewed as an expert (which gives your blog greater credibility and appeal) will grow.
Get Ideas for Blog Posts
If you're having a dry spell in terms of coming up with post ideas, Twitter can help get your creative juices flowing. Read and send some tweets and see what people are talking about. Something you read is apt to spark a post idea or two to get you through a temporary state of blogger's block.
Ask Questions
Just as you might use Twitter to establish yourself as an expert in your field, other people use it for the same reason. Don't be afraid to ask questions. You just might learn something new and find new bloggers and users to connect with!
Provide Live Coverage
If you're attending a conference or meeting that you'd like to share, you can send multiple tweets real-time to share the information you learn then expound on your tweets with blog posts.
Ask for Diggs, Stumbles and Other Promotional Help
Twitter is a great place to ask your followers to Digg or Stumble your blog posts. You could also ask other users to blog about your post with a link back to it or spread the word to their own Twitter followers to drive more traffic to your blog.
Accuracy and Fact Checker
Imagine you're writing a blog post about a recent event but don't know how to spell the names of the people involved in the event. Send a tweet to get the information you need, and while you're at it, give your followers a heads up about your upcoming blog post.
Find and Share Resources
Need a quote, interview or guest post? Want to offer your services as a source? Send a tweet!

Google Apps : Can There Possibly Be a Downside?

2009-01-06T03:37:00.001-08:00

If using Google Apps has any disadvantages, they mostly revolve around your personal relationship with your Internet connection. Assuming you do have a decent connection (something high-speed in nature is best), you’re good to go. If you don’t have an Internet connection, turn off the lamp and start dreaming. You must be online to use Google Apps. Checking your e-mail, updating your calendar, and collaborating on a document require online interactivity. Google Apps doesn’t work without an Internet connection. Internet connection speed is important, too: Google Apps does work over dial-up connections, but it’s so slow. (Nevertheless, you can always connect with dial-up when you’re away from your high-speed connection.)

When deciding whether to use Google Apps, remember that all these services are in perpetual beta, meaning that unlike traditional software that gets a new, big update every year or so, Google is constantly updating its services and adding new features. Although the most common features are fully implemented, you should check to make sure that the features your organization needs are available. (Along those lines, you may occasionally notice a slight difference between what you see on your screen and what you see in the figures in this book if Google made an update after this book was published.)

The upside, of course, to the perpetual beta model is that by the time the features of the new version have been rolled out, Google Apps users are already familiar with the changes, so you have to deal with only a minimal learning curve. When you and your fellow users get up to speed, you just need to keep using the products to stay up to date. And keeping ahead of the curve is an advantage, all by itself.

Google Apps : What’s in It for My Organization?

2009-01-06T03:30:00.001-08:00

As part of the Google Apps program, Google hosts your e-mail, documents,spreadsheets, presentations, calendars, and more at little or no cost. A team,business, school, or organization of any size can have Google Apps up and running quickly. When you use Google Apps, your IT resources aren’t so drained because Google takes care of the technical details. Oh, yeah and they keep your information safe and secure.

Here are a few additional features of Google Apps that may grab the attention of decision makers and your IT department:

You don’t have to purchase or set up any hardware.
Because Google Apps are Web-based applications, you don’t need to download, install, update, or pay for software again when new versions are released. (Except for a Web browser, of course, and at least you don’t have to pay for that.)
Your organization can use its own domain name for e-mail addresses and Web pages when you use Google Apps.
Google boasts a 99.9% reliability rate, which means that the service rarely, if ever, goes down.
Google takes care of all the data backup and support operations.
Google provides online support resources for free and gives 24/7 support — including phone-based support — for Premier Edition and Education Edition users.
You can set up users quickly by using the Dashboard.
A single sign-on adds convenience for Premier Edition users. Users can sign in once and access all their Google Apps in addition to other corporate intranet or school resources.
Gmail can support an existing e-mail gateway.
Administrators can access e-mail migration tools for Premier Edition and Education Edition customers.
Gmail protects users by constantly updating and running very effective and efficient spam-blocking, virus-protection, and filtering software. Don’t forget one of the biggest advantages of using Google Apps: Whether you’re at the office, traveling, working from home, or sipping a latte in a café that has a wireless hotspot, as long as you have a live Internet connection, you can log into your Google Apps account. Also, you can check your e-mail and do other tasks from your mobile device.

Choosing the Right Google Apps Edition

2009-01-06T03:27:00.001-08:00

As we mention in the “Meeting the Google Apps” section, earlier in this chapter, Google Apps consists of four main programs: Gmail, Calendar, Docs, and Talk. Anyone can use these services without signing up for Google Apps, but to help organizations replace or complement their existing systems, Google has some powerful administrative and collaborative tools for those ready to take the plunge.

You can choose from four Google Apps editions: Team, Standard, Premier, and Education. Each edition has been customized to meet the needs of different types of organizations, large and small:

Team Edition: This is the easiest way to start using the collaborative tools available with Google Apps with your school or work team. You don’t have to change your e-mail address or worry about any administration tools. Sign up for free with your existing e-mail address (see Chapter 2 on how to do this) and you can start connecting with other people in your domain right away. Gmail is not included in this edition.
Standard Edition: Use this edition if you’re a family, group, or small business. Register or transfer your domain to access Gmail, Calendar, Talk, Docs, and the Start Page. This version is free (meaning adsponsored) and supported by online help. You can always upgrade to Premier Edition later, if you want to.
Premier Edition: Medium to large organizations should generally use this edition. At the time of this publication, it costs $50 per user per year, but you likely currently spend more than that on maintenance of your existing setup. Because this is a paid edition, you can choose to turn Gmail ads off. This edition also has additional administration tools and security settings. Your users receive significantly more storage space than with the Standard Edition.
Education Edition: Built for — you guessed it — schools, colleges, and universities. Nonprofit organizations can also use this version. This version is free (although not supported by ads), and it includes many of the features from the Premier Edition (albeit a little less storage space). If you’re interested in the Education Edition, Google requires you to provide proof of accredited not-for-profit status.

The best program is the one that best meets the needs of your organization.

Google’s cloud computing

2009-01-06T03:22:00.001-08:00

Google believes that you want to spend more time doing things with your organization, family, group, or school in an online environment.Called cloud computing, the premise is that users can create, edit, and store massive amounts of information through the Internet (or “cloud”) with any device that has a Web browser (such as a computer or cellphone) and Internet access. The Web applications (or apps, for short), as well as the files themselves, are stored securely on powerful servers in data centers throughout the world, as illustrated in Figure 1-1.

Users can share their information with others, including friends and coworkers, and collaborate in real time on important projects. Because the files are already online, a user simply sends a message to his or her friends that contains a link to a file, and those friends can click the link to see and contribute to the sender’s great work. Using Google Apps, you don’t need to send attachments back and forth or keep track of different file versions.

Google Apps brings cloud computing to the masses. And it helps alleviate some of the issues of traditional computing:

Cost: Computer hardware and software is expensive. For schools and businesses alike, buying PCs and servers, and all the software that goes with them, is making less and less financial sense — especially when it all becomes obsolete before anyone figures out how to use the new stuff. These organizations want solutions that can provide a better return on investment.
Maintenance: Maintaining all those PCs and the network software is a pain. Information technology costs even more money and uses a lot of resources — especially when organizations grow and someone needs to maintain all those new users.

So, why not go with Google and leave all the tedious technical stuff to the people not savvy enough to jump on the Google bandwagon? If you keep your information in their Internet cloud, you don’t need to buy any servers, load any software, scan for any viruses, or back anything up. No more rebooting the server or your PC when the system crashes, again. Everything just works with a lot less cost, maintenance, and hassle because it’s coming to you directly from Google.

To put it all into perspective, here’s an analogy for you: Would you rather hide your life savings under your mattress and risk it being stolen or lost in a fire, or store it in a bank where you have access to it anytime, anywhere, from an ATM machine?

In this new, Web-enabled world, your Web browser becomes your ATM, and Google becomes your bank. You can use your own domain name, company logo, and all that branded identity stuff to personalize your Google Apps. You can preserve your corporate, school, or organizational identity and slash your costs in a dramatic way.

Google Apps – new Game to play

2009-01-06T03:16:00.001-08:00

Google is building a radically different way of working that can shatter the primacy of the current methods and reduce the need for all the tired, old office productivity software on your hard drive. Google provides most of the apps for free or at a fraction of the cost of traditional software.
Google Apps is a powerful set of tools that Google has bundled together to meet the needs of businesses, schools, government agencies, and other organizations of any size. You can use Google Apps as a powerful digital communications infrastructure for your business or school that Google maintains for you. (Very sweet.) The key Google Apps are

Gmail: An e-mail app based on Google’s popular Gmail platform. This version lets you use your organization’s domain, such as user@ yourdomain.com.
Calendar: A calendar and scheduling app that allows easy collaboration.
Talk: Instant messaging, available directly from within Gmail or as a standalone software application. Talk also allows voice calls, voice mail, and file sharing.
Docs: A simple, yet powerful, set of word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation apps.
The Start Page: An app that you can personalize by adding gadgets to access any or all of the other Google Apps, as well as news, weather reports, entertainment information, and more from one place.

In addition to the apps themselves, Google provides some powerful tools for administrators in the Google Apps Dashboard. Features for administrators include

Web page creation tools
Domain settings
Advanced tools, including administrative support and migration tools
Individual apps settings
Custom Web addresses for your Google Apps
Phone-based support tools

What Makes Google So Successful

2009-01-06T02:56:00.001-08:00

As you can tell from the title of this section, Google, like Frisbee and Kleenex, has become a household name. Web surfers everywhere use the word ‘‘Google’’ to describe the act of searching for something, many times not even realizing (or caring) that there is a powerful company that shares the same name. That works both ways, too; businesses both large and small hope they will be ‘‘Googled’’ by those same consumers, who will go on to find out more about what they have to offer and eventually make a purchase.

The place to start with Google is to determine how it can help your site become more visible on the Web. And the way to understand that is to understand how the Google search works. Here’s an overview to give you the gist of it.

Google’s founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, came up with formulas for indexing the contents of Web pages, storing them in a huge database, and retrieving pages based on keyword searches.
Google uses automated programs to scour the contents of Web pages on a regular basis (just how frequently is one of those trade secrets I already mentioned). The programs record the contents of many pages and the URLs and store them in a database.
You, the end user, type a word or phrase like ‘‘Irish dancing’’ into Google’s search box and click the search button. When you do this, a program is activated on Google’s servers. The program searches the pages that have already been stored in the database. That’s right: when you click the search button on Google’s home page or in the Google Toolbar, you are searching Google’s database of Web pages, not the ‘‘live’’ Web itself.
Google compiles a set of search results ranked in the order of highest relevance to your search. It’s Google’s system of page ranking—of determining which items are on the top on the first page of the results—that’s as notable as anything in this system.

As an end user, you already know how the search system works: it helps you find Web pages that contain information you’re looking for. But ‘‘Going Google’’ means you want to make use of the system from the standpoint of someone who wants to do better business. You can take advantage of the system of keyword searches and page rankings to achieve the business objectives outlined in the sections that follow.

Downloading Picasa

2008-12-31T23:37:00.001-08:00

Picasa, like Google Desktop, is software you download and install on your computer. Downloading Picasa is easily done by navigating to http://picasa.google.com, and clicking the Try Picasa now button in the right-hand side of the home page. This will take you to a software download screen where you will download Picasa as an executable file to your hard drive.

25 tips to boost traffic to your website

2008-12-31T23:06:00.001-08:00

Getting your website a lot of daily traffic takes a lot of hard work and planning. How will people find your site if you don't tell them where it's at? This is a very important thing to consider - you have to advertise somehow. Here are a few great methods to try to get more visitors coming to your website. Read on for more details.

“Exactly how am I supposed to get traffic to my website?” A lot of new web site owners think that simply having a good web site is all you need to get loads of visitors coming your way. Sorry, but this is completely untrue.

Getting traffic to your website and making people aware of it takes a lot of hard work and planning. Oh, and one other thing, this will not happen overnight. So be prepared. How will visitors find your site if you don’t tell them where it’s at? You have to advertise.

All webmasters, new and old, realize soon enough that traffic is the lifeblood of their website. Without it a website will simply be lost in the ether somewhere out there on some server. Traffic is exactly what brings a website to life - the importance of this one thing can’t be taken for granted. Bringing in traffic to your web site is not easy and it will take a lot of hard work. I can promise you that - but without a lot of traffic your website will not thrive.

I’ll try and list just a few ideas below to help you start getting traffic directly to your site without getting too way techie. Before you start spending a lot of time and money on getting visitors to your site, be sure your website is ready for them. After that, try a few, or all, of the 25 methods to boost traffic to your website that I’ve listed below.

1. Create valuable, original content.

2. Use the best keywords or keyword phrases for your site.

3. You want to make sure that you don’t have broken links on your site!

4. Create a blog to build traffic to your website.

5. Join the SiteBuildIt! Value Exchange link program.

6. Let your audience see “your own personality” in the writing of your web site.

7. Create an XML sitemap for your website, then submit it to Google, Yahoo!, and MSN.

8. Write and submit articles to article directories.

9. Create an newsletter and offer free subscriptions to your visitors.

10. Offer free online services or utilities from your own web site.

11. Regularly post on forums related to your sites topic.

12. Join several forums and form your own online communities.

13. Submit your web site to social book marking sites like Squidoo, del.icio.us etc.

14. Try Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertising.

15. Add a sitemap to your site.

16. Use on page website optimization methods (ex. page title, META tags, headlines, etc).

17. Create and submit press releases to various Press Release sites.

18. Use viral marketing to help spread the word about your site.

19. Know your website’s users wants, needs and interests.

20. Write and ebook and give it away for free.

21. Add video clips to your website that supports your websites topic.

22. Consider giving something valuable away to your customers.

23. Once your website is established, create your own affiliate program.

24. Your web sites content should be fresh and new and uploaded frequently.

25. Submit your site to all the major search engines using a service like Selfpromotion.com.

Once you’ve tried even a few of the methods listed above I’m sure you’ll see a spike in your traffic ratings in no time at all. And if you use several of them, I’m sure you’ll see a measurable traffic surge over time when you check your stats. And all that extra traffic is a very good thing. This is definitely a case of “the more the better”. Want to learn more about the SiteBuildIt experience? Then visit: pedigreedpups.com/WebDRarticle. Want to learn more about creating websites in general? Then visit us anytime at: the-website-doctor.com.

Understanding Google Apps

2008-12-31T20:25:00.001-08:00

If you’re like me, you have spent years purchasing and installing applications for your computer. The centerpiece of those applications has probably been Microsoft Office,the application suite that is virtually ubiquitous and that includes the Microsoft Word word processing application, Microsoft Excel for spreadsheet, PowerPoint for presentations, Outlook for e-mail and communications, and Access for database applications. Every few years, a new version of Office is released, and you have the option
of installing it so you can keep up with the people you work with in other companies,who have their own versions of Office, too.
Google Apps is a set of Web and business applications that is aimed at competing with Microsoft Office. What makes Google’s offering dramatically different from Office is the fact that the applications are all offered online as Web-based services that you access with your Web browser, not as separate applications you install on your computer. This ‘‘software as a service’’ approach wasn’t invented by Google.Lots of other companies give you the ability to store files, keep your financial records, and perform other functions online using your browser. The fact that these applications are being offered by one of the most popular and best-known—not to mention most successful—Web businesses around is what makes Google Apps notable. Google Apps is Google’s signal that it wants to shift from being the leader in Web search to a leader (if not eventually the leader) in Web services.

Downloading Picasa

2008-12-31T20:23:00.001-08:00

Downloading Picasa

2008-12-31T20:22:00.001-08:00

Organizing Your Images with Picasa

2008-12-31T20:17:00.001-08:00

Picasa is a free, downloadable software package offered by Google. While still in its developmental phase, Picasa nonetheless offers many powerful tools allowing you to organize, manipulate, and modify the images stored on your computer’s hard drive. Because Picasa organizes your images chronologically regardless of their location, it becomes not only easier to compare the volume of images created from one month/ year to the next, which can be useful if you are in a business environment and need to inventory your images, but also to simply find files that you may not have remembered were there. Essentially, instead of having to go through your hard drive searching for stray images, you have only to install Picasa, and the work will be done for you.

Picasa combines tools previously found in separate programs, such as the slide show creation of PowerPoint, for example, and the photo manipulation of Photoshop. You won’t get anywhere near the quantity and sophistication of specialized tools found in the aforementioned programs, but Picasa’s interface is both intuitive and easy to use, and allows you to perform surprisingly powerful actions without any prerequisite knowledge. Also, don’t overlook the fact that Picasa is free, thus potentially saving you hundreds if not thousands of dollars.

Finally one big plus to keep in mind is that Picasa is, after all, a Google product. So it has many built-in methods for getting your photos online. Tasks such as creating a Web album, emailing images, or even adding them to a blog can be performed at the click of a button.

Understanding Web Traffic Analysis

2008-12-31T20:10:00.001-08:00

When you create a Web site, your hosting service should provide you with a way to track the number of visits each page receives as well as some indication of where they are coming from. This isn’t information for its own sake: you want to be able to analyze and act on the data. By learning about who visits your Web site, how your visitors find you, and what they do while they are browsing through your online presentation, you can tailor your product selection and presentation to better meet their needs.
Traditionally, the practice of Web site traffic analysis is referred to as reviewing the ‘‘log files,’’ the information-packed and techie-looking files that contain computer addresses and Web page URLs. Such information needs to be displayed in the form of a graph or chart to understand it better, and that’s exactly what Analytics does. Typically, you want to look at information over a particular period of time, whether
it is a month, day, or week. You need to pay attention to facts such as:
• Domain Reports—This kind of report tells you which domains your visitors come from.
• Referrer Reports—A ‘‘referrer’’ is the site that referred someone to you—in other words, it’s the site a visitor was visiting just before it came to your site. By tracking referrals you can see which links steer you the most visitors.
• File Type Reports—These sorts of reports tell you what type of files are being accessed by your visitors—they might be images, presentations, PDFs, and so on.
• Browser Reports—These tell you what kinds of browsers your viewers are using so you can tailor your content to particular versions or types if needed.

Often, log file reports present you with a ‘‘Top Ten’’ list of pages visited, files accessed, domains that visit you, countries of origin, and so on. When you’re trying to choose from Analytics’ rich set of reports, you might keep such options in mind so you can present your coworkers and managers with the information they need to make informed decisions about your Web site and what sort of content is contained on it.

How Can Google Talk Help Your Business?

2008-12-31T20:05:00.001-08:00

Google Talk isn’t just a supplement to phones and e-mail. It’s also a way to save money. Like most of the other Google services described in this book, it’s free. You can install it on each of your employees’ computers and get them typing messages to one another quickly and without incurring any expense at all. And if you run up costly long-distance phone bills with international calling, you can opt to exchange chat messages with Google Talk instead. Since you’re using the Internet to communicate, you don’t pay anything more than you already do for Internet access. And you ‘‘converse’’ almost as fast as you would on the phone.

Not only that, but Google Talk can be used for an increasingly popular technology called Voice over IP, also known as Internet phone service. Programs like Skype and Vonage let you use your computer as a telephone; with a microphone and (optionally) a headset, you can literally speak (yes, I mean really speak with your actual voice, the old-fashioned way!) over your computer using Google Talk. Why use your
computer as a phone when you already have lots of phones at hand? The answer is in your pocketbook. Programs like Google Talk enable you to talk to someone across the country or across the globe without spending a dime.

The VoIP Telephone Services Revolution

2008-12-31T06:29:00.001-08:00

Ever since the birth of the internet, entrepreneurs with an eye to the future have predicted that voice communications -- telephone services -- would eventually be merged with internet services. With the widespread adoption of VoIP, that day has come, and it is causing a revolution in the telephone industry.
In simple terms, a VoIP service allows you to use your broadband (high-speed) connection to place telephone calls over the Internet. It is not difficult to see how this is rocking the telecom industry to the core.
It's all about cost

Two things have made traditional telephone service providers like AT&T and Bell so powerful. Their monopoly over local telephone services, and their traditional stranglehold on lucrative and usually over-priced "long distance" services. Both of these captive markets have been seriously eroded over the last few years, as the reality of VoIP has started to sink in.
In anticipation of the revolution that is now upon us, most aspects of telephone service have gradually been opened up to competition. Most of us now have a choice of providers for both local and long distance telephone service. And the biggest reason for the new competitive environment is the recognition that the widespread adoption of VoIP is inevitable.
The development of VoIP
VoIP has been developing slowly over the last ten years or so. Early implementations allowed computer users to talk to each other through their computers. This was only feasible if you had a voice-enabled computer, a reliable and stable internet connection, and a software program installed on your computer that made it all work.
The advantage of this computer-to-computer communication was that you could completely bypass the traditional telephone system and talk to anyone in the world free of charge -- as long as they had a similar setup to yours. But the disadvantages of communicating this way were also obvious. You could only communicate this way using your computer. You were completely dependent on often unstable dial-up internet connections. And the person at the other end of the conversation had to also be "online" with a voice-enabled computer.
Today's VoIP has solved these problems
Today's versions of VoIP have left these problems in the past. Two things were required to make VoIP technology feasible on a large scale basis, and both of these things have now been realized.
First, broadband internet service has been widely adopted. This makes it possible to have stable internet connections that are "always on". Second, the industry has developed a simple, inexpensive method of integrating the IP network (the internet) with the traditional telephone system. This allows a user of VoIP to use his or her own telephone to call anyone else in the world who has a traditional telephone connection.
This is where we are today. As traditional telecom companies like AT&T, Bell, Qwest, and SBC develop their own implementations of VoIP technology the way has been opened up for a myriad of choices for consumers. Today's VoIP allows anyone with a broadband internet connection to place calls to anyone with an ordinary telephone connection, anywhere in the world.
Why you save money with VoIP
The major advantages of VoIP are lower cost, and greater flexibility with no significant decrease in voice quality. First, a VoIP subscriber does not need a traditional phone line. Instead, you are assigned a phone number by your VoIP provider. Prices for these numbers can be as low as $9 usd per month.
Second, most VoIP subscribers will purchase a "bundle" of services that includes unlimited incoming calls and unlimited long distance calls to anyone within a defined geographic area. For instance, VoIP unlimited calling plans to anyone in the USA or Canada start at around $20 per month.
Third, most VoIP service providers offer free bundled features that most traditional telephone companies charge for. These include free voicemail, call forwarding, caller ID, call waiting, call waiting ID, 3 way calling, speed dialing, and many more of the services that the traditional companies are constantly trying to sell you.
Greater flexibility and portability
Another significant advantage is the flexibility and portability of VoIP phone service. With VoIP your personal telephone number is programmed into the converter that acts as a bridge between your internet connection and your regular telephone.
This has several important advantages. As already mentioned you do not need an actual land line. Instead your telephone number is assigned to your converter (not to your geographic land line). So you can take your converter with you anywhere in the world, plug it into any available broadband connection, and immediately start using your regular number to make and receive calls.
This flexibility also lets you choose a number in an area code where most of your long distance calls originate. For instance, if many of your friends, family, business associates or customers are calling from a specific city that traditionally involved a long distance call for them, you could choose a number in that area code and immediately turn all their calls to you into local (free) calls for them.
The advantages of VoIP are many, and the savings can be very significant. So it is no wonder that VoIP has become the hottest telecom technology of the decade. Informed consumers and businesses around the world are adopting this technology at a phenomenal rate.

Finding The Cheapest Voip Service

2008-12-31T05:38:00.001-08:00

You've done it, I have done it. At some point we have all combed the Internet trying to dig up the cheapest service rates we can find. Some of us look for discounts in the form of bundled services, while others seek out that holy grail of low rates.
When looking for the cheapest service rates, new technology is worth looking into more often than not. Instead of just searching for low rates, try looking for new ways of getting that service first, then compare rates on those services.
Thanks to modern technology, elective utilities can be much less expensive than ever before. You might try voip service, or satellite tv rather than cable, both of which can save one a significant amount of loot each month.
Another way to pinch a penny is to keep an eye out for promotional offers and special incentives. People sometimes have a habit of thinking this is just another way to get you to "buy something". Maybe so, but is sure is nice to get that rebate a few weeks later.
Sometimes finding the cheapest service is a matter of taste. My grandfather for example wouldn't touch voip service with a ten foot pole for fear the "new fangled" monster might do him in. We all know this type, and pardon me if this is you :)
In closing, when sticking with traditional services, be sure to read the fine print. It isn't always the advertised rate that gets you. 0.02 cents a minute is great for long distance, but not if it's only that rate for 2 hours on Friday afternoon.

Corporate Blogging: 7 Best Practices

2008-12-31T04:44:00.001-08:00

Blogs have become one of the hottest communication tools on the Web. Offering the opportunity for anyone to create their own free Web site, encouraging opinions and interaction, blogs provide forums for individuals to create their own highly personal presentations to the Web audience. They also provide for consortia of all types to experience the sort of online community feeling that was pioneered by early newsgroups and by the phenomenal success of AOL in the 1990s.
Blogs have reached into the corporate and government sectors as well. What started out as an outlet for teenage expression and grassroots journalism has turned into a lucrative communications tool for small and large businesses alike.
Corporate Blogging refers to a company producing or supporting a blog that it uses to accomplish business objectives. As with anything, there are certain "best practices" to be followed to ensure your company reaps the maximum benefits. These seven tips guidelines will help make your blog a success.
1. Fine Print. Blogging can lead to legal issues. Companies should have real concerns about liability, exclusions and limitations, and indemnity. Although there are laws that protect against libel, misappropriations and other injuries suffered as a result of posts on the Web, companies can still be held "vicariously" responsible for statements made by employees that are harmful to others. Since there are so many legal issues surrounding blogs, it is imperative that the site has some sort of disclaimer and limitation of liability.
2. Know What You're Doing. Senior management should be educated by the corporate communications and legal department about what blogs are and how they might affect business. That way, they can be contributing members of the blog, further improving employee relations. Their support and participation is often what makes a blog more effective.
3. Create blogging policies. In any medium where an employee is sharing information, there is the possibility of leaking trade secrets or financial information. Blogging also has a tendency to become personal. A company should have a list of policies regarding blogging to ensure that trade secrets are kept secret and personal lives do not become public. Policies may include keeping financial information from being posted, as well as severe consequences for anyone using the blog for negative publicity.
4. Avoid the Marketing Blog. Making your blog into a blatant marketing campaign is a bad idea. Customers are looking for real answers and honest opinions. They will pick up on insincerity instantly. Use the blog for what it's for, transparency. This is an opportunity to make a real connection with your customers. Don't ruin it by filling it with empty advertising.
5. Keep It Fresh. Blogs are usually judged by their amount of new content. Easy to add on to, they are designed to be updated constantly. To keep your readers coming back, make your content relevant and timely. Don't forget, content can include anything from product releases to job openings, recent news to thoughts from the CEO. It's practically impossible to run out of material.
6. Reinforce the company's core values. Use your blog to reflect your company's inner soul: its mission, goals and direction. A blog is just another medium by which you interact with your customers and employees. It's another part of the brand experience. It should be consistent with the impression the company wants to make.
7. Encourage employees to use it. Create an atmosphere where they are comfortable asserting their opinions and concerns. You'll be surprised how the quietest employees will speak up when given such an opportunity. With all communication, blogging can become negative, so remind employees of the public nature of the blogs and the ramifications for their actions.

Blogging for Money

2008-12-31T03:31:00.001-08:00

Blogging for money might sound like the latest game show or some new drinking game, but it's the latest craze to hit the Internet. Bloggers began blogging for a number of reasons, but as the blog movement has increased in popularity, they have found ways to monetize their blogs and are seeing their commitment pay off.

Whether a blogger's focus is to communicate with customers or just to have fun, they have begun looking at ways to earn revenue from their blogs. The most popular ways for bloggers to earn some added cash for their pet projects are:

1. ) Google Adsense in Blogs

Google AdSense allows webmasters to dynamically serve content-relevant advertisements in blogs. If the visitor clicks one of the AdSense ads served to the blog, the website owner is credited for the referral. Webmasters need only to insert a Google-generated java script into the blog or blog template. Google's spider parses the AdServing blog and serves ads that relate to the blog's content. Google uses a combination of keyword matching and context analysis to determine what ads should be served.

2. ) Affiliate Programs (Product Endorsements)

Affiliate Programs work when an affiliate web site receives income for generating sales, leads, or traffic to a merchant website. Generally, bloggers will mention or endorse specific products and if site visitors purchase the product, bloggers will receive a portion of the sale.

3. ) Product Promotion

Businesses use blogs to detail how specific features or product add-ons can increase functionality and save time. Content-rich product promotion will help with search engine placement.

4.) Banner Ads

While less popular than in the past, websites with high traffic levels can still earn decent revenue by selling banner space.

As the Internet evolves bloggers will continue to seek out ways to monetize their opinions and thoughts. Daily journals and online blogs have become more than just a communication means to many.

Blog Problems

2008-12-31T03:30:00.001-08:00

What in the world is up with the world of blogs? Blogs are meant to be this great new technology where people can share their ideas and interests with others around the globe. As far as I'm concerned the state of blogs is one of chaos, confusion, and anti-interactivity. The other day I decided to do some research on the Web and try to connect to some blog writers out there that interested me. Let me tell you it was not an enjoyable task as I had envisioned. I spent four painful hours surfing through around a thousand on-line journals, and I found only a few that interested me. What are we doing out there people?
First of all, just getting to a blog can be a pain in the arse. For example, you type in the words 'Philosophy blogs' and a whole bunch of sites come up. Some are conglomerate sites with thousands of journals, but the area you're searching for may have only one blog in it! This is because they separate the blogs into a million different categories, like 'love', 'lovers', 'lovable' etc. Why not have just a few main categories to choose from?
The next problem is the content. People with 'philosophical' blogs are having personal chats with their mates about the local dance competition on Tuesday! Why not go to a chat room if you just want to talk to your friends? Blogs are supposed to be a personal viewpoint expressed to the whole Web community. Wouldn't you actually like to meet more people like yourself? How is this going to happen if you talk in strange uncommon slang and acronyms that you and your friends can only understand? Please stick to the subject at hand, and take it at least half seriously.
Another major problem is the fact that you can find a really cool blog that sparks an interest, but then find that the writer hasn't added an entry in over a year! What's it doing on the Net? Have these people passed away? I seriously doubt it, as there are so many blogs in this 'lost' state. Having a blog is a responsibility; it's a shared diary for the whole community. How can someone form a relationship if you only write in your blog once a millennium?
Back to the subject of content: These on-line journals are a real chance to communicate regularly with others with similar views to yourself. We can learn a lot from each other, as each human is an individual with special traits and skills that only they have. So why do we see so many blogs just talking about trivial nonsense like 'Who the coolest movie actor is.' Humanity is an intelligent species evolving everyday towards a higher consciousness. So where are all the thinkers out there, the people who have taken us to the next levels of spirituality and scientific exploration? I'd really like to hear what you've got to say, but all I can find are philosophical beliefs on why died pink jeans express one's true inner self.
The issue of making comments on someone's blog is also a controversial one. Why have comments sections if you're not going to reply to people who have expressed an interest in what you've had to say? How is this community going to function if all the conversation is one-way! Come on people, wake up and smell the onions! Let's change the blogging community into the awesome structure of shared knowledge that it was intended for. Please don't let it turn into the small-talk world of chat rooms.

Blogging for Business

2008-12-31T03:29:00.001-08:00

Business blogs are primarily used to improve a company's communication both internally and externally. Business blogs are a type of communication channel that could be used effectively in product launches, team interaction internally within the company or interaction between clients and company. With the level of interactivity blogs provide, clients feel more confident in the company. Not to mention the amount of traffic it brings to the main site.
Personal and business blogs: What is difference between two?
There is not much of difference between personal and business blogs visually but there is a fine difference between them in terms of reputation and brand attached.
Business blogs should be well planned before hand. Companies can't afford to just walk away after launching their blog. Business blog has to be successful. Constant and consistent posts are the rule of the game. Blogsphere is full of best writers and faster one learns their rule, better for them. Companies can't just rely on the fact that they are market leaders in their business so they will be successful with their blogs too.
The postings on business blog should be open and should portray personality of the writer and the company. The postings on business blogs should be very informal, and should be written in first person voice. Posts should be informative and relevant with an expert touch to it.
Business Blogs and it content:
According to search engine optimizers, "Content is King". Indeed this is true for websites but not for a blog. Blog is all about writing with a particular voice and personality. A lot of people would like the style and would stick to the blog with regular visits. A lot of them will hate it and would never return.
Content for a business blog should be written in a strong voice with high consistency in quality. It becomes somewhat difficult to maintain quality with regular postings, but no choice. A few bad or substandard posts and regular visitors to the blog will fly off.
Important
Don't hammer your visitors every time with posts like how great is your product and so on. Add some funny incidences or bit of humor to your postings. Talk something about how employees enjoyed drinks in a party organized at particular department. Add some lighter moments in between posts.

eBay Gold

2008-12-30T04:21:00.001-08:00

Internet auctions are relatively new having been around since the mid 1990's. There are several Internet auctions including Yahoo Auctions and UBid. But of course the undisputed king of Internet auctions is Ebay. Ebay has over 40 million registered users making it one of the top 10 most visited websites in the world.

Just about anything you can imagine can be found on Ebay. And there were more incredible bargains to be found than at any other ecommerce website or brick and mortar store I had ever visited. After about six months or so of buying, I began selling items on Ebay. I had an extensive collection of unbuilt as well as built plastic model cars. I began placing the models on Ebay with starting bids of $5.00 and no reserve. To my surprise, people started jumping all over these model kits. Some of them sold for as high as $70.00. It was at this time that I realized the enormous money making potential of Ebay. The key to being a successful seller on Ebay is selling items that people want. There are a number of ebooks on Internet auctions that tell of the importance of a great headline and a killer ad for your auction. While this is true, it is also important to remember that the best ad in the world will never sell an item that no one wants. The items that do well on Ebay are unique or interesting items. Antiques, pottery, collectables and high-end apparel are just a few of the items that will bring high bids on Ebay. If you can easily find the item at Wal-Mart, chances are it will not do well on Ebay.

There are a number of wholesalers around the country that you can buy merchandise from to sell on Ebay. But before you buy, do your homework. It's very tempting to buy a bunch of electronic widgets that sell for $2.00 a piece. You might think you can buy 20 of the $2.00 widgets and then sell them for $12.00 a piece on Ebay and make a killing. Unfortunately, you discover that no one is bidding on your widgets despite the fact that you have started the bidding at a mere $6.00. In fact, there are very few people that are even viewing your auctions. The end result is you are now stuck with 20 widgets that no one wants. The first mistake here was not doing a search of widgets on Ebay to find out if they're hot or not. The second mistake was trying to sell an electronic item. Yes, I know there is a huge market for electronic gadgets. That's the problem; the market is too huge. It is already saturated. How many times a day are you bombarded with offers for the latest and greatest cell phone or digital camera? If you try to sell in this market on Ebay, you're encroaching on Best Buy's turf, which means you'll be smashed like a bug. On the other hand, how many offers do you receive for NASCAR collectibles or Gucci shoes? Or how about die cast models? These are the hot items on Ebay. These are in demand items and more importantly you can sell these items without competing against Wal-Mart and Best Buy.

If you're new to Ebay, the first thing you need to do is to build positive feedback. Feedback is vital to your success on Ebay. Potential buyers will read your feedback in order to determine if you're an honest seller. If you have high numbers of negative feedback, many buyers will look elsewhere. Take a look at some of the Ebay Power Sellers feedback. Many of them have feedback in the thousands with a rating of over 99% positive. It's no secret how these Power Sellers became successful on Ebay. They take care of their customers. This means they'll have plenty of repeat business.

When you first sign up with Ebay, you'll have zero feedback. Most buyers will shy away from an Ebay newbie with zero or very low feedback. Start building your feedback rating by selling personal items from around the house that you no longer want. This is a good way to get the feel of using Ebay and to build positive feedback. You should invest in a good digital camera. Good clear pictures are an important selling feature on Ebay. Remember to describe your items accurately and honestly. Do not try to trick or deceive buyers in any way. You can't afford receiving negative feedback this early in the game.

I came across a perfect example of a deceptive seller on Ebay a while back. The seller had sold a pair of slightly used shocks for a 2003 Chevy pickup. He used Ebay's Buy-It-Now feature to sell the shocks for just one cent. Wow! What an incredible deal! But wait a minute. The unwary buyer forgot to read the entire auction. The shipping charges were a whopping 60 bucks! The result was a pissed off buyer and negative feedback for the seller. This was an obvious attempt on the part of the seller to make money on the shipping costs. He was banking on the fact that the buyer would not read the entire auction and would simply assume the shipping charges would be reasonable. Do not use deception in your auctions or try to make money on shipping costs. If you treat your customers the way you expect to be treated you will never go wrong and you'll be well on your way to building a reputation as an honest top-notch seller.

If you happen to get a few non-paying bidders, resist the temptation to leave negative feedback for these individuals. Leaving negative feedback will only result in possible retaliation by the non-paying bidder and negative feedback for you. Once again, you do not want any negative feedback this early in the game. Buying items off of Ebay is another great way to build positive feedback. When you win an auction, pay for the item promptly. The result will be positive feedback for you. Most buyers will not care whether your feedback came as a result of buying or selling as long as it's positive.

After you've built a feedback rating of least 25, you'll be ready to start purchasing wholesale merchandise to sell on Ebay. Remember what I said about doing your homework before buying merchandise. If you have your eye on a particular item you think might sell on Ebay, first do a search of that item on Ebay to find out what people are bidding if anything on the item. If it looks hot, at least 7 or 8 bids, then it's probably a good bet. If it doesn't appear to be getting many bids, you should steer clear. You can also do an advanced search for auctions that have already ended. It's a great way to find out the final bid price for a particular item. A few extra minutes of research can save you from a giant headache down the road.

Optimization for Yahoo!

2008-12-28T16:50:00.001-08:00

From Jerri L. Ledford's Book

Every search engine differs a little bit from the others, and Yahoo! is no exception. Where Google focuses on elements like relevance of content and links, and MSN focuses on freshness of content and the tags on your site, Yahoo! is more focused on keyword density and keywords in the URL and title tags.

So if you’ve used basic SEO techniques, you’ll likely be listed with Yahoo! in a matter of time. Your rank on Yahoo! will depend on competition, of course. So you’ll need to focus carefully on the keywords that you select if your industry is a highly competitive one. Just be careful, because using a higher density of keywords so you’ll rank well in Yahoo! could cause you problems with MSN and Google. It could look to those search engines as if you’re stuffing your site with keywords.

The Yahoo! Search Crawler

The Yahoo! search crawler is called SLURP, and it will rank your page based first on your keyworddensity. The optimum keywords density according to Yahoo! is:

Title tag — 15 percent to 20 percent: Yahoo displays the title tag content in its result page. Therefore, write the title as a readable sentence. A catchy title will attract the reader to your web site.

Body text — 3 percent: Boldfacing the keywords sometimes boosts the page’s ranking. But be careful not to overdo it. Too much boldfaced content irritates readers.

Meta tags — 3 percent: The meta description and keyword tags provide important keywords at the beginning of your web page. Just be careful not to use the keywords repeatedly in the keyword tag, because Yahoo! may consider that practice spam. Write the description tag as a readable sentence.

Yahoo! also looks at the inbound links to your site. And of course, there are other factors SLURP looks at while it’s crawling your site. Even when you’re optimizing for three (or 15) different search engines, there are a few basic optimization strategies that are essential and relevant for all of them. Rather than focusing on all of the differences and stressing yourself out, focus on all of the actions that are similar for each search engine, and then think of how you could change or improve your site so that it will be the most relevant, and the most locatable, for your potential visitors. Put customers and visitors first, and your search engine rankings should follow naturally.

Understanding Google PageRank

2008-12-28T16:49:00.003-08:00

From Jerri L. Ledford's Book

Google’s proprietary ranking algorithm is what makes it different from the other search engines. An element of that algorithm is Google PageRank.

Google explains PageRank like this:

“PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the Web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page’s value. In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at considerably more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; for example, it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves “important” weigh more heavily and help to make other pages “important.” Using these and other factors, Google provides its views on pages’ relative importance. Of course, important pages mean nothing to you if they don’t match your query. So, Google combines PageRank with sophisticated text-matching techniques to find pages that are both important and relevant to your search. Google goes far beyond the number of times a term appears on a page and examines dozens of aspects of the page’s content (and the content of the pages linking to it) to determine if it’s a good match for your query.”

In other words, a PageRank is based on a ballot system that compares your site to all the other pages on the Web that are related. The comparison allows the algorithm to determine which pages are most relevant to a search query based on numerous elements of the page. A hyperlink to a page counts as a vote of support. The PageRank of a page is defined recursively, or in comparison to the other pages that Google is also ranking, and depends on the number and PageRank metric of all pages that link to it. A page that is linked to by many pages with high PageRank receives a high rank itself. If there are no links to a web page, there is no support for that page. Google assigns a numeric weighting for each web page on the Internet; this PageRank denotes your site’s importance according to the PageRank algorithm.

So if you want to successfully rank on the Google search engine, you should follow the guidelines that are laid out in Google’s Webmaster Central (http://www.google.com/intl/en/webmasters/). There is also a set of tools available in Webmaster Central that allows you to analyze and add to your site to help make it more Google-friendly. Those tools include the following:.

Site Status Wizard: Determines if your site is currently being indexed by Google.

Webmaster Tools: This is a set of tools designed to help you improve the indexing and ranking of your site. You can also find the Google Sitemap Generator here.

Content Submission Tools: Use these to submit your site to Google, or to add products to Google Base or content to Google Book Search.

Google’s Webmaster Blog: Find tips and strategies for ranking well in Google on this blog. You’ll also find changes to the Google algorithm and other information that you’ll need to stay on top of your site rankings.

Webmaster Discussion Groups: Talk to others about what they’re doing to improve their Google rankings.

Webmaster Help Center: If you don’t understand something about Webmaster Central, here’s where you’ll find an explanation.

Ultimately, if you follow the guidelines laid out in the early parts of this book, and design your pages for people, not search engines, you’ll rank well in Google. You may need to tweak some of the inner workings of your site — keywords, links, meta tags — and you’ll need to be patient. But given time, your ranking with Google will occur naturally. Then all you have to do is continue improving your offerings for customers and stay on top of maintaining your site, and you should see your ranking climb gradually.

Optimization for Google

2008-12-28T16:49:00.001-08:00

From Jerri L. Ledford's Book

By this point in the book, you should have a pretty good idea of how Google works, including how your sites are indexed and what you should avoid doing. But there are a few more things to understand about Google and how your site is ranked. These additional tips will help you to improve your rankings.

The first thing you need to understand about Google is that, given time, if your site is on the Web and has at least one link to it, you will eventually be crawled. As an example, I have never done anything with my personal web site by way of SEO. I haven’t checked the code to ensure that it’s written with search engines in mind. I haven’t used or invested in keywords, and I haven’t submitted my site to a search engine.

Yet, if you type my name into the Google search engine, my personal web site will be the first result returned. I’m ranked number one for my name, because (presumably) there is only one of me. If someone searches for my name, I’m at the top of the list. And that’s good. But your site is probably going to be much more diverse than mine, so how do you get Google to take notice? Again, be patient. Google will crawl your site in a short period of time (sometimes it takes less than a week). And once your site has been crawled, you can begin the slow climb through the search results.

On my personal site, it took nearly a year to reach the top ranking slot for my site. But I never did anything to boost that rank. It’s my personal web site, so I don’t put a lot of effort into it. In short, it is what it is, without any type of SEO strategy at all.

If your site is topically related to other sites, however, you probably won’t be able to throw your site on the Web and wait for it to be indexed at number one. And although you will be indexed automatically, you’ll have to compete for top placement.

Google doesn’t sell placement, either. There are ads above and to the right side of the search results, but ads are the only placement that’s available for purchase. That means that where your site places is based on your SEO and search marketing efforts.

Optimization for MSN

2008-12-28T16:45:00.001-08:00

MSN is now powered by Microsoft Live, and although you can go to the MSN.com web page and still access MSN search capabilities, the underlying technology has been rebranded as Microsoft Live. But it’s still one of the top three search engines, and it’s definitely not one that you should ignore. Studies have shown that searchers who enter your site from MSN searches may be fewer in number than those from other search engines, but they routinely have higher conversion rates.

As with other search engines, the basic optimization techniques that you’ve learned are the best way to get listed with MSN search. MSN also does not allow paid ranking, so your organic efforts will be the deciding factor for your rankings.

The one difference with MSN is that this search engine puts more emphasis on the freshness of content than other search engines. Specifically, sites that update high-quality, relative content on a regular basis have a better chance of ranking high with MSN. So if you have not yet implemented a content strategy, and if you want to rank well with MSN, you should plan and implement that strategy. MSN, like Google, indexes pages according to a proprietary algorithm. And like Google, MSN (or more accurately, Microsoft Live) has a set of guidelines that you should follow if you would like your site to rank well. Those guidelines can be found by going to MSN or Microsoft Live and using the search string: Site Owner Help. The guidelines that you’re seeking should return as the top search result.

MSN also looks at your meta description tags, and the title tags on your pages. So pay close attention to creating the most useful and relevant tags you can. Also include keywords and importantinformation as near the top of each of your pages as possible.

Over time it’s certain that the MSN brand will be folded into and eventually replaced by Microsoft Live Search. Branding is likely to be the only thing that changes when this happens. MSN had long used Microsoft technology (MSN, after all, does stand for Microsoft Network). This means that your SEO efforts will remain viable even as the MSN/Microsoft Live rebranding takes place.

Social network aggregators

2008-12-28T08:20:00.001-08:00

Social networks have gotten so pervasive that much like metasearch aggregators engines, social network have begun to arise. The concept is to log in to one place and see all your updates from various social networks, photo sharing, and presence applications. Examples : socialthing!,socialstream, profilactic

Social media, then, are services that allow you to publish or distribute content to a core group of people who are connected according to some central interest. If you’ve ever heard the term Web 2.0, then you’ve heard someone talking about technologies such as social media.

The concept of Web 2.0 is that the next generation of web-based services will be structured differently than those in the past. It’s not about new technologies, really. Instead, Web 2.0 is about the way that people will interact with the Web.

In the past, it was pretty straightforward. You went to a web site, saw what there was to see, and then if you liked it you talked to your friends or sent them an e-mail that included a link. Web 2.0 is about streamlining that process and taking advantage of the connections that the Internet enables. Specifically, Web 2.0 is about using the Web as an application. This means that many social-media sites are considered Web 2.0 sites, but not all Web 2.0 sites are social networks.

Now, when you find something you like online, sure, you can send your friends an e-mail — or you can distribute it using one of the social-networking services. This allows you to stay connected with your friends, streamlines the connection to those friends, adds new friends to the network, and makes it possible for you to receive items of interest from them as well.

In short, social networking and social media are all about one thing: communicating with your friends about common interests. People want to classify the Web. These technologies allow them to do just that rather than depending on someone else’s classification who doesn’t see the world the way they do.

Social-Media Optimization

2008-12-28T08:18:00.001-08:00

From Jerri L. Ledford's Book

Ask any child over the age of 10 what MySpace is, and you’ll get a pretty good description. During the conversation, you’ll also probably hear about other places like Flickr, FaceBook, ShoutLife, YouTube, Twitter, and Jaiku. These are all examples of the different social networks that have become an Internet phenomenon over the past few years.

Social networks are groups of people who are linked by some type of connection. MySpace is a social network where friends people who know each otherconnect. New friends come into the mix. Friends’ friends come into the mix, and eventually you have a network of people who may not know each other in the real world but are connected on the Internet.

The phenomenon part of the social network is how quickly people have adopted it. And using the connections made available by social networking, the category of social media has grown nearly as quickly. Social media are contents generated by social networking. The publishing mode for social media is many-to-many publishing. What this means is that a group of people publish a work or works that are distributed to another group, or several groups, of people.

Literally defined, social media are the technologies and practices that people use to share content, opinions, insights, experiences, perspectives, and multi- media. These technologies and practices can be translated into all different kinds of social networking. Table 18-1 is a short list of some of the types of social media and social networking available.

Types of Social Media and Networks

Wikis

These are collaborative web sites. The concept behind wikis is that anyone who has access to the site is able to add to or change any page on the site. Examples : Wikipedia

Social networks

A group of people tied together by some common interest. Interests can range from reading to education to food to news or any other subject imaginable. Examples :FaceBook,MySpace,Villij

Presence applications

Presence applications are like miniature blogs. These sites allow users to communicate back and forth using their services. Conversations run from important to completely mundane on these web sites. Examples : Twitter, Jaiku,Pownce

Video sharing

Have a great vacation video you want to share? YouTube takes “America’s Funniest Home Videos” to a whole new level. If you have a digital videocamera and some time, you can create and share any kind of video thatyou would like. examples : YouTube

Virtual reality

This interesting social networking category is like living in a fantasy world. You make up your looks, personality, your life, and all of your surroundings.But don’t think this is just a game. Living a virtual life can be more than just fun; it can also be a way to make a good income for some people. Examples : Second Life

Events

Events networks connect people according to the events that they are attending or want to attend. If you want to know who’s going to be at that TobyMac concert on Thursday night, check out on of the social-events networks. Examples : Upcoming

News aggregation

These social networks are connected by current and past news. If you find a news story that you think is good enough to be shared with people whose interests are the same as yours, you can add it to your network for them to view. Examples : Digg, Reddit

Photo sharing

Everyone wants to share pictures. Photo-sharing networks let you share your pictures with anyone that you want to. Most of these services also allow online photo storage. Examples : Flickr,Zooomr,PhotoBucket

Livecasting

Livecasting is literally live webcasting. A community is built around the webcasts, including everything from blogs to chatrooms. Examples : Justin.tv

Episodic online videos

These social networking sites are built around online videos, but the videos difference here is that each person tells a specific story in a series of episodes. The social network is built around your favorite episodes. Examples :YourTruman-Show

Media sharing

If you want to create a network of people with whom you can share all kinds of media files, these services are the ones to use. Connect to as many or as few friends as you like when sending e-mails, videos, audio files, and more.

Examples :Izimi, Twango

Music sharing

Not music file sharing, but creating community around music. Most of these sites allow for integration with iTunes or other media players to keep track of the music you listen to, and make recommendations based on your tastes and the tastes of your network. Examples :last.fm, pocketfuzz

Social bookmarking

Social bookmarking is one of the most widely used social-media techniques. These services allow you to tag news stories, blogs, videos, audio files,web sites, and other Internet-based services to share with friends. Tagged sites are then ranked (and searchable) according to the number of tags received.

Examples : del.icio.us, ma.gnolia.com,blinklist

Avoiding SEO Spam

2008-12-28T08:14:00.001-08:00

From Jerri L. Ledford's Book

So spamming a search engine isn’t the best idea in the world. When you are caught spamming one, the penalties will differ according to the search engine, but most will delist you from search results. Being delisted isn’t the worst thing in the world that could happen to your site. In most cases, you can get your site reincluded.

It may take an explanation to the search engine of the tactic you employed, why you employed it, and how you corrected it, followed by resubmission to the index. Then it could take a couple of months (or longer) to get reincluded. Then you have to work your way back to the top of the results. The whole process could take six months to a year or longer.

Time is a valuable commodity when you’re talking about the Internet and the possibilities that it brings to your revenues. Time lost on the Internet is easily as expensive as if you had a bricks-and- mortar store that you just didn’t open on one of the busiest days of the week.

What’s at stake makes it especially worrisome that you could possibly spam a search engine and not know it. It wouldn’t be intentional, but the results would be the same. So, how do you avoid this? How do you rank well without falling into the black hole that leads to search engine spam? That’s an easy question to answer, really. There’s only one way to avoid accidently (or purposely) ending up labeled as a spammer. Build your web site for your audience and not for a search engine. Really, it’s that simple.

Here’s why: The purpose of a search engine is to find, index, and serve content to people who use the search engine to find something. The search engine’s target audience is those people. And in an effort to do the best job possible for those people, it’s going to look at every page it indexes in the scope of what’s best for the searcher.

So, if you approach creating your web site in the same manner that a search engine approaches serving content to its users, your goals will automatically align. And that natural alignment will keep you out of trouble with search engines.

You should already know how to design your web site with the user in mind. But you can keep a few guidelines in mind to make search engines see that your site is exactly what searchers are looking for:

1. Provide users with unique relevant content. The most important element of your site is probably the content that you put on it. Provide the information that users need to help them understand, compare, or make decisions. Make it useful, and users (and crawlers) will love you.

2. Use links appropriately. You want a good balance of links into and out of your site. You can’t necessarily control all of the links that come into your site, but you can influence them by participating in your industry. And when you build links that lead away from your page, make sure they take users to other sites that are relevant and useful.

Spam of any kind is bad. And no one wants to be labeled a spammer. But being labeled as SEO spam is probably one of the most detrimental blows that your web site can suffer. So instead of focusing on how you can make search engines like your site, focus on how you can make users like your site, and search engines will naturally follow the users.

Google AdSense and Blogs

2008-12-28T08:12:00.001-08:00

by: Diane Nassy

If you have a blog, or are thinking about starting a blog, then you are definitely going to want to read this article. It’s all about how to line your pockets with money that’s just waiting to be made without working much harder than you already are.
No only are blogs the hottest thing on the ‘net right now, but they are custom-made for Google’s AdSense program. Why? It’s simple. Blogs represent constantly changing and fresh content to Google’s search engine spiders. Feeding fresh content to those little spiders is just like tossing raw meat to a tiger. They just gobble it up. The more pages of your blog that get indexed, the more traffic you get. And the more traffic you get, the more exposure your AdSense ads get. Are you beginning to see where I’m heading here?
It’s not just Google that loves new content, all of the major engines do. In fact, some web-savvy bloggers are testing Google ads on one page and Overture ads on the other. It doesn’t take too long to see which ads are doing the best when you have nearly side-by-side comparison statistics to look at. Just don’t make the mistake of putting Google and Overture ads on the same page together. While they won’t kill each other like a pair of Siamese fighting fish in the same bowel will, you will be violating both sites’ Terms of Service, and it isn’t worth killing the goose (geese) that laid the golden egg.
It’s a snap to set up Google AdSense ads on your blog. Everything you need to know is right inside of the Google control panel. What’s not so easy is figuring out what ads are going to appear on each page. Since Google targets your key words, and your blog articles could possible wander towards any subject, you never know what you’re going to get.
Well, “never” is a strong word because there actually IS a way to pre-test your blog’s ads before you post your newest edition. Here’s what you do:
• Write your blog article like you normally would
• Plug in your AdSense code and then post your newest page to a sub directory that’s not part of your blog.
• Click refresh a few times until Google wakes up and starts sending ads.
• If you don’t like what you see then fine-tune the article until you see the types of ads that you’re looking for.
With some ads paying as much as $5 per click or more, I’d certainly spend an extra 30 minutes or so tweaking my blog. That’s for sure.
If you’re working hard to get your blog in front of visiting eyeballs, then it doesn’t make any sense at NOT to be using Google AdSense to draw every penny out of your site that’s possible. OK, that’s the end of the article. Now get busy tweaking your blog and checking your ads. You’ve got money waiting to be made!
About the author:
Diane provides marketing and internet profit tips.
For more Google AdSense tips, visit http://www.adsense.deeljeabiz.com
Email : deeljeabiz@gmail.com

When AdSense Goes AWOL

2008-12-28T08:09:00.001-08:00

by: Diane Nassy

No matter how hard you work to optimize your page, there are going to be times when Google just can’t figure out which AdSense ad to deliver, so it defaults to delivering a PSA (Public Service Ad) instead.
Now I don’t have any problem with charities, but I give to the ones that I choose to give to. Since I don’t have a non-profit license of my own, the goal of my web site is to make money and I depend on Google AdSense revenues to help pay my bills. Someday I want it to fund my retirement as well, so I can’t afford to have non-revenue PSAs showing up on my site.
The good news is the Google understands the human’s basic greedy nature, so it provides us with an alternative to donating our precious web real estate to charitable organizations. That alternative is known as AdSense Alternate Ads.
As strange as it seems, this feature allows you to let Google competitors into your site. Don’t worry, Google is allowing it with their eyes wide open. They even tell you how to set up the alternate ad code to work on your site and they let you do it right in your AdSense control panel.
Once you add the code to your site, Google will pull ads from whatever service you defined rather than serve a PSA. Google will do that even if those ads are coming from Yahoo, or Overture, or your grandmother’s attic.
This goes a long way towards ensuring that you never lose an opportunity to monetize a visitor’s time spent on your site. How nice it is of Google to gives us that opportunity.
Who do you choose?
Ah, now that’s the big question. Most people head straight for Overture or Yahoo, but there are other fish in the sea worth considering. In fact, some of these fish make their living almost solely by serving replacement ads for PSAs. Run this search (http://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official_s&hl=en&q=google+psa+alternatives&btnG=Google+Search) on Google and you’ll have plenty of options to choose from.
Why bother?
Sometimes Google doesn’t have any ads in its inventory to match your site’s keywords. Sometimes Google gets confused and can’t figure out which ads to deliver, so it grabs a PSA ad.
Google also has a not-so-readily-available list of what it calls “stop words”. When the Google AdSense spiders detect these words on your page they automatically trigger PSAs. Some of the more commonly known words include severe profanity (think: George Carlin’s 7 Words You Can’t Say on T.V), as well as other words which may very be quite legitimate for your site such as pharmaceutical, drugs, death, dying, abortion, and the list goes on and on. At least we THINK that it goes on and on but no one really knows for sure outside of a trusted few Google staffers.
But no matter what the reason, you don’t want non-revenue ads running on your site. There’s no excuse when Google makes it so easy to keep the revenue flowing.
About the author:
Diane provides marketing and internet profit tips.
For more Google AdSense tips, visit http://www.adsense.deeljeabiz.com
Email : deeljeabiz@gmail.com

Adlink Success - A New Advertising Style From Google Adsense

2008-12-28T08:06:00.001-08:00

by: Derrick Pizur

There is a new advertising style from Google Adsense that is available in your Adsense panel, it is called “Google Ad Links.”
This new ad system presents a list of 4 or 5 vertical links(you can pick either 4 or 5 and Google will supply the actually links) to your site visitors, when the visitors click on one of the targeted contextual words it displays a results page from Google listing ten Adwords advertiser’s ads for this related topic.
Here is what Google says Adlinks are: “What are Ad Links by Google?
Ad Links are a new form of text advertising that we're offering to our AdSense publishers. Using the same contextual targeting algorithm that targets Google ads to your content pages, Ad Links units display a list of topics that are relevant to your page. Each topic, when clicked, brings the user to a page of related advertisements.
The result is advertisements that are closely targeted to the interests of your users. By selecting the topics through interaction with the ad unit, users are presented with useful information in the form of related advertisements. Their direct involvement with the evolution of the ad unit guarantees an interest in the ads that are presented.”
Positive Aspects of Adlinks:
They allow you to blend this in with sections of your links which will get more visitors to click on them, inevitably increase your Adsense revenue.
The Adlinks ads display 10 ad results when clicked without cluttering you page.
Google’s rules allow you to place three Adsense code block on a website. If you are doing this near say a 500 word article it can distract the visitor from viewing the article. With Adlinks you can still display 1 block of normal Adsense code and the Adlinks block and it keeps your page relatively nice looking while still giving you revenue potential.
Negative Aspects of Adlinks:
Adlinks requires your visitors to make two clicks. One on the original Adlinks block and one when they view the Adlink results. As any marketer knows the more actions you need a visitor to take the less the response rate.
Where are the best places to display Adlinks ads?
The best place to display them are within your navigation menu. Try to make them blend in as best as possible.
Another great place to put them is at the end of an article suggesting an interested reader view these resources. When doing this the reader is very targeted since they red your whole article and if they are likely leaving your website, why not let them leave through Adlinks and make some money?
Are Adlink ads as effective as the normal ad blocks?
Well some have seen positive results while other have not. Personally I am going to test it some more to see what kind of results and make my decision then.
About the author:
http://www.derrickpizur.info
Want Free information about Google Adsense and Search Engine Opt?

How To Drive Traffic to Your Blog

2008-12-27T17:30:00.001-08:00

ProBlogger.net

When Darren Rowse comes up to you, and asks you to write a post for ProBlogger.net, it’s not something you can really say ‘no’ to. Not that you’d want to of course, but more the fact that it’s the opportunity of a lifetime. Why should I write, of all people though? Well Darren wanted to hear the methods that I as a young person use to drive traffic to my blog, without spending any money.

Learning the basics

First you need to grasp and understand that the Internet is a big place. Several billion web-pages, and often with very little time available to the end-user, they’ll use several techniques to find what they’re looking for.

SEO

Search? Standard engines like Google, Yahoo and Live are the most popular nowadays, and optimizing your site to be found easily, can be easy and hard based on many factors.

My best advice for someone starting out would be to start by building quality content for somebody to see, then progressing to “The Three Cs”. This way, you’ll get noticed by genuinely interested people, who’ll actively want to play a part in your site’s development, by giving you quality feedback on ways to improve, design and usability.

If you have a blog or a website that’s been going for several weeks, perhaps a month or two, and you’ve done “The Three Cs”, or at least some of them, would be to start focusing on building on your existing content, with fresh, interesting, relevant and unique content. Note I say ‘relevant’ and ‘unique’. This is important. There are so many splogs out there now-a-days, that people can quickly distinguish whether an article has been written by somebody or not, at least the majority of the time. Relevance too, like I said, is a key factor. If you have a very personal blog, then one day write something completely off-topic about a new type of golf club that comes out, people will start to wonder if you and your blog actually have an aim or a purpose, which is yet another vital thing to consider.

If you’re somebody with a very mature blog, that is several months or more old, you can now focus on the technical side of things, which is mainly down to the spiders. If you’ve been blogging this long, then if you’re not on your own domain, or hosting, I recommend it, as it allows for greater flexibility, design and SEO. Search engine optimization? Yep! A Google Sitemap can be stuck on your server for the Google-Bot and metatags can be added, which let you pre-define information about your page automatically, such as the author, a description, keywords and feed information. This also makes usability easier for feed-ready browsers like Firefox and Internet Explorer 7. Tacky pre-set designs become a thing of the past too, and upgrading to Wordpress can be a smart move, as the developer community there will help you along the way with every aspect of your blog, from the writing itself, to the advanced functionality like widgets that are available, and the themes that are freely downloadable to customize your blog’s look. Of course you could always give design a go yourself as I did at Techzi.net - though admittedly I enlisted the help of two professional designers as well.So, what are these ‘C’s that I’ve been talking to you so much about anyway? Read on to find out…

Community, communication, consideration.

The three founding principals of marketing your blog to an audience, whether general, or specific. People want to get be a part of the next thing, so give them a chance.

1. Community

Whether you start up your own community, or join others, via means of MyBlogLog, MySpace, LinkedIn, Xing and others, this is a guaranteed and proven way to get visitors, to get hits, impressions, and often quality traffic, because you know that these people haven’t just clicked on a random link or search engine listing, but have seen you or your website’s profile, and followed it through to your homepage/landing page. The best ways to get the profiles themselves noticed? See below…

2. Communication

I don’t mean ’spam’ by this either. Get involved in genuine discussions, with other people of similar interests, start up a civilized, profitable, knowledgeable discussion, then when you’re finished, ask if they’d take a look at your blog or website. You’d be surprised how many loyal readers have come to my own blog in this way. Simply leave comments in communities, on social networks, on other blogs, etc.

Still not quite your way of dealing with people?

3. Considering

All the time, you have to consider the reader. Who are you writing for? The reader. Who will be navigating your blog? The reader. Who should you devote your time, energy and attention to? The reader. Consideration is important, and you can show this in many ways. Either by having a clutter-free, easy-to-follow design, or you could alternatively try getting the readers involved, by asking questions in blog posts, or website statements, and opening up comments. If people comment, strike up a conversation with them, and keep them coming back. Answer their queries and requests with solid, reliable, dependable answers, and take note of the feedback they leave by using it, and putting it into action. If someone states that your text is hard to read, change the colour to stop it clashing so much with the background, or simply make it slightly larger.

There are lots of ways you can show consideration to your audience, and it shows just how loyal you are to your readers through this. If someone spots an inaccuracy in a blog post and tells you, don’t be lazy. Go change it! They’ll keep coming back, they’ll tell their friends, and in turn this C will do word-of-mouth marketing wonders.

The Element of Surprise

You’ve looked at both SEO, content and the ‘C’s now, but my last tip is probably what has brought me the large majority of my visitors, both loyal and one-off traffic hoppers. Differentiate yourself, do something different. Be daring, be random! Try something wild, or something completely unheard of, whether it’s outrageous, or greatly beneficial to the reader. Sometimes, even beneficial to the writer! (http://www.techzi.net/donations/) Mad things work out great sometimes, other times, they really can lower your reputation, so it’s time to take calculated risks here.

My advice? Follow your instincts. Be an entrepreneur. Take that risk. Make it happen. Throw a competition (http://www.techzi.net/competition/), for all the good it will do. Stand out and be different. Darren will sure know what I mean by that…

Essential Blog Directories for Your Blog

2008-12-27T17:10:00.001-08:00

Gaining exposure for your blog is critical to building a following, readership, and revenue. Besides the basic SEO steps of adding compelling and keyword friendly titles, URL structure and descriptions (along with the basic Wordpress SEO plugins) basic link building for blogs begins with listing them in blog directories.

Personally, I love launching a new blog, or adding one to an existing site, and watching the high valued links roll in. And as we know, BLOG = Better Listings On Google.

There are many paths to consider when building links to your site or blog such as link baiting or blogroll link swapping, but few are as easy to implement and cost effective as submitting to blog directories - and good link juice is essential to a healthy growing blog.

1. Best of the Web Blog Search La Crem de la Crem, Best of the Web’s Blog Directory is very selective and only lists aged and valuable blogs. A link from here is majestic and well deserved.

2. EatonWeb Blog Directory is a real jewel with many aged inbound links and a blog rating system. You may have to pay a fee for your blog to be reviewed, but like Yahoo, the review fee is well worth the few dollars.

3. Blog Hub offers a drop down category and member blog list. With its “new blogger” list and hot topics, Blog Hub is a great directory to list your site.

4. Upon visiting Bloggernity, you find a crisp, clean, and easy to navigate site. Scrolling down, you find the new blogs. As there is little advertising on the home page, it is pleasant to the eye of the reader as well.

5. Blogarama has an impressive listing of over 65,000 blogs. The site is well designed and follows the same content categories as many other sites.

6. One of the most selective Blog Directories on the web (and Wordpress powered), Blog Search Engine is owned by Performancing’s parent company and serves search results powered by IceRocket.

7. Blog Catalog features a vast directory of categories, from academic to writing, while offering the ability to search by country, language, or user. It has a no frills design, but offers convenient member access through simple blog registration.

8. Globe of Blogs has too many features to list. In order to be listed on the site, the blog must not be commercial. The site may appear to be busy, but I like the features of being able to search by title, author, or subject. Narrowing the search becomes easier on this blog.

9. The ultimate directory of British blogs connotes all things British. It is not directed by location, but by the culture! It is asked that bloggers be genuinely “britished.” Being listed in this blog reaches readers all the way across the pond!

10. Blog Universe is the perfect place to promote your video or podcast themed blog. Its layout is easy to navigate. Although the content is limited, it is an all around good directory site worthy of submission.

11. Bigger Blogs is a relatively new blog directory with only a few blogs registered. The blog is intertwined with a business directory. The blog section is difficult to find, and it is located through a link on the right side of the business directory page. However, the benefit is that the earlier you are accepted on a blog directory, the more exposure your blog will obtain. In addition, a back link is indeed a back link, so this can help with your search engine placement.

12. Bloggeries has the best categories and subcategories home page on the internet. The layout is clear and concise, and readers are able to find what they are looking for in a snap!

13. Bloggapedia has an interesting and eye catching homepage. Readers are easily connected to the top blogs and newest posts. Innovative categories and a colorful design make this blog directory a hit.

14. Spillbean is a well-designed blog directory site with categories such as health, society, internet, and personal. The site is aesthetically pleasing, but there are not many listings yet.

15. Blogging Fusion is a blog with over sixty categories. These categories include photo blogs and family focused blogs. Blogging Fusion has an good amount of blog listings within the directory, and it also has visitor stats available.

16. Blogflux is not only a tool for bloggers, but a directory that has the listings in alphabetic order. The blog listings are organized and clear. It is definitely an effective blog directory in which to be listed.

17. The blogs on the top listings of Bloglisting are fun, colourful, and catch the attention of the reader. Bloglisting displays the page ranking blogs, which is a helpful tool when determining with whom you want to exchange links.

18. Blogio may be a small blog directory with few listings, but it worthy of a submission. Despite its small size, there are quality blogs and a solid ability to search on this site.

19. Blog Explosion claims to be the largest blog promoter on the internet. They have a vast directory but do not seem to have direct links. However, the listing in the directory can still show up in SERP’s, so keep this in mind.

20. Super Blog Directory is a great site that offers tools to posters that others do not. You can see the latest submitted links and blogs on the site, which is a perk that draws traffic into the directory.

Amaya 10.1

2008-12-27T15:48:00.001-08:00

A complete web browsing and authoring environment and comes equipped with a WYSIWYG style of interface
Amaya is a Web editor, i.e. a tool used to create and update documents directly on the Web. Browsing features are seamlessly integrated with the editing and remote access features in a uniform environment. This follows the original vision of the Web as a space for collaboration and not just a one-way publishing medium.

Work on Amaya started at W3C in 1996 to showcase Web technologies in a fully-featured Web client. The main motivation for developing Amaya was to provide a framework that can integrate as many W3C technologies as possible. It is used to demonstrate these technologies in action while taking advantage of their combination in a single, consistent environment.

Amaya first started as an HTML + CSS style sheets editing software. Since that time it was extended to support XML and an increasing number of XML applications such as the XHTML family, MathML, and SVG. It allows all those vocabularies to be edited simultaneously in compound documents.

What's New in This Release:

· New features
· Redesign of the user interface: new toolbars, palettes, panels
· A contextual menu provides navigation and editing commands.
· Within a template instance, the contextual menu allows one to insert and append template components
· Tools can be displayed on the left, or on the right, or custumized tool by tool
· There are now two editing modes: tthe word processing mode (called Text mode) or the XML editing mode (called XML). A button allows one to switch the mode quickly.
· On/Off buttons or entries can be used to go in/out of an inline element.
· For example you click strong, enter the strong text, then click strong to close the element.
· Insert and Append commands must be used to insert before and after the selected structure element
· First implementation of Amaya themes
· Possibility to change tabs order or to display two documents side by side
· There is now an icon in each tab area to close it (not available on mac)
· The application now doesn't close when the last tab is closed
· New XHTML document allows one to create a simple document or a template instance
· Save As allows one to save without template when the document is a template instance
· The File menu gives now access to the list of recent open documents
· There is now a command Select All
· Amaya proposes new options when a table, an image or an object are created
· The links view display all elements with an id attribute as they are potential targets of a link
· Class attributes are now displayed in the status bar
· New management of the selection within tables
· Reconfiguration of menus
· Profiles for customization of the user interface
· Bug fixes
· Set the environment variable G_SLICE="always-malloc" to prevent a crash on new Linux platforms (the crash occurs as soon as a dialog is displayed)
· A reference to the current page now moves to the top of page
· Amaya generated an explicit lang="en" attribute when an element of an English document is copied and pasted into a French document
· "Preserve Lines When Pasting" didn't work correctly in MacOS X
· The Preferences dialog didn't display correctly
· In dialogs, buttons that clear an URI are now displayed close to the URI
· It's now possible to delete a link with the Link dialog
· Maps areas could be lost
· The CSS parser now detects the BOM character
· Large background images could crash the application on Windows
· When changing or deleting the same attribute for several contiguous elements, only the first element in the set has the change/deletion applied.
· Avoid several concurrent download of a document
· Dialogs are now displayed at the current cursor position
· Amaya didn't complain and could generate invalid markup for an Xhtml Strict or Basic document when an element was not inside a block element.
· On MacOS X, the menu items Copy/Cut/Paste were disabled after having double-clicked a file in the file browser.
· Fix a problem with CSS background images loading.

WordPress eBook: Success with WordPress

2008-12-27T08:24:00.001-08:00

Are you looking to find success with WordPress? Over the past year, WordPress has become the top blogging platform in the world, and many major internet companies (such as CNN, Yahoo, Sony, The New York Times, People Magazine, and eBay) have taken notice. A quick browse around many of these companies websites show WordPress installations being used to manage portions of their websites. At the same time, many bloggers are using a number of techniques to make significant income with their WordPress blogs. Are you getting the most out of your WordPress installation?

Whether your blogging goal is to simply write a personal blog, transition to making a full time income online, or anywhere in between, the open source WordPress software has you covered free of charge.

With the Success with WordPress eBook, you’ll learn a number of blogging techniques, advanced strategies for optimizing your WordPress blog for search engines, and of course how to properly market your WordPress blog for the most exposure.

A list of the topics covered in this eBook include:

   1. A Beginner’s Guide to WordPress
          * Installing WordPress via Fantastico
          * Finding a WordPress Friendly Webhost
          * WordPress Post-Install Checklist
          * Creating a WordPress Sitemap
          * Creating a Robots.txt File
          * Using Google Webmaster Tools
   2. Building a Multi-Author WordPress Blog
          * Setting Up Author Permissions
          * Adding Author Information To Your WordPress Blog
          * Building an Author Page
   3. Using WordPress as a Content Management System (CMS)
          * How do I build my CMS?
          * Should I use a Content Management System?
          * Building a WordPress Forum
   4. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tips designed specifically for WordPress
          * WordPress Permalink Structure
          * WordPress Post Slug
          * Using the Post Meta Title
          * Using Images + Alt Tags
          * Emphasize Keywords
          * Using Anchor Text
          * Making Your Post Dates Stand Out
          * Standardizing your Backlinks
          * Using Breadcrumbs On Your Blog
          * Controlling Link Juice
   5. Building a Niche Blog with WordPress
          * What is a Niche Blog?
          * Niche Blogging Strategy
          * How to Locate a Niche?
          * How to find a niche domain?
          * Finding a WordPress Niche Theme?
          * Completing Your WordPress Niche Blog

The other topics covered in great detail in the Success with WordPress eBook include how to maximize CPC Income with Google AdSense and also a number of advanced Affiliate Marketing techniques designed specifically for WordPress users.

WP e-Commerce

2008-12-27T08:19:00.001-08:00

Authors: Dan Milward, Thomas Howard, Chris Beavan, Allen Han

The WP e-Commerce shopping cart plugin for WordPress is an elegant easy to use fully featured shopping cart application suitable for selling your products, services, and or fees online.

WP e-Commerce is a Web 2.0 application designed with usability, aesthetics, and presentation in mind.

Perfect for:

    * Bands & Record Labels
    * Clothing Companies
    * Crafters & Artists
    * Books, DVDs & MP3 files

DotShoppingCart

2008-12-27T08:16:00.001-08:00

Many of our customers struggled with the complexity of the software. To set up a full featured ecommerce web site they had to install different software e.g. shopping cart, wiki, blog, forums etc. Even though they might send time and effort to get all the pieces working these different systems work in the silos. The end customers had to use different logins to sign in to the different parts of the web site. Also the site owners had hard time to gather the useful information cross the heterogeneous systems. Now we have a solution for our customers looking for a powerful web site building platform.

Here are the reasons to use DotShoppingCart:

    * Web Site Made Simple
      Easy-to-use site setup and design wizards with pre-designed themes and templates can get your site up and running in minutes.
    * Flexible Customization without Coding or Programming Knowledge
      DotShoppingCart has WYSIWYG HTML editor and block building tools built in. The content management system allows you to create unlimited pages and articles. The innovative block building page editor enables you to customize the look and feel of every single page of your site.
    * Versatile and Feature Rich
      The pluggable modularized architecture meets all your needs to create and manage your web sites. All the functionalities break into the our unique server block framework. Each server block serves a dedicated feature. Many server blocks are integrated e.g. products category list, blog, FAQ, online help, RSS feed, RSS viewer etc. Whether it's a ecommerce business or a family Web site DotShoppingCart is the best one stop shop software for building your site.
    * Stress-free and Scalability
      Hundreds of our customers sites run though our hosted services. We make sure all of these sites get loaded in customers' browser within 1 second on average broadband connections.
    * Search Engine Optimized
      We put a lot of effort into ensuring that DotShoppingCart is optimized for search engines. Whether it’s search friendly URLS or properly structured content or products, you will find that DotShoppingCart was built to help your customers locate your content with ease.