Link Building in 2013: Panda Packs a Punch

The recent Panda update was yet another step taken by Google to clean up its search algorithm and further eliminate spam. This update set out to punish those utilizing black-hat tactics and specifically those with poor content. The main focus of the Panda update seemed to be on quality content, as the effects of it were most devastating for those using content farms and spun articles to acquire links.

It also seems as though Panda put a heavy emphasis on relevancy, penalizing those which possessed links to sites way outside of their niche. One of the more famous sites to get hit by the Panda update for these very reasons was J.C. Penny, which can be seen in this article from the NY Times. Although many sites such as J.C. Penny were caught by Panda, there are those who evaded the update and continue to exercise black-hat schemes.

Black-hat Link Building

Black-hat practices, in regard to link building, aim to gain as many links as possible through minimal effort.

One of the primary strategies utilized by black-hat link builders is the use of spammy comments. They will place comments in posts located on other sites that have nothing to do with the actual post; instead the comment just promotes their site and contains a link. This has led to many webmasters implementing moderation into their comments section. Also, it appears that Google has caught onto this as well and these types of links are not as powerful as they once were.

Another tactic black-hat link builders have turned to is creating link farms. A link farm is a site that is created purely to produce links for another site. Some of these sites are well constructed and look legitimate. However, when examining the external links on such a site you will see that they all point to the same place.

Along with these clever schemes, black-hat link builders exploit guest posting. They produce low-quality content and target sites that publish such content with no regard for relevancy. Sites like this tend to raise a red-flag for Google and usually get penalized along with the sites linking to them.

While these strategies will produce quick links, the links obtained are not organic and Google will not reward these types of links. Some of these tactics may produce results in the short-term and some may even go unnoticed for a prolonged period of time, but in the end Google will continue to update its algorithm and eventually expose and punish such shady practices.

White-hat Link Building

On the other hand, there are those who attempt to follow widely accepted white-hat link building strategies.

White-hat link building, for the most part, involves two major aspects. Those two aspects are quality and relevant content. White-hat practitioners aim to produce useful, high quality content on relevant niche sites where it will provide value to the audience.

This type of link building takes much more time and effort, and follows the classic philosophy of quality over quantity. The reason it takes longer to obtain links through white-hat link building methods is because it is much harder to produce interesting and stimulating content; and then, find the best and most applicable location for that content.

There is a reason that although these white-hat techniques are harder to execute and take longer to implement, many link builders still elect to pursue these strategies. This is because this type of organic link building is beneficial for the online community as a whole, which is something Google tends to embrace. The goal for Google is to make navigating the web easier for the user, and they are not going to punish something that does exactly that. This is why these types of link building processes are the future of SEO.

While black-hat link building tactics offer short-term results, Google eventually is able to pin down these types schemes and disciplines them accordingly. White-hat link building practices provide a mutually beneficial situation for the link builder and the internet community as a whole and Google approves of these techniques. If you are implementing any sort of link building projects for your website or blog, I strongly suggest you take some time to thoroughly consider which camp your own strategies fall under before you’re the next victim of a Google algorithm update.

About the Author
Andrew Dennis is a writer at the relevancy-first link building company Page One Power. When he’s not writing about link building best practices, he prefers playing indoor soccer and pick-up games of basketball at the local gym.

Image via t r e v y

Interviews have the potential to be so much more than just another element to add to your blog. When conducted correctly, an interview can produce a post that is truly one-of-a-kind and unique within your niche. Crafting quality interviews require care, consideration and these 5 essentials.

Research to Save Your Life

Do you want your interviewee to clam-up on you? Then by all means, ask the same old interview questions they’ve heard a thousand times, or better yet, prove your lack of knowledge by requiring clarity on the most basic aspects of their history.

The most important aspect of an interview takes place long before you ever say “hello” – it’s the research. Your goal as an interviewer is to ask a question they’ve yet to be asked, or better yet, get them to contemplate something in a way they’ve never thought of before.

When crafting your questions, keep your audience and theme in mind and never position yourself for a yes/no response. For example asking, “Are you able to comprehend the magnitude of your viral following?” won’t be as insightful as, “What have been your feelings about the massive size of your audience?”

Have a Conversation

You should strive to make the process as personal as possible whether you are in-person, emailing, phone interviewing or using Skype. Ease interviewees by encouraging them to think of the experience as a typical, back-and-forth conversation; the direct quotes can be detailed later. Setting this type of mood can get people to open up; they will be able to focus more on the discussion, and less on crafting perfect, quotable sentences.

Just let the conversation flow and strive to grasp the feelings and meanings behind his/her statements. When quote-worthy comments come about, repeat the quote for clarity and get confirmation from your interviewee; “So what you’re saying is…”

Leave the Map at Home

While your research fully prepares you with a comprehensive lists of questions, allow (in fact, encourage) discussion to navigate off of your mapped path. Some of the most interesting tidbits can be discovered while going off on exploratory tangents. In the end, you’ll always come back to the script, but don’t rush the process of the scenic route.

Other important things to note: after preparing your questions, edit the order so that the interview naturally builds on itself. Whenever possible, provide yourself with smooth transitions from question to question to keep things flowing mid-interview. Also, even if they are related, remember to never ask more than one question at a time (i.e. “How have you been handling this busy schedule? Aren’t you exhausted?”). Most likely in the process of answering, one of the two will get skimmed over.

Marketing Still Matters

As organic as the interview process is, it also hosts plenty of corners for classic marketing.

Gain some hype with teasers leading up to the release of the interview, and get your following involved by allowing them to submit questions for you to ask on their behalf. When looking for guests to interview, seek out someone that you can provide with a win-win (i.e. do they have a new book or latest project that needs publicity?); cross promote wherever possible.

Most interviews fall flat because they live up to be just that, interviews. For a post like this to be successful, it stills needs to retain the quality of any other post, the only difference being your info is coming from this unique and specified source. Try branding the interview around a specific theme and in preparation, create a vignette of talking points to surround your branded topic.

Go Ahead, Go Off the Record

Don’t be afraid to ask off-the-record questions at the end of your interview. It goes without saying that they should be crafted with respect and your common sense. Remember that all recording devices need to be turned off; pens should be put down with your hands preferably visible (both psychological and situational, this move encourages trust).

Asking an off-the-record question should always be in an effort to satisfy the piece, not your curiosity. For example, you might seek clarity on personal feelings toward a past situation, just to aid you in setting the tone of the article. Be sure not to ask any of these types of questions without first confirming that you do, in fact, have their permission to ask them an off-the-record question. In short: forge ahead, but tread politely.

Regardless of the medium in which the interview was preformed, there has yet to be a better way to say thank you than the handwritten note. While permitting your interviewee to review your draft before it is published is enthusiastically not recommend, be sure to reach out once the interview goes live with an update and one final thank you.

Happy Interviewing!

What have been your experiences conducting interviews? Share your stories below.

About the Author
Kelly Gregorio writes about marketing trends and blogging tips while working at Advantage Capital Funds, a provider of merchant advances. You can read her daily business blog here http://www.advantagecapitalfunds.com.

Image via Blog Growth

Improve your skills, learn from your peers, and grow your contact list, all in the name of more success, with any one of these five blogging meetups to come in the summer of 2013:

1. NYC Bloggers Meetups

While there is an endless list of skills that will come in handy for bloggers, they all aim to lead to the generation of revenue, and that’s exactly the focus that the NYC Bloggers meetup group takes in its events! Every meetup takes a different approach to a new skill, but everything that is passed on here is meant to be able to be implemented quickly and easily the moment that you get back to your desk, making this group an invaluable one if you’d like to take your blogging endeavors to the next level through the end of 2013.

When and Where: This very active group gets together a few times each month in locations in and around New York City; with things only picking up during the summer season, you’ll have the opportunity to take in one or more events, depending on your circumstances.

2. Haven Conference

Focused on women, but open to anyone who blogs in the DIY/home improvement niche, the Haven Conference provides a unique opportunity for web workers who want to learn more about the work they do, both online and offline.

For three days, you’ll rub shoulders with others who participate in your niche, including some of the very best in the business, giving you the opportunity to learn, build new skills, and grow your virtual rolodex, all at the same time.

When and Where: This year’s Haven Conference will take place at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in sunny Atlanta, Georgia, from August 1-3, 2013.

3. WordPress DC Meetups

If you blog, it is very likely that you do so using the WordPress platform, and the WordPress DC meetup group aims to give webpreneurs in the Washington, DC area a better handle on that platform than they’ve ever imagined having! While simple and intuitive by nature, there are endless possibilities to take WordPress to new levels if you understand what lies under the hood, and that’s why each meetup of this group takes a different focus, helping you to become a more well-rounded blogger than you’ve ever been before.

When and Where: This meetup group gets together on a regular basis in Washington, DC; if you plan to stay long enough to check out the other sights that the nation’s capital has to offer, you can find great rates on accommodations via Cheaphotels.org!

4. WordCamp Vancouver

Sticking with the WordPress theme, those who enjoy working with the world’s most popular blogging platform would do well to check out a WordCamp event. Casting its gaze on everything from writing to coding, this year’s WordCamp Vancouver conference will do just that, giving you a handle on everything it is to be a popular, successful blogger – and web developer!

When and Where: If the early heat of summer is weighing on you, take a trip way up north to the beautiful city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada and attend that town’s WordCamp event on August 17, 2013.

5. Bloggy Conference

Blogging and social media are inextricably linked, and that isn’t a fact that’s likely to change any time soon. With that in mind, the Bloggy Conference aims to tackle both of those facets of brand building and networking, giving you the inside track on skills like writing, connecting with others in your niche, making personal connections with your readers, and much more!

When and Where: End your summer on a positive professional note from September 13-15, 2013, by attending the popular Bloggy Conference in rustic Sandusky, Ohio!

You can find a few more meetup ideas here.

Twitter launched Twitter #Music about a fortnight ago, a new service and app to discover new artists and music through Twitter. The system uses a platform which was acquired last year by Twitter, oWeAreHunted, but has been refined and expanded through integration with Spotify and Rdio, two large music streaming services.

Currently, the system extracts songs from iTunes, Spotify, and Rdio, but other sources will be added in the future. By default, users can only listen to short snippet of songs – 30 seconds – directly from iTunes but for Rdio and Spotify, you will need to use your credentials to log in.  Based on the recent acquisition of “We Are Hunted” by  Twitter, the system will help us to discover new songs and artists based on custom criteria, including the artists followed by us or our followers.

Users can also search using specific fields and listening to real-time view of their followers. Of course, the songs will be tweeted directly from the application. The service is currently new and is in its initial stages, hence some log ins do not work at this time. From the official profile of the staff, we read that #Music will change the way by which people search for music. In addition, it has been announced that there will be suggestions to the user depending on his/her musical tastes.

Four sections of the app and website that will be launched soon:

• The most popular songs [Emerging]
• Emerging songs [#NowPlaying]
• Suggestions based on who you follow on Twitter [Popular]
• What the people you follow on Twitter say they are listening to [Suggested]

The challenge of the major Social networks begins! Google+ counts on Play music in many markets. Then the agreement with iTunes, Spotify,Rdio and Twitter was born – Twitter #Music, the new music streaming service made ​​by Twitter that will allow you to chirp to the sound of music!

Twitter and music ‘asssociate well together’. Did you know there is a micro-blogging platform study that indicates that many accounts with the most followers are those of the singers and that at least half of the users follow an artist?

The aim of the platform is to increase user engagement, encouraging them to be more active on the network, giving them additional means to express their interests. It’s also a move that can become a new source of revenue, especially advertising.

Twitter #Music has not only been launched on the web at music.twitter.com, but the app has also made its mark on the iTunes App Store. We wish we could ask to try Twitter #Music to have a handson perspective on this subject, but we cannot.  As of yet it hasn’t been made available in India and many other parts of the world, and it only works in some countries like Great Britain, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and of course, the United States.  We hope to see something more and on all platforms in the near future.

But if you are eager enough to check out what it really offers, you could try using a U.S. or a U.K. proxy.

Summing up, so you reckon that Twitter # music is a necessary service? Or at least a service that will add to the micro-blogging platform’s user base?

About the Author

Clement Almeida is the managing editor at www.bloggercent.com. He also has an interest in watching movies, proven by the large number of movies in his library. An active person he has taken a new step towards blogging and hopes to use his skills in this venture.

The social media giant has boomed in the last half decade or so, with more than a billion users to its name. The magnitude of the impact it can have on people has not gone unnoticed. The harmful stats are sure to throw anyone for a loop. From Facebook depression to stalkers, from a loss of productivity to slander – the problems that are part and parcel of the social media network are aplenty.

Parents are often left scampering to figure out ways to keep their kids safe online, while employers are wondering what to do with employees who can’t leave the network alone. Some put up blockades on internet connections with apps and software only to realise that the person they’re trying to keep away from Facebook has found a back door (and in the case of teens and employees there’s always a loophole or a backdoor).

What’s one to do in this situation? We’ve taken some of the most significantly harmful stats that we could find and put them together in the form of an infographic for the average Joe on the internet. Whether you’re an employer or a parent, you’re going to find the numbers on Facebook misuse both interesting and disturbing.

Do you see any familiar problems in our stats? Is there something you’d like to add to our little list? Check out the image and tell us what you think.

Source: MobiStealth

Image via Imperfect Women

Have you noticed the number of posts on Google.com that now feature Google Authorship? Every time you see a post with an authors name attached and their picture you are witnessing the start of Google+ SEO magic.

Getting started with Google+ optimization for SEO is simple and surprisingly not time consuming in the least. 

Use Your Keywords

When you post a URL to Google+ a link will show to your article and above that link you can write a post update. In the update section you should introduce the article in 1-2 sentences while focusing on your keyword. For example, if your article keyword is “proper SEO” you might write: “Proper SEO practices are hard to master, here is an article that explains search engine optimization in easy to understand terms.

Link To Your Actual URL, Not A URL Shortener

There is absolutely no reason you need to use a URL shortener with Google+ since you can write in the post update window for far more than 140 characters. If you are going to use the full URL for your article make the URL look pretty. WordPress users can change the permalink structure below their titles. The general rule of thumb is to use a URL that has your keyword right at the start of the title and the start of the URL. Combining your keyword in the description, in the title and in the URL will show search engines what to look for.

Get Added To Google+ Circles

During my current days as the editor of a large scale online content company I have learned one thing to be true about Google+ authorship. People with thousands of circle connections seem to rank better for a lot of terms. Since more people are likely to share your content you are likely to receive authoritative rankings for semantic searches. Don’t spam people but create engaging content and maybe even put your Google+ follow button below articles on your personal websites.

TAG PEOPLE AND BRANDS

Authoritative ranking has swept through the socially semantic web and you can take advantage of that movement. If you write about Coca Cola be sure to tag the company’s brand page via Google+. If you write about a person, city or other data do the same. You are more likely to receive authoritative mentions if you religiously tag your Google+ posts. This is also a great way to earn yourself more Google+ Circle inclusions.

MAKE THE POST PUBLIC

Search engines will not publicize your private posts and therefore make sure your website posts are placed via a “Public” posting and not to one of your circles. Public posts mean more exposure by a larger audience and therefore the higher possibility of your post being shared and crawled by search bots.

Companies like White Chalkroad Road SEO offer other ways you can get your social search into the hands of the people you want to see it. For example, paid advertising campaigns on social networks can hyper-target users.

Essentially the trick with Google+ is to not over think the SEO involved. To be success with Google’s social network you simple need to find your keyword and use it responsibly in posts to your followers.

Be sure to link your Google Plus profile to your articles and soon you should start to see the positive effects of your efforts.

]]> http://www.blogherald.com/2013/05/04/optimizing-google-posts-for-offsite-seo/feed/ 2 http://www.blogherald.com/2013/05/02/why-you-should-outsource-your-companys-technical-needs/ http://www.blogherald.com/2013/05/02/why-you-should-outsource-your-companys-technical-needs/#comments Thu, 02 May 2013 08:57:14 +0000 Angus Shaw http://www.blogherald.com/?p=27082 The saying “life’s short” couldn’t be more true when it comes to technical troubleshooting. If you’re like me and you spend hours of your day fighting with email, web hosting, remote file hosting, and more.

A few months ago I made the decision to outsource my technical moments and I did so by allowing fully managed services to handle my businesses technical details.

In my path towards freeing myself from technical hiccups I broke up my outsources technical help.

WEB HOSTING WITH FULL SERVER MANAGEMENT

If you’re like me and you loathe SSH commands a fully managed server setup might be the way to go. I chose to use a fully managed WordPress hosting company because all of my websites run on WordPress. Using my new host they take care of WordPress updates, security patch fixes, server upgrades, nightly backups and pretty much everything else. No longer do I spent hours on server hardening and attempting to find WordPress code mistakes and memory leaks caused by junky plugins.

If you hate command line code and you want to free yourself from a lot of stress and headaches I recommend a fully managed support system.

REMOTE ACCESS SUPPORT

There are a lot of capable remote access programs on the market but I constantly find myself troubleshooting issues for my employees. After a while I realized that I wasn’t up-to-date on security protocols, newer and better technologies and more. I hired a company with a focus on email and remote access services to handle my company’s encryption keys and other data.

If you use various pieces of technology such as a Windows computer at home, a Mac at work, and an Android device for mobile on the go you might find it easier to allow an outside agency to handle syncing your devices. If you have employees and you don’t want to answer a billion questions this type of outsourcing makes sense.

IT business support can be surprisingly inexpensive, especially if you take into consideration all of the hours you’ll save by having someone else handle technical headaches on your behalf.

DESKTOP SUPPORT

I work in front of my computers for 12-16 hours a day and that means I run into a lot of issues. I can renew my IP address, format my hard drives, even troubleshoot some mid-level issues. With that being said I no longer allow PC and Mac issues to escalate. For a small monthly fee I was able to hire a tech company that provides 24/7 computer support. If something seems off I now call my “computer guy” immediately.

My desktop support choice included the ability to allow for remote updates by a technical expert. Not only do I have someone to fix my PC issues as they occur, I have someone who pro-actively makes sure my system is up-to-date.

Just running diagnostic checks and periodic reviews of my system was enough for me to be happy.

Important Note: I encrypt all important data files on a secure drive to keep those files away from prying eyes. I setup an update schedule with the tech firm I use so my system is only open to a technician at certain times.

CONCLUSION

I use to spend 10-15 hours a week managing my company’s server, troubleshooting my email server wouldn’t connect with my Android phone and worrying about if and when my next desktop crash would occur. These days I pay a small fee just to ignore the very technical aspects of my company that use to drive me insane.

]]> http://www.blogherald.com/2013/05/02/why-you-should-outsource-your-companys-technical-needs/feed/ 0 http://www.blogherald.com/2013/05/01/free-webinar-programs-for-personal-and-business-use/ http://www.blogherald.com/2013/05/01/free-webinar-programs-for-personal-and-business-use/#comments Wed, 01 May 2013 04:30:41 +0000 Angus Shaw http://www.blogherald.com/?p=27064 If you need to host a quick webinar with your business colleagues, study group at school, or anyone else for that matter, you might want to consider some of the very capable free applications available for general use.

Webinar programs allow users to share screencasts, chat with friends and even connect to customers. While there are numerous business, educational and personal webinar apps in the market, we focus this time on several free yet competent options.

MeetingBurner

This webinar program is one of the most popular in the market. The program allows users to host up to 10 people in a webinar at no cost and with no ads. MeetingBurner offers impressive features including Skype connectivity, fast screen sharing and reliability. MeetingBurner also provides real-time session analytics.

AnyMeeting

This is my personal favorite webinar application. While the free version does display ads, it is also capable of supporting up to 200 attendees at no cost. The AnyMeeting webinar software supports screen and application sharing alongside messaging, VoIP, and even polling support.  AnyMeeting allows sessions to be recorded and shared via social networks, which makes it perfect for training and other purposes.

Vyew - Google Chrome Plugin

Using Vyew is a simple process in which the user downloads a specialized Google Chrome plugin. Once installed, the application can support up to 5 parallel webcam streams. Joining a Vyew webinar can be accomplished in real-time and screen applications can be offered as shared resources. Vyew also offers Google image search and YouTube integration.

OpenMeetings – Free and Open Source Webinar Software

We love free and open source software at BlogHerald and OpenMeetings is a web-conferencing software package that offers the open-source type of connectivity we have come to love. OpenMeetings is hosted on a users own server and provides sharing for screen, mic, and webcam. OpenMeetings also offers a whiteboard during webinar. There is no limit on the number of users who can participate. Keep in mind that this is server side technology and therefore its scale is dependent on your own servers ability to handle user load.

Those are just a few of the free webinar programs offers online. The team at BestWebinar has compiled a list of webinar programs you should probably give a test run to before you get started.

Many websites consider allowing guest posting in order to help boost their ratings. On the other hand, some websites choose to guest post on other sites in order to help boost their rankings. In both of these cases, you can watch your ratings go through the roof so long as you execute your posts correctly.

For this reason, you might want to think about how guest posting can help your SEO value out. There are several different reasons behind how guest posting will help you, and it is important to understand how it can benefit you. By understanding how guest posts can help you, you will be able to make sure that you use them efficiently.

Traffic

The very first reason that guest posting is a great SEO method if you own a website business or service is because it will help drive traffic to your website. The number one aim of any guest post is to drive traffic back in your direction. By reaching out and contributing to another site you will get a payback if you are careful while writing out your posts.

Credibility

At the same time that guest posts help to drive traffic to your website, they also help to boost your credibility. When people think that you are credible, they are more likely to purchase a product or a service from you.

Guest posting makes you look like a web authority if you put up enough posts around the web. Therefore, you should take advantage of open directories and offer advice to the public. Not only will this help you reach out to your target audience, but it will help make you a sound voice among your target audience.

You may not be able to directly observe the difference, but when people start to view you as an expert, they will travel to your website and you will see sales conversions on the rise.

Subscribers

In addition, when people like you, they will subscribe to your blog, your guest posts, and possibly your business or service newsletter. The more subscribers you have, the more outlets you will have to offer them valuable information about promotions, sales, and other similar events.

Once you get an email name on a subscriber’s list, you increase your chances of making a sale, increasing regular traffic, or selling a service twofold. It is the first way that a consumer displays interest, and it gives you a wider target audience to work with.

Back Links

Finally, at the very least, guest posting is great for building back links that are natural and reputable. Back links can be hard because they have to be natural and logical, but with guest posting you do not have to worry about these facts.

Every guest post is special and proves that you are a knowledgeable source; therefore all of the links will be valid. If you are worried about back links and their legitimacy, guest posting is the number one method to use.

Featured images:

•  Image by My Blog Guest

Simon Bliss blogs about SEO and social media. He’s used guest posts to drive traffic and acquire subscribers to his blogs.

If you want to take your website beyond amateur hour, you’ve probably already realised that it’s not enough to get lots of people to visit. If it was, black hat SEO techniques (like putting ‘free porn sex hot girls free car win’ in white text on a white background) would be more excusable mistakes.

But here’s the kicker: it’s not enough. Not only do you need to very quickly convince a searcher that your description in the SERP is their perfect match – you also need them to continue believing that when they arrive at your site.

I’ve got a few pieces of advice to help you get that conversion rate up.

Keywords

A massive mistake that I see time and time again is putting too much importance on these so called ‘keywords’. If your site is relevant to the search, it will naturally have keywords that create that relevance. I’m not saying ‘Don’t worry about keywords’ but at least be clever, rather than just spraying your website with supposedly valuable hooks in an act of desperation.

For a start, using keywords like ‘car for sale’ or ‘nail salon’ is a) pitting you against millions of other results and b) not specific enough. That searcher wants a blue car with room in the back for his mountain bike, and the nail bar has to be within walking distance of York town centre.

You can only target people whose needs YOU ARE GOING TO FULFILL – otherwise your site is useless to them and you will never make a conversion. You don’t need thousands of people to be drawn to your website; you just want the ones who want you as well.

Usability

When I’m trying to find something in a hurry using my terrible Blackberry or in a dodgy Wi-Fi hotspot, the last thing I have time for is an unresponsive or poorly laid-out site.

If you want your website to be anything other than an online ad, your site must work at least rudimentarily for mobile devices. I only ever use a PC at work because I have a tablet and this is true of millions of other internet users. We want answers and we want them NOW. If a site gives me that when I’m rushing or panicking, I’m pretty likely to engage in a transaction and therefore no basket abandonment or the equivalent.

You need to make sure your site isn’t garbled for a tablet user in case they spend five minutes filling in a form only for your ‘Submit’ button not to work. Get your visitor from A to B as quickly and fluidly as possible so they’re buying before they know it.

Copy

If you are a great company offering a great service, make sure you really sell what’s special about you on your site. Mumbling on for paragraphs about your ‘business solutions’ is a sure fire way to get people clicking off. Just remember that no one actually cares where you went to university; they just want to know how you’re going to make their life easier and nicer.

With that in mind, don’t just list your services; tell visitors how those services will solve their problem.

For example, ‘We provide a drain jetting service’ could become ‘Your blocked toilet will be a distant memory after our drain jetting treatment’. That’s what I’m after – thank you Mr Plumber, I’ll see you Friday. Always remember that your visitor may not know what the solution is, but they’re an expert on the problem.

Here’s a good general rule for writing copy that aids conversion: ‘We’ is old and ‘You’ is gold.

Design

Your design appeals to all the subconscious decision-making your visitor does in their journey from search to sale. Any little thing can put someone off, but there are a lot of general design rules that can help you with conversion rate optimisation.

Vitally, your site must be clean and uncluttered, with plenty of space. Huge blocks of text will be avoided, poor colour choices will annoy, and badly-organised navigations will cause a high bounce rate.

Lead your visitors’ eyes to important directive phrases with stand-out calls to action (CTAs). ‘Order your free glossy treehouse brochure’ needs to be placed above the fold so everyone sees it, and should take some kind of graphical style so that it’s distinct from other text. This combination of directive language and eye-catching design is a great way to up your conversion rate.

The world of online marketing is being forced to become a nicer place. The importance put on good website design and engaging copy is inescapable – and you shouldn’t want to escape it. Google’s motto ‘Don’t be evil’ can be applied here: make choices based on what your customer wants and you’ll not go far wrong.

What other advice is there for website owners worrying about their conversion rate? If you’ve run into trouble or you have some great tips, let us know.

About the Author
Honor Clement-Hayes is a web project manager who’s seen an awful lot of bad websites in her time. She has a deep love of quality copy and web design and wants to help other people get there too. She writes for Strategy Internet Marketing.

Image by John. Karakatsanis

VPNs are also a great way to access websites that are restricted by a specific geography. Many users take advantage of VPN services so they can watch, for example, a show on NBC when they live in the UK.

The Internet brings content to virtually every corner of the universe. This means that all you need for a little exposure is to get yourself on the Internet, and you have a market of billions of potential consumers.

Social media has spawned advertising, and the aim of every social media advertising campaign is to go viral. The question facing advertisers is where to advertise. There are so many platforms available from which to launch your assault on the unsuspecting public, that the choice of is almost mind numbing.

Facebook is a market leader in the social media space, and there are people who can barely function without checking or updating their Facebook page. However, it is not the only social media site that you should consider when looking to launch social ads.

Actually, I might even call it the LAST resort.

After recent studies have implied that not all Facebook clicks are real, and so are “Likes” that you pay for within a well-targeted campaign, I have tested it for myself and witnessed the horror with my own two eyes.

We all use the different social platforms out there, but hardly ever consider trading our Facebook PPC budget with any of them.

So here’s a quick summary to remind you there’s a better world out there.

LinkedIn

For those looking to target a mainly business audience, LinkedIn should be the site of choice for social advertising.

A LinkedIn advertisement, whether it be a recommendation ad or a display ad, has the capacity to reach a market approaching 200 million in more than 200 countries. Even a company page on LinkedIn which does not cost anything opens your world to a vast audience of business professionals.

Pro Tip: LinkedIn’s business interface was updated only a couple of months ago, and very few businesses have adjusted to it. Get your unfair advantage by upgrading before they do.

YouTube

YouTube is the king of getting a short film clip to the public.

If you have decided that short film clips in the form of traditional advertising are your preferred form of social advertising, then YouTube is a preferable starting point than Facebook.

Of course, links can be made on a Facebook page to a YouTube clip and everything can be cross-referenced, but it is YouTube rather than Facebook that first springs to mind when people think of video clips.

Pro Tip: YouTube Ads are expensive and get less clicks than normal AdWords ads. If you are having trouble deciding between Search page Ads and YouTube Ads, go for the first option.

Viddy/Instagram

Viddy and Instagram are shorter form deviations of the YouTube theme.

As the pace of life has increased and the world has become a much faster environment, people either assimilate information faster or don’t have the time or attention spans to assimilate vast swathes of information anymore. Adding a promo code or discount coupon to an Instagram picture is a great way to attract interested parties.

People can take in a lot more from quickly looking at a picture than they can from having to sit and listen to information. Of course, the picture and accompanying text must be compelling. Also, men are much more visual than women, so these methods of social advertising are well suited to a male audience.

Pro Tip: Find a unique Instagram hashtag that is related to your niche, and dominate it with a contest.

Twitter

Twitter is the king of going viral for those with a limited attention span.

With its 500 million members, a successful Twitter media campaign has enormous traction and something of interest can spread around the world in seconds. All it takes is a great idea and access to someone with a huge following.

Easier said than done, but nobody ever said that life was meant to be easy – even in social media land.

Pro Tip: Try different platforms that allow paying for sponsored tweets – sometimes the right tweet from the right influential figure could have more effect than thousands of dollars’ worth of advertising.

Pinterest

Pinterest is a fast growing social network site. It is the third largest site of its kind, behind Facebook and Twitter.

It has over 48 million users and distinguishes itself by facilitating users to collect and share photos of their favorite hobbies, interests, and events. It works on the premise of targeted social networking and is a sort of combination of Instagram and Facebook with the best features of both at its disposal, which makes it potentially the perfect place for your social ad.

Pro Tip: US users are using Pinterest as a search engine, sometimes even over Google.

StumbleUpon

StumbleUpon is a relatively new concept gaining traction at an alarming rate.

As a customized form of push marketing it helps you attract a target audience that is seeking what you have to offer. Rather than marketing with a scatter gun approach you can now effectively hand pick your market with a high probability of success, which should ensure quicker and higher conversion.

Pro Tip: SU doesn’t allow a paid stumble when it’s leading to a page with thin content. So to get approved, make sure to target a page with actual and interesting content.

Conclusion

Advertising may be easier than ever. The question now facing you is how to distinguish yourself from all the other wannabes and which social network to use for this task.

Facebook is by no means obsolete in the social network stakes – far from it; however, there are other options which should be considered either as alternatives to or in conjunction with a Facebook social network advertising campaign.

About the Author
Jove Welner is the CEO of App Champ, a viral community that rates new Apps and reviews them.

Image via Jason A. Howie

With so many files sitting on cloud servers, users can quickly find themselves practically taking out a second mortgage to pay for the safekeeping of their data.

Thankfully there are a few services that offer quick data speeds alongside a decent amount of FREE data backups.

Here our three of the best cloud-based backup service for your data needs:

Dropbox

Dropbox starts users with a rather low 2GB of free storage space. However, that number can be bumped up to 18GB through the platforms referral program. Users who provide their friends with a referral link to the service each receive 500MB of additional space just for having their friends sign up for the free plan.

The best part about Dropbox is that it is free to use for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Mobile. The platform also offers constant data speeds. Some services charge extra for faster speeds, concurrent downloads, etc.

Dropbox offers folder sharing among members which makes it perfect for file sharing and data collaboration.

This industry standard is the standard for a reason and Dropbox continues to impress.

Mega.co.nz

Sure, the URL for anyone not used to typing it is a bit strange, but this successor to MegaUpload.com is already becoming a powerhouse.

How does 50GB of free storage sound to you? What about super fast upload and download speeds via unmetered data port? If you want to transfer data quickly and over an encrypted system via our web browser you can’t go wrong with Mega.

I tested out the program when it launched and I immediately fell in love with the user interface. Creating a files mimics a desktop setup and the programs drag and drop functionality is amazing.

Mega allows users to view a list of files or view them in thumbnail form.

Users can also choose to share files publicy or keep them securely private.

If you need more memory 500GB starts at just $9.99 per month with a 1TB bandwidth limit.

The company’s paid service is one of the best in the industry based on price alone.

Google Drive

I have been amazed by how well Google has handled its cloud services. I may have chosen Amazon Cloud Drive over this service if Amazon offered the type of inter-account connectivity offered by Google.

Using Google Drive’s free 5GB of storage, I create all of my spreadsheets, power point presentations and other files with ease. I then share those documents via Google Docs with my co-workers who then edit those documents in real-time.

From a collaboration point of view Google Drive is amazingly simple to implement and manage. What is most amazing though is Google’s focus on bringing together all of its services.

I picture the day when my Google+ photos auto save to my Google Drive account and then sync to my PC.

In fact, the Google Drive app, which creates a virtual drive on my computer is one of the reasons I fell in love with Google Drive.

I also love that Google Drive allows me to keep files private, share them with people I assign via email or share them with people via a public link. I can also choose to make files read only for outside viewers or turn on full editing capabilities for all users.

Still not sure what type of backup service you need for your files? I suggest checking out the website Best Backups which provides users with the ability to enter info about their own needs and then received customized suggestions.

Those are just a few of the best backups available in the cloud. Keep in mind that other competent competitors exist and depending on your personal or enterprise needs, you might want to consider paying for additional space, bandwidth and other features.

But exactly how do you maintain and build a real estate brand on Facebook?

BUILD A FACEBOOK PAGE FOR YOUR BUSINESS

The first step should be the creation of a Facebook Fan Page. This page should offer a mix of insightful home buying tips, interaction with followers and of course, beautiful photos of your listings. If you use your real estate page to educate your fans and then you show them homes that match that education, they are likely to visit your next open house or hire you to setup a similar sales pitch for their own home. Engagement is important because it shows that you offer open communication through the sales process and that you understand the needs of various customer types.

REACH OUT  TO PROSPECTIVE BUYERS AND SELLERS WITH A PERSONAL PAGE

A second practice involves friending potential clients. If you search through the Open Graph protocol, you can find people posting about homes and you can do the same in local real estate based groups. It is recommended that you create a personal fan page so you can friend people you don’t know without anyone prying into your personal life. While you don’t want to be overbearing in approaching potential customers, this could be a more personalized approach. Plus, if that person likes your personal page just to check you out your home listings could end up in their daily news feeds.

TEST DRIVE FACEBOOK ADS

Facebook Ads can be daunting because they offer such highly targeted capabilities. However, it is those highly targeted capabilities that make it worth the while. For example, you can literally find 25-50 years olds in the San Francisco Bay Area looking to buy a home or a 35 year old single mom looking to sell her home quickly.

The trick with Facebook Ads is to pinpoint your demographic and then target them in the area of interest. The nice part about Facebook ads is that you can choose to gain exposure with a simple CPM (cost per thousand pageviews) ad or with a CPC (cost per click setup). If you are simply trying to brand, you pay less to get your company name in front of people’s eyes in your area. If you want engagement, you pay when they click through to the page of your choice.

A PROFESSIONAL IMAGE IS KEY

Remember when we talked about creating a personal fan page? That is where you post about your home sales, tips for customers, and connect with people. Remember that this page is a business page, it is not a page about your left or right leaning political beliefs or a place to post about the drunken weekend you had with old college friends.

In fact, if you can use the page to connect with other real estate agents it will showcase your ability to network and make you appear on the surface to have better and more trusted connects.

THESE TIPS WORK FOR NON-PROFESSIONALS

Are you involved in a “For Sale By Owner” type of transaction? You can take the tips above and apply them to your own situation. Build a page for your home, invite people to check it out and if you feel comfortable even try some Facebook Ads, even $100 worth of highly targeted Facebook ads can go a long way in finding the perfect buyer.

This article was written by Mark who is a consultant for a sell house fast company that aims to provide help and advice for those who are struggling to sell their home.

I’m a big fan of WordPress, in fact I haven’t built a web platform with anything but WordPress in the last 5 years. Need an e-commerce website? You can do it with WordPress. Need a Craigslist type classifieds website? WordPress is there for you again.

With that being said not all WordPress websites are created equal and that is often because of the theme framework used by the website operator.

WHAT IS A WORDPRESS FRAMEWORK

If you are unfamiliar with WordPress frameworks in the most simply of terms they are barebone themes that are optimized for SEO, page load and other optimization purposes.

Several of the most popular WordPress frameworks include the awesome Genesis Theme and the equally cool Thematic framework.

Users choosing a framework should keep in mind that too many changes to the framework can hurt optimization. I tell clients that they should use the custom.css (or equally similar section) to change the look of their websites output without changing the actual structure of its templates.

CHOOSING THE RIGHT FRAMEWORK

A good framework is one that is supported by a developer and constantly updated. For example, the team at Genesis is constantly following WordPress development work and updating the framework and its child themes (themes that go along with a framework) to match best practices.

I always tell users to look at currently available technologies. Does the framework use HTML5, CSS3, the newest version of Javascript, Ajax capabilities, etc. Typically you can find out how strong any given framework is by looking at reviews for the product.

Understand what it will cost to maintain the theme. Many frameworks come with one-year of full support and upgrades at which time you must pay additional fees to continue receiving updates. I actually encourage these frameworks because it means the developer has good reason to keep updating the themes they create.

TURN-KEY HEAVEN

I often build websites for clients and then find out at a later time that they are frustrated with the difficulty they are having in changing basic elements. Most often a client wants to change a background color or the width of their header or article body section.

A well thought out WordPress framework makes these changes easy. Oftentimes a devoted area within the WordPress admin section will allow users to input color changes, add new columns and complete other simple template changes with very little effort and zero amount of coding.

While a WordPress framework might not be for everyone they are used by some of the webs largest websites. If nothing else frameworks offer a nice  starting point that can allow for the flexibility needed to create something really unique and special without a degree in design.

Bio:

John Mackenzie is a web designer who offers working tips to improve web design. He specializes in full WordPress theme development and server optimization. You can find more information about proper web designing at Designermag.org.

Do you also know that 40% of potential visitors to your website will abandon it if it takes more than 3 seconds to load?

These and more insightful data can be found in this Econsultancy study; however, I’m not here to talking about website speed data but to share some practical tips to help you significantly improve your website speed.

In other words, one of the top ways to kill your website is if it is slow.

Whether you’re a blogger, a small business or a corporation, a slight delay in how long it takes for your website to load could be costing you a lot in revenue while some little tweaks to make your website faster could double conversions on your website. Here are a few tips for you:

1. Limit the Number of Plugins or Addons that Power Your Website

This is especially important if you’re a WordPress user; it’s impossible to run a website that is powered by WordPress or other major CMS without using a few plugins but the reality is that the number of plugins you use every day grows and ends up slowing down your website.

With an open source platform like WordPress, each plugins are coded by different people and as a result the server configuration required for each plugin to run is different; in other words, when the function a certain plugin provides is requested, it’ll make a request to your server which will eventually influence your website speed.

It can be crafty knowing which WordPress plugin to install but the P3 Plugin Performance Profiler WordPress plugin can help you scan all your plugins and then provide a report of which plugins use the most resources; this makes it easy to know which plugin to keep and which plugin to disable.

The image above shows how a scan from the P3 Plugin Performance Profiler looks.

Image credit: my blog

2. Be Careful about Using Tracking Codes

Another mistake most people make that keeps their website slow is having too many tracking codes installed.

Of course, it’s great to be able to track traffic, conversions and actions on your website but each tracking code you install means your visitors’ browser has to make a request to an additional server; 5 tracking codes means 5 additional requests to 5 additional servers and this gradually slows down your website. Things become complicated once the server of a certain tracking code starts to become slow due to peak traffic or once a certain server is down.

3. Avoid Hotlinking to Media Files on other Sites

While there are some exceptions where it might be better to host media files on another server – like videos on YouTube – in most cases it isn’t recommended.

A lot of website owners make the mistake of hosting all their multimedia files on other servers and this only increases the number of requests a visitors’ browser has to make to different servers, which eventually slows down the website.

Also, by hosting your multimedia files on another server the server your file is hosted on will be to an extent responsible for your website; if that server is down, it could also bring your website down or at the least make your website extremely slow.

4. Use Content Delivery Networks to Make Your Website Server

A content delivery network or CDN is a collection of servers in a particular network deployed in multiple data centers on the internet; most content delivery networks are located in different countries, hence making it easier for people in that country or in a nearest country to have quick access to sites hosted on a CDN with a network in a certain country.

For example, when someone from Greece tries to access your website that is hosted in the US, it’ll take longer than it’d have taken if that person were in the US; if you use a CDN that has a server in Greece, however, someone trying to visit your website from Greece will be able to access it at a much faster rate.

MaxCDN and Amazon CloudFront are great examples of a content delivery network.

5. Combine Your Website Layout Images into CSS Sprites

For your website to take the current form it takes, there are a combination of images that has to be requested from your server, which is why websites don’t look appealing when you have images disabled in your browser.

Sometimes, there are dozens of images your browser have to pull before a website can fully display and each image increases the server request; by combining your layout images into CSS sprites, however, your visitors’ browser will have to load minimal images, which decreases the number of server requests and then makes your website faster.

6. Install a Caching Plugin

While the above points should result in some significant improvement in your site loading time, another way to make a website faster is by using caching; when you implement caching on your website and a user visits a page on your website, the cached version will usually be served unless it has changed since it was last cached; this saves a lot of requests to your server and as a result makes it faster.

You can cache your website by using the Varnish Cache software or by installing W3 Total Cache if you use WordPress.

7. Use Expires Header

When a user visits your website, your website files will be stored on their computer so that your website loads faster for them the next time the visit; there’s an expiration date in the file header that determines how long these files will be stored on their computer, however. This is known as “expires header” and is usually set to 24 hours by default.

You can configure the expires header so that the files never expire or you can increase the expiry date significantly so that it doesn’t affect your server.

8. Put Scripts and Tracking Codes at the Bottom

This is especially important if you use a lot of tracking codes on your website; put them at the bottom so that your visitors’ browsers only load them after other components of your website has been loaded. This way, even if there’s a problem with the tracking server your visitors won’t be affected.

Tobi is a professional blogger and marketer with several years of online experience; he specializes in helping people find the best WordPress hosting provided by OutstandingSETUP

[Via: Halloween Express]

BeerCloud

Free on both iOS and Android, this great beer discovery app helps you find nearby beer favorites while also dishing out expert beer pairing advice.

Brew Gene

Perfect for beer enthusiasts looking to keep tabs on the beers they’ve tasted, Brew Gene serves as a journal for your personal ratings, as well as a place to leave notes for future reference. It also helps you pick out a beer based on your taste preferences.

Pintley

One of the smarter beer recommendation apps out in the market today, Pintley delivers specific suggestions based on your previous notes and ratings, tailoring its suggestions to your taste. It also sports a handy check-in function.

Beer Prophet

Another beer suggestion app, Beer Prophet steps it up with an expansive beer info database, suggestions based on your notes and ratings, and the ability to check in and score badges such as with Foursquare.

Untappd

A beer social network that allows users to share info and check in with other fellow beer enthusiasts, Unapped lets you connect with people – it’s like facebook with beer.

For instance, there’s an awful lot of articles online talking about the importance of guest blogging and the benefits it can bring, which is all fine.

However, there’s lot less info on how to actually deal with guest blogging on the networking side (how to handle the common scenarios you can encounter when contacting people and sending your articles).

Basically, the idea of guest blogging itself is quite simple. You find a blog, send an article, and get published, but the practice shows that things often get a bit more complicated. Here’s how to deal with this.

Image credit: ScottieT812

The stages of guest blogging

Finding quality and relevant blogs where you can guest post is something you can surely do on your own, so I’m not going to talk about it here. What I am going to focus on is what happens after you decide to target a given blog.

Now, two paths for you to choose:

1. Some people prefer to send an article pitch first, and then send the actual article only when the blog owner approves the idea.
2. Others prefer to send the complete article right away and hope for the best.

No matter what’s your method of choice, you still need to get ready for a number of scenarios, and in this post I’ll try to describe every one of them.

Furthermore, things can happen even after your post gets approved and published, so the story doesn’t end there…

Sending the pitch first

This is where one of three things can happen:

1. No answer

I’m starting with this because it’s often the most common scenario to happen. No hard feelings though.

There can be a couple of reasons why someone didn’t send you an answer: they might be uninterested, they might have not received your original message, they’ve decided to let it sit for a while until they find some time to answer, etc.

Well, you don’t know what the case is so you can only send your message again. I advise waiting seven days before doing so.

When you send another message, make it clear that you’ve tried contacting the person a while ago, but be careful not to sound aggressive.

If you don’t get an answer here too, wait for another 5-7 days and send yet another message.

No answer again? At this point it’s probably a good moment to move on.

2. Declined

“No” doesn’t have to necessarily mean no. Just like in real life…

Anyway, two kinds of negative responses you can encounter: (1) the blog doesn’t accept guest posts at all, (2) your post didn’t seem to be interesting.

In case it’s (1): Move on.

In case it’s (2): Try pitching a completely different idea. Or better yet, come up with 2-3 separate ideas. Whatever you do, don’t try to recycle your already declined idea. This won’t work.

3. Green light

If you’ve got lucky and someone is interested in your guest post, there’s nothing more for you to do other than to send the post for review.

If the blogger doesn’t mention any preferred format, always send the post as a WordPress-HTML – this is the simplified HTML code used inside the Text Editor in WordPress. The best way of converting your post into such a format is to submit it as a draft to your own blog, copy it from the Text Editor and save it as a standard text file.

Don’t forget about your bio (not that you would).

Sending the post

This is where the fun starts. No matter if you’re sending the post out of the blue or start by contacting the blogger first, you can basically still get the same kind of answers.

1. No answer

The reasons are quite similar to the “pitch first” scenario, only with one more addition. If you’re sending the post as an email attachment then there’s a good chance it’ll get flagged as spam.

In the end, it doesn’t matter why you’re not getting an answer. The only thing you can do is re-send your post (again, the 7-day rule).

Remember about pointing out that it’s your second attempt and make sure not to sound aggressive.

Also, consider including the post in the body of the email as opposed to sending it as an attachment again (the spam issue).

Wait another 5-7 days before sending the third message.

Still no answer? Move on, there are hundreds of other blogs out there for you to guest post on.

2. Declined

Image credit: Sean MacEntee

If your post has been declined because the blog doesn’t host guest posts then the thing is pretty clear… not much for you to do here.

But if the post you’ve sent doesn’t meet the standards of the blog, I would advise to go back to the pitch phase. Propose some new ideas and see what happens.

Sending another complete article right away (just like that) doesn’t convey the right message. It makes you look like a content mill or something, and this is not a good impression to make.

If you get declined again, it’s probably time to move on.

3. Accepted with probation

This is when the person sends you a message like “it’s a great post, but …”

No matter what comes after the but you should make the required edits and re-send the article. If you decide to give up at this stage, you’ll look like a complete spammer/content mill who isn’t even willing to edit their work to make it more suitable.

Remember that the blog owner always knows best what has the most potential to work on their blogs, so don’t argue, simply do what’s right.

4. Scheduled

Make sure to mark the date in your calendar (the day your post is supposed to go live) so you don’t miss out on responding to comments.

Also, if the day passes and your post isn’t published, contact the blogger and ask about the new publication date.

5. Published

Mission accomplished. Have a beer, respond to comments, send a “thank you” email to the blogger.

The “what if” scenarios

Here’s a couple of things that can happen after your post gets published.

Your bio gets changed

Not such an uncommon thing, by the way, unfortunately… The most likely scenario is to have your links removed. I don’t really know why people do this, but they probably think that you won’t notice since the post has been live for three months or so.

If that happens, make sure to contact the blogger and ask them politely to restore your bio to its original form.

Your post goes down

I only had this done once. Unfortunately, there’s not much you can do. If someone went ahead and deleted your post then they clearly no longer want to host it.

If it’s a related and evergreen topic, you can publish it on your own blog.

(Contacting the blogger in this case is optional. I didn’t.)

The whole site goes down

A situation very similar to the previous one (at least from your point of view). You can republish the post on your blog if it’s relevant.

I can’t think of any more scenarios, so it’s probably a good moment to conclude this tutorial. Experience shows that guest posting can force us to handle multiple different situations, not even mentioning the time it takes to write a quality post.

However, when it’s all said and done, it’s still a great method to build your brand and make a name for yourself in the community.

Two final questions: Do you guest post a lot? Do you deal with a lot of communication problems along the way?

This guest post is written by Tobi. If you’re looking for comparison of the top website builders, check out Website-builder.com

The New Year is already here (for a while, actually), so it’s probably a good moment to do a review of some kind and take a look at how well your blog was performing during the last 12 months.

Now, apart from some fairly common things (like taking a look at your traffic stats, for example) there’s also a range of other actions that may not be all that obvious at first, yet they can still provide some great insights into your blog’s current condition.

Image credit: Gravixar

First of all, why do you even need to do some review, instead of just blogging normally?

Well, okay, you’ve got me, I don’t intend to sound like a smartass and tell you that you absolutely have to review everything you do. You don’t. You can continue blogging in 2013 like nothing ever happened and you’ll probably be just about fine.

However, if you do perform a review, you can plan your next actions to capitalize on the strengths of your blog and to fix the weak spots in its armor. In other words, you can make everything more connected to the reality you’re in and the position your blog has in the niche.

In just a minute, you will know exactly what I mean by this.

Step #1: Starting with the obvious

This is about your traffic stats.

(Hey, not everything has to be groundbreaking. Besides, we have to start with the basics, and no serious review can go without looking at the stats.)

What’s important, however, is not the numbers themselves. It’s the trend.

If your blog is a kind of new then you probably don’t have a big audience yet, so you might not feel all that great looking at, say, your average daily number of visitors sitting at a majestic number of 30. But this isn’t something you should worry about. The important part is whether your traffic is on the rise or not.

If it’s not rising then you need to think of a way to change the situation and get on track (some ideas on this in a minute).

Step #2: Your posting frequency

Your posting frequency (or the average number of posts you publish every month) is important for a number of reasons. Just to name a few:

• It gives you an insight into your consistency and your ability to keep working undistracted.
• It shows you possible areas for improvement. Do you think that you could get better results if you posted more often or less often, for example?
• It allows you to compare your traffic stats against your posting frequency.

The last item on the list is about determining whether your posting frequency has any direct connection with the number of visitors you get. If so, the easiest way for you to get more traffic is to simply post more.

Step #3: Best performing days

You can look at this metric from multiple perspectives. For instance:

• What is the best performing day of the week?
• What is the best day to post new content?
• What are the results during national holidays?
• What’s the best performing time of the year? And many others.

Once you have such info you can plan the next 12 months to include periods of more frequent posting during the best time of the year and periods of less frequent posting during the times when people hardly even visit your blog.

Step #4: Top performing pages

Your top performing posts are one thing, but as it turns out, it’s the pages that tend to attract the most traffic for many blogs.

The top performer is usually your about page. But the second and third place on the podium can vary depending on your niche and the pages you have on your blog.

If you stumble upon some well performing page, it’s a great idea to work on improving it even further. Always try to find what’s already popular and make it even more popular.

Step #5: Returning visitors

In plain English, returning visitors = your community.

New visitors come from Google or other sources of traffic and then either stay for a while or leave and never come back. Returning visitors are people actively interested in what you’re doing. That’s why they’re the crucial group for every blog’s existence.

Take a look at your Google Analytics and check how many returning visitors your blog has. Is this group on the rise?

If you’re not pleased with what you’re seeing, you need to start working on improving your content (a common source of returning visitors), as opposed to improving your SEO (a common source of new visitors).

Step #6: Number of guest posts you scored

Image credit: ScottieT812

This is a good statistic to keep track of because it gives you an overall look at how much effort you’re focusing on your blog’s promotion.

Guest posting is by far the most effective way of attracting new audiences and building your brand and expertise. The more you do it, the more your blog will grow. Simple.

A good idea is to take a look at the stats for 2012 and set a goal for 2013 to improve on them. You can, for example, set out to increase your guest posting rate by 50% or so if possible.

Step #7: Number of guest post offers you received

Now let’s take it the other way around.

As your blog becomes more and more popular, you should start receiving some guest post offers yourself.

Basically, the more genuine offers you get, the better shape your blog is in. And genuine being the keyword here.

Genuine means that the offers come from real people who have researched your blog beforehand and not just some random spam-bloggers.

Again, this is not that much about the numbers. It’s more about the overall trend.

Step #8: Did you expand in any way?

This one is tricky. What I actually mean is did you include any additional product to your blog’s main offering (to your content)?

For instance, some things that are usually a nice addition to most blogs:

• Email newsletters (no fancy software required, nor any investments; try MailChimp).
• Any kind of products. Things like software, apps, packages of resources, etc. (PDF e-books of 15 pages or less don’t count.)
• Joint venture projects. Things you do with other bloggers in your niche.
• New branches of your blog. New domains that are part of your empire, or new “hub-sites” (there are many platforms that let you launch those; there’s a whole list at Website-builder.com).

In the end, the point here is to take a look at your blog as a more broad business than just the blog itself. If you’re serious about making your blog the next big thing then you should start thinking about expanding in one way or the other.

Step #9: Number of new subscribers

The nature of this metric is quite similar to the number of returning visitors, but subscribers actually deserve a separate place in every blogger’s heart.

(By subscribers I mean both RSS and email subscribers.)

The number of new subscribers you manage to attract every day is actually a great market research tool. Especially if you’re offering some bonus in exchange for signing up.

For instance, let’s say that your bonus in an e-book on {insert your topic of choice}. If you’re constantly attracting a healthy number of new subscribers, this means that the bonus is still a great answer to the market’s needs. But if this number starts declining then it’s probably a good moment to restructure your offerings (maybe your whole blog), and also to launch a new gift.

Note. You can monitor your stats through FeedBurner (RSS) or MailChimp (recommended email newsletter service).

Step #10: Pages/posts with the most SEO potential

Finally, the topic of SEO. The most favorite thing for all bloggers, right?

This isn’t about minding your rankings in general, though. You probably already do that on your own. This is about looking at the potential of some posts and pages on your blog.

Basically, the content that brings the most traffic (for fairly popular keywords) yet sits on the lowest positions in the rankings is the one with the most potential.

This may sound a bit complicated, so let me give you an example. Let’s say you have two pieces of content:

• Post #1; 100 visitors a day; #4 spot for a popular keyword on Google,
• Post #2; 130 visitors a day; #2 spot for a popular keyword on Google.

In such a scenario, post #1 is the one you should focus on in your next SEO campaign, even though it’s not your top performing post at the moment. That’s because once you get it to position #2 or #1, it will outperform post #2 massively.

Step #11: The average number of comments and shares

Let’s end the list with one pretty obvious metric that’s still important for the overall picture.

If you have comments enabled on your blog, you have a great way of evaluating how in-tune your content is with your audience and niche.

Similar story here, the numbers are not that important. What’s important this time is the relative difference between individual posts.

For instance, if one post has 20 shares, and another has 40, this basically means that the second one is two times more in-tune with your audience’s needs.

By using such an approach, you can pick the best posts on your blog, and then replicate their success in the future.

Even though a review is nothing mandatory for a blogger, I’m confident that it will pay off and make your blog better in 2013, so I really urge you to perform one. It will only take an hour…

I guess that’s it for my list, but feel free to ask me anything and also point out some other metrics you find important for a kickass New Year review.

This guest post is written by Tobi, an expert marketer with over 3 years of online experience that writes for Websitebuilder.net

Via: Legal Funding

Meet women in your niche for the purpose of both friendship and professional development by checking out any of these four female blogging meetups for 2013:

1. Blissdom Conference

If you’re a female blogger who will attend only a single industry event in 2013, the Blissdom Conference is an easy choice! Promising to be the premier destination for women on the web yet again this year, Blissdom will offer three days of speeches, panels, workshops, and the best networking opportunities that you’ll ever come across.

Besides its structure, Blissdom also provides an electric atmosphere of energy and creativity given the hundreds, or even thousands, of unique minds in attendance, giving you the opportunity to make alliances, gain inspiration, and learn new techniques in a setting that is fully conducive to making you better at what you do. No matter which aspects of the event you take advantage of, you’re guaranteed to leave refreshed, rebooted, and ready to tackle the web with renewed vigor!

When and Where: This year’s Blissdom Conference will take place at the Gaylord Texan hotel in Dallas, Texas, from March 21-23, 2013, bringing together ladies involved in a wide array of disciplines to share their blogging expertise.

2. Women Business Owners Conference

Whether you’re a lone blogger or a burgeoning web guru, your business needs every edge it can get when it comes to taking over the internet and being truly successful, and what better way to learn the secrets of success than by hearing directly from women who have made it happen for themselves?

The 2013 Women Business Owners Conference will bring together ladies from a wide variety of businesses, online and offline, in order to allow each to share their stories in the interest of giving everyone in attendance a leg up on their competition. Jam-packed into a single day, this low-cost event presents a fantastic opportunity to take your business-savvy to a new level, helping you to tackle your blogging endeavors from a fresh perspective once you return to your desk.

When and Where: Take in this one-day event by heading over to the Anaheim Marriott Hotel in Anaheim, California on March 22, 2013.

3. BlogHer ’13

Another of the premier industry events for female bloggers is the aptly named BlogHer conference, a gathering of women from every niche and every level of success that aims to help each to achieve new goals. You’ll take part in technical workshops and networking events, learning from some of the most prominent ladies in the business and allowing yourself to leave with a fresh mindset and new toolkit in the pursuit of your own personal success.

When and Where: If you needed an excuse to visit the exciting metropolis of Chicago, Illinois, now you’ve got it; BlogHer ’13 will take place in the Windy City from July 25-27, 2013. Whether you stay a day or a week, you can always get the best rates on the best accommodations at Chicagohotels.org.

4. Snap! Conference

Creativity is the name of the game at the Snap! Conference, with each aspect of the event helping to make you a better and more interesting blogger with its three days of dreaming, planning, and learning to implement. Instead of a rigid schedule alone, Snap! provides a place for bloggers to share their thoughts and ideas, inspiring one another all the while, and leading to each attendee becoming a more well-rounded and engaging writer.

When and Where: Visit the unique town of Salt Lake City, Utah, from April 18-20, 2013, in order to take part in this year’s Snap! Conference!

Using public domain or CC licensed content is the perfect way around that. You can use photos and videos as you like, not worrying about the cost or being sued for copyright. Which is ever bloggers wost nightmare, thanks to the many horror stories we are subjected to on the web.

Creative commons laws can be complex and difficult to understand, however. If you find yourself confused, you will probably remain so. Even experts and lawyers are not always certain of the application of copyright law. But these comics might help you to at least get the basics.

1. Nerdson

Friendly and helpful Nerson want’s to answer your questions about creative commons, such as whether or not you can use his comics on your blog. He goes through the different elements of the licensing basics, telling you about the different types and how to use them. It is long and text heavy, but endearing and well explained. Probably the best comic I have found on the topic, and definitely the most descriptive.

2. How It Works

Want something more simple and explaining the steps to getting a creative commons license for your own work? Let Anita show you show. Her new friend Ignacio will also show you how such things can be used, and how they should not be used. It is all a cute little Paint comic that tells you exactly what you need to know.

3. CC Infographic

This one isn’t exactly a comic, but an infographic. It breaks everything down in an easy to understand, well researched strip that you can share with others or keep as a quick reference. It even has some helpful and interesting information on the statistic use of CC content, the percentage covered by laws, how many were available at the time of it’s creation and more.

Further reading and resources:

• Dirjournal directory: Understanding Image Copyrights and Creative Commons
• SEosmarty: 15 Cartoonists That Allow Using Their Web Comics for Free
• TekSocial: Flickr creative commons

Do you know of any good creative commons infographics or comics that you would like to share? Let us know in the comments.

For many years digital video recorders (DVRs) offered stagnant technology that focused on a singular goal, recording in a fashion similar to traditional VCRs. However, in the last year Dish Network has rolled out its Hopper service and DirecTV has answered with the Genie DVR.

It is that DirecTV Genie service that has excited me once again about using DVR technology. Launched in December 2012 the DirecTV whole-house service offers the flexibility of DVR with the power of new technology.

The new service can serve up to eight televisions in a single home with four TVs recording shows at one time. Customers can sign up for the service with a new DirecTV contract and existing customers can upgrade for $300. DirecTV notes that many smart TVs, including new sets from Samsung come with the software already ready to be used by DirecTV customers.

As a new customers to DirecTV I was able to have the new technology installed with expert satellite installation at no additional cost and given the tech I received that was the cherry on top of the platform.

The Genie DVR comes in the form of the HR34 which features a nicely sized 1TB hard drive that connects to the homes main TV. Other TVs can then receive a C31 Genie Mini Client or customers can connect their RVU-capable Samsung HDTV.  The nicest part about the C31 Genie Mini Client is that it is extremely small compared to the main box, making it the perfect choice for wall mounted and flat panel TVs.

One of the biggest generalized complaints in recently years from customers has been the dated interface found on traditional DVRs, to combat that dated UI DirecTV has added a new interface that includes five easy to browse sections that includes: My DirecTV, Search & Browse, Recordings, Extras and Settings & Help. That’s not to say the “dated” menu is gone, the unit still features a grid guide that can be accessed six channels at a time and a mini guide that can allow for TV browsing while keeping the original program on the TV screen.

My one personal complaint is that a centralized box for recording does mean the possibility of a single point for failed equipment, with that being said, not having to pay for expensive DVRs in each room is a huge plus, especially in a home with 5 television sets.

From expert satellite installation to a ton of new features I couldn’t be any happier with my DirecTV Genie service. Satellite isn’t for everyone but given my choices of expensive cable TV or an easily accessible DVR product from DirecTV I think I made the right choice.

Classes such as VMware VCP-510 exam are growing in popularity because businesses want employees who can fully implement IT infrastructures for more dynamic and flexible datacenters with datacenter virualization that meets enterprise application SLAs and can increase time-to-market for application provisioning and upgrades.

VMWare offers various benefits for the workplace, here are a few of those benefits from the team at VMWare:

• Reduce costs by increasing energy efficiency and requiring less hardware with server consolidation
• Build up business continuity through improved disaster recovery solutions and deliver high availability throughout the datacenter with VMware Site Recovery Manager
• Virtualize enterprise apps, including Oracle, Exchange, SQL Server, SharePoint and SAP, and deliver the highest SLAs and top performance
• Gain policy-based automation and ensure compliance and performance with a zero-touch infrastructure using vCenter Operations Management Suite for virtualization management
• Learn why the Software-Defined Datacenter is the best and most efficient cloud infrastructure solution

Unfortunately implementing VMWare applications does not mean plugging in some system provided applications and letting them loose on your company’s infrastructure. IT technicians need to be properly trained in VMWare software and understand how that software can benefit the enterprise for whom they are employed.

Training in VMWare includes business centric training for the implementation of deploying desktops as a managed service, allowing for reduced costs and improved services across virtualized desktops.

The other type of training involves enterprise applications which allow for business-critical applications to be run. Enterprise solutions include the simplification of a businesses infrastructure, maximizing efficiency,and eliminated over-provisioning through standardized service catalogs that are on-demand in minutes.

Whether you work for a small, medium or large scale business, the option of VMWare can make all of your IT infrastructure changes faster, more secure and easier on IT technicians.

VMWare offers the opportunity to streamline a company’s infrastructure while offering many benefits. If you are serious about helping your IT team cut costs study up on VMWare and learn what it takes to properly utilize the technology.