Sunday, May 29, 2011

Top Seven Tools For Budding Webmasters

You’ve finally finished building your very first website and whether you built it from scratch or used a template from Wordpress or Joomla or some other CMS source, unfortunately your work is still not complete. Even if you’ve packed the site with thrilling content and wonderful writing and the design is impeccable, you’re still going to have to wade into the somewhat murky world of search engine optimisation if you want people to actually read it. This article will look at the very best tools to help you tweak your site for the search engines.


Before you do anything however, you’ll need to look into what keywords you should be targeting to get your site to rank well in the search engines. Whether you intend to run your own organic SEO campaign or go for Pay Per Click advertising you’ll still need to choose the right keywords before you do anything else and this is best done, initially at least with a pen and paper. Take half an hour to quickly note down all the search phrases you would use and the words you would type in if you were searching for a site like your own. Repeat the process for your competitor’s site and you’ll very soon have a decent list of search terms that will bring the right kind of traffic to your site.

 
Now you’re ready to start working on search engine optimization you’ll need to get to grips with some of the tools that will make your day to day work a bit easier. Here are seven which are popular with webmasters:


Google Analytics – Google provide Google Analytics for free, allowing site owners and webmasters to track the activity on their website and to study certain categories such as average time spent on the site, bounce rate, pages viewed per visit, page views and page hits. Google Analytics is invaluable in helping you to make sense of your site’s search traffic, the value of your keywords and the performance of your content.


Link Diagnosis – A popular tool for analysing links and link competition. Link analysis reports on link competition by giving you details of a competitor’s links. Link Diagnosis lists page rank and anchor text amongst other things, but is limited to use with the Firefox browser.

 
SEO Logs – SEO Logs offers a wide range of tools such as Keyword difficulty check, SEO optimizer, on-page SEO and Google tools for detecting any fake PR results. Also useful are the included HTTP headers and status check features, the back link analyser, the domain age checker, Adsense profit calculator and the ability to compare Alexa rankings.


Alexa – Alexa is another tool you should get to grips with. Alexa is used as a way of measuring websites’ popularity by using browsers toolbars. 

 

Key Complete – Key Complete is best used for working out a competitor’s keywords when conducting a PPC campaign. A useful online tool.

 

SEO Moz – One of the main tasks performed by SEOmoz is to detect any errors on your site, monitor and track your traffic and research keywords. Receives reports from search engines including Yahoo, Google and Alexa.


Widexl – Widexl is useful to help you understand link popularity and the pages that link to your website. In addition there is a Meta tag analyser which looks at keyword density, meta tags, page loading time and other similar SEO related details.

Alex is a blogger and seo consultant. He currently writes for the Bedouin Group on finance and the contracting sector, covering everything from mortgages to umbrella companies.

 

Thursday, May 26, 2011

How to Turn SEO Into a Job

Image: jscreationzs / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

A lot of us would love the opportunity to stay home and work from home. To be able to pay our bills, yet wake up when we’d like, as well as work certain days of the week, that’s a dream to many. One opportunity that can make that happen is through Search Engine Optimization, also known as SEO.

If you’re looking to start your own business in the field of SEO, here are a few ways you can start that today.



Create a site or multiple sites: In order to get you started, you need a website plan. What would you like your site to be about? It’s a good idea to stick with something that is unique, has low competition, as well as one that is highly searched. For example, weight loss will be a challenge because of all the weight loss sites, but maybe something like food processors would work better because of the low competition.

Now think to yourself, how are you going to make money? Are you going to provide an online service, promote products through affiliates, or maybe even just rely on things like Google Ads. It’s up to you, as long as you have a plan and some type of outline.

Create helpful content: Websites need content. You will find that the more content you have on your site, the more visitors you’re going to have. That translates into the more visitors you have the more money you will make over time.

Consider ads: Ads are usually people’s highest payer. The more ads visitors click on, the more money you will make as a website holder. These can be costly, but if they have a good return it’s worth it.

Get links: It’s important that you get good links back to your site. The more links you have pointing to your site, the more authoritative it is, as well as the higher it’ll rank in the search engines. You can get links by providing good content on your site, as well as doing things like guest posting.

Spread the word: Spread the word of your site. Tell your friends about it, have them tell their friends and the word can spread quickly if you have a good site. Also, try social bookmarking. Create a Facebook fan page or even a Twitter account.

As you can see, there are a few things you can do to help create a job in SEO. The most important thing is that you wait for your sites to age. You need a lot of patience, age for site, and a lot of links to help boost you in the search engines. Work hard, wait a few years, and hopefully you’ll see the money come your way.

This article was written by the writer of MyJobApps.com, a website that offers 1,000+ Online Job Applications, as well as the job descriptions and salaries for each one.

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Read And Make The Right Choice!

Web designing industry is faced with numerous changes on daily basis. The trends in the web designing change over the night. Currently website redesigning becomes the most valuable activity to increase more and more visitors to your website. For this, you have to update your website designing by taking the help of any professional web designer or web design company, if you wish to survive in the market.

If you want to keep yourself updated with the current trends, following links are worthy of being visited.

Design Meltdown














If you are looking for the latest and updated design elements, and if you wish to learn the latest trends in the market or you have some problems to be solved, simply log on to Design Meltdown. This is a tutorial specially designed to cater such issues with lot of chapters on design principles and the styling, plus the other elements like color or themes as well.

Red Acorn














This is the place where you can get maximum help in web designing. If you wish to learn how to plan or market out any website or even how to publish your website, there is no better option than Red Acorn.

Boogie Jack














It features tutorials to help you out with CSS and other resources with an HTML format. You can also get few tips for hosting and if you are looking for tips for SEO and easy website money, there is no better option than Boogie Jack.

Alertbox










Learn more about the top mistakes that web designers make from Alertbox. You will get many tips to improve your work here. This is being hosted by Jakob Neilsen.

Save The Pixel





This is a complete book for web designers and it is available now to be downloaded. The whole book might turn out to be costy, however, you can download the first chapter for free. The first chapter includes information on the designing, pixel usage and many more.








Network For Good






You can view different campaigns here for free. If you are looking for online tips and tricks of marketing, log onto it and get started with it instantly.

Designer Talk







This is the leading forum of web designers. You can get a lot of information on designing, advertising and marketing here.

Web Developer’s Handbook 2.0






If you enjoy designing and you have free time to experience with your designing tactics, this place is a paradise for you. Articles here range from quality and creativity to accessibility and CSS tools.

Web Design Trends for 2009



















Find out more on the popular trends of the market through Web Design Trends for 2009.

Monday, May 23, 2011

javascript: Changing text

How to dynamically change text on HTML page with jscript? It is relatively easy to do this. Learn how to make web page where you can changing text with one click on link.

In this guide you will find how to:

  • make a simple javascript function to change text after click on the link

  • change text to two different words with click on first or second link with calling one javascript function

  • change text of one link to "pressed" or "unpressed" after clicking that link

  • hide and show text with changing link text to "show" or "hide"

In this samples text inside Div element is changed after click on link. You should know that it is possible to change text in various HTML elements such as buttons, paragraphs, text in drop down lists...

For more useful javascript effect tips follow the link.

Changing text with javascript after clicking a link

In this demo text will be changed after you click "Change text to AAA" link or another link "Change text to BBB". One link change text to first version ("Text changed to AAA") and a second link change text to another version ("Text changed to BBB").

Demo:

Change text to AAAChange text to BBB

This text will be changed

Here is a HTM/jscript code responsible for changing text demo:


<script language="javascript">
function changeTextToAAA()
{
document.getElementById("divA").innerHTML = 'Text changed to AAA';
}

function changeTextToBBB()
{
document.getElementById("divA").innerHTML = 'Text changed to BBB';
}
</script>

<a href="javascript:changeTextToAAA();">Change text to AAA</a>
<a href="javascript:changeTextToBBB();">Change text to BBB</a>

<div id="divA"><h4>This text will be changed</h4></div>

Explanation of code:

  • Text is in the div element with id=divA

  • when "Change text to AAA" link is clicked javascript function changeTextToAAA() is called

  • In javascript function changeTextToAAA() innerHTML of divA (where text is stored) is changed to text "Text changed to AAA"

  • Each HTML element has an innerHTML property that defines both the HTML code and the text that occurs between that element's opening and closing tag

  • same principle for "Change text to BBB" link, when "Change text to BBB" is clicked it call function changeTextToBBB() which change text (innerHTML of divA to "Text changed to BBB")

Changing text with only one jscript function called from two links


Demo:

Change text to FirstChange text to Second

This text will be changed

In this demo text is changed to "First" or "Second" after clicking one of the links which call one jscript function with input parameter with text which appear.

Take a look at code:


<script language="javascript">
function changeText(newText)
{
document.getElementById("divB").innerHTML = newText;
}
</script>

<a href="javascript:changeText('First');">Change text to First</a>
<a href="javascript:changeText('Second');">Change text to Second</a>

<div id="divB"><h4>This text will be changed</h4></div>

Explanation of code:

  • Text is in the div element with id=divB

  • when "Change text to First" link is clicked javascript function changeText() is called with parameter 'First' - so call to function look like changeText('First')

  • word entered for input parameter is passed to jscript function which change text to this word - in this case this word is First but if jscript function changeText is called like changeText('MyText') then text will be changed to "MyText"

  • In javascript function changeText() innerHTML of divB (where text is stored) is changed to text from input parameter 'First'

  • same thing for "Change text to Second" link, when "Change text to Second" is clicked it call function changeText('Second') and changing text to "Second" (innerHTML of divB to "Second")

One link changing text to pressed or unpressed


Demo:

Unpressed

When page is loaded link text is "Unpressed". Press link and its text is updated to "Pressed". Click link again ant its text is changing to "Unpressed"...

Sample code:


<script language="javascript">
function changeTextOfLink()
{
var link = document.getElementById("linkClick");

if (link.innerHTML == "Unpressed")
{
link.innerHTML = 'Pressed';
}
else
{
link.innerHTML = 'Unpressed';
}
}
</script>

<a href="javascript:changeTextOfLink();" id="linkClick">Unpressed</a>

Explanation of code:


  • Link with id=linkClick have text "Unpressed", its innerHTML value is "Unpressed"

  • when link linkClick is clicked jscript function changeTextOfLink() is called

  • jscript function changeTextOfLink() check the innerHTML property of link id=linkClick, if link innerHTML property have value "Unpressed" it is changed to "Pressed"

  • when link is clicked again (second time) it have innerHTML value set to "Pressed", then jscript function changeTextOfLink() change innerHTML value to "Unpressed"

Hide or show text in div and changing link text to "Hide" or "Show"

Hide

This div will be hidden




In this javascript demonstration div tag with text "This div will be hidden" is hided when use click link with "Hide" text. Link text is changed to "Show". When user click link again, div element with text "This div will be hidden" will be showed and link text is changing to "Hide".

Code:


<script language="javascript">
function divToHide(divToHideOrShow) {
var link = document.getElementById("linkId1");
var div = document.getElementById(divToHideOrShow);

if (div.style.display == "block")
{
div.style.display = "none";
link.innerHTML = 'Show'
}
else
{
div.style.display = "block";
link.innerHTML = 'Hide';
}
}
</script>

<a href="javascript:divToHide('divShowHide');" id="linkId1">Hide</a>
<div id="divShowHide" style="position:absolute; display: block"><h4>This div will be hidden</h4></div>

What this code do:


  • Link with id=linkId1 and text "Hide" on click call jscript function divToHide

  • in div element with id=divShowHide is text "This div will be hidden"

  • when link lnikId1 is clicked jscript function divToHide() is called

  • jscript function divToHide check if div element divShowHide is hidden or showed

  • if div element divShowHide is showed (div.style.display == "block") then div divShowHide is hided and text of link linkId1 is changing to "Show"

  • if div element divShowHide is hided then div divShowHide is showed and text of link linkId1 is changing to "Hide"

Failing the Right Way with Email Marketing: How Trial and Error can Lead to Future Success

Email marketing maintains a paradoxical approach to effective internet marketing. It works yet it doesn’t work. How can this be so? Basically, email marketing is always a work in progress. Due to the enormously negative sentiment some potential customers have towards spamming, they might be a little closed minded towards certain email marketing pitches. Yet, there are others that have discovered a logical and effective personalized approach to email marketing which can deliver excellent results.

The key here is learning how to fail the right way on the path to email marketing success. Basically, you really need to employ trial and error to succeed with emails marketing. Abandoning email marketing too soon or prematurely means you might not live up to your potential. Rather than do this, it is best to learn how to fail in the right manner. In other words, you need to test the email marketing waters and analyze what when right and what went wrong. Once you analyze the feedback, you can then make effective determinations so as to improve performance.

In short, you will want to avoid getting discouraged when you start an internet marketing campaign. Instead, you simply want to build on your efforts. Doing so certainly will increase your chances for success and history is filled with great examples of this.

Among the most famous saying ever made by a historical figure would be Thomas Edison’s quip after having failed to get a light bulb to work even after 1,000 tries. The legendary Mr. Edison said, “I did not fail. I learned 1,000 ways how not to make a light bulb.

He was right. More importantly, he did become the man who eventually invented the light bulb.

No other inventor at the time found the proper path to make a light bulb. Many tried and many ended up quitting when trying. And out of all the inventers and tinkerers on the globe, only Edison found the path to actually create a light bulb.

Is there a moral here? Yes, it would be that there are really no failures on the road to progress as long as you keep making progress. That is the true lesson that email marketers need to understand.

Here is how all this works as far as email marketing is concerned:

The first step in determining the progress you are making with your initial email marketing ventures. If you gain a small conversion rate, that is a good thing. You are clearly doing something right. If you are getting no buyers, you need to realize you have a really weak campaign and need to make changes. An honest and critical assessment of your campaign needs to be undertaken to ensure you correct any flaws that are present. Trying to convince yourself your email campaign is brilliant when it is not delivering results just won’t help you succeed. So, avoid being dishonest in your self-assessments of your email marketing campaigns.

Often, the problem with an email marketing campaign is the target audience and the other problem is the message. Are you effectively targeting the proper opt-in audience? Does the message you are sending to those on your list appear timely and does it present effective advertising marketing copy? The first question can be answered with a simple yes or no and if you are not sending messages to an audience that has opted in, you can make the needed adjustment easily. You either need to create an opt-in function to build a list or you need to purchase such a list from a reliable source.

As for the second half of the equation, if you are not using effective and timely ad copy, you will need to slowly analyze what is wrong with it. When you are unable to determine the problem, you should ask others for their honest and informed opinion. At this point, you can absorb what they have told you and make adjustments. Be open-minded to constructive criticism and you will discover you email marketing campaign increases exponentially.

One thing to be mindful of here is that there is a science to email marketing. Of course, each email marketing campaign is different so you cannot employ a standardized approach with every campaign. You will need to tailor the scientific components of email marketing to your own unique needs and this is only derived from honest assessment of feedback, foibles and fumbles, and a commitment to improving a little bit each time you try.  Once you do get into the proverbial groove of how to make email marketing work, you will discover how potentially lucrative it can be.

Mariana Fang Lin is an avid blogger and writes throughout the blogosphere. She really likes writing about mobile marketing, business web hosting services, and SEO strategy. You can follow Mariana on Twitter here.

Friday, May 20, 2011

Reasons The Web Designers Are Preferring CMS Over Other Options

The way web sites are designed has undergone significant changes in recent times, with the trend leaning towards more user friendly, interactive sites with social media integration. The web users now prefer the websites that offer them enhanced interaction facilities and are intuitive in nature. This trend has contributed in a way behind the rise of the CMS based websites. Using a CMS application to design a website helps the website design professionals to create websites that are user friendly, useful and presentable. That explains why CMS apps like WordPress and Joomla have become popular with website design companies.

There are various benefits of using a CMS based app to design a website. First of all, CMS apps make administering and maintaining a web site easier than ever before. Earlier, the web site developers had to spend a lot of time updating and maintaining website designed in conventional method. However, with CMS site administration and maintenance woes have become a thing of the past, literally. In fact, web developers with little HTML expertise can easily make professional looking websites using the CMS apps.

In a CMS based website, the website design professionals can change the template without bothering about the content. This is because content and template updating are two separate processes under CMS. This makes site updating a hassle free affair. Apart from that, website administration is very much flexible with CMS. From anywhere the developers can log in the web and make the modifications in the website. It also saves the developers a lot of time in the process. A number of developers can work on the same website running on CMS from various places which is a significant advantage.

CMS Web design is also ideal for making a website search engine friendly efficiently. It makes generating RSS feeds easier and the users can access these feeds according to their convenience.

For making a CMS based site, a website design company is not likely to run short on creative designs. The top CMS apps come with a huge number of layouts and templates meant for making various types of websites. These layouts can be heavily customized which reduces the chances of a site looking like a replica of another. The CMS apps also have a number of extensions and plug-in which come for free. These can be used by website developers to extend the capabilities significantly and offer more features to the users.

Pankaj has been working as an internet marketing expert in a leading website design company, for the past 2 years. He has also written articles on different topics such as website design, Search Engine Optimization, logo design, graphic design etc.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Avoiding the Hackers while Browsing the Internet

Even though internet security has become much more advanced over the last few years, cyber criminals are still at the same game of trying to get malicious software installed onto user’s computers.  The newer versions of Internet Explorer are very good at stopping Trojan horse viruses from getting on your computer in the first place but many people still ignore the warning signals and go ahead and download the bad software anyway.  This is because hackers are using a new strategy called social engineering.

This new kind of hacking involves making the computer user think that they need to download this software in order to view a certain video, open a file, or view a certain website.  These schemes are hitting the social networking world hard as well.  Facebook users are seeing messages from “friends” asking them to rate a picture or check out a video.  When the user clicks on the link it sends them to a website asking for them to download the software so they can view it.

Internet Explorer and other secure internet browsers are detecting these Trojan horse techniques, but still some people are ignoring those warnings and downloading the malicious software anyway.  In fact Yahoo news just ran a story that claimed that Windows users are downloading malicious software at a rate of over 7% for every download.  This alarming rate means that more people are getting bad software installed on their PCs and laptops all the time.  The best way to beat the hackers is to be aware of what they are doing and know how we can stop these harmful tactics.

Another tactic is to make the computer user think they have a virus installed on their computer and that they need to download a certain “anti-virus program” to get rid of it.  In all actuality, this “antivirus program” is the virus itself.  Never trust a pop-up asking you to download an anti-virus program you have never heard of.  Or at least look up the name of the software first and see if it is legit or not.  In most cases if you have a good anti-virus system like Kaspersky or Norton you will not need to download a new one.

I do recommend that every computer user at least has a good malware detecting program on it.  Some of the most popular ones are Ad-Aware, Advanced System Care, and Super Anti-spyware.  I know the last one has a funny name but it is very thorough in detecting and deleting any kind of spyware, malware, or even adware from your computer.

The biggest problem with these malicious programs is that they can eventually lead to your identity theft.  Certain thieves are targeting specific users in a method called spearphishing which involves showing you pop-ups and warnings that relate to something you were just searching for online.  Or maybe you just took a vacation and the window will display something about your trip.  The hackers figure that with better security in internet browsers they need to use mind games to hack into our lives.  But to keep your identity safe you should only download programs that you know and trust.  Even if it takes doing some extra research just to be sure, it is worth your time and effort.

Phillip is a writer for an ID theft awareness site that compares some of the best identity theft protection services and writes reiews of each one.  You can also find some cool products like RFID blocking wallets to help protect your credit cards.

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Show or hide multiple divs

In this tutorial you will learn how to hide multiple div elements with only one action (for example click on button). To hide or show HTML elements javascript is used. Usually for hiding and showing HTML elements, HTML elements are placed in one div tag and this div tag is hided or showed with a help of javascript.

Here you can find two demonstrations:

  • how to make one jscript function which can be called from multiple places on web page

  • how to hide multiple divs with only one click link

If you didn't find exactly what you need in this article try How to show or hide with jscript tips or javascript effects tutorials.

One javascript function which can be reused to hide multiple divs elements

Demonstration:

show/hide Div A

Div A


show/hide Div B

Div B

Here is a sample of javascript function divHideShow with one parameter - id of div you want to hide or show. This code hide or show divA with click on link show/hide Div A which call a function divHideShow. For link show/hide Div B same function divHideShow is called to hide divB (but with divB parameter).


<script language="javascript">
function divHideShow(divToHideOrShow)
{
var div = document.getElementById(divToHideOrShow);

if (div.style.display == "block")
{

div.style.display = "none";
}
else
{

div.style.display = "block";
}


}
</script>

<a href="javascript:divHideShow('divA');">show/hide Div A</a>
<div id="divA" style="position:absolute; display: block"><h4>Div A</h4></div>
<br />
<a href="javascript:divHideShow('divB');">show/hide Div B</a>
<div id="divB" style="display: block"><h4>Div B</h4></div>

In this example div elements are in two line. Sometimes you could find useful tutorial how to place div elements in one line side by side.

If you want to change text of link when you click on the link to "Show" or "Hide" check Show and hide with javascript summary.

Hide or show multiple divs with only one click

Demonstration

show/hide Div C and Div D

Div C



Div D



Here is a sample of code which hide two div tags with only one click on link show/hide Div C and Div D.


<script language="javascript">
function divHideShow(divToHideOrShow)
{
var div = document.getElementById(divToHideOrShow);

if (div.style.display == "block")
{
div.style.display = "none";
}
else
{
div.style.display = "block";
}

}
</script>

<a href="javascript:divHideShow('divC');divHideShow('divD');">show/hide Div C and Div D</a>
<div id="divC" style="position:absolute; display: block"><h4>Div C</h4></div>
<br />
<div id="divD" style="display: block"><h4>Div D</h4></div>

If you need to center div elements set margin-right and margin-left to auto.

Monday, May 16, 2011

Make Your Website a Magnet for Search Engine Spiders

After setting up your website, your next goal is to make it visible in search engines so that more people could visit it. But this cannot happen until you have made some modifications to make your website search engine friendly. If no search engine optimization strategies are applied in your site, you have poor chances of getting found on Google, MSN or Bing.

It is however not advisable to design the website based on search engine friendliness. You want it to be friendly both to users and search engines. Putting too much emphasis on search engine optimization could hurt your page rank later on.

Put it in Text

Websites pages need to be in HTML text format so the search engines can index them. Flash files, images and other non-text contents will not be visible to search engine spiders unless they are indexed within the content. So, when using images, be sure to include a written transcript or description so they can be picked up by search engines easily.

Creating Smart Link Structure

When it comes to website pages, it is important to put links within them so search engines can easily navigate on them. When picking a keyword for your links, be sure to use a user friendly description. Aside from benefits of getting indexed quickly, creating quality links also ensure good experience for users.

The Power of ‘alt’ Tags

An image alt tag is basically a keyword or description attached to an image. It is mainly used to tell users as well as the spiders to identify what the image is. While a complete description is not feasible, it will be best to have something in there. It is not necessary to put alt tags in all images but be sure to put one on your primary image such as your logo.

The Role of Keywords in Page Rank

Appropriate usage and placement of keywords in content is the key to effective search engine optimization. Since search engine spiders index and rank pages through keywords, it is important to use the right keywords in the description, URL and content.

It is best to use keywords at least three times on every page. Underlining or bolding of keywords will give spiders hints on which words to attach more importance to. If possible, include keywords on the title as well. Be careful however, not to overuse keywords as this may also have negative effects on your site. Search engine algorithms might identify your site as a spammer and ban you from search engines for good.

Watch Out for Black Hat Search Engine Optimization

Another practice you might want to avoid in search engine optimization is content duplication. Copying the contents of other sites could get your website penalized. Search engines don’t usually show duplicate content anyway. So, why bother taking risks?

Search engines also warn against doorway pages, shadow domains, scumware and spyware. These are not the way to go if you want to reach page one of Google. They may work for awhile but you will eventually get caught and disappear in the face of Google earth.

Making your site accessible for the major search engines is one of the basics of any search engine optimizaton strategy (interesting to know is that the Danish term is søgemaskineoptimering). You can read more useful SEO tips, from this great article.