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How To Create High Quality Landing Pages For Google Adwords

// November 27th, 2009 // No Comments » // Google, Internet, Twitter

Google Adwords can drive you crazy with its “secret formula” for favorable ad placement and impressions. “Do I have the right keywords?” “Maybe my ads aren’t eye catching.” Just when you think you’ve got the formula figured out, Google changes the rules. Here is a tip that will work no matter what…deliver what your ad promises. More than anything, Google wants you to help them create a positive experience for their users. Create a quality landing page that does that and you and Google Adwords will become very good friends.

Too many Google Adwords marketers spend their time on keywords and ads, and leave the landing page out of the equation. Doing so can leave marketers scratching their heads when their cost per click remains high and conversions remain low. Despite all of the complicated theories about how to succeed with Google Adwords, it comes to this one fact: Google rewards or punishes its advertisers based on how well they solve the problem that Google’s searcher has. If your ad says “Learn Guitar In 2 Days” then the content on your landing page better have them playing like Eddie Van Halen within 48 hours. Anything short of that will, sooner or later, result in a Google “slap” where your impressions from Google Adwords are severely reduced or cut off altogether.

Here are some key elements of a good Google Adwords landing page:

1. Deliver on the promise of your ad – As I said before, this is the biggest key to success. If you solve the searcher’s problem/issue, you win. If your searcher clicks off of your page and begins another search, Google tracks it and penalizes you. Deliver on your promise and Google rewards you with lower cost per click and more impressions.
2. Make your page original – Unlike in the past, mass produced “replicated sites” no longer work. Google values giving their searchers unique and high quality information. Mass produced site, with their duplicate content, was watering down Google’s search results so they put an end to their use by penalizing advertisers that used them. Your landing page is your chance to “wow” your visitor. Make it count by making your landing page unique, novel and personal. Google will reward you for ending a search on your landing page by lowering your cost per click and increasing your number of impressions.
3. One page does not fit all – Your visitors decide in just a few seconds whether to stay on your site or click off. Be sure the top of your page matches the ad they clicked on. This is where, as good marketer, you can really excel. Maximize your conversions across all ads by creating a landing page for each ad. This mainly involves customizing the top portion of the page. The rest of the page can remain the same for all pages.
4. Get to the point – How long should your landing page be? Exactly as long as it takes to convey your message effectively. No more, no less. Grammar counts! Leave the misspellings and bad punctuation for the amateurs.
5. Have a goal in mind for your visitors – Are you trying to make a sale or get a lead? Have a goal in mind before creating your page and write your copy to lead them to that conclusion. Focus on one goal per page.
6. Increase conversions with a bonus – Everyone responds to “Free.” Adding a bonus to sweeten the deal will increase conversions. Information products work great and they don’t cost you anything.
7. Credibility counts – You are an experienced, successful business person. Your page should convey that. Graphics should augment your page copy, not compete with it. Leaving white space on your page is a good thing. Also, audio or video that launches when your visitor accesses the page is a big no-no. Your page should be welcoming without looking like a Vegas billboard.
8. Be trustworthy – Trust is a huge issue online. Anything you can do to be transparent is a plus. For example, are you a member of the Better Business Bureau? Put your member logo on your page! Same for site security certifications. Also, let your visitors know a little bit about you. Nothing really personal but you want your readers to feel like you are a real person.

This can seem like a lot to remember until you understand that all of these tips boil down to being a real and genuine person online. With billions of pages of content to wade through, people crave quality and trustworthy professionals to do business with. When you think about it, Google Adwords has set the bar very low for online marketers. Be a professional and deliver on your promise, the same as in any other kind of business. Just these two simple things will give you a huge advantage over the competition.

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Trish Thackston – Still struggling with your online marketing efforts? Brookview Partners mentors new home-based entrepreneurs using our proven five principle approach. Click below to get our free report => http://www.thehomebusinessroadmap.com

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

How To Create High Quality Landing Pages For Google Adwords

Is the workplace subverting social communications and intimacy?

// November 27th, 2009 // No Comments » // Google, Internet, Twitter

Last night my friend was again giving me a ticking off for not having looked at his beloved TED website. Today, though, I did. The videos on its home page display an array of interesting subjects, but the one that caught my eye was Stefana Broadbent’s discussion on the universal use of IM, texting, Facebook and Twitter and the “spoiling of human intimacy”.

As an opener, let’s look at this lady’s credentials and then find out what she has to say on the subject: Stefana Broadbent is a digital ethnographer who, over the past twenty years has been investigating the evolution of digital activities in the workplace and at home to monitor the changes in social practices. Her TED biography describes her as: “a cognitive scientist, [who] has spent decades observing people as they use technology, both at home and in complex workspaces such as air-traffic control towers…that speaks volumes on the way we think about our relationships.”

Here I summarise five main aspects of Stefana’s research:
•    A typical user spends 80% of his or her time communicating with just four other people;
•    People use different communications technologies in distinct and divergent ways;
•    There has been a diminution of voice communication and an increase in written channels;
•    Instead of work invading our private lives, our private communications are now invading the workplace;
•    People in general do not like to work while on the move: hotel rooms and airports are not valued as appropriate environments for substantive work and are mainly used for email.

Based on her in-depth research about the changing relationship between work and social relationships that has irreducibly altered, there are now around one billion people in continuous technological contact. However, as Ms Broadbent’s research shows, up to eighty percent of these exchanges, regardless of the channel, are with only five people.

Among the psychological community, the worry is that these new forms of communication has led to emotional dependence, which for the obsessive is perhaps true; while the concerns of the sociologists are that “tele-cocooning” has bred a “retreat from public engagement”. Personally, I enjoy extreme use of communications technology during my time at work and then leave it alone entirely (except for the mobile in arranging venues with friends) and then enter entirely into verbal dialogue in the evenings and at weekends. What, may I ask, is so dependent and introverted about that?

Thankfully, I work for my own company so I can choose what method of communication I like, but that is not the case for the majority whose companies have long been concerned about the excessive use of company time to catch up with people using their own, private, digital space.

In Ms Broadbent’s video, she points out that workplaces, administrations and schools have for a very long time set limits and regulations on the amount of time employees are permitted to use devices and websites to communicate with their friends and family.

Being that an employee is paid to be there, that comes as no great surprise. But introducing penalties ranging from confiscation, fines, blocking access to social networking sites, instant messaging, private email accounts and cell phone usage, it all seems a bit stringent in this age of advanced digital communications.

Socially, what seems to be happening is that today’s employees are challenging the need for companies to block their digital interactions, in direct contradiction to company policy that forbids it in order for them to be “productive and effective”. But does that necessarily mean companies are subverting people’s relationships?

Subversion, Ms Broadbent argues, has been going on over the last 150 years, and that the private sphere has always been banned from the workplace. Society in general, she says, has functioned on the inculcating principle that “attention, isolation and productivity” are all interrelated and that employers have enforced these principles so that communications can only be directed towards the external rather than internal. So is it now the case now that private communication is somehow threatening these entrenched “ethical” values of the school and workplace?

The revolution of the personal perhaps started in earnest from the mid-1990s when people started to use email on their PCs, followed by mobile phones. It has since advanced into strands of a social media milieu that so threatens the educational and corporate hierarchies that they have moved to restrict access to such usage. Not in my back yard but I believe what she says is true.

Her research seems to empirically demonstrate that personal communication at school and in the workplace is more about trust than lost production. Perhaps it has always been that way, but haven’t people always found ways to circumnavigate the status quo?

You can listen to the full video at TED: Stefana Broadbent

John Sylvester is the media director of V9 Design & Build and an expert in search engine optimization and web marketing strategies.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Is the workplace subverting social communications and intimacy?

Microsoft launches battle with Google in News Corp pact

// November 26th, 2009 // No Comments » // Google, Internet, Twitter

Following all the shenanigans of late about News Corp threatening to put their content behind paywalls and blocking Google from using its content, the last few days have seen them courting Microsoft in a deal where their content would only be found on Bing.

According a story in weblogs.hitwise.com, the two companies are in negotiations for Bing to become the “exclusive indexer” of their news content. All well and good but do the figures add up? The article shows that: “As of last week, WSJ.com’s referred and non-referred traffic from Google and Google News amounted to 15.3% and 11.0% respectively…The potential loss of Google News traffic is potentially more serious. As reported here, over the three years, WSJ.com’s traffic from Google News has grown from 2% to over 11%…Bing, a potential News Corp suitor for search exclusivity provides less than half of Google News’ volume…”

The story broke a couple of days ago in the Financial Times’ website, saying, “Microsoft has had discussions with News Corp over a plan that would involve the media company being paid to ‘de-index’ its news websites from Google, setting the scene for a search engine battle that could offer a ray of light to the newspaper industry.”

One of the more interesting slants on this story is that: “the Financial Times has learnt that Microsoft has also approached other big online publishers to persuade them to remove their sites from Google’s search engine.” It appears then that, “Microsoft’s interest is being interpreted as a direct assault on Google because it puts pressure on the search engine to start paying for content.”

We all know that the newspaper industry is still trying to construct an online business model that somehow stems the descent of print revenues, but now Microsoft’s deals are being evaluated by antitrust regulators. This is a company desperate to catch up with Google in internet search with the release of Bing this year, as we all know.

With much ado about, well, something, and with other news media outlets all supplying content for free, this deal to block Google in exchange for cash cannot surely be a viable way for News Corp to improve the bottom line for their media outlets? Even more troublesome for News Corp, these deals may not even be legal.

According to DailyFinance.com, several of their legal experts have concluded that: “It could violate anti-trust laws, says to Michael J. Thomas, a principal at the St. Louis law firm Harness Dickey. ‘Anti-competitive behavior is where you’re trying to impair or eliminate someone’s ability to compete against you,’ says Thomas. The fundamental principle is that competition is good for consumers. For Microsoft to pay News Corp (NWS) specifically to withhold its content from Google while making it available to other search engines ’strikes me as more anti-competitive than competitive’.”

The article continues: “Another possibility is that Google could argue that, by inducing News Corp to sever its existing relationship with Google, Microsoft is committing so-called ‘tortious interference’. Typically, that’s when two parties have a contract and a third party induces one of the two to breach that contract. [Although] there’s no contract that entitles Google to index News Corp’s stories, Google could make a case that its longstanding access to those articles creates a ‘valid business expectancy’, which in some instances is sufficient to allow a tortious interference claim to go forward.”

Even if the antitrust lawsuits give Microsoft the green light, Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt has said before: “In general these models [paying for online content] have not worked for general public consumption because there are enough free sources that the marginal value of paying is not justified based on the incremental value of quantity. So my guess is for niche and specialist markets…it will be possible to do it but I think it is unlikely that you will be able to do it for all news.”

It is highly unlikely that other online publishers will follow Mr Murdoch’s lead or they would have done so by now, but it looks likely that the Microsoft-News Corp deal is an attempt to undo the big men of search. Some hope.

John Sylvester is the media director of V9 Design & Build (http://www.v9designbuild.com) and an expert in search engine optimization and web marketing strategies.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Microsoft launches battle with Google in News Corp pact

3 Superb SEO Plugins for Your WordPress Blog

// November 26th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Google, Internet, Twitter

Search engine helps you to generate traffic, but consequently Search Engine Optimization is very complicated, which beginners and expert bloggers dismay in joining such a strategy for achieving traffic. Starting a wordpress by default is pretty suitable at letting search engines see what’s happening. Fortunately, there are wide varieties of plugins accessible to keep you attain a good ranking for your blog, lessen that the stress of typing the code of your blog to obtain results of the search engines.

Here are some very beneficial SEO plugins to help you build a better wordpress blog.

Redirection

In improving our wordpress blogs, we cannot avoid our permalinks to be broken. This happens when you make changes to an old post, or maybe in upgrading or improving your wordpress blog also when you make changes on your permalinks. These changes can break up your entire wordpress blog.

Ill explain what really happens behind these changes, each post has its own URL this is what we call permalinks. When it is broken, those visitors won’t find your blog post. The redirection plugin helps you to redirect the visitors to follow the new permalink. So that your traffic will work efficiently.

features include by John Godley:

• 404 error monitoring – captures a log of 404 errors and allows you to easily map these to 301 redirects
• Custom ‘pass-through’ redirections allowing you to pass a URL through to another page, file, or website.
• Full logs for all redirected URLs
• All URLs can be redirected, not just ones that don’t exist
• Redirection methods – redirect based upon login status, redirect to random pages, redirect based upon the referrer!

Existing features include:

• Automatically add a 301 redirection when a post’s URL changes
• Manually add 301, 302, and 307 redirections for a WordPress post, or for any other file
• Full regular expression support
• Apache .htaccess is not required – works entirely inside WordPress
• Strip or add www to all your WordPress pages * Redirect index.php, index.html, and index.htm access
• Redirection statistics telling you how many times a redirection has occurred, when it last happened, who tried to do it, and where they found your URL
• Fully localized

Robots Meta

Robots Meta plugin allows you to point specifically to the search engines which sections of your blog to crawl. This means that you’ll gain more respect from search engines, and likewise more traffic.

This plugin by Joost De Valk makes it possible to:

• Prevent indexing of your search result pages, while still allowing the search engines to follow the links on them, by adding noindex, follow robots meta tags.
• Disallow indexing of subpages to your homepage, category pages, author pages and tag pages, to prevent duplicate content.
• Prevent indexing of your login, register and admin pages by adding noindex robots meta tags.
• Add noodp an noydir meta robots tags, allowing you to opt out of DMOZ and Yahoo! Directory descriptions.
• Prevent Yahoo! and Google from indexing your feeds by adding a meta tag to their head-section.
• Prevent indexing of just your comment feeds.
• Disable author and date-based archives.
• Prevent attachment pages from ranking in the search results over your articles.
• Enforce a trailing slash on archives.
• Edit your .htaccess and your robots.txt from within WordPress.
• Assign robots meta tags to individual posts & pages.
• Verify your site with Google Webmaster Tools, Yahoo! Site Explorer and Bing Webmaster Tools.
• Add noarchive tags to your blog.

SEO Smart Links

Internal linking structure is the prime subject of SEO. If you have more links it just convey how well your website structure is. The problem with this is that if you had to manually go and create links to relevant and important posts you’ll spend hours and hours doing it.

Here are some advantages by Vladimir Prelovac:

• SEO Smart links allows you to specify a word, like ‘SEO’ and then link it to a post on your site. Then each time the word SEO appears on your site, it’s automatically turned into a link you specified.
• SEO Smart Links provides automatic SEO benefits for your site in addition to custom keyword lists, nofollow and much more.
• SEO Smart Links can automatically link keywords and phrases in your posts and comments with corresponding posts, pages, categories and tags on your blog.
• Further SEO Smart links allows you to set up your own keywords and set of matching URLs. Finally SEO Smart links allows you to set nofollow attribute and open links in new window.
• It is a perfect solution to get your blog posts interlinked or add affiliate links to other sites.
• Everything happens completely transparent, and you can edit the options from the administration settings panel.

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Stace Zimmerman is an Internet Marketer who owns & maintains many websites online. Please visit this site for wordpress themes and other blogging information. He also runs a hoodia information site.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

3 Superb SEO Plugins for Your WordPress Blog

How to Get Explosive Results from Social Media From Faster Sharing

// October 15th, 2009 // No Comments » // Google, Internet, Twitter

If you want to get explosive results from social media, one thing you’ll have to lean heavily on is your ability to be a team player.

You see, one of the top reasons why people do things for you – things like submitting your site to a social bookmarking site – is because they feel you’ve added value to their lives.

If you’re lucky, you already have an audience, and whether it’s small or large, you have people who will share your content because they got value from it.

But that’s not the only reason. That’s handy if you don’t have an audience yet.

Another reason why people will share your content is fairly obvious. At some point, you shared theirs.

That doesn’t mean the world of influence in social media is simply a game of quid pro quo, where if you submit my link, I’ll submit yours. No winking in this article is implied or inferred – I’m being totally serious. If it was as simple as “share to be shared”, you could just go to the top person in the network, share their content and be done with it.

Doesn’t work that way. That top person got where they were because they pleased their audience. And they must keep pleasing that audience if they want to stay there. So they have to stay on topic, with fresh content, that’s not just good, it’s excellent.

That isn’t to say that sharing other people’s articles, videos and blog posts in social bookmarking, news and networking sites doesn’t help. It does. Just don’t plan on seeing dividends from every share you invest, or from the same person.

Having said that, since sharing generously helps, it makes sense to learn how to share better.

The first step to better sharing is faster sharing.

Organization helps dramatically, so it’s a good idea to develop some type of habit in your link sharing, starting with how you gather links, and where you share them.

Personally, I like to start with people who’ve commented on my blog (with legitimate replies, not borderline spam or paid comments), then links people have posted to our Open for Web Business Facebook Group, then links I’ve shared myself on Twitter, Business Week’s Business Exchange, StumbleUpon, or Facebook.

Once I’ve gathered all my links, I split them into groups.

In coming up with your own routine, I can tell you a couple of things that might help from experience.

First, you’ll likely want to save all the links to your favorite social bookmarking site. There’s a general one like Delicious or Furl that will be the place that you want to save every link you ever find.

Then you may find that of those links, there’s a subset that will be remarkable enough to blog about, or submit to social news sites.

Also keep in mind that several of the sites you use reach difference audiences. You’ll find that sharing certain links in multiple places expands the audience the link reaches, even though there may be some overlap.

This is why I continue sharing after I’ve bookmarked. The ones that are relevant to my blog topics, I also splice into my feed or blog, using plug-ins to automate the process.

This is the special group of links I only share on Delicious that get spliced into my site feed as well, as a service to my readers.

Then, I go to Stumble Upon and share the best of the links. I later submit the ones that I don’t see getting deserved attention to social news sites. I also vote on the ones that are already submitted.

This may sound like a lot of work, but the entire ritual takes a few minutes a day. You simply use tools that automate part of the process, that leverage RSS or web applications that let you do more than half of your social media marketing from one place.

When you can share faster, you can share more. When you share more, both a subset of the people whose content you have shared, and the people observing you as a sharer, will help you get one step closer to explosive results from social media.

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Tinu AbayomiPaul – This article is one small piece of the puzzle that is social media. Find out how you can get 27,000 visitors from just one social media site by making a few small changes to your routine. Learn which ones give you the Ultimate Power in Social Media – read a free chapter today.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

%%How to Get Explosive Results from Social Media From Faster Sharing%%

How to Get Explosive Results from Social Media From Faster Sharing

3 Critical Things Blog Site Webmasters Need To Know About The FTC’s New Blog Regs

// October 15th, 2009 // No Comments » // Google, Internet, Twitter

In recognition of the increasing influence of social media online, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on October 5, 2009, for the first time since 1980, issued new regulations governing online testimonials and endorsements by bloggers.

If you operate a blog site, your exposure to legal liability may have increased exponentially. Violators could be fined up to $11,000. And you face new liability associated with statements made by your endorsers, such as affiliates.

It’s critical that you understand how these regulations affect your website business.

A Quick Summary

In a nutshell, the new regulations are aimed at protection of online consumers. The FTC wants to regulate blogs to see if they’re trading testimonials and favorable reviews for some kind of financial reward. That’s a good thing.

The not-so-good-thing is that the new regulations may be overbroad and even in conflict with existing legal precedent. As a result, they may subject harmless, every-day activities to potential liability. Serious liability.

A good way to see how the regulations affect you is to consider 3 basic questions discussed below.

No. 1 – Threshold Question: Are You Even Covered By The New Regulations?

If you have a blog on your site, or if a blog is essentially your site, and all you do is publish creative content about your areas of interest, you’re not even covered by the new regulations.

No worries.

No. 2 – Are You Promoting Someone Else’s Products or Services?

If you promote or pitch someone else’s products or services on your blog, there are 2 key requirements under the new regulations:

• disclose “material connections” — you must disclose all incentives you receive — cash, gifts, benefits, etc. – for promoting or pitching the product or service, and
• disclose typical results — you can’t get away any more with small print disclaimers such as “results not typical”; you’re now required to provide a more complete and forthright picture of what can be reasonably expected from a product or service.

If you’re a violator, you could be fined up to $11,000. In addition, you could be held liable for false, misleading, and unsubstantiated statements.

This all sounds like a great win for consumers; however, It doesn’t take much creativity to imagine horror stories with the “material connections” requirement.

Example: suppose you’re a book reviewer. Book publishers routinely send you free books to review. If you fail to disclose that the book was free in your review, will you be fined $11,000? Technically, your failure to disclose the free book would be a violation, but would you be fined? That’s anyone’s guess. If you’re not fined, and someone else in a similar position is fined, is that selective enforcement? As you can see, there’re a lot of potential problems with well-intentioned, but overbroad regulation.

No. 3 – Do You Recruit Other Bloggers To Pitch Your Products or Services?

If you recruit other bloggers to pitch your products or services, such as affiliates, you’re an “advertiser” under the regulations. As an advertiser that sponsors endorsers, under the new regulations you’re required to:

• provide guidance and training to ensure that statements made by your affiliate-bloggers are truthful, not misleading, and substantiated, and
• monitor your affiliate-bloggers and take steps necessary to stop the publication of deceptive representations when they are discovered.

The new regulations apparently embody the concept that advertisers can be held liable for the endorsement-related sins of their affiliate-bloggers. The FTC stated: “It is foreseeable that an endorser may exaggerate the benefits of a free product or fail to disclose a material relationship where one exists. In employing this means of marketing, the advertiser has assumed the risk that an endorser may fail to disclose a material connection or misrepresent a product, and the potential liability that accompanies that risk”.

Legal scholars are now debating whether this new liability exposure for advertisers is in conflict with a well-established legal defense provided by a federal statute (47 USC 230(c)(1)), which reads: “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” In simple terms, this statute has been interpreted to mean that Party A is not liable for Party B’s online content.

Has the FTC overlooked 47 USC 230 in its haste to regulate? The courts will have to sort this out. Only time will tell.

Conclusion

The FTC was well-intentioned in its new blog-related regulations. Protection of online consumers is a worthy undertaking.

However, overbroad regulations, particularly if they are in part contrary to well established legal precedent may create as many problems as they solve.

One thing is clear, however — if you fall under No.s 2 or 3 above, protecting yourself from unexpected legal liability should be a high priority.

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Leading Internet, IP and software lawyer Chip Cooper has automated the process of drafting website documents for small websites with his MyLegalFirewall website documents drafting service. Discover how quick, easy, and cost-effective it is to determine which legal documents you need, draft them online, and claim your FREE Special Report, Determine Which Legal Documents Your Website Really Needs, at ==> http://digicontracts.com/kits/firewall.aspx

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

%%3 Critical Things Blog Site Webmasters Need To Know About The FTC’s New Blog Regs%%

3 Critical Things Blog Site Webmasters Need To Know About The FTC’s New Blog Regs

Top 10 Firefox Browser Plugins

// October 9th, 2009 // No Comments » // Google, Internet, Twitter

About a year ago I fired Internet Explorer as my primary browser. Why? Because it crashed on me constantly and took forever at times to transition from one site to another. I’ve found the Firefox browser much more user friendly, especially given the number of plugins that have been developed for the browser.

The ability to customize Firefox with these plug-in extensions is what makes this open-source browser so special. However, there are so many available options for plugins, it’s tough to know what’s worth installing and what’s will be a complete waste of your time.

There are lists of Firefox plugins that have been created citing the best extensions for web developers or for a better YouTube experience. However, I wanted to create an everyday list of my best choices just for the ordinary online business owner.

Out of these, here are my top 10 Firefox extensions:

1. Adblock Plus. If you have ever been annoyed by all those ads and banners on a site that often take longer to download than everything else on the page, install Adblock Plus and get rid of them. Right-click on a banner and choose “Adblock” from the context menu, and the banner won’t be downloaded again.
2. Colorful Tabs. This simple add-on that makes a strong colorful appeal. It sets each tab to a different color and makes them easy to distinguish while beautifying the overall appearance of the interface. After a long day of research when you have lots of browser windows open, this makes online page viewing easier on the eyes.
3. ColorZilla. ColorZilla puts an eyedropper icon in your status bar. Click it and you’ll get a crosshair cursor. As you run this over a Web page, the RGB values of the pixel under the crosshair will display in the status bar, both as three separate values and as a hex value (e.g., R:255, G:255, B:255 | #FFFFFF). I use this all the time if I’m trying to match colors; i.e. a font color to an the primary background on an image, for example.
4. GMail Manager. This Gmail notifier is great if you have multiple Gmail accounts. It allows you to receive new mail notifications along with viewing account details including unread messages, saved drafts, spam messages, labels with new mail, space used, and new mail snippets.
5. MeasureIt. After installing this extension, you’ll have a small ruler icon in your left side of your status bar. When you click on it, your browser window will fade out a little, and you’ll have a crosshair cursor. Drag the cursor over a section of the screen that you want to measure. Next to the box is its height and width, measured in pixels. I use this all the time when trying to measure the size of images. When you’re finished, just hit the Escape key to turn it off and return normal viewing to the page.
6. Quirk Search Status. Search Status allows you to see how any web site you visit is performing. When you land on a page, SearchStatus lets you view its Google PageRank, Google Category, Alexa popularity ranking, Compete.com ranking, SEOmoz Linkscape mozRank, Alexa incoming links, Alexa related links and backward links from Google, Yahoo! and MSN. This combined search-related information means you can view not only the link importance of a site (according to Google and Linkscape), but also its traffic importance (according to Alexa and Compete), so providing a balanced view of site efficacy. I use this all the time to determine whether a site has enough traffic to warrant accepting a joint venture opportunity.
7. Scrapbook. ScrapBook helps you to save Web pages and easily manage your saved collections. Major features are: saving web pages or snippets of a page, saving a web site, organize the collection in the same way you do bookmarks, full text search and quick filtering search of the collection, and editing of your collected pages.
8. Session Manager. Session Manager helps you manage your Firefox tabs. If you visit the same sites every day, all you need do is open all the sites in separate tabs and/or windows, and then use Session Manager to save the session with a distinct name. Then, you simply go to Tools > Session Manager, pick your session, and all the windows and tabs open up just as you saved them. And, Session Manager tracks your sessions as you surf, and if Firefox (or your system) crashes, you can recover the selection of tabs you had open when it crashed.
9. Tabs Open Relative. Tabs Open Relative makes all new tabs open to the right of the current tab, rather than at the far right of the tab bar. This reduced a huge annoyance I had with how the Firefox browser worked.
10. XMarks, XMarks (formerly Foxmarks)provides seamless bookmark synchronization between your computers and browsers via their synchronization server. Your bookmark (and optionally password) data is securely stored and backed up on our servers and is available online, as well. After you install the add-on, click on the notification to set up Xmarks and start backing up and synchronizing your bookmarks. Install Xmarks on each computer you use, and it seamlessly integrates with your web browser and keeps your bookmarks safely backed up and in sync across all of your computers. Secure Password Sync is an optional Xmarks feature.

Note: To locate these, search for the plug-in extensions here, https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:7

If you don’t currently use Firefox as your browser, perhaps this list will convince you to give it a try. I have liked my experience so much with Firefox that I’ll never use any other browser.

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Online Business Coach and Internet Marketing Strategist Donna Gunter helps service business owners automate their Internet marketing.. Would you like to learn the specific Internet marketing strategies that get results? Discover how to increase your visibility and get found online by claiming your FREE gift, TurboCharge Your Online Marketing Toolkit, at ==> TurbochargeYourOnlineMarketing.com

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

%%Top 10 Firefox Browser Plugins%%

Top 10 Firefox Browser Plugins

How to Make a Website: Create a Website for Business or Fun

// October 9th, 2009 // No Comments » // Google, Internet, Twitter

Knowing how to make a website is essential if you want to make a website, either for business or just for fun. There are many sites online that will explain to you how to do so, but few of them offer a good solution for a beginner. They all seem to need some form of pre-knowledge of many of the factors involved, and they make it look a lot easier than it actually is.

Sure, anybody can create a website that looks passable, but how do you make a website work for you to make money or to get visitors? These are the two reasons for anybody making a website. No matter who you are, or what the site is to be used for, it will meet one of these two criteria.

First it must get visitors: otherwise there is no point in having one. Even if you just want the site to run your hobby, or keep in contact with your family (better with Facebook!), people have to visit. If you also want to make money from it, then you still need visitors, but you have to persuade them to buy. That means keeping in touch with them: you have to collect the names and email addresses of your visitors and then keep in touch with them, making them special offers, providing information, until they eventually buy.

It takes the average person 7 – 8 exposures to your product before they decide to buy it. That’s what advertising is all about: to get these exposures until the prospect finally makes a purchase. However, back to the website.

Most sites that show you how to make a website don’t tell you that once you create a website you have to make it work. It’s like buying a car. You don’t just buy a car, sit in it, and it takes you to where you want to go like a cab does. You have to learn how to drive it. Once you have learned, then you can drive it. However a website is not like that even. Why Not? Because it doesn’t come with all the bits and pieces needed to make it work. These are extras!

Here are the things you need to make your website work to make money for you:

A Web Host The host provides you with the web space for your site. That’s just like a large directory on which you can place your files, such as your web pages, graphics files, products and so on. Your host also provides the means by which you can connect to the World Wide Web.

A Domain Name Your domain name is the name of your website: the bit that comes after http://www. You need it before you can create a website and put it on the web. You can choose from those still available, and then register them with the DNS (Domain Name Service). Your domain name will cost you around $10 a year – you never own it, you just hire it with first refusal every year, though you can pay for it for some years in advance. You will also need keyword software to enable you to choose the best domain name for your site.

Site Building Software You will need an HTML text editor. HTML is the language used to make a website what it is, and most HTML editors offer wysiwyg functionality, so you don’t have to know HTML, and just type in what you want. However, if you want to link to other pages on your site or to other websites, or if you want to add graphics and anything else other than plain text, you will need to know some HTML.

Email Service You will need an eMail service with your site. Nobody will buy from you if you are using a free eMail service to run your website!

Autoresponders Unless you want to be writing and sending eMails manually all your life you will need software that can do it for you. An autoresponder can send an email to people requesting information, take orders, deliver orders for electronically deliverable goods, send invoices and receipts, thank you notes and acknowledgements, and also parts of weekly or monthly courses you might provide to your subscribers, who will hopefully become customers.

Shopping Cart If you are selling goods, even eBooks or software, you will have to provide a means for a customer to order them. You will also need a product catalogue if you sell more than one item.

Payment Processor You will require a means of accepting credit and debit card payments. If you can’t do that, then shut up shop now and don’t even start.

Traffic Analysis You will need software to analyze your traffic and find out what your most popular pages are, what keywords bring most visitors and what pages most visitors leave from without buying. You can them improve these pages to keep visitors on your website where you want them.

Other Software Other software or tasks needed to create a website that works properly include Search Engine Optimization, to make sure your web pages are listed as high as possible on Google and other search engines and once you become more advanced, audio and video software to jazz up your website, graphics software, a blog to market your website and a lot more.

All of these are essentials that you will have to purchase and will have to learn how to use when you set out to create a website. It is possible to get free versions with your cheaper websites and hosting services, but some of these can lack the functionality to make them look really professional and persuade people to buy from you or continue to visit your site.

If that all frightens you then you are right to be scared, because you are going to have to learn how to use them all. However, there is an answer that can allow you to avoid all these, because there are systems online that offer you a website with all of these extras integrated with it. Some are truly integrated with the site so that all you need do is to add the text, while others offer all of these components for you to use to make a website, but you have to learn how each is used separately.

While the latter offers you more latitude in your website design and functionality, the former allows you to create a website from scratch without knowing the first thing about the subject. With these, you can make a website by choosing templates and filling in the blanks. A bit like painting by numbers really!

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Peter Nisbet – If you are interested in making your own website, examples of each of these two different ways of making it easier for yourself are offered on How to Start a Website . Although easy to use, they provide you with a very professional looking highly functional website that thousands have used to make their fortunes.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

%%How to Make a Website: Create a Website for Business or Fun%%

How to Make a Website: Create a Website for Business or Fun

Web Entrepreneurs Can Learn From Big Business Mistakes

// October 7th, 2009 // No Comments » // Google, Internet, Twitter

The Wall Street Journal reported today that Chili’s restaurant chain brought back their “I Want My Baby Back Ribs” jingle with a new media campaign. In Canada, the makers of the Coffee Crisp candy bar recently started to rerun an almost twenty year old commercial featuring two very amusing card playing senior citizens with the memorable tag, “How do you like your coffee? I like my Coffee Crisp!”

Unlike the movie and music industries that keep recycling the same tired ideas and overpriced performers because (1) they fear their own self-perpetuating financially crippling business model and (2) because they are at heart, creatively bankrupt, some in the commercial marketing industry have realized what branding is about: a consistent message that resonates in the mind of the consumer. If you have a memorable campaign that penetrates the mind of the consumer, you need to push it for all it’s worth, rather than switching messages like you switch your underwear.

McDonald’s runs so many different campaigns aimed at so many different demographics that it no longer has a brand image. Maybe some overpaid marketing guru will remember “two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, etc.”

Small and medium sized businesses can learn an important lesson from this kind of marketing faux pax: once you hit on a brand message the works, one that people not only remember, but take to heart – do not mess with it.

Jerry Bader
MRPwebmedia
(905) 764-1246

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http://www.mrpwebmedia.com/ads
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About MRPwebmedia

People ask, “What do you do?” You could say we inform, enlighten, innovate, and create; you could also say we deliver our clients’ marketing messages in memorable ways using video, audio, webmedia campaigns and websites; all created in-house from concept to implementation, from graphic and motion design to Web-design, from script writing to video-production to post-production, from music composition to signature sound design.

What do we do? We motivate action by speaking to your audience’s real needs. We tell your story so your brand, your message, embeds in the minds of your clients. We are corporate storytellers; we turn advertising into content, and content into an experience.

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%%Web Entrepreneurs Can Learn From Big Business Mistakes%%

Web Entrepreneurs Can Learn From Big Business Mistakes

Successful Website Design Criteria

// October 7th, 2009 // No Comments » // Google, Internet, Twitter

We believe you don’t start the design of a new or revised website by sitting down with the designer and coder of the website. Rather, we recommend you review the approaches, ideas, processes and other methods listed below to determine if they apply to your situation.

Think about your audience. Are they looking for immediate answers and solutions? We bet they are. Most likely these visitors to your website are very much like you. Chances are you use the Internet more than other types of media to search for information. If a web page doesn’t “grab your interest” within 8 – 10 seconds after landing on it… you move on!

As a “first step” we suggest that you start by reviewing the questions listed below. We are convinced that once you get to the last question… you will have a list of action items identified that will greatly improve the productivity of your current website. The success or failure of the site and/or business may very well depend upon the decisions you make after reading these questions.

What Do You Know About Your Clients and Prospects State of Mind?

When visitors land on your website, they have very little time to read what you say. They have a need for information or a product and don’t want to listen or read verbose descriptions and comments. You have about 8 seconds to engage them and get them to take action. Do most visitors land on your website wanting:

1. information,
2. a “quick fix”,
3. a bargain,
4. a large selection,
5. or a phone call, etc.?

It is imperative to know the answers to these and many other questions BEFORE you design the pages within your website.

Do You Make Website Visitors Feel You Can Satisfy Their Wants and Needs?

Landing on any page within your website [especially the Homepage] must make the visitor know that you understand their needs, business, wants, and desires. The more you put yourself into the “mindset” of the website visitor, the better chance you have of converting their visit into something you want to happen i.e. buy, complete a contact us form, bookmark the page, pick up the phone and call you or any other method of measurable conversion.

What Approach Do You Take When Developing Pages Within Your Website?

What do you think you would want from your website if you were the prospective visitor or client? Assume you don’t know as much information as you want in order to make an informed decision. Talk to these visitors in a language they will understand. If visitors want more insight or information, tell them to click on the more info link or give you a call. They will follow your direction ONLY if you have built some level of trust or understanding.

What are You “Selling” to the Website Visitor?

Are you focused on telling them about your product or service or are you making them understand that choosing your firm will deliver that special feeling they are seeking by making the purchase? Are you sure that you made the visitor know that you understand their needs, wants, problems, etc.? What techniques did you implement to get your points across?

How are You Going to Get the Visitor to Stop and Think About Your Service or Product?

Remember… they are ready to pass by your website in a blink of an eye. What are you going to do to engage them? The answer you come up with will be critical to the success you have in gaining their confidence enough to buy or call you. Make sure what you say is NOT the same old thing they are used to seeing or reading on other websites. Be boring and you lose! Address the issues that appeal to the visitor and they WILL STOP! This is hard work… but worth the effort.

What Kind of “Call to Action” Statements are You Placing on Your Website?

Turning a visitor into a prospect or client is one of the most critical actions of your website. How will you engage them? Once they know that you understand their needs and wants, they are more inclined to follow your CTA direction. Call to Action statements are critical to the success of any website’s conversion. Guide them in a manner that is more telling, rather than selling. Don’t be afraid to be assertive.

How Does Your Website Address the “Who Are We” Issue?

Again, it is about making the website visitor feel confident that they are choosing a reputable firm or organization with which to do business. They need to read about your success. This can be done by exhibiting your affiliation with associations, awards won, satisfied client statements, client success stories, examples of your work, etc. Show them you are a “player” in your industry.

Are You Prepared to Answer: “What Makes You Different”?

What have clients and prospects said about you and your company? Have they applauded you for your approach to doing business? Did they say you made them feel like you understood their needs and wants? Think back to the reasons clients buy from you. How did you meet their needs and wants? Give your prospective clients reasons to do business with your firm.

A final thought…

Make it your primary goal to understand the potential client. Look at your website through that client’s perspective. Who are they? What makes them different? What do they individually want and need? Be informative… do more telling than selling. They will “get it” and appreciate that you have made them an educated buyer. Finally, tell them what you want them to do next. Get them to take the first step and be ready to deliver on the expectations you have set throughout your website!

Finally, be sure to hire Internet marketing professionals to do the job if you don’t have the capabilities in-house. Too much is at stake to leave this part of your business to chance! We are pleased to provide you the insightful comments contained herein.

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David Smith – We have 11 years of Internet marketing experience re building successful website promotion programs and meeting the challenges of appealing to today’s Internet visitor in the current economic environment. Call us at 631-423-0815 for further discussion on how we might be able to assist you and your team or to review the Full list of PDF documents on Internet Marketing and Conversion techniques. http://www.InternetConsultingAndCoaching.com

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%%Successful Website Design Criteria%%

Successful Website Design Criteria