Archive for October, 2007

Wouldn’t it be cool if you could have an avatar image, like you can have on a forum, that follows you around the web? With Gravatar you can. You just sign-up, upload an image, and assign it to your email address(es). From then on, your “Gravatar” will appear on any Gravatar-equipped blog you comment on.

Here’s how it works:

• You register and set-up your Gravatar.
• You go about your business online as usual.
• If you comment on a Gravatar-equipped blog using one of the email addresses you added to your Gravatar acccount, your avatar will be automagically added next to your comment.

Is that cool, or what? Now that Automattic owns Gravatar, the service is getting even better. Features that previously required payment are now freely available to everyone. Now anyone can have “multiple e-mail addresses and more than 2 uploaded avatars to choose from.”

ProBlogger Darren Rowse is credited for “inventing” Speedlinking. When you Speedlink, you round-up a collection of links to other blogs’ posts that you think would be interesting/useful to your readers. Here are a couple of examples:

• Speedlinking - 18 October 2007
• BlogBuzz October 18, 2007

After looking at the above examples, you should have a good idea of what Speedlinking is all about.

Why should you Speedlink? It can benefit you, your blog, and other blogs as well. You save time, your blog gets traffic and comments, and other blogs get incoming links. Everybody wins, right? Here are some of the said advantages: (more…)

• Start a Wordpress Blog on Your Own Site Part 2: Why Wordpress?
• What would Google look like if they designed it to rank well in their own search results? According to the author, this “satirical piece” has been Dugg, Redditted, and Slashdotted to death. It’s one of the month’s best pieces of viral content.
• Amazon’s “1-Click patent” picked apart by US Patent Office.The USPTO “has rejected 21 of the 26 claims in the patent, leaving only five as ‘patentable’.” Too bad Microsoft still managed to patent the iPhone.
• Plenty of Freelancers have business cards, but what about calling cards? FreelanceSwitch.com thinks “that the calling card is well overdue for a renaissance. Giving a business card to a social acquaintance implies that you are your job – and we think that’s a little one-dimensional.” So they’re having a calling card-contest.
• Everyone likes shiny stuff like Photoshop gradient effects, right? Deziner Folio has a huge pack of Web 2.0 Gradients up for grabs, so be sure to download a copy.
• More Dilbert-Boss-Style thinking.
• While we’re reading comics, here’s a funny XKCD comic strip: “Photoshops.”

EDIT: The contest has ended. Results.

I’ve been searching around various podcast directories (including the “official” on in iTunes). I’ve noticed a lack of Blogging/Webmaster podcasts, and I’ve decided to start one here on Webmaster-Source.

I’m getting close to recording a pilot episode, though there are a few things I need first.

1. A name for the podcast.
2. A blogger willing to give an interview through Skype (or talk about some blogging-related subject).

I haven’t come up with many ideas for the podcast’s name yet, and if you have any ideas please post them here.

As for the other point on the list, I haven’t had too much luck there. I’m looking for a blogger who’s had a bit of success in his or her area, and is willing to talk about their blog, and share some advice. If no one’s interested being interviewed, then I’d be willing to accept someone who wants to talk about a random blogging-related topic instead.

So, here’s the deal: Whoever thinks-up the best name for the Webmaster-Source podcast will get a 486×60 banner for their site placed on the Webmaster-Source homepage for 30 days (subject to approval).

Also, if you want to be in the pilot episode for the podcast, please let me know.

Contact: Leave a comment, or email me at matt {at} webmaster-source [dot] com.

EDIT #1: Some updates on the naming contest.

“The Trackback is dead,” many are saying. Others (including me) think that the trackback/pingback is alive and well. Trackbacks, as Paul O’Flaherty says, are more valuable to him than comments. Depending on their preferences, bloggers either enable or disable trackbacks. Big bloggers, like John Chow, often disable them because of the size of their blogs. They get innumerable quantities of backlinks, and they just don’t want to deal with all of the trackbacks. It’s much easier to moderate comments than pingbacks.

Personally, I like trackbacks. If someone wants to write a large blog post on their blog, rather than leaving a large comment on my blog, it’s fine with me. The only problem I have is with the display of the pingbacks. (more…)

Google Analytics is one of the most popular, and most comprehensive, web statistics services. It’s not the most user-friendly site in the world though.  I’ve spent plenty of time digging around in its interface, and I’ve found a killer feature that should really be highlighted a bit more.

Okay, you start out on an overview page like the “Top Content” page. Going with the example I mentioned (the Top Content) you then click on one of the entries. Once you land on the stats page for the individual blog post, take a look at the little dropdown menu marked “Segment.”

By using the Segment dropdown, you can pull-up pretty much any data you could ever want about the page. Which sites are referring all those visitors? Just choose the “Source” option from the menu. What browser do they use? The Segment dropdown saves the day again.

You’d be surprised how many people don’t know this option exists. It’s, in my opinion, one of Google Analytics’ most useful features.

How would you like to sell T-Shirts through your website without having to do any of the hard work yourself? With CafePress you simply upload an image, and you’re selling shirts (or other products) in no time at all.

I’ve experimented with CafePress a little in the past, but not too seriously yet. As NorthXEast.com had said months ago, back when it was still the personal blog of Collis Ta’eed, you probably won’t have great results if you’re selling shirts with just your logo on them. Only sites or companies with large mega-fan followings can do that (like Firefox, Apple, Google, maybe ProBlogger). Instead, you want to sell shirts with something funny on them (like at the Freelance Switch store). Would people buy a shirt that just says “FreelanceSwitch.com”? No, but they’d buy shirts that say “Think Outside the Cubicle.”

CafePress has two types of stores; the “free” version, and the “premium” variety. The way the free version works is

• CafePress says a basic T-Shirt is $8.99
• You apply your image and mark-up the price to $10.99 to make a $2 profit. If you think people will pay $15, then go ahead and mark it up to that amount.
• You can only have one variety of each type of product (basic shirt, premium shirt, bumper sticker, etc). You can’t have two versions of the basic shirt with different images.

The premium version, for a monthly fee, removes some of the stupid restrictions and gives you more shop customization choices. Now, if only I could think of something good to put on a shirt…

Google AdSense is the biggest and most-used ad network among bloggers. As you’ll know already, it’s based off a Pay-Per-Click (PPC) model where the placement of the ad units drastically affects earnings. Want to make more money off your ads? Keep reading.

So how should you place your AdSense blocks? The three most important rules to remember are

• Pick a good ad format, as they tend to have different click rates.
• Position the ads near content or navigational elements, where people will notice them.
• Style the ads so they blend-in. If your ads are obviously ads, your users’ eyes will steer around them. If your blog has black text with blue links, then your ads should too.

Of course, there’s more to it than that. (more…)

Imagine this scenario: You have a personal, and somewhat random, blog that you write on for about six months, then you decide that you want to start a new blog on a specific topic instead (or in addition to) so all those people don’t have to weed through descriptions of your lunch so they can find the secret to beating level 29 in Donkey Kong 73. So you decide to start a gaming blog. The only thing is, what if you want to put some of your better content on the new blog instead? Google doesn’t like it when you re-post something on a different domain.

I ran into this problem myself. I’d, for about 6-7 months, been blogging at http://redwallhp.ntugo.com. Eventually I decided to start blogging here instead, so I revamped this site into a blog. Then I launched NTugo. I was quickly out of time for my old blog. I’d mainly posted computer stuff on there anyway, so Webmaster-Source and the NTugo blogs covered me fine. (more…)

Are you killing your Text-Link-Ads after reading about how Google has been penalizing websites that sell text links? First, consider these two points:

• With all of these sites panicking and removing their TLAs, the value of text ads is going up. If you continue to sell the ads, then you may be making more and more money as sites stop using the program. Personally, I’m too chicken to risk my rankings like that.
• Sure, Google doesn’t like you selling text links on your website. What about the other services TLA offers? You can sell text links in your RSS feeds, which the big G doesn’t seem to have a problem with, or you can use their affiliate program.

I’d advise you against continuing to sell text links on your website, though I think TLA’s Feedvertising program is a good opportunity. Their affiliate program, used by ProBlogger Darren Rowse, seems to be profitable as well.

Feedburner’s RSS ad system is rather exclusive at the moment, and TLA’s is open to anyone (plus it seems to pay well).