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WordPress Blueprint For Small Business

Posted in: WordPress For Business by Kuzzuk on January 11, 2010

This is a presentation by Adria Richards, a geek goddess on how great WordPress is for small business owners. In this presentation, you’ll find helpful posts on how WordPress can be used for your business website. Enjoy!

Blog Development And Launch Checklist

Posted in: Featured, Resources by Kuzzuk on October 7, 2009

Blog Launch checklist

Blog Launch checklist

Over at ProBlogger forum, the first challenge is to come up with a list post. This post is my entry to the challenge. Let’s say you want to develop and launch a self-hosted WordPress blog. Here is a checklist of items that you can tick off before unleashing your blog to the world.


I’ll start off by listing the items on the checklist before I expand further. This is going to be one long post so you may want to grab some coffee or download the PDF file to print and read at your leisure.

  1. Choose a Good Domain Name
  2. Evaluate WordPress Recommended Hosting
  3. Change the WordPress Default Theme/Template
  4. Update Permalinks to Create Search Engine Friendly URLs
  5. Ditch the WYSIWYG Editor
  6. Change Date and Time Option
  7. Update Akismet
  8. Expand Ping List
  9. Install and Configure Redirection Plugin
  10. Install and Activate SEO Slugs Plugin
  11. Install and Configure All-in-One SEO Plugin
  12. Install and Configure Robots Meta Plugin
  13. Improve Navigation with the Breadcrumbs Plugin
  14. Improve Pagination with Pager Fix
  15. Install and Configure Super Cache Plugin
  16. Validate your Blog or Website
  17. Grade Your Blog or Website With Website Grader
  18. Browser Compatibility Check
  19. Add Google Analytics
  20. Make Your Blog or Website Social

1. Choose a Good Domain Name

Do you have a good domain name? Skip this part if you already have a good domain name that you want to use.

  • A good domain name should incorporate some of your main keywords and be easy to remember.
  • Nameboy is a fantastic service for brainstorming and buying domain names. OneLook is not a domain registrar but is another great service that can be used for brainstorming domain names.
  • After deciding upon a domain name, register it with a service like Nameboy, GoDaddy or NameCheap.

2. Evaluate WordPress Recommended Hosting

Do you have a good hosting provider? Skip this part if you already have a web host that you are satisfied with. Some of the important criteria to evaluate hosting providers are as follows:

  • Disk space
  • Bandwidth per month
  • Number of email accounts provided
  • One click installer for WordPress like Fantastico or SimpleScripts (especially useful if you are non technical)
  • Price Plans
  • Number of databases (useful if you intend to host more than one WordPress installation per account)
  • Add-on domains (useful if you intend to host more than one domain per account)
  • Demo login is important if you want to familiarize yourself with the hosting control panel interface.
  • Customer service factors like 24/7 customer service via telephone, live chat or email is important. Especially if you live in a different timezone, 24/7 support is vital.
  • Reliability can be gauged by the number of issues reported on public websites like Google Groups and WordPress.org support forums. However, this cannot be absolutely accurate because the number of problems is usually directly proportional to their number of customers. Additionally, check whether they have a server status monitoring system.

WordPress recommends the following hosting providers:

  1. BlueHost
  2. DreamHost
  3. HostICan
  4. ANHosting
  5. Media Temple
  6. Laughing Squid

Disclosure Note: The hosting provider links (except Media Temple and Laughing Squid) are affiliate links through which I will earn a commission. However, if you buy hosting from my links I’ll provide you with 2 hours of technical setup for free.

3. Change the WordPress Default Theme/Template

To make your website or blog to look unique, here are a few options to consider:

  • Hire a WordPress professional at eLance or Rent-A-Coder to create a custom theme or template. However, looking through the premium and free themes would be a great way to determine what exactly you want for the design of your website or blog.
  • A good starting point would be premium themes that cost less than $100 in most cases. These themes can form a good base should you decide to customize the template yourself or hire a WordPress professional at eLance or Rent-A-Coder. Unlike free themes, premium themes provide support services and free upgrades.
  • If you can’t find a premium theme that meets your needs or if you don’t want to pay for a premium theme then consider free themes. However, finding a good free theme is like looking for a needle in a haystack. For free themes, check out WordPress Extend.

Still can’t find a suitable theme? You can get ideas from other blogs or you can hire a WordPress professional via eLance or Rent-A-Coder.

4. Update Permalinks to Create Search Engine Friendly URLs

By default, WordPress creates ugly URLs like http://example.com/?p=345 which is not exactly ideal. However, creating a user and search engine friendly URL is not difficult at all. Here’s what you do:

  1. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  2. Click the “Settings” link on the left sidebar followed by “Permalinks” link.
  3. Choose any structure apart from “Default”. I like to use the Custom Structure of “/%postname%.html” that makes my URL look like http://example.org/postname.html
  4. If the permalink doesn’t work then it is most likely because of the .htaccess file permission issues (assuming the server is Apache). Open the .htaccess file and add the following code (if WordPress is installed in the root directory):

    # BEGIN WordPress

    RewriteEngine On
    RewriteBase /
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
    RewriteRule . /index.php [L]

    # END WordPress

  5. Open the .htaccess file and add the following code (if WordPress is installed in a directory called ‘blog‘):

    # BEGIN WordPress

    RewriteEngine On
    RewriteBase /blog/
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
    RewriteRule . /blog/index.php [L]

    # END WordPress

5. Ditch the WYSIWYG Editor

By default, WordPress provides a visual WYSIWYG Editor to edit content. I strongly recommend to turn this visual editor off because a lot of times it creates unnecessary extra code especially when you copy and paste from word processors like Microsoft Word. Do the following to turn the visual editor off:

  1. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  2. Click on your profile name link on the top right corner of the administrator’s interface.
  3. Uncheck the “Use the visual editor when writing” box and click the “Update Profile” button.

6. Change Date and Time Option

By default, WordPress is set to the UTC timezone which is most likely not your timezone. Do the following to change the date and time option:

  1. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  2. Click the “Settings” tab followed by “General” link.
  3. Scroll down to “Timezone”, “Date Format”, “Time Format” and “Week Starts On” settings and change it according to your timezone and preferences.
  4. Click the “Save Changes” button.

7. Update Akismet

Comment spam is a nuisance for WordPress blogs and websites. Spammers usually use automated software to post comments that promote their commercial services. Akismet (comes bundled with WordPress) is the plugin of choice to protect against comment spam.

  1. Log into your WordPress account.
  2. Click on the “Plugins” link on the left side of the Dashboard.
  3. Click the “Activate” link for Akismet.
  4. A note saying “Akismet is almost ready. You must enter your WordPress.com API key for it to work.” will be displayed.
  5. Open a new window and go to www.wordpress.com and sign up at http://wordpress.com/signup/. At the end of the registration, an API key will be emailed to you.
  6. Go back to the WordPress administrator and click the “enter your WordPress.com API key” link.
  7. Enter the API Key and click the “Update options” button.

Now your WordPress website or blog is protected against comment spam.

8. Expand Ping List

By default, WordPress only pings one service and does not notify other blog directories and search engines that your website or blog has been updated. So it is a good idea to expand this list and notify more services.

  1. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  2. Click the “Settings” tab followed by “Writing” link. Scroll to the “Update Services” box and enter the list of ping services here.
  3. Click the “Save Changes” button.

Check out Setting up your WordPress ping list for details on how to use a plugin to prevent your blog from over-pinging.

9. Install and Configure Redirection Plugin

The Redirection Plugin is important for SEO purposes. Whenever a URL changes for whatever reasons then it creates an issue with search engines. For instance, lets say http://example.com/category/postname changes to http://example.com/category/name-of-the-post and the former URL has already been indexed by the search engine. Then there will be SEO consequences. The Redirection Plugin comes in handy in such cases to do a 301 redirect which means that it tells the search engine that http://example.com/category/postname has permanently moved to http://example.com/category/name-of-the-post. Do the following to activate and configure the plugin:

  1. Download Redirection Plugin and FTP to the server’s “wp content/plugins” folder. Alternatively, search for the plugin via “Plugin -> Add New” option.
  2. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  3. Click on the “Plugins” link and click the “Activate” link for the Redirection Plugin.
  4. After successful activation, click the “Manage” tab followed by “Redirection” and “Options” link.
  5. Under “URL Monitoring” set the values to “Modified Posts” and click the “Update” button.

10. Install and Activate SEO Slugs Plugin

The SEO Slugs plugin removes common words like ‘a’, ‘the’, ‘in’ from URLs to improve search engine optimization. For example, http://example.com/category/how-to-install-wordpress becomes http://example.com/category/install-wordpress. Do the following to activate the plugin:

  1. Download SEO Slugs plugin and FTP to the server’s “wp content/plugins” folder. Alternatively, search for the plugin via “Plugin -> Add New” option.
  2. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  3. Click on the “Plugins” link and click tthe “Activate” link for the SEO Slugs plugin.

Note: Please do check out other slug plugins as well.

11. Install and Configure All-in-One SEO Plugin

All-in-One SEO Plugin is one of the most comprehensive and popular SEO plugins for WordPress. It optimizes titles (titles are very important for search engine rankings) and automatically generates META tags (which can also be over-ridden manually). Do the following to activate and configure the plugin:

  1. Download All-in-One SEO Plugin and FTP to the server’s “wp content/plugins” folder. Alternatively, search for the plugin via “Plugin -> Add New” option.
  2. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  3. Click on the “Plugins” link and click the “Activate” link for the All-in-One SEO Plugin.
  4. After successful activation, click the “Settings” tab followed by “All in One SEO” to configure accordingly.
  5. You can also manually create title, description and keywords while writing posts or pages in WordPress. Just scroll down to see the options. Please note that certain tthemes like Thesis handles SEO very well and you may not need this plugin.

12. Install and Configure Robots Meta Plugin

The Robots Meta Plugin allows you to set which parts of the WordPress blog or website can be indexed by search engines. For example, it makes it easy to prevent pages like registration, login, search results and categories to be indexed. Do the following to activate and configure the plugin:

  1. Download Robots Meta Plugin and FTP to the server’s “wp content/plugins” folder. Alternatively, search for the plugin via “Plugin -> Add New” option.
  2. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  3. Click on the “Plugins” link on the Dashboard.
  4. Click the “Activate” link for the Robots Meta Plugin.
  5. Click the “Plugins” link followed by “Robots Meta” link to set the configuration. I recommend preventing the following from being indexed:
    • Site’s search results pages
    • Login and register pages
    • All admin pages
    • Author archives
    • Date based archives
  6. Additionally, you can manually allow or prevent a post or a page to be indexed while writing posts or pages in WordPress. Just scroll down to see the options.

13. Improve Navigation with the Breadcrumbs Plugin

The Breadcrumbs Plugin is a great navigation tool because users are often lost within a website, especially if they came to an internal page or post via search engines. An example of a breadcrumb would be “Blog Home > Category > Breadcrumbs R Us”. Do the following to activate and configure the plugin:

  1. Download Breadcrumbs Plugin and FTP to the server’s “wp content/plugins” folder. Alternatively, search for the plugin via “Plugin -> Add New” option.
  2. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  3. Click on the “Plugins” link on the Dashboard.
  4. Click the “Activate” link for the Breadcrumbs Plugin.
  5. Click the “Settings” link followed by “Breadcrumb NavXT” link to set the configuration.
  6. Open the appropriate file for your theme (usually header.php). This can be done by clicking the “Design” tab followed by the “Theme Editor” link.
    breadcrumb-change
  7. Save the file and the breadcrumbs are now active.

Note: Please do check out other breadcrumb plugins as well.

14. Improve Pagination with Pager Fix

The Pager Fix plugin improves pagination dramatically. This is benefecial because users can directly jump to a particular page plus search engines have access to links for all pages. Do the following to activate and configure the plugin:

  1. Download Pager Fix plugin and FTP to the server’s “wp content/plugins” folder. Alternatively, search for the plugin via “Plugin -> Add New” option.
  2. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  3. Click on the “Plugins” link on the Dashboard.
  4. Click the “Activate” link for the Pager Fix plugin.
  5. Open the appropriate file for your theme (usually index.php). This can be done by clicking the “Design” tab followed by the “Theme Editor” link.
    pagination-code
  6. Save the file and the new pagination is now active.

Note: Please do check out other pagination plugins as well. The new version of Pager Fix may not require you to change code.

15. Install and Configure Super Cache Plugin

The Super Cache plugin significantly speeds up a site. Users and search engines love fast websites. It is relatively hard to configure but once you are done, the increase in speed will be noticeable. Do the following to activate and configure the plugin:

  1. Download Super Cache plugin and FTP to the server’s “wp content/plugins” folder.
    Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  2. Click on the “Plugins” link on the Dashboard.
  3. Click the “Activate” link for the Super Cache plugin.
  4. Click the “Settings” tab followed by the “WP Super Cache” link to configure the plugin.

16. Validate your Blog or Website

It is important to validate your website to ensure that it meets coding standards.

  1. Go to http://validator.w3.org/
  2. Enter the URL of your website and click the “Check” button.
  3. The results will show the total number of errors. If there are no errors then rejoice.

17. Grade Your Blog or Website With Website Grader

Test your WordPress blog or website with Website Grader to mainly check the “On-Page SEO” factors like titles, headings, content, and URLs to improve search engine rankings.

  1. Go to http://www.websitegrader.com/
  2. Enter the URL of your website and click the “Generate Report” button.
  3. Note the results of the “On Page SEO” mainly the following:
    • Metadata
    • Heading Summary
    • Image Summary

18. Browser Compatibility Check

Check your WordPress blog or website with BrowserShots to test the compatibility of the site with various browsers.

  1. Go to http://browsershots.org
  2. Enter the URL of your website and check the browsers of your choice
  3. Click the “Submit” button. Results appear as per server availability.

Note: It is virtually impossible to be compliant with all browsers so focus on the dominant ones like Internet Explorer 6 and above and FireFox.

19. Add Google Analytics

Once the website or blog is launched, analysis and tracking is vital to see where the traffic is coming from and which parts of the site are popular. Google Analytics does a great job of measuring and analyzing traffic but is not the one and only analytics program available. Feel free to experiment.

  1. Go to Google Analytics and sign-up or sign-in
  2. Click the “Add Website Profile” link and enter the website address and timezone. Click the “Finish” button.
  3. A tracking code like below is generated.
    googletrackingcodeanalytics
  4. Open the appropriate file for your theme (usually footer.php). This can be done by clicking the “Design” tab followed by the “Theme Editor” link. Note that some themes provide an option to place the code without having to edit the theme.
  5. Paste the above code immediately before the closing body tag
  6. Save the file and Google analytics is now active.

20. Make Your Blog or Website Social

Make it easy for your readers to share your website, blog, post or page through social media. A plugin for this purpose is Sociable. Do the following to activate and configure the plugin:

  1. Download the Sociable plugin and FTP to the server’s “wp content/plugins” folder. Alternatively, search for the plugin via “Plugin -> Add New” option.
  2. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  3. Click on the “Plugins” link on the Dashboard.
  4. Click the “Activate” link for the Sociable plugin.
  5. Click the “Settings” tab followed by the “Sociable” link to configure the plugin. I usually like to display it in posts and pages.
  6. Save the changes and Sociable is now active.

Note: Also check out other social media plugins.

Download the more detailed PDF of the Checklist

Please do leave comments, would love your feedback on expanding and making this checklist more useful.

List Of Blog Ping Services

Posted in: Resources by Kuzzuk on

By default, WordPress only pings one service and does not notify other blog directories and search engines that your website or blog has been updated. So it is a good idea to expand this list and notify more services.

  1. Log in to your WordPress administrator account
  2. Click the “Settings” tab followed by “Writing” link. Scroll to the “Update Services” box and enter the following list of ping services.
  3. Click the “Save Changes” button.

http://1470.net/api/ping
http://api.feedster.com/ping
http://api.moreover.com/ping
http://api.moreover.com/RPC2
http://api.my.yahoo.co.jp/RPC2
http://api.my.yahoo.com/RPC2
http://api.my.yahoo.com/rss/ping
http://audiorpc.weblogs.com/RPC2
http://bblog.com/ping.php
http://bitacoras.net/ping
http://blog.goo.ne.jp/XMLRPC
http://blog.goo.ne.jp/XMLRPC
http://blogdb.jp/xmlrpc
http://blogmatcher.com/u.php
http://blogpeople.net/ping
http://blogsearch.google.ae/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.at/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.be/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.bg/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.ca/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.ch/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.cl/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.cr/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.hu/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.id/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.il/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.in/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.it/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.jp/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.ma/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.nz/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.th/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.uk/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.ve/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.co.za/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.ar/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.au/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.br/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.co/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.do/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.mx/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.my/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.pe/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.sa/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.sg/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.tr/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.tw/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.ua/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.uy/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com.vn/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.de/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.es/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.fi/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.fr/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.gr/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.hr/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.ie/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.in/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.it/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.jp/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.lt/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.nl/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.pl/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.pt/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.ro/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.ru/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.se/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.sk/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.tw/ping/RPC2
http://blogsearch.google.us/ping/RPC2
http://bulkfeeds.net/rpc
http://coreblog.org/ping/
http://feedsky.com/api/RPC2
http://hamo-search.com/ping.php
http://holycowdude.com/rpc/ping/
http://mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatt
http://ping.amagle.com/
http://ping.bitacoras.com
http://ping.blo.gs/
http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/
http://ping.blogmura.jp/rpc/
http://ping.blogoon.net/
http://ping.blogs.yandex.ru/RPC2
http://ping.cocolog-nifty.com/xmlrpc
http://ping.exblog.jp/xmlrpc
http://ping.fc2.com/
http://ping.feedburner.com/
http://ping.kutsulog.net/
http://ping.myblog.jp/
http://ping.namaan.net/rpc
http://ping.rootblog.com/rpc.php
http://ping.snap.com/ping/RPC2
http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php
http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php
http://ping.weblogs.se/
http://ping.wordblog.de/
http://pingoat.com/goat/RPC2
http://r.hatena.ne.jp/rpc
http://rcs.datashed.net/RPC2/
http://rpc.blogbuzzmachine.com/RPC2
http://rpc.bloggerei.de/ping/
http://rpc.blogrolling.com/pinger/
http://rpc.blogrolling.com/pinger/
http://rpc.icerocket.com:10080/
http://rpc.newsgator.com/
http://rpc.pingomatic.com
http://rpc.reader.livedoor.com/ping
http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
http://rpc.technorati.jp/rpc/ping
http://rpc.twingly.com/
http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2
http://topicexchange.com/RPC2
http://trackback.bakeinu.jp/bakeping.php
http://wasalive.com/ping/
http://www.a2b.cc/setloc/bp.a2b
http://www.bitacoles.net/ping.php
http://www.blogdigger.com/RPC2
http://www.blogoole.com/ping/
http://www.blogoon.net/ping/
http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates
http://www.blogroots.com/tb_populi.blog?id=1
http://www.blogshares.com/rpc.php
http://www.blogsnow.com/ping
http://www.blogstreet.com/xrbin/xmlrpc.cgi
http://www.lasermemory.com/lsrpc/
http://www.mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatter/ping.php
http://www.newsisfree.com/RPCCloud
http://www.newsisfree.com/xmlrpctest.php
http://www.popdex.com/addsite.php
http://www.snipsnap.org/RPC2
http://www.weblogues.com/RPC/
http://xmlrpc.blogg.de
http://xping.pubsub.com/ping/
http://xping.pubsub.com/ping/

Unabridged Audio Book Of Chris Anderson’s Book Free Is FREE

Posted in: General by Kuzzuk on September 20, 2009

Free By Chris Anderson - Audio Book Is Free

Free By Chris Anderson - Audio Book Is Free

Just a quick note that the audio version of Chris Anderson’s bestseller book Free is free via Wired magazine. This is the unabridged version. No registration or purchase required.

Download it here

Singapore Is… According To Google Suggest

Posted in: General by Kuzzuk on August 26, 2009

I was doing some keyword research and typed in “Singapore is” and Google suggested options like:

  • Singapore is in what country
  • Singapore is a fine city
  • Singapore is famous for
  • Singapore is what country
  • Singapore is where
  • Singapore is the capital of Asia
  • Singapore is the capital of what country
  • Singapore is part of China
  • Singapore is the capital of which country
  • Singapore is a
Singapore Is?

Singapore Is?

Goes to show that Google doesn’t really know us!

Allan Gardyne Lessons

Posted in: Affiliate Marketing by Kuzzuk on July 20, 2009

Allan Gardyne Lessons (Image Source: sxc.hu)

Allan Gardyne Lessons (Image Source: sxc.hu)

Here’s what I learned from reading Allan Gardyne’s Associate Programs site. He gives good insights on affiliate marketing and Alan is a veteran on the affiliate marketing scene.

  1. 10-point list building cheat sheet: This nice little cheat-sheet is from Fabian Lim. The 10 tactics listed here range from the obvious article marketing to Get Response Power Leads. Highly recommended to anyone who wants to build a list i.e. all affiliate and Internet marketers.
  2. Differences between rich and poor affiliate marketers: This particular article is by Jay Stockwell and is about the mindset of a rich affiliate marketer. Main takeaway: You want your affiliate business to really fly, don’t treat it like a hobby.
  3. Easy way to increase commissions: This article is actually a pitch on a video creation service for affiliates but the underlying message is that video is important for conversions.
  4. Affiliate turns his life around:An article by John Gibb on how he turned his life around using Dan Ho’s http://www.affiliatearticlewriters.com/. The main takeaways are that article marketing still works and copywriting in an important skill in the affiliate marketing industry.
  5. Learn from affiliates who keep it simple: This is an article that is a follow-up from the above one. The main message is not to complicate things and to keep it simple. Especially, a good message for me as I am still learning to appreciate the power of simplicity.

Needless to say, I’ll update these lessons as I read further.

What I Have Learned From Affilorama

Posted in: Affiliate Marketing by Kuzzuk on July 17, 2009

Mark Ling From Affilorama

Mark Ling From Affilorama

I have been a big fan of Affilorama and Mark Ling and a regular reader of their blog. Here’s what I have learned from them.

  1. Praise where praise is due: In this post from 3 August, 2006, Mark talks about the importance of giving praise where it is due and gives a shout-out to three Internet Marketers he sees as mentors:
    • John Reese: http://www.jrreport.com/ (You’ll be able to download a free copy of his Reese report here, along with how he made $500,000 in his first year in Adsense. I’m a member of the Reese Report and strongly recommend it, even if it’s not for you right now, you should download your free copy and keep it in mind for the future)
    • Brad Callen: Visit http://www.affilorama.com/downloads/seomadeeasy.pdf to download and print out his free book on search engine optimization (Simply fantastic).
    • Ken Evoy: Visit http://aff-masters.sitesell.com/download9.html for his free Affiliate Masters Course ebook. This is even more great free information for you about how to make money from affiliate programs.
  2. Viral e-books: This post on 25 August 2006 is about a lesson in creating a viral e-book and takes the example of an Affilorama student who created a viral e-book http://wealthywal.com/Resources/wealthywal.pdf that was informative, engaging, not particularly “salesy” and it’s definitely something you would pass around to your friends in the make money online niche. A niche he doesn’t particularly recommend for beginners. Good informative post and related material, in any case.
  3. An Easy Way to Earn More From AdSense: This post from 29 September 2006, Mark talks about how to maximize earnings from AdSense via ad placement (above the fold) and how the use of tables in a web page determines the way content will be read (and the quality of the ads displayed). My takeaway was not to use tables (when I can) and to make ads look like an important resource rather than an irritating distraction.
  4. Finding Profitable Niches – “HELP ME! WHERE DO I START?”: This post on 13 October 2006 talks about how to systematically find a profitable niche. The basic points of this post is to do the following:
    • Keyword research: Do research to determine there is a market for what you intend to promote.
    • Payouts: Products paying 60 – 75% commission or a high-price, low commission physical products to promote that earns you the same amount.
    • Merchant Sales Page: Is it compelling to you as a potential customer. If it is not then you’ll have to spend a lot of time on pre-selling.
    • Competitive Analysis: Analyze the competition and if you are a beginner then stay away from the ‘make money online’ crowd. Are people already making money in this niche?
    • Contextual Advertising: Determine whether you should use an PPC ads to drive traffic. If yes, whether it should be Yahoo or Google. Note: I prefer free traffic sources so I ignored this part but maybe I’ll use PPC in the future. Who knows.

      • How to find topics: The key to finding good, profitable niches is brainstorming, lateral thinking, and research. Visit lots of sites to get those brain juices going. Remember that most good sites are getting money from somewhere. For each site you visit, as yourself: how are they making money? Here are some good places to start your brainstorming:

      • Search affiliate program directories.
      • Get ideas for B2B sites from B2B directories. The good thing here is that it’s all categorized for you already. Take some of these topics and plug them into the “view bids” tool in Overture to see what people are willing to pay, then use inventory.overture.com to see what the traffic is like. You might need to have a dig around until you find something suitable.
      • Visit sites like About.com to get ideas. About.com gets money from advertisers paying for listing on their site, so they’re not likely to create articles/topics that aren’t profitable?
      • Visit eBay and have a dig through their categories to get ideas for products/niche topics that people might be interested in. For instance, dolls. There are people bidding big dollars for dolls — there’s probably a doll-geek community that you could market to. (You could place eBay product ads on your site and earn a percentage of eBays revenue from successful sales, or for referring people who become eBay members.)
  5. How to Make Money From Affiliate Programs – Your Questions Answered: This was the first post of 2007 and I need not elaborate more as the title says it all. The audio as at http://www.affilorama.com/blog/blog_content/audio_blog1.zip and PDF notes are at http://www.affilorama.com/blog/blog_content/how_to_make_money_from_affiliate_programs.zip.

That;s what I have learned about affiliate marketingfrom the Affilorama blog. I’ll update the list as I go along and find notable posts.

How To Spy On Bit.Ly Stats

Posted in: Affiliate Marketing by Kuzzuk on July 16, 2009

Bit.Ly Stats Spy (Photo Credit: www.sxc.hu)

Bit.Ly Stats Spy (Photo Credit: www.sxc.hu)

Increasingly, a lot of affiliate marketers are using bit.ly as a convenient way to shorten and mask their affiliate URLs. But what many do not realize is the ease with which your competitor can spy on the stats of your shortened URL. Let me illustrate with an example.

Someone (obviously an affiliate marketer), posted this tweet on a making money on Twitter.


Want to make money go to http://bit.ly/sfxDF


Let’s say, you wanted to check how legit this person was and wanted to find out more without having to click his link. You could take his shortened URL http://bit.ly/sfxDF and add “info/” after http://bit.ly/ making the URL look like http://bit.ly/info/sfxDF.

Voilà, it shows me his bit.ly link stats. I can see he has had more than 1,700 clicks to that link, the location of his original link, which geographical regions generate the most clicks and whether there are any conversations going on in sites like Twitter and FriendFeed.

bit.ly Stats

bit.ly Stats

There you have it, a quick way to spy on bit.ly stats.

Monk Who Sold His Ferrari Review Link

Posted in: General by Kuzzuk on July 11, 2009

A number of people have contacted me to ask what happened to The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari Review. Well, it was on the old blog and it remains there especially because Robin Sharma’s website directly links to the page. That’s the reason I didn’t move it to the new blog. Partly it is laziness as I could always do a 301 redirect.

Here’s the link again: The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari Review.