Create An Online Community – MyBlogLog
December 13, 2007
The internet today is all about communities of people interested in the same things talking to one another, sharing ideas and opinions, discussing options. One of the best ways to bring traffic to your blog and become an expert in your niche area is to build your own online blog community (and join others). Find out who is reading your blog and talk to them.
Creating Your Own Community
One way to do this is to create your own community at MyBlogLog. You get a free Yahoo ID, decide on a name for your community, a purpose, enter info about yourself, a photo or icon to represent yourself and download special widgets and buttons which you can display on your blog to encourage people to join. Buttons are similar to the one above and the widget (which you can see in my sidebar shows the members of your community or people who have been visiting your blog and even their faces or choosen icons). People who join your community can post messages which eventually turn into a conversation.
Joining a Community
You can join my blog community by clicking on the button above and following the prompts or go directly to MyBlogLog and click on communities to see what else is out there. Once you join, your face appears on the communities page and on the member box on their blog. The best thing is about this is that other members or visitors to the community can click on your face or on a message you have left and be taken to your blog or website.
I look forward to seeing you. – Jo
Create a custom Favourites icon
December 1, 2007
A Favicon is such a little thing (16 x 16 pixels to be exact) but having one on your website/blog really makes you feel like you’re moving up in the world. A favicon is the little icon which appears next to your website title on the menu bar in Internet Explorer/Firefox etc. It also appears next to your website title in the Favourites menu if someone saves your site to their favourites.
By creating a custom favicon of your own using your logo or part of your logo, you both reinforce your brand and make your website stand out amongst the sea of Internet Explorer blue ‘e’ icons which most websites feature by default. Note the tiny black circle with the green ‘W’ next to my website address at the top of this page. Now save this website to your favourites and see what happens….
How to Create Your Own Favicon
- Decide what image you’d like to use. It is going to be really small so you may want to use only part of your logo. You want it to be clear whether it’s an image or a letter. (See my best favicons list below for ideas)
- Go to http://tools.dynamicdrive.com/favicon/ to create your Favicon.
- Upload your image and create favicon
- Using an ftp program (see my post on ftp of you don’t have it already) upload your new favicon called favicon.ico to your main website directory.
- Insert the code below in the head section of your main index page (homepage).
- <link rel=”shortcut icon” href=”/favicon.ico” mce_href=”/favicon.ico” />
- It took a couple of days for my new favicon to appear online so just keep checking.
My Favourite Favicons
- http://www.springwidgets.com/
- http://www.clipart.com/en/
- http://createpdf.adobe.com/
- http://www.shopnewzealand.co.nz/
- http://www.nhf.org.nz/
NOTE: I originally read about favicons on the Java Script Kit website.
Submit Blog Posts to News Websites
November 28, 2007
www.scoop.co.nz, a top online news website (if you search for New Zealand news stories on Google, Scoop is listed number 1) has a new community-driven news and information website called Scoopit (see www.scoopit.co.nz). This the New Zealand equivalent of Digg and Reddit.
On Scoopit, anyone can submit stories and articles (with the link from the blog/website they came from) for review, however, rather than allowing an editor to decide which stories are worthy of frontpage attention, the users do. Once an article has at least 4 votes, it is published on the Scoopit site and the Scoop site for Google and the rest of the world to discover.
As kiwis can subscribe to Scoop to receive daily email news under any number of categories they choose, this has amazing potential for getting your news and your blog/website in front of thousands of potential customers.
How to Get Your News onto Scoopit
- You can add a Scoopit link to all the posts on your blog which readers can click on to automatically submit your article. See an example of this at the bottom of this and every other post on my blog. Get instructions for a hosted Wordpress blog, free Wordpress blog…
- You can add Scoopit links to your website for the same effect. Get instructions… (there is also Scoopit code to paste onto your standard webpages.)
- You can submit articles yourself.
Once an article has been posted on Scoopit, it goes into the Pending Scoops category. You can just leave it and wait for people to Scoopit (vote for it) or email your customers/friends and ask them to vote for it. You do have to register to be able to submit articles.
Other Places to Submit Your New Zealand News/Articles/Press Releases
- www.homebizbuzz.co.nz – Share your expertise with other businesses and profile your business at the same time.
- www.newsroom.co.nz – email your press releases to editor@newsroom.co.nz for free
- www.scoop.co.nz – email Comments, articles, speeches and press releases to: editor@scoop.co.nz
- www.tv3.co.nz – You can send your stories, comments and pictures to tv3. If you have taken a picture or filmed some video that tells a story you can send that too.
If you’re aiming more at the international market, you should try Digg and Reddit.
Let me know how you go with Scoopit and others suggested above. It would be great to hear what sort of traffic you created for your site. Please feel free to Scoopit any of my articles by clicking on the Scoopit link below each post on this website.
NZ Affiliate Programs for Your Website
November 22, 2007
Joining a website affiliate program which complements your product and provides you with additional income is great for you and your customers.
Most people just add a product here and there on their website or blog, but many people are now building entire websites based on products from affiliate programs they are a member of. You simply find a niche on the web which doesn’t seem to be catered for or find a topic you are very knowledgeable/interested in, create a website, add products from various related affiliate programs, market the site well online and start earning commission on products people click on on your website. In most cases they need to actually make a purchase before you receive any money.
You can find a full list of Affiliate Programs in New Zealand at http://www.affiliateprograms.co.nz/new-zealand-affiliate-program-list/ as well as lots of useful articles on making money this way.
Or check out the Affiliate Directory, New Zealand
If you want a bit of background reading, buy Make a Fortune Promoting Other People’s Stuff Online: How Affiliate Marketing Can Make You Rich from Fishpond or buy Make a Fortune Promoting Other People’s Stuff Online
Wordpress Auction Website
November 15, 2007
Sell Books on Your Website
November 13, 2007
A great way to offer your customers additional infomation and make some money at the same time is to join a website affiliate program with Amazon (US-based) or Fishpond (New Zealand and Australia) to promote books of your choosing on your website or blog. See the Blogging Books section on the right sidebar of this blog as an example of what you can do.
Sell Amazon Books – Earn up to 8% from referrals
To join Amazon Associates, go to the Amazon website and click on Associates Program on the left sidebar. Once your membership has been approved, you login and go to Build Widgets/Links. Before you start building links or widgets, it is a good idea to visit the main website and find all the books you want to promote on your site, scroll down each book listing to find the ASBN number and make a note of it. Once you have created a widget or link, it is just a matter of pasting the code into your website or blog. The great thing about Amazon is that it is not only books, but also music, toys, clothing and millions of other products which may complement your products.
Find out more about getting your own Amazon aStore…
Types of links
- You can create a box similar to the one on my website using the “My Favourites” link.
- You can choose a banner link like the one below.
- If you have a free Wordpress blog, you can create product links to individual books and paste them inside posts or pages for users to click on.
- You can also build your own A-Store full of all your favourite books etc.
- See other examples of Amazon widgets and banners in the sidebars of Kath’s Sticky Websites blog.
Sell Fishpond Books – 10% commission on books, music and movies
To join the Fishpond Affiliate Program go to http://www.fishpond.co.nz/affiliate_info.php?osCsid=cb24edb2cdd74d8586607794311c2471. Fishpond is based in New Zealand and Australia so if your customers are mostly in New Zealand, this is a good one to use in terms of delivery costs and range of New Zealand books. Once your membership has been approved, you login on left side of the website and go to Build Links. Before you start you need to visit the main Fishpond website and find all the books you want to promote on your site. You then make a note of the product number (the 7 digit number at the end of the page url) of each book. Once you have built a link, you simply paste the code into your website or blog.
Types of Links
- Build a Link- You create links with a photo of the book to paste into a post or page on your website.
- Product Links – You can put general banners onto your site like the one below.
All links contain your unique affiliate code so Amazon or Fishpond know that visitors have come from your website. Give it a try and add value to your website and your business.
I’ll be posting links to more great affiliate websites over the next few weeks. Please let me know how you get on with Amazon or Fishpond in the comments box below.
Add a Table of Contents to Your Blog
November 7, 2007
My all time favourite plugin which was actually discovered by a colleague, Kath from Sticky Websites… is the Site Map Plugin by Dagon Design. This plugin creates a table of contents showing all your posts under the relevant category. You download and activate the plugin, create a new page, paste in a snippet of code and you’re a step closer to making sure your blog visitors can actually find what they are looking for.
- You can see the Site Map Plugin in action at www.business-website-advice.com
- Download the Site Map Plugin
How to Use this Plugin
- Download Plugin
- Activate on the Plugin Administration Panel
- Create a new page called sitemap of something similar
- Paste the following into the code of this page. <!– ddsitemapgen –>
- Publish your page.
More great plugins coming soon…
Personal Video Messages
November 1, 2007
A friend of my sons’ who lives in Australia recently had a birthday and we were trying to think of something really special to do for her. We recorded the boys singing Happy Birthday to her on my digital camera, complete with Hip Hip Hooray and 3 claps (for her age), uploaded it to my VodPod video clips and emailed her the link to my blog so she could watch it on her birthday. You can see the clip on my Mum2Boys blog.
Obviously not everyone wants this type of message, but doesn’t it make you think about a great personal message you could have on your website and blog for your customers to view. Let me know about your interesting video ideas using the comments form below.
Plugin Guide – Step 3 – Essentials
October 25, 2007
The following 2 plugins are included as standard on a free Wordpress blog (that’s how important they are), but need to be uploaded and activated on a Hosted Wordpress blog. Without them, you have no way of stopping your blog being inundated with spam comments and have no idea who is visiting your blog and what they are looking at.
No. 1 Essential Plugin – Akismet Spam Filter
You can download a Spam filter to stop 90% of the comments from spammers coming to your email. Download Spam Filter… Once you have downloaded the files, follow step 2 of my Plugin Guide to activate your new plugin. It will ask you for an API key to complete the process. Find out how to get one below.
No 2 Essential Plugin – Wordpress Stats
You can download Wordpress Stats to view numbers of visitors to your blog on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. This allows you to see which pages they have looked at, which links they have clicked on, where they have come from and what search terms they have used to find you. Download Wordpress Stats… Once you have downloaded the files, follow step 2 of my Plugin Guide to activate your new plugin. It will ask you for an API key to complete the process. Find out how to get one below.
Get a Wordpress API Key
An API key is a unique Wordpress password. You can get one for free by going to www.wordpress.com, click on the big green “Sign Up Now” button, fill in your details and check “Just a username please” at the bottom. Once you have clicked the Next button, you will be emailed your API key.
Additional Info on API keys
- What is an API key?
- If you already have a free wordpress blog, you already have an API key which you can use on your hosted blog. To get it, login to your free blog, go to admin and profile. Copy the key and paste into your hosted blog.
- Once you have an API key, you can put details and a photo into your profile so that when you make comments on other blogs, this info appears.
- Try and use something relevant and not embarrassing for your API key username as it will be visible when you make comments.
Some of my favourite plugins to enhance your blog next…
Plugin Guide – Step 2 – Upload
October 23, 2007
Upload Plugins to Your Blog
Once you have connected to your ftp site, you need to double-click the main blog folder, usually called “wordpress” or “blog”, then “wp_content” folder, then “plugins” folder. This is where you put the unzipped files you downloaded to your computer. Remember when you unzip them, they are usually extracted inside another folder so you need to make sure you are uploading the actual folder containing the plugin files.
Activate Your Plugins
In the admin/dashboard of your blog, go to Plugins, find the one you have uploaded and click on Activate. This usually activates one of the following:
- A new widget appears under Presentation/Widgets. You can drag this onto your sidebar, double-click to customise, then save changes.
- A new panel appears under Options which allows you to customise and manage the new plugin.
- A new button or set of fields appears above or below every post allowing you to add new functionality to each new post you write.
The two most important plugins next…
