CAPTCHA is very often used as a method to reduce the number of spam comments on websites. It is a way to verify that the person who leaves a comment is real, and is not an automated script. For those who do not know, CAPTCHA is a type of challenge-response test used in computing to determine whether the user is human. “CAPTCHA” is an acronym for “Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart”, and it is often incorporated it in a way that visitors have to type the letters of a distorted image. Most spam comments are posted by bots or programs which are specifically designed for spamming. They automatically visit sites on the Internet to look for places where it is possible to submit comments. They do this in order to post unwanted advertisements of websites or services. One of the best ways to stop these bots is to use the CAPTCHA system which requires the visitor to write down the letters that he sees. Since computer programs do not know how to analyze images, only humans will be able to decipher the letters. While some CAPTCHA’s have been broken like phpBB’s, it is still a very good method to avoid scripts spamming forums or other websites. A lot of sites are recently adding the CAPTCHA verification system. I think that this will not make them necessarily less enjoyable to visit, but will rather prevent spammers and hackers. However, when using CAPTCHA it is important to make it readable to for average person. After all, we want to stop bots from visiting our site, not our loyal visitors.
Blog, Tech, Web
Designing a blog template requires a lot of knowledge and skill. Even if we use finished templates, there is still a lot of work to do associated with designing our site. That is because we should try to make some changes so that our website will not look exactly like hundreds of other blogs. Sites that look more original are generally more valued over the Internet. There are many website elements that we may want to incorporate into our site to make it look more original, but the one that I want to discuss today are drop-down menus. These dropdown menus are html elements that upon clicking reveal a set of internal or external links. It sounds really fun, but in my opinion, we should generally avoid having such elements. That is because many visitors may not choose to click on the drop-down menu, and they will not visit the links we included there. We should encourage visitors to visit our links, not make it harder for them. It is true that people prefer more simple solutions, and giving them an option to choose from a drop-down menu, might only cause some unnecessary trouble. If you want to add any links on your website, try to keep it as simple as possible, and avoid complicated elements like drop-down menus.
Blog, Web
There are many ways to make money online. Some of them yield the potential to earn a lot of money, while some of them are not that great. Working as a freelancer is one of the possibilities you have, but usually you need to have some expertise and you need to know a few things such as where to get business cards online to promote your services. There are many jobs being offered for freelancers including web development, flash design, data entry, css programming, logos design, creating 3d models etc. If you want to work as a freelancer, then you should have quite vast knowledge about some things I mentioned. On the bright side, the pay is usually good, so there is potential to earn a lot of money. There are some excellent resources on the Web like, for example, freelanceswitch, which offers job boards, news, and advice you might need in order to become a successful freelancer. What you should take into account that being a freelancer is not that easy due to competition. There are many people that try to make money online, and some of them are from countries where there is lower cost of living. Because of that they might be able to undercut you and still be satisfied with the profit. That is why you should make sure that you are an expert in your field.
Biz, Web
There are various community exchanges that are getting organized all the time. Did you ever consider organizing a community exchange? Let us say that you want to organize a MyBlogLog community exchange. If you are interested in gaining a lot of traffic and increasing the number of readers you have, this can be a very good opportunity for you.
You should start by listing a dozen or so websites along with the link to their MyBlogLog community page, and notifying them about it. You should also inform them about the rules of participating in the exchange. Let them know that they should join all of the MyBlogLog communities on the list. They should also copy the list and create a new post on their blog. They should include the list in their post, and write a brief paragraph that explains the rules of the community exchange. They can add two or three more MyBlogLog communities to the list, and then publish the post on their blog. They should also indicate that if anyone wants to be added to this list, they should leave a comment requesting it.
Not only such exchange bring new readers to your website, but also increase your backlinks and can be a lot of fun.
Blog, Web
Online marketing has many strategies, one of which is keyword research. Blogs can often rank well in search engines due to their frequently updated content. This can bring a lot of visitors to your site. Another way to bring many visitors is to do some keyword research. This type of research will show you what people are searching for, and will maximize the potential the search engines have to bring traffic to your site. If you research what keywords are popular, then you will know what topics to focus on, and maybe you will even change the marketing strategy your blog has. Great tools with the help of which you will be able to research keywords are keyworddiscovery.com and wordtracker.com. Both of them are relatively easy to use so check out both of them in order to decide yourself which one you will want to stick to. I have to warn you that keyword research might take some time, but in the end it is worth it. After all, search engines are an excellent source of traffic for webmasters who optimize their site for them. I does not mean you have to makes drastic changes; however, being aware of the most popular keywords will surely give you an advantage over the competition. Investing some time into keyword research is certainly a good idea for any webmaster who wants to be successful. Using a powerful keyword research toll should save you a lot of time.
Blog, Tech, Web
The Internet has been very useful to many people as it is a great source of information and entertainment. There are more and more people on the Internet each day, and this also includes government officials such as presidents. Even presidents surf the Web, and why would they not do it? After all, the Internet can definitely be beneficial to them in many ways. The Internet allows them to have contact with regular citizens, and it is an important part of being a president. Based on some interviews I deducted that there are two main things presidents do on the Web:
• Read the news. Obviously there is an abundance of high quality news sites on the Internet. A president might have even more accurate sources of information, but it does not mean that he never reads news online.
• Read political suggestions and advice given by surfers. While most presidents might not do that, staying in contact with the public is very important.
I think that presidents are not that much different from us as they also take advantage out of modern technology. While they are usually very busy I am sure that sometimes they might take some time to simply visit their favorite website.
Web
When it comes to blogging, there are some decisions to be made related to our domain names. First of all, we have to decide where we want to host our website. For example, if we decide to host our site on Blogspot, then our domain name will look like this: domain.blogspot.com. On the other hand, if we choose a custom domain, then we can completely customize our domain name. We will also not be forced to use “blogspot”, “wordpress”, or any other word in our blog address. Custom domain cost money, but some sites can teach you how to have an extra income to cover the costs of your domains.
Being hosted on a custom domain name is generally considered to be a better solution, but why are there still many successful blogs that are hosted on Blogspot? I believe that they did not switch to a custom domain name, because they did not want to lose their domain age and back links. If that happened, this would mean that from a SEO perspective they would have to start from the beginning. Since accumulating links can take a long time, changing a domain is not an easy decision to make.
Another aspect to consider may be growing registration fees. The registration fees for domain names are generally getting higher, as VeriSign quite often raises the prices. VeriSign raised the prices at least two times since 2006, so some analysts are getting alarmed by this trend. I think that the prices are still relatively low, as the cost of hosting is the major expense for webmasters. This especially applies to those with a lot of traffic and downloadable resources such as videos, audio, and software. VerisSign claims that the .com and .net infrastructures are continually being fortified against more sophisticated cyberattacks, so let us hope that this company will spend the extra money it is receiving on security.
The decision whether to switch to a custom domain will ultimately be up to you, so consider all facts before making a final decision.
Blog, Tech, Web
If you like implementing videos on your blog, you might be interested in the feature I am going to discuss. Some time ago Adsense introduced a feature called video units that allows its users to embed a YouTube video on one’s blog. This allows to make money from ads being displayed along with the videos.
If the videos you embedded on your website are relevant to the topic of your blog, this feature will allow you to make some extra cash, while at the same time not distract your visitors from other content. You can be always sure that the ads displayed will be relevant to the video and they will be non-intrusive. Additionally, you will be able to blend your YouTube videos into your blog by customizing the color and layout, as well as choosing from a few different player sizes.
Of course, whether you will really benefit from videos on your blog depends on your blog’s niche. Some blogs can greatly benefit from YouTube videos like, for example, entertainment blogs. It might not be that easy to find suitable videos for a niche like blogging. However, since there are millions of videos on YouTube, I am sure that every webmaster will be able to find some videos worth embedding on his blog. There are many videos that can either teach something valuable or simply video that are entertaining. Whenever you implement a video on your blog make sure that your website loads quite fast. Many webmasters make a mistake of adding to many elements to their blog that take too long to load.
Biz, Blog, Finance, Health, Personal, Web
A lot of bloggers struggle to post on a daily basis on their blog. However, you do not need to post on a daily basis to be a successful blogger. What is important is that you should post on a regular basis, and that you should find your blogging rhythm. Here are a few tips which should guide you in the right direction:
-Consider your niche and type of blog. How often are your competitors posting? The ideal posting frequency might be once per week or even a few times per day. The posting frequency might depend on your niche. If you are a news blogs then you might need to post many posts per day.
-Be consistent. Try to establish a consistent posting rhythm, so that your readers will know when to anticipate your next post. You may decide, for example, to post on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.
-Start out slow. Make sure you do not put unnecessary burden on yourself. It might take some time before you will get used to writing posts every day. Once you will be more experienced it will be a lot easier for you to write posts.
-Monitor your readerships response. Do your visitors enjoy your current posting frequency? Look for any signs you might not be posting often enough. On the other hand, maybe you are posting too much and it is hard for most of your readers to keep up?
You will have to make the decision yourself, so take into account all of the aspects.
Blog, Web
From time to time, I like visiting a particular blog that I could describe as very successful. This blog mainly discusses the topic of blogging. What I found interesting is that in one of his articles he listed all of the things he has never done to promote his blog. These included no feedcount, no guest blogging, no guest posts on blog, no contests, no paid advertising, no incentives (this means no eBooks, free reviews, or gifts of any sort), no Digg frontpages, and no frequent posting. This was a very surprising information as it shows that he did not use many different methods to promote his blog, yet he has a lot of visitors. I still wonder however how he achieved such a success. It seems that there is no consensus on how to achieve a large number of visitors. However, there are some things you can work on to increase the number of visitors. I believe that organizing and maintaining a blog is not an easy task, and that is why I want to give you some SEO advice:
-Optimize your blog properly. Your blog should be optimized first for users, then for search engines, and later possibly for monetizing it. My advice is that you look for a template that will have a white background.
-Change your permalinks so that they look as follows: /%year%/%monthnum%/%day%/%postname%/. This will make your permalinks more search engine friendly, and visitors searching for particular keywords will be directed to your post.
-Manage RSS feeds. RSS is a very good way to help your content read the data from your blog. I personally am quite familiar with FeedBurner.com; however, if you want you can also try OnlyWire.com and Technorati.com. To let the search engines know that you posted a message on your blog, use such free services like PingOMatic.com and Pingoat.com.
Blog, Health, Personal, Web