Archive for the ‘Websites’ Category.
Hi Everyone,
Well it’s been a while since I last posted anything up, but I promise I will have some really good free stuff coming up for you.
To get the ball rolling why not check out this site which could save you time for putting together slides, give you some inspiration for creating yours or you could even upload yours for others to gain from it.
Alan
I typed up a quick reply to a clients query and thought with a few edits it would make a good topic to share with everyone here.
Back links are one of the most important aspects you can have in your SEO campaign as it makes one of the biggest impacts on your page ranking and therefore your position in the natural searches of search engines, so get as many back links as you can.
However be aware of paid link backs and link farms as these will harm your SEO rankings. Also try to get links from related or associated websites and not just random sites as this again will help firm up that you are a vital resource or business in your chosen industry.
Finally don’t just have all the links go to your home page, you will get ranked better if you post direct links to information pages or products. It also means that the visitor doesn’t have to go looking for the page.
One last thing when you get a back link ask the website owner to not just put click here as the link, try to get them to link with the keywords of the service or product that tie into your Search Engine Optimisation.
So for example “click web design to visit the Contact Multimedia website”
Now go and build your external links!
Alan Fair
I came across what I think could possibly be one of the most cost effective ways to see how people use your website. This can help to shape your site to become more effective. I’ve been using it for a week now and have made several small changes that have already paid off.
Stats can only tell you so much and even for a stats junkie like me there is a lot of assumptions that you need to make, not ideal.
What you really want is to be able to watch people use your website, but the problem with that is they are usually aware that they are being watched. This can influence how they use your site. They also tend to not actually be your customers, so the data is useful, but is missing some vital information – how your actual customers use your site.
If only there was some way to be able to see what customers do on our sites without them knowing it? Well there has been something for a while now, but it was a very VERY expensive thing to do.
No longer though, go here http://www.userfly.com and sign up for a free account. You get 10 free captures a month or you can upgrade to get more. All you need to do is then add a piece of code to your website (ask me if you need help doing this – I’ll do it for free) and enjoy watching your customers actually using your website.
I feel I should let you know they are updating the site and it’s features constantly, so there are a few bugs here and there, but I still think the data you get to see is invaluable.
Do you have a time saver or something like this site that you can share with us, leave a comment if you do!
Alan
Today I had a client ask me where she can get free photos for her site, so I had a quick look around on the internet and came across a very handy collection of free stock photo sites (someone else has kindly collated them for us).
It’s always difficult choosing the right photo, so having plenty of sites to look at increases the chances that you’ll find the perfect one.
What I would say though is sometimes free sites just don’t have the image you need and for the sake of a few quid you can save yourself a lot of wasted time trawling through the free sites if you just buy the images. Also it helps to support the photographers being able to take more.
Anyway happy hunting, here’s the link Free Stock Photo list
I thought I would share a very cool site (or maybe it’s cool just to us web developers), but I have a sneaky suspicion you’ll lose at least an hour to this as well.
It’s the internet archives, what do I mean by that, well this site stores as much information as it can on websites past and present. So if you’ve had your website change in the last year or so, but you wanted to look at your old site, then just put in your url and it will list all the version it has saved over the years.
**Warning** usually images and CSS (a coding thing) for new sites aren’t saved as the engine was built for the days where code and design weren’t separated, but it can be interesting.
http://www.archive.org/index.php
p.s. you can use it to see what your competitors may have done in the past as well, but you didn’t hear that from me
Kind Regards
Alan Fair
So what’s the headline all about, well I was doing my usual surfing about the internet and came across a site that has a lot of really good information on self improvement. No wait! before you think oh god it’s another site like… this one is really good it focuses on personal productivity, motivation, positive psychology, and self education.
The thing I like about it is that the people who comment are generally people who think about their answers and not just put up useless garbage. I’m not saying everything on the site is right, but there are a lot of ideas that makes you think and question yourself and your processes, so I put that down as a worthwhile site to revisit every now and then.
Here is the link to the site http://www.pickthebrain.com enjoy!
Regards
Alan Fair
I came across a site that does stock photos for websites in a completely different way. It has two options Pay per view, where like with Pay per click ads you pay every time someone views the image. Alternatively if you don’t mind some ads then you can get the image for free.
Here is the link for the site enjoy
Alan
I get a lot of clients asking how to choose a domain name for their website, so I thought I would give you my 5 top tips.
Sometimes you find the domain name you want isn’t available because someone else has bought it. You could buy it from them, if they’re not using it, but sometimes it can cost you hundreds, even thousands of pounds.
Alternatively go through the 5 steps below first and see if you can get a domain name that works for you.
One last bonus tip, when you want to check to see if your domain name is free or not, do not use companies who sell the domains to check them, why? Well some of them sell lists of popular searched domains to companies who buy and then intend to sell them at a huge profit.
So what can you do to safe guard your potential domains, well simply use the following sites to check if your domains are available as they are the main registry companies for domain names across the internet.
A. http://www.nominet.org.uk for *.uk domain names
B. http://www.internic.net/whois.html for most others
You can of course type in your potential domain name into a browser but this is not a good indication if someone else has bought the domain name or not as they may not be using it yet.
I hope that’s useful to you.
Regards
Alan
Over the years I’ve had clients call me up or email me saying that their site is down, but when I go to the site it seems to be ok.
So here are a couple of great sites to be sure that your site is up and running and it’s not just your internet connection Firewall or ISP provider that’s not working right.
http://downforeveryoneorjustme.com
This is a great and easy tool to use, just enter in the website address and it will tell you if the site is up or not, simple but effective.
This tool is fantastic! Worried about your site going down and missing out on new customers or are you launching a new product and not sure whether you’re hosting can handle the strain. Use this tool and never worry again.
Alan
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