Archive

31. August 2007:

Who Is Hosting YOUR Blog?

In association with our webhosting directory we're asking the question that so many people want answered. What hosting company should I use for my blog?

We'd like to know who your blog host is and if you have any additional comments to make about them please feel free. Whether you are on a shared hosting plan, VPS or dedicated server, whether you are small time or big time, please help us by letting us know who you use to look after your precious blogs. A nice cross section of bloggers and their chosen hosts would be a great help to others. 

It's always difficult to choose a hosting company, so we thought it would be helpful to all bloggers to get a feel for what others are using. Let us know who is hosting your blog and maybe help out some who are either starting out or considering a change.



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29. August 2007:

Affiliate Data Feeds Made Simpler

If you are involved in affiliate marketing you've no doubt heard of data feeds, and might even have looked into using them on your own sites.

I'll be up front and admit that I'm certainly no expert, and that data feeds seem like a great idea until you realize that it's not that easy to use them without some technical know how. There are many helpful resources explaining what they are and how to use them and these are very helpful for some people, but very intimidating for others with for example, little PHP and SQL experience.

Some of the best articles and guides on affiliate data feeds are to be found at Carsten Cumbrowski's website, together with a lengthy list of useful resources and I would highly recommend this site as your first port of call. If you don't want to wade through all the links there just yet, bookmark his site and read on for a couple of quick and simple data feed tools that anyone can use, free of charge.

For beginners and those who don't want to spend money up front, one of the simplest ways to start using data feeds is via the web based application provided by FeedProcessor.com which will enable you to process and use data feeds in various ways, including converting them to RSS or building site templates from scratch. There are of course plenty of paid services, scripts and software out there that will do these things and more, but if you're just wanting to dip a toe in the water, this free web app is a winner.

I should also mention the excellent PopShops which is also free and enables anyone to build affiliate storefronts to add to existing websites with their simple point and click interface. They have a very user friendly and attractive Web 2.0 layout which makes the site even more appealing. This is also highly recommended and even the pro versions are great value if you decide to start building more substantial affiliate based websites.

This post is affiliate link free - enjoy the free tools without making anyone richer but yourself!

Since writing this post I unwittingly spawned another discussion on affiliate data feeds at the 5Star Affiliate forums to which the eminent Carsten Cumbrowski has added some very useful comments, so I thought it would be beneficial to include another link here. 

TCH



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27. August 2007:

Nominations For Coolest Bloggers or Online Good Guys/Girls

I had a thought while sitting here on the front porch today, a thought about all the years I've spent online and all the people I've come into contact with through blogging and other online activity. I  know it's a bit warm and fuzzy, but I thought it would be nice to enable people to speak openly about others who they think have helped or contributed something good to their online experiences.

The idea of a list of "cool people" is not an original one, but perhaps it would be good to acknowledge those who you might feel are deserving of more than just a passing mention. It could be another blogger, it could be someone who has solved problems for you online, a mentor, whatever. I'm leaning towards a comment from readers about the person they feel deserves mention, including a link to that person's site or blog. (please note that Nucleus doesn't allow HTML in comments, so please just type the full URL of the nominee).

To make it difficult, nominations are restricted initially to one nomination per comment - if there are duplicate testimonials, that's fine and a measure of that person's coolness so if they've already been mentioned don't let that stop you. I have no objections to A-List bloggers but I'd be really interested to see who else gets a mention. It doesn't matter what they blog about either, all I ask is that your reason for nominating them is more than just a lame link juice attempt. I want real comments from real bloggers about real people.

I could kick off with a long list of names, but I won't. I'd like to hear from everyone who has something good to say about another person online and wants to promote that person by way of a "thank you". This will benefit everyone if we can get some links to "good people".  

OK - it's your turn. 

TCH

Hosting Directory & Reviews 



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27. August 2007:

More On Blog Comments and Credibility

The subject of commenting and comment moderation has been a busy one in recent weeks and many views have been expressed about it on a variety of blogs. Recommended reading can be found Big Bucks Blogger and more recently here at Jangro.com

In addition to this blog I also own another site with DoFollow enabled, although it is basically commercial in nature and, some would argue, not really a blog at all. It uses Wordpress however, and comments are enabled on the majority of posts.

This morning I found a comment awaiting moderation which was a blatant advertisement. OK, nothing really new about that, but the advertisement was for something in direct competition with the paid and affiliate content of the site. Do people really imagine that such a comment is going to be approved? It wasn't even a comment, there was no effort to remark on the post itself (which was informing visitors of new additions to our directory) just a blatant advertisement.

So, here's yet another little lesson for people who think this type of comment form hijacking is acceptable or even worth the effort.

In principle I agree with Andy Beard when it comes to self promotion and affiliate links in comments. If you have something useful to say or a service to offer, I will consider an affiliate link in a comment carefully. If it doesn't compete with something that I am promoting myself, or something that customers pay me for, it might well get through, which I think is a reasonable stance.

Look at it this way - there are many advertisers who pay good money to advertise on blogs and it is important for a blogger to strike a balance, both for credibility and financial reasons. Let's assume that an advertiser is paying $25 weekly for an advertisement - it doesn't really matter what the fee is - but they think it's worth a slice of their budget so you have two happy parties, publisher and advertiser. The advertiser soon notices however that people are "fly by commenting" and getting for free what he is paying for, maybe even more. As a result, you lose an advertiser and gain what? A lot of spurious comments leeching link juice from you and probably not even leaving you the option of commenting on their sites which are invariably not even blogs.

This is clearly not very smart!

On the subject of paid advertising I'll say this. During the past couple of weeks I have turned away several hundred dollars worth of advertising revenue (and it did hurt a little, yes). That's great I hear people say, you're lucky you can afford to! The thing is I can't - and I can - in (nearly) equal measure. Like most bloggers, the opportunity to bring in revenue is welcomed, but sometimes you have to think about what you're giving in return, and just how it will affect the issue of "perceived value". We've all seen bloggers who will post about every single offer they get from the paid blogging services and that's their perogative, but, how many free blogs have you seen that contain a post about dog grooming, followed by one about Caribbean cruises and another about a dieting fad? I'm sure they are grateful for the $10 per post but it is surely short sighted if you want a blog to which people will return and look forward to reading and one that will be at least somewhat attractive to future advertisers.

I can honestly say that the last ten offers I received were declined - either because of irrelevance or very low payment offers, or both. Don't I need the money? Doesn't every little help? Not always, and this is my point. For every suspect paid post I make, and for every minimum payment offer I accept, I have to weigh up the effect on my blog and the likelihood of attracting more serious and long term advertisers. $10 now or a recurring weekly, monthly or yearly payment?

In addition to the sponsored posting offers, I also negotiated my way out of a couple of long term advertising deals, again because the money on offer was not consistent with what existing advertisers pay me. Sure, they were up front offers and would have meant a good pay day for me, but they wanted high profile space for a year to two years and were trying to take advantage of the fact that this is a relatively new domain. What is a good offer for that space now, (and this wasn't that great) may be an appalling one a year down the road, and you find yourself stuck with something bringing in no money and a space you could sell for a whole lot more than the amount you sold out for. Tough to decide for any blogger, but I was firm on this occasion and think I was right. It's an age old ploy - appear to be offering great money, pay in advance, a few hundred bucks, watch the blogger salivate steal a great deal, a few years of advertising for pennies a week. Of course, it can backfire on the buyer, but if you are determined to be in the blogging arena for the long term, you need to be consistent and credible. A quick pay day might not always be the best move, although I certainly appreciate the excitement for new bloggers when you first get offered some form of financial recompense for your blog. It's a great feeling, and by all means enjoy it to the full, but thinking long term is important and could see you rewarded far more if you are prepared to be patient.

If you are going to monetize a blog, I would agree with what JohnChow said - go all out. If people are offended by ads on your blog, it won't make any difference if it's one ad or ten. All I would add is to remember that striking a balance is important too.   

Credibility is made up of a number of ingredients of course but the sooner you grasp the basic concepts, the better. I did read somewhere a one line comment on a blog from someone, to the effect that he deleted all URL's from comments on his blog unless they were from "regular visitors", but happily inserted his own URL into a DoFollow blog - I'm sure I'm not the only one who would have deleted that particular URL whilst smiling inwardly at the oh so ironic justification for doing so. 

Getting back to my friend, the drive by commenter/advertiser, you sir, will have to try harder.  I'm just debating whether to delete your comment or mark it as spam.........then again you could always consider my very reasonable advertising rates.

 TCH 



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27. August 2007:

Bloglines Beta Announced

Yes, it's not really news to many by now but Bloglines have released a new Beta version of their popular RSS reader. At first glance it doesn't appear to be much more than a facelift, and I admit that it does look a little "prettier" to my jaded eyes.

I noticed that one feature is missing from the old layout and that is the number of Bloglines subscribers attributed to each feed. This will probably upset some people with large subscriber numbers but it may be appreciated by those with very few - what fragile egos we bloggers sometimes have.

There is a neat little tab enabling readers to switch between a full or "quick" view of posts listing only titles which comes in handy and further tabs enable quick selection of which posts you actually want to show in the main reading pane. Some commentators have compared the new look to Google's reader (which I've never tried) and claim there is very little innovation demonstrated in Bloglines latest effort, but, if it ain't broke don't fix it, seems to be the idea here. I've included a screenshot to pad out a rather belated post.

Choosing an online RSS Reader is purely a matter of personal preference, but if the old fashioned look of Bloglines compared to say, Newsgator, put you off, the new look might persuade a few more people to switch.  



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24. August 2007:

Is Email Marketing Still A Worthwhile Option?

For many bloggers and affiliate marketers the idea of any kind of email marketing is often not even a consideration. For some, the idea of marketing using such an old fashioned method is simply not worth it, but there are still plenty of people enjoying varying levels of success using email to get their message out, the question is, should you reconsider?

If you are a blogger you already have an RSS feed and you should have an option enabled for people to subscribe to your feeds via email and that's a great start for keeping in touch with your readership. But what about people who don't read blogs or subscribe to RSS feeds? There are always new people you can reach and a large number of them still use email far more than anything else.

The problem with email marketing is building your list of opt in subscribers, and for some people this is the stumbling block that prevents them from ever developing a "warm" email list. You should never even consider unsolicited mail to anyone, particularly if it is commercial in nature, and  a whole industry has sprung up in recent times, advising people on how to build a list, wearing out phrases like "the money is in the list!" But is it true and is it really worth trying to build that almost mythical profit machine? A lot of marketers will tell you categorically yes, 100%, so let's examine things a little more closely.

An email marketing strategy can indeed be a powerful tool for affiliates and this is why the whole list building machine still runs at full throttle. There are many ways you can build a list, or try to, so let's take a look at some of the options available.

Most people are well aware of the use of pages designed to do nothing but capture an email address - usually they will promise or offer something in exchange for which you must fill out your name and email address - capture pages. Sometimes they will offer a free report or e-book or video, the value of which can range from absolutely nothing to very useful, but the purpose is to get respondents onto an opt-in list. This is hardly news to most people, and the effectiveness of capture pages has waned as more people become more savvy, but, used properly they are still a valid way to start building a list of addresses to market your services to. To put one in place you will need your own hosting and access to an autoresponder service - this means spending money to make money, so if you still believe in free, it is not really an option. Several hosting companies including Kiosk.ws provide fully featured autoresponders and lead capture pages as part of their hosting packages.

There are countless list building programs that are ostensibly free to join but are they effective? Well, the earlier you get into one, the greater chance you have of developing a reasonable list, but you will still need to persuade new people to join, and the ultimate problem with these lists are that you are sending messages out to other marketers whose main aim is to sell or promote something of their own. This type of list is therefore less likely to see much of a return, but, they can be successful if you have something of worth to offer the demographic of the  membership. One such service is Your Lucky List which works on the basis of a regularly updated matrix, meaning that even if you don't directly recruit many new list members yourself, you will still be able to mail to a certain number of members each week. Ultimately, you are building a list for the program owner who is therefore the biggest winner.

You could try setting up something like a traffic exchange - there is a good reason for the explosion in the number of  traffic exchanges - you guessed it, building a mailing list! The effectiveness of traffic exchanges is a debate that has raged forever and despite one or two innovative ideas over the years, most of them are a dead loss in terms of promotion. Very few users of traffic exchanges are serious buyers of anything, which is why they are using free traffic generation of this nature, usually in vain attempts to recruit people into dubious MLM's and the like. However, it can be worth promoting certain free programs on them, particularly of you are working an affiliate program that pays for referrals or rewards you on a CPA basis as just one example. However, in general, the traffic exchange owners are the smart ones, they are building a list, just like any other membership site owners.

At this point I will mention safelists - these are invariably totally ineffective, simply because they rely on each member receiving huge amounts of mail from the list themselves and any savvy user just uses a dump email address and never reads a single message from the other members. They are certainly no substitute for building your own list, just as the safelist owners are doing. There are one or two safelist ideas that work slightly better than the traditional format, and one that springs to mind is Muscle Mail Safelist which works on a credit based system and requires the membership to at least read some mail if they wish to send any themselves. These types of safelist are really the only ones worth considering if you want to use them at all.

If you are cheap and still want to try your hand at developing some kind of list without too much financial outlay or effort, developing technology has seen the rise of things like direct desktop software such as Desktop Lightning. This doesn't rely on email, but enables you to send messages directly to the desktops of other users providing they continue to run the easily installed software. It's actually very good, although, as with other programs, the owner is the biggest beneficiary, and you could argue that you are still just preaching to the converted.

So, the message would seem to be, if you're serious about building a responsive list, it takes work, money and time - nothing new there then.

If you are prepared to spend a little money, there are several options and one very useful program from LeadSpinner enables you to collect email addresses from all your website visitors. It's automated and runs on your chosen sites 24/7, turning visitors into qualified prospects ethically and simply. You can find out more at the LeadSpinner website. (Update - LeadSpinner is currently out od action)

If you are already using email to market your services you might also be interested in developing your campaigns and raising them to a very professional level with the services of someone like Constant Contact who can turn your marketing campaigns into very slick looking sales copy with templates, surveys and more. At present they are offering a free 60 day trial and thereafter costs are very reasonable and should definitely help marketers see a much better ROI from email shots to their lists.

With so much focus nowadays on PPC , blogging and social networking as THE tools of the affiliate marketer, maybe adding a list building strategy of some kind wouldn't do any harm; after all, the succesful affiliate should not overlook any potential avenue for sales and conversions.

TCH 

Hosting/Marketing/Autoresponders



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23. August 2007:

Text Link Ads Important Update

UPDATE:- Since writing this post, it appears that TLA have decided to abandon this course of action - best advice, don't make any changes until you hear further from TLA. Thanks to Ian Fernando for his latest post on the topic of Text Link Ads and TinyURL 

If you didn't receive an email from Text Link Ads or if you are not already a member, you need to make sure that your links are updated as soon as possible as they have decided to use Tinyurl for all referral links. You have about a week to update your links as after this time, the old ones will no longer function.

If you are not using Text Link Ads already, you might want to take a look at the company who are helping a great number of bloggers to monetize their sites quickly and simply, whatever current advertising arrangements you have in place already, TLA are a worthy addition to your strategies.

Further information and reading - I should perhaps  make clear that the use of Tinyurl relates to member's affiliate links and also point readers in the direction of Andy Beard's excellent post entitled Will The FTC Investigate Google & Matt Cutts for Paid Links? about the ongoing paid links/Google struggle which probably isn't going to get resolved any time soon and certainly not to the satisfaction of all parties.

 

TCH

Web Hosting Domains Webmaster Tools



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21. August 2007:

Hurricane Dean Spares The Cayman Islands

I am pleased to report that our recent brush with hurricane Dean is now over. Luckily we were spared the worst and held our collective breath on the night of Sunday 19 August as Dean approached. It was a windy night and by 7am on Monday morning, still experiencing tropical storm force winds, a look outside confirmed that the expected heavy rainfall had not materialized and that wind damage in our immediate area had been minimal.

The eye of the storm had past over 100 miles south of Grand Cayman, but due  to its size and ferocity, the effects on both wind and tides were felt by our small islands for a period of at least 24 hours. 

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17. August 2007:

The Secret. BS Taken To The Limits.

I started the day off checking my mail and catching up on the progress of our hurricane "Dean" and somehow stumbled onto more about The Secret. Before you throw up your hands, roll your eyes and the like, I realize it has been discussed to death, but I got sucked into the discourse and it really was very interesting. Result, I spent a good couple of hours reading through some really strong opinions, flames, name calling and thought provoking debate.

Before anyone thinks this is going to turn into an evangelical sermon supporting the book/DVD, it isn't. I first heard of the so called Secret when some air headed aging hippy type mentioned it to my wife and I over some drinks one evening a few months ago. At the time I politely sat there and listened (or half listened) to their over zealous drivel and was mighty relieved to be sat down at the dinner table far from their clutches about half an hour later. This should give you a clue as to where I stand, but I will elaborate.

First, I have a real problem with anyone who is prepared to perpetrate a scam of any kind and can still sleep soundly at night, all the while laughing and actually taking pride in their ability to deceive and 'persuade' by playing on the vulnerability and, let's be honest here, stupidity and greed of others.

When I came across the post about "The Secret" over at The Skeptico Blog, I was hardly prepared for the intensity and moral, ethical, religious, scientific nature of the commenting. (It is a VERY  long discussion thread so be prepared). Everyone who got involved had very strong views, and a lot of people were torn to shreds after getting in way over their heads in terms of their ability to debate or reason with some very determined and vocal skeptics.

I heard terms that I had never come across before, like "woos" and "bleevers" and at times I winced and others laughed out loud. As I said it was an interesting two hours.

The second time I read anything about the Secret was over at another blog I like to visit called Scams, Lies and Crap which is penned by an acerbic  Aussie called Phil Miranda. He has posted a couple of articles and  videos about it on his pages (sadly one of them is no longer available) but you can see what you think of one of the supporters and advocates of the whole incredible Secret gravy train. Read Phil's post about David Schirmer and The Secret Exposed and watch the video.

(Update - thanks to Phil for confirming that you can once more find the other amusing video about The Secret here   

I never needed any convincing of the total falsehood of the premise that if you want something all you have to do is wish for it. This is basically the BS that the Secret promotes, and states to be an irrefutable law. Apparently, millions of people don't agree with me and willingly parted with money to purchase a so called life changing secret. (Perhaps I could sell them on an idea I've had about  this guy, let's call him  Nick, who lives at the North Pole and  every year will give you everything you want. That's right, everything. All you have to do is send him a letter assuring him you are worthy of his altruism. I was thinking we could dress him up in some kind of outfit and asign some miraculous properties to his character, to confound those who might pick holes in the credibility of Nick......it needs some work but I think I might be onto something).

Folks, if you bought into it and if you haven't realized it yet, you were had, in a big way. There is no "secret", but there are unprincipled people who will happily relieve you of your money and give nothing in return and there always will be. Positive thinking can make a huge difference to your sense of well being, even your happiness or lack of it, but folks, it doesn't deliver million dollar cheques, fancy cars, mansions or any other kind of material wealth. The Secret goes way beyond the suggestion that positive thinking will make you feel better. If it didn't it wouldn't be so bad. What it does do is make astoundingly bold and untruthful claims and backs them up with nothing but hot air. Don't be fooled, the Secret makes no-one materially wealthy but the charlatans who designed and marketed it.

Some have said that it was a remarkable piece of marketing that you have to admire, but I would say that depends entirely on your view. It certainly worked, but it is impossible for me to find anything admirable about dishonesty and playing on people's weaknesses and vulnerability by abusing the power of suggestion and spreading false hope and fantasy. To me it is no different to those who prey on old and vulnerable people to deliberately relieve them of their life savings by frightening them into buying overpriced security systems or whatever else they can scare them into believing will ensure their well being. It's disgusting behavior. I've said it before and I'll say it again, maybe those who were cheated deserved what they got, but it still doesn't excuse it in my book.    

There is absolutely nothing new about the Secret apart from its incredible audacity perhaps. I recall being dragged to a seminar about 20 years ago in England by someone who had supposedly "seen the light"  after being rooked out of a large chunk of money by some really obnoxious motivational speakers. I went along because this person was my friend and I was concerned by everything I'd heard about the methods being employed. These included sleep and sensory deprivation and it was basically a crude form of brainwashing. The introductory meeting, was as expected, a fanatical assault on people's self esteem and perceived shortcomings and weaknesses all topped off with an even greater attempted assault on their cheque books and credit cards. It made me sick and I wasn't alone and after challenging the scammers several people present went on to report them to the authorities in that country.

I'm sure readers may be wondering what this has to do with the things I normally write about on my blog, but I hope it's relevance is apparent. So many bloggers arrive on the web with the aspiration of making it big, working from home, giving up the J.O.B. and I'm not for one minute saying it's not possible. Please realize that  success normally comes through your own endeavours. By all means think positive, believe in yourself and your ability to achieve whatever passes for success in your eyes, but remember that there is no secret to controlling that which will always be out of your control. If there were, it would be worth a whole lot more than a few dollars for a "self-help" course.

There are those that mock good old homespun philosophy but try to remember the time worn wisdom contained in some of it. "Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it" springs to mind. The Secret promotes a selfish and self serving way of living your life, it feeds on the avarice and mercenary in human beings and trades on fear, but teaches nothing of value to anybody. In short, when any of us go through periods of self analysis and examination of our priorities and what is important to us, we really don't need spurious and unqualified nonsense like this do we? Don't be taken in by those who tell you should always strive for more than you currently have, nor that what you do or do not have, marks you out as a failure, or someone deserving of nothing better because your attitude sucks. In short don't buy into a con that has been repeatedly perpetrated for centuries under various guises.

Now, I'm signing off but not before I wish for a planet free of hurricanes, earthquakes, floods, volcanic eruptions; a world without inequality, disease, starvation, or war and a life full of nothing but peace, happiness, wealth and the complete absence of misfortune (for myself of course) and it will come to pass. The world can thank me later for my taming of the universe through the "law" of attraction. What? You don't believe I can do it? Please just think about that before posting anything about me not being open-minded or other such tosh. 

 

TCH

Web Hosting Directory and Reviews     

 



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16. August 2007:

Deep Secrets Of Successful Blogging

This little tome has been a popular download from our sites for a while now, but it is finally time for it to relinquish the space it was occupying in our sidebar here at the blog. In case you haven't yet grabbed your free copy I've included it in this very short post so that it will remain available from our site for the forseeable future.


Get Your Free eBook Now!

(We are currently keeping an eye on approaching hurricane "Dean" and, so, depending on how the storm develops, there may be a pause in our output over the coming days).

TCH

Web Hosting Information 



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14. August 2007:

Blog Advertising And New Wordpress Plugins

I've been away from the keyboard for a while (when the beach calls, you have to answer) so it's time to knuckle down and catch up on some of the things I've missed whilst soaking up the sun :-)

On the advertising front it seems that Kontera have secured further funding of around $10.3M which will ensure their continued operation for the foreseeable future. There was a time when you needed to be a very high traffic site to be able to participate on Kontera's program, but judging by their increasing presence on a wide range of blogs, those restrictions have certainly been relaxed somewhat. If you've never tried Kontera just because you don't qualify according to their terms, why not try it? They can only say no after all, but if you have a blog of reasonable quality, you should stand a chance of being accepted. 

I know some people hate the Kontera ContentLinks, but to my mind the pop-up ads are far more efficient than traditional PPC ad blocks. They allow the reader to completely ignore them if they so choose as they will only display on mouse over of one of the double underlined links in the text they are reading. I think this gives more power to readers, rather than less - what do you all think? I've been running them for a few months now and although results have not been outstanding, I intend to persevere with them for a good while yet. If you hate them, I'd like to know.

Still on the advertising front Ad Engage are enouraging publishers to sign up and use their successful PhoText Ads. AdEngage enables publishers to set a price for advertising on their pages and wait for interested advertisers to contact you. You have a reasonable amount of control over what kind of ads you will or will not accept and for those just getting started in selling advertising space, they are an easy starting point. Be realistic with your prices and you could soon be selling ads and generating some of that much wanted blog revenue. Alternatively, Text Link Ads are proving to be a great success story, although you may find it difficult to find interested advertisers if your blog is only small time.

On a completely unrelated subjecct, I posted over at TheCaymanHost.com a plug for Network Solutions who are currently offering a discount deal on their SSL Certificate services for online merchants. If you are selling your own products or services and need to accept credit cards you will understand the need for your own SSL security measures, and if you've been considering it, this offer might persuade you to get it done now while this time limited offer is  running and save yourself a bit of money. More details here - 10% off any SSL Cert/Seal purchase. Coupon code: AFF0000045. Offer valid from 8/13/07 - 9/13/07

OK, that's the commercial bits and pieces out of the way so I'll move on to some other interesting snippets. Firstly, another new Wordpress Plugin has been launched by Stephen Cronin of the More Than Scratch The Surface blog. This is another RSS Feed related plugin called DualFeeds and allows you to give your subscribers the choice of either a full or partial feed. As it's always a matter of debate which option is best for bloggers, this should solve the problems by allowing the readers to decide. Neat. Find out more about the DualFeeds Wordpress Plugin and downoad it at Stephen's blog. 

Advertising and Wordpress plugins - leads me neatly into the next item, which deals with both subjects. The OIOPublisher Direct Wordpress plugin has been designed to enable Wordpress bloggers to sell advertising on their blogs, directly, without the need for a middle man taking his share of the pie.  This idea is barely out of the wrapper yet, so it's not likely to show  results immediately, but if you like the idea and have a self hosted Wordpress blog you might want to take a look at what it can do.  There is also a hosted option for those unable to use the plugin and both are free.

Finally I must mention Dane's excellent article over at Blog Strokes on Wordpress Security which highlights a potential problem I certainly didn't even know existed, not being a tech minded person. Worth a read.

Before signing off, there are a couple of things I'd like to mention. One, I'm still looking for feedback on my post about blog donations and plugins here so please drop by and vote/leave a comment as I'd really like some more meaningful numbers and opinions.

I would also like to apologize to commenters for the lack of HTML functionality in the comments area of the site. This is a Nucleus issue and  there's not much I can do about it. So, if you wish to leave a link in the comments field, just type in the URL and it will be clickable, but  there is no facility for anchor text links. Sorry.

TCH

Free Software and More At TheCaymanHost



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13. August 2007:

In My Bloglines This Week

I know I said I'd publish this over the weekend but life interfered so I'm bringing you the highlights of some of the blogs currently to be found in my Bloglines in the past few weeks, a couple of days later than expected.

These blogs are all worth looking into for any blogger,regardless of what you blog about. I haven't included any major names because,well, you probably know all about them already.

One of my most recent additions is the Fantastic Site of Lord Matt, a UK blogger who writes about all sorts of things including blogging, SEO, making money, affiliate marketing and more. He gets the first plug because, like me, he blogs using the NucleusCMS platform and there aren't many of us around! Pay Matt a visit, there is much to learn at his blog - it's not all about looking regal in a top hat!

Also due a mention is the bovine blog at JohnCow.com who recently caused a bit of a stir with their phony lawsuit post - shutting down their site for a day after breaking the news that they were being sued for "copyright infringements". It all turned out to be rather convoluted bit of linkbaiting but it had a lot of people going, including me, I admit it. I'm glad it turned out to be a hoax, because it is currently one of my favorite reads.

While on the subject of cows I should also mention a special hosting promotion going on at FatCow.com who are currently offering a whopping $33 off of your initial purchase of their $99 hosting plan. Click the graphic for more information about getting moo for your money at Fat Cow.

FatCow $99 PlanMoving away from our four legged friends and back to blogging, I would recommend to everyone who doesn't read it already, the very useful 5Star Affiliate Marketing Blog and their forums that reside permanently in my RSS reader for the simple reason that they deliver some great information for anyone blogging for profit as well as love. This article about 100 ways to make money online is a case in point.

Other honorable mentions this month go to the RSS Newsniche Blog which delivers really good information about the world of RSS and has become an excellent point of reference for me. I think you will find it very useful too, however experienced you may or may not be with RSS feeds.

The next blogs will be of particular interest to Wordpress bloggers as they cater to the quest for Wordpress knowledge. The first has been stored in my Bloglines for quite a while now and is one of the best blogs about WP that you will find -  The Optiniche blog makes for an excellent resource on blogging with Wordpress and also offers sound advice on niche blogging and monetization. In addition you may also like to have a look at a newer kid on the block in the blogging about Wordpress arena at the promising Wordpress Max blog, recently discovered via Bumpzee, as was the very useful BigBucksBlogger site, another WP oriented site that I have mentioned before on these pages, with well written articles about both Wordpress and blogging as a whole. You will also find some useful Wordpress plugins at all of these places too.

There are of course countless other sites and I do intend to mention more of them in the days ahead, but that concludes this month's precis of what is being read via the Cayman Host's RSS reader this month. Many of my recent discoveries have come via my membership of a couple of communities at Bumpzee and if you would like to find out more, why not come and visit us, at the DoFollow/IFollow/NoNoFollow community, which encompasses several of the blogs mentioned in this post.

TCH

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11. August 2007:

Does Yahoo Really Suck?

SLURP........BURP!

Well, it would seem that when it Slurps it does indeed suck, and largely your bandwidth is want it craves, more than a Humvee craves the Middle East's finest vintage. If you have ever looked at your server stats, you will undoubtedly have noticed Slurp, Yahoo's crawler, muddling its way through your site, but did you notice how much more of a pig it is compared to the spiders of the other leading engines?

Now, personally I don't have too much of a problem with this, because, sadly, I never  come close to approaching my monthly bandwidth limits in any case. However, having read the very interesting article over at The Friday Traffic Report where the blog's owner has become so fed up with the greedy Yahoo spider, he has disallowed it in his robots.txt file.

It makes my little complaint about ASK.com in my last post look a little tame doesn't it? To be fair, the author at FTR has a point - the activity from Slurp should mean a translation into some reasonable listings and visitors, should it not? Yahoo is supposed to have huge numbers of users and be one of the highest traffic sites on the web.

Continuing on from my ASK.com experiment, I ran the same search on Yahoo. Now, to give Yahoo its due, its results are way more relevant than those found on Ask.com, but where am I? Nowhere. This is strange indeed, because I actually know, that I used to appear on the first page of their results, but now, after clicking through fourteen pages I still haven't turned up. As the "Yahoo slap" is not generally known, I don't think it's due to any bad behavior on my part. Something odd has happened however.

Tagging the word "hosting" on the end of the search string does bring me a result on page two, but only because of a del.icio.us bookmark, so, I tried adding "Cayman" instead and finally find an entry for this domain. Alas it is not a link to a specific article, just the home page of the blog. Now, obviously nobody will be using such a search term, but what is Yahoo doing?

Well, it would appear that for reasons known only to itself, Yahoo Slurp, isn't indexing all of my posts, and even some of the ones it does, it is not appending the full URL to them, but using the default /item/# I have no idea why this is happening, but it does explain why I do not appear  for the chosen term. I haven't changed the structure of my permalinks and I know that Slurp has been blundering around through my domain on a regular basis biting all my individual posts, and yet it is failing to index them properly??

All I can think of is that when I recently redesigned my pages, there was a brief period when not all of my permalinks were in place and this has caused such an overnight disappearance. We shall see if, in time, Slurp will return the pages in question to their results. 

Ultimately I don't think it really matters, because even with good results Yahoo just doesn't seem to drive much in the way of traffic. I can only assume this is because Yahoo users just aren't an audience for this type of site. If you are interested in doing all you can to help with the Slurping Spider this article on Yahoo search gives some facts and figures about just how big the "second largest search engine" really is and how to please it.

It's an interesting discussion and the post and subsequent comments at The FTR might persuade you to look a bit closer at your own Yahoo Slurp give and take ratios :-)  I don't intend to stop Slurp from guzzling anytime soon, but maybe a lesson in table manners wouldn't  go amiss Yell At least I posted something without mentioning Google.....oh damn!

Tomorrow, I'm going to take look at some of the blogs I've been reading lately and some that I haven't.

TCH

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07. August 2007:

Getting A Site Listed In Ask.com

In an entirely unscientific experiment today, I took a look around at Ask.com to see how I stacked up in their search results. It was certainly an interesting little adventure and the results were a little surprising too. I often see people asking how to get ranked in Ask.com without paying for sponsored listings (of which Ask.com returns many) so here's the tale from the perspective of an SEO fumbler.

Let's start off by saying that you cannot submit a site to Ask.com for a free listing, they don't work that way. Your best chance of getting included in their results is via links from other sites, but more of that later. In my little experiment, I picked a search term for which Google has sent me a fair amount of visitors. I chose it because it isn't a term for which a huge number of searches are likely to occur, and because by its very nature, most of the searchers are likely to be dyed in the wool 'Googlers'. I wanted to see just what results I could achieve in Ask.com, for a term I do reasonably well with on Google......

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06. August 2007:

Visit George Town Grand Cayman Live

If you haven't had a vacation this year and like the idea of a brief interlude in the Caribbean, why not come and visit our island, or at least a bit of it?  The  live cam in George Town is up and running again, enabling you to take control of the webcam for a live view of the harbour area. Count the cruise ships, watch the bustling waterfront of our capital and take a quick breather from blogging/working. The camera will open in a new window, enjoy your trip! Cool

View The Grand Cayman Live Webcam Now 



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06. August 2007:

PC Maintenance A Sunday In Purgatory

I've been tied up for the whole day working on technical issues once again, as I was beset with problems with the laptop, Firefox, IE, my connection and all sorts of other wierd and not so wonderful behavior. It seems to have been a bad week for things going wrong, not just for me but for several other blog owners whose feeds I read. If it's not hosting issues it's spam or hacker attacks or spam or a whole list of other annoying things that just eat up way too much time. So, for your reading pleasure, here is the run down of my Sunday in our sunny Caribbean paradise.  

When I woke up this morning my wife informed me that "something is wrong with the computer" which is always a worrying thing to hear as you struggle up from your pillow. "What's up with it?" I mumbled back, reaching for a cigarette and squinting in the sunlight streaming through into our room. "Internet Explorer keeps closing, and Firefox is going really slow........."

Oh boy, as Sam used to say in Quantum Leap

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04. August 2007:

New Look For The Cayman Host Blog

After three days in the trenches I've finally managed to get the new design up and running. Things are still not finished but at least I have  a functioning blog again. The work has left me with a backlog of things I meant to do, but it wasn't all the fault of rewriting these pages......

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03. August 2007:

Quick News - Blog Redesign

This is just a very quick post to let you know that we are currently in the process of overhauling our blog's clothes. 

If you encounter any strange behavior over the next few days, please bear with us as we iron out all the little problems. Hopefully it won't be for very long, but while we are testing  some things it could turn up the occasional odd pageview. Thanks for your understanding.

TCH

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01. August 2007:

Kontera Control Wordpress Plugin

Having literally just published a list of some of my favorite Wordpress Plugins over at the main CaymanHost site, I discover another one which deserves a mention in its own right. 

(I came across this whilst involved in a very interesting discussion about blog comment spam at Big Bucks Blogger which is deserving of your attention no matter what you blog about and the original post spawned another about cultural factors that influence comment spam).........

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