Yes, I do have ideas for products that you can create online. I’ve created the following infographic to help kickstart your idea phase. Below the infographic is a more detailed explanation of each general idea.

(Note: If you feel you don’t have the necessary skills to create the product, but have a great idea, then it’s time to look at outsourcing the product development phase. You might be surprised at what you can hire people to do at a cost you can actually afford to pay).

You can embed this infographic on your own site or blog by copy/pasting the following code.

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Online Product Ideas

Start with your own knowledge base. What are your interests and passions? Narrow down to the one topic that you know the most about, have the most interest in, and have the most passion for. Now think about creating a product (which may be a website, an online tool, a digital download, or a physical product) in that niche that fills one or more of the following broad areas.

Solve A Problem

The surest product “win” is usually the one that solves a problem. What’s your biggest pet peeve in the niche you’ve chosen? Can you solve it? Can you solve a physical problem people may have (get fit, grow strong nails, etc.)? Can you appeal to the group’s vanity by making them look better? Can you solve an emotional fear they may have? Can you solve a financial issue they have? Make some related chore easier? Make the normal products they use every day better? Remember that you even very small, seemingly simple problems can be huge if solved in the right way. You’re more likely to score a win by solving one very small, very specific problem than trying to tackle a huge tangled mess of problems.

Enable Giving

People love to give to others, especially if it is easy and unique. Think beyond the typical flowers, gift baskets, or e-cards. Can you create a product for your niche group that enables them to share congratulations, express sympathy, or show their love and friendship in a unique way?

Design A Playground

Everyone loves to have fun. Create a product designed for your target audience that is fun, allows them to enjoyably waste time, or enables them to share fun quizzes and memes with their network of friends.

Let Them Manage

Is your target group looking for a way to manage their niche data? Can you help them organize it? Can you design a product that will allow them to store and retrieve it? Search and find just what they need?

Accessorize

Create a product that plays off of someone else’s product that your target audience uses every day. Maybe you can create skins or themes for a virtual product, or cases and other accessories for a physical product. If your niche uses a particular online application, can you create an add-on product that enhances the original?

Facilitate Connections

Are your niche users having a hard time finding each other? Could they use a product that helps them connect for group collaborations? Can mentors find people looking to be mentored? Do groups interested in similar hobbies have a way to meet and share? Does your target audience need a way to find like-minded people to date? Do they need a tool to help them find jobs in the niche or buy/sell/trade with each other?

Data Virtualization, Visualization and Manipulation

Can you enable your audience to create their own mashups, tools, and infographics based on public or private data sets? Can you make it easy for them to create graphs and charts, or share case studies with their audience? Can you provide a way to let them explore geographic areas, go on virtual vacations, or visually travel to outer space by letting them manipulate geodata?

Make The Idea Unique To Your Niche

Take any of these ideas and find a way to make it work for your niche; your topic; your knowledge; your interest; and your audience. There are probably similar products already available, but that doesn’t mean you can’t come up with your own unique product geared towards your niche audience with your own personal twist. Keep it simple. Don’t create a product with 100 features. Create a product with one or two crazy wonderful features, or one that solves one small but mighty problem. Remember that this product may be an online application, a small online tool, an entire website, a downloadable, installable application, a digital e-book, a physical, manufactured product, or anything else that can be sold online. Also remember that there are vast resources to pull from, and nearly anything can be outsourced when necessary.

Data Resources

Public Datasets can be found many places including:

• Google Public Data Directory
• Data.gov Catalog
• NBER
• Public Health Data
• KDNuggets List
• Geodata

Remember, you can embed this infographic on your own site or blog by using the following code:

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Post tags: ebusiness, infographic, make money online, Online Product Ideas
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How many times have you seen the panicked tweets of people who’ve had their blogs hacked? Ever wondered what you should do if it happened to you? Today, I’m talking to an expert in dealing with hacked WordPress blogs, Michael VanDeMar. Listen, learn, and then be careful out there!

How He Knows

Donna: I know you have a popular blog post that describes how to completely clean your hacked WordPress installation. In fact, it’s even been linked to as a resource by WordPress themselves (twice) and by the well-known WordPress geek Lorelle VanFossen as well. My question is, how did you become so familiar with hacked WordPress blogs? How do you know how to clean one?

Michael: I went through a period a few years back where I was getting hacked every other month, and on multiple sites. Usually it was because I didn’t follow one of my bestest friend’s advice*, and would procrastinate on upgrading. As it is I learned by necessity how to quickly and effectively clean up a blog, and have used that knowledge to try and help others as well.

Protect Yourself

Donna: So, everyone agrees that the best way to prevent getting hacked is to keep WordPress upgraded to the latest version. What else should we all do in addition to that?

Michael: Up until the most recent versions of WordPress, every single version that was released wound up having relatively serious security holes in them. Now that WordPress itself seems to have plugged all of those, there are 2 main ways that a WordPress installation can get hacked:

1) Insecure hosting environment. Unfortunately this year some of the bigger names in hosting have had security issues, and almost always when they were discovered, it was WordPress that was attacked by the hackers, and in many cases unfairly blamed for the security holes. You should always investigate your host before buying a package, make sure that not only are they safe, but check out how they responded to problems in the past. Those that owned up to them and addressed the issue, instead of repeatedly issuing denials that anything was wrong, are probably the ones who take security more seriously.

2) A virus on a computer belonging to someone who has ftp access to the web server. Although this is more rare, it does happen. Certain FTP programs store their passwords in plain text, which means anyone who can read the files on the computer can see what those passwords are. If a person is using one of those programs, and their computer gets a virus, there are viruses that will read those passwords and ftp up malicious files to the host. The solution to this, aside from using strong virus protection (or switching from Windows to Linux), is to not store your passwords in your ftp program.

There are some plugins that can sometimes help catch certain types of hacks, and you yourself wrote a very handy script designed to check the last modified dates on files located on the server and alert you of any change, but unfortunately there are ways that hackers have found to get around most of those (although of course they still help in many situations).

What About DIY?

Donna: I know you often clean hacked WordPress blogs as a service. In what situations would someone need to hire you to clean their hacked blogs? Can’t they just do it themselves?

Michael: Yes, many people can, and the guide I wrote was intended to be a DIY type of instruction manual for people to do just that. However, one of the main attractions of WordPress in the first place is that it allows people with almost no technical knowledge to be able to build and maintain their own websites. With one-click installation and built in upgrade functionality, you don’t even have to know how to FTP files to your server to be able to have a WordPress blog. Cleaning a blog (at least, cleaning one properly) involves actually going into the sql and looking inside the php files themselves. For many people that is unfamiliar territory that they would rather leave to a professional. Plus, getting hacked is scary. Some people who might even have some basic web development knowledge feel better having someone who is more familiar with the ins and outs of dehacking a website handle the job.

Back Door Access

Donna: Ok, I’ve actually been asked this question a few times, so I thought I’d let you answer it here. If I do get hacked, can’t I just upgrade my blog and everything will be ok?

Michael: Unfortunately in most cases that will not help the situation. When hackers get into a WordPress installation they usually modify more than just the core WordPress files, which is the only thing that gets overwritten when someone performs an upgrade. Theme files and plugins will get extra code injected into them, whole new pages that act as back doors to the site will get added, and the database will have malicious code inserted into it. The only sure fire way to make sure that everything is good is to start with a blank slate, and rebuild the files, retaining and carefully scanning only those files that cannot be gotten from fresh, clean sources.

Do The Happy Dance

Donna: Do you do a little dance when satisfied clients tweet how great you are?

Michael: Yes.

It’s Not Your Momma’s Cleaning Service

Donna: Tell us about your hacked blog cleaning service and how someone should get in touch with you if they need to hire you.

Michael: If someone does have issues with cleaning their blog, or has hired someone else to do it but still keeps getting hacked, I am available for hire to do cleanups. When I do perform cleanups myself, in most cases they are complete wipe and reinstalls, as I suggest doing in my guide, retaining only those elements that can’t be replaced with fresh downloads (the uploads folder, customizations to a theme, and the database). For all of the elements of a hacked site that I do retain, I carefully scan them by hand and then put the blog back together in it’s original condition. There are many, many places that hackers can hide malicious code in your installation, and none of the automated or scripted solutions out there will find them all. When I scan by hand, I don’t just look for specific lines of code, I look for broad matching patterns in all of the places where back doors and virus droppers can be hidden. I have written some tools to help me with this, so I can be both thorough and relatively quick at the same time, but I still need to visually examine the results to be able to determine what is malicious versus what is simply suspicious.

I actually finally added a contact form on my blog. If anyone is interested in my services, the contact form on my blog is the best way to get in touch with me.

Care To Share?

Donna: Is there anything else you want to share with us? About WordPress hacked blogs or the meaning of life, even?

Michael: I can’t think of anything for this one.

Disclaimer

Donna: Disclaimer: Michael is my best buddy, so yeah, that may make me favor him, but what it really means is that I know his work. I’ve seen firsthand, many times over, how he painstakingly makes sure he misses nothing. He spends much more time being careful to ensure that every single detail is handled than anyone I’ve ever met. So if I tend to favor his work, it’s not just because he’s my best buddy – it’s because I know my best buddy’s work so well. That, I believe, is the best kind of endorsement.

* “bestest friend” = me. Why does my advice go unheeded so often, and for so long? Don’t answer that!

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 9 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: hacked, WordPress
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There is no shortage of conversation online. An internet that was once barren – completely devoid of conversation as little as five years ago – has become remarkably social, attracting people from different countries, social classes, and ethnicities to interact and share their opinions. With equal access to information, communications, and publicity for all, it seems as if the modern internet could be the greatest source of information available.

There is a problem, though. For all the praise heaped on the social internet for ‘connecting’ us, very little real connections have happened. We have built thin relationships, largely for the purpose of extending our virtual networks, and have often left out the truly important factor in online networking, publishing, and blogging: authority.

The most successful bloggers are not those with the highest reader counts or the most Facebook friends – they are the ones with the insightful audiences and influential guests. If you want to become a blogger that is not concerned solely with traffic graphs and other gimmicks, pay attention – these four tips, strategies, and tactics could help you transform your blog.

Write less.

For most bloggers, the idea of writing less feels like a step in the wrong direction. They spend months – occasionally even years – building their online reputation, only to be asked to limit the amount of output they produce instantly.

It is nothing to fear. Limited posts ensure that the little you do publish is polished and refined. Cut down your posting frequency by 50 percent and double the value of your work – your readership won’t regret it.

In every post, write more.

Two three-hundred word throwaway posts are often worth less than one detailed six-hundred word account. If your aims revolve around building a reputation – an authority aura, if you will – one of the best things you can do is improve the amount of content a single post contains. Cut out the idea that daily, weekly, or even bi-weekly updates are required, and focus on delivering lengthy, high-value posts when possible.

Don’t comment or speculate; meditate on past events.

The rise in blogging has given hundreds of undiscovered geniuses a voice. It is also given thousands of idiots an outlet for speculation. There is no shortage of unfounded accounts and inane predictions online – they litter most feeds like a sampling of low-quality entertainment. Rise above and over reflective content and you will see the favor returned in higher quality comments, coverage, and value.

Attract high quality guest posters.

There is an old saying – “you are the sum of the five most influential people in your life.” If your blog has a purpose – a goal you want to achieve from it – it is essential that you stock it with the right people. Spend time building relationships with online influencers, the type of people that almost everyone listens to, and you will be rewarded with a greater deal of respect and attention yourself. Most bloggers are not opposed to guest blogging – they just have not found the right platform for it yet.

This article is written by Roko Nastic, editor at Webmaster Format, website where you can learn how to create better, faster and more profitable websites. You can follow him on Twitter to get the updates form the ever changing web.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 31 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: online influencers, Roko Nastic
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The Bottom Line First

Let’s cut right to the chase. The best part about this book is that it is a VERY comprehensive look at social media marketing today. The worst part about this book is that it might be a little too comprehensive. It’s a long read. Granted, it’s packed with information, but if I had to find fault with any part of it, it’s that it could probably be cut down just a bit. That aside, there’s plenty of social media marketing guidance here for any company in any industry.

The one thing I noticed is that Li doesn’t just share the *shoulds* – those things companies *should* do when working their social media strategies. She also shares many of the things that *shouldn’t* be done. There are so many misconceptions about what makes up a social marketing plan that businesses are very often tripping and making huge mis-steps instead of successfully implementing the plans. But until someone points out the things that shouldn’t be done, it’s very easy to do all the wrong things with all the best intentions.

The Book’s Audience

Who is this book really for? Although anyone with a business – online or offline – can benefit from the book, it seems to be aimed at companies rather than individual entrepreneurs. Li shares lots of information on handling employee buy-in to the strategies, as well as how to deal with all the matters of who does what, and who says what, out in the social realm. There are lots of issues that companies have to consider when they have employees who participate in social media every day – even if it’s only from a personal perspective. Liana does a good job of covering all those issues.

Of course, one-person companies like myself don’t have those problems. Many of you may not either. In that way, this book covers a bit more than we need, but that doesn’t mean we can’t get tons of great information from the book. We just aren’t it’s ideal target market. Everyone with a business would benefit from this book, certainly, but especially companies bigger than small mom and pop shops will get the most value from it.

The Bottom Line, Revisited

If you’re unsure how to implement a social media strategy for your business, you should probably read this comprehensive book. On the other hand, even if you *think* you know how you should implement your social media plan, you should also read this book. You might be surprised at all the new insights you hadn’t thought of before.

Want To Win A Copy Of The Book?

I have a brand new copy of Li’s book to give away, so let’s have a little contest! I promise it will be very easy to enter.

How To Enter – This Way

In the comments below, tell us all about your favorite social site – other than Digg, Delicious, Facebook and Twitter. Digg, Delicious, Facebook and Twitter WON’T count. I’m hoping we can come up with some lesser known but still useful social sites that we should be aware of. Social sites can include any of the following: Social News (like Digg), Social Networks (like Facebook), Social Bookmarking (like Delicious), or Social Streams (like Twitter).

How To Enter – Or This Way

Or, in the comments below, tell me which post on my site you like best (and why) and enter the URL of the post within the comment, so others can check it out too.

The Content Ends On …

On August 13th, 2010, (Friday the 13th in fact), sometime around noon CST, I’ll put all the entries into a virtual hat (my random php script), shake them around (run the script), and pick the winner. I’ll notify the winner by email. The winner can give me a mailing address to ship the book to, and I’ll get it sent via USPS asap.

UPDATE – THE WINNER IS…

Ok, the contest has ended, and the winner was easy to choose because there was only one entry! Woot! Stephanie Suesan Smith, I’ll be getting in touch with you to find out where to send the book. CONGRATULATIONS!

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 6 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Liana Evans, social media
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Deciding To Change

Over time, my interests changed, and I subsequently sold SEO Scoop. I’d decided that I wanted to center my work days around the more general topic of making a living online, and I came to the conclusion that this was the place to discuss that topic. The problem was, I wasn’t sure how to move from posting about punks who knock down mailboxes, and momma birds attacking me when I got too close to her babies, to the conglomeration it has become – how to make money online.

I didn’t want to turn off all my regular visitors, but I knew that at least some of them came here because they enjoyed my take on everyday life. (Most of those were extended family members and I knew they wouldn’t really be interested in hearing what I have to say about ebusiness). On the other hand, I also knew that many of my regular visitors were people who had found this site because they had been regular visitors of SEO Scoop, or knew me from the SEO world somehow. I assumed at least some of those visitors would be happy to hear my thoughts on ebusiness.

Where To Engage Those Loyal Visitors

Around this same time, social networks were starting to reach the point where even my not-so-technical family members were starting to participate. That’s when I realized that I could continue to share my daily oddities with the people who wanted to know those kinds of things by simply participating in the social networks where they hung out. (I’m also considering using something like Tumblr for a mini-personal blog but I haven’t done that yet).

So, knowing that it was inevitable to lose some of my visitors, but that I could still keep in touch with them elsewhere, I began the transition here from a personal blog about my life, to one that is focused on ebusiness. How did I actually make the transition?

The Actual Process

• I changed my template from a more laid back one to a more professional one.
• I slowly started making more blog posts about ebusiness and less about my personal life
• I began creating more and more ebusiness-related categories, and started consolidating the personal categories into a new parent category called Life.

If you really believe you’ll lose most of your regular followers, and don’t want to engage with them elsewhere instead, then it’s time to have some one-on-one conversations with them. Ask them if they would stick around even if your posts became less personal. If they say yes, try to come up with a compromise solution. Maybe you can have a private section of the blog devoted to the personal side of your life. Perhaps you can blog once a week in that private section, and only those visitors that you’ve made arrangements with ahead of time, are allowed into that private section. That would be what I would personally do in that situation. Your regular visitors would probably appreciate being a part of a private community like that. I’m not sure what the best way would be to actually create a private section, but I assume there’s some kind of plugin out there to handle this.

My Ideas, Your Ideas

So interacting with users on other social networks is one idea to keep that connection with regular visitors after such a major transition, and a private area of the blog just for those visitors is another idea. Of course, you could always just start a new blog, but that’s the obvious choice, and isn’t really the point of this post. I’ll bet there are other great solutions out there that I haven’t thought of. Do you have any ideas to share with those who are thinking of transitioning a personal blog to a business blog? If so, please share in the comments below.

This post is part of the Big Girl Branding / Blogs With Wings carnival created to find out “how to best go about taking a simple blog and turning it into a business blog without it being a turnoff to the readers. What would you do to turn a blog into a business platform without alienating the readers and maintaining your blog’s integrity?” Since others will be answering this same question, they’ll be adding to the ideas, so go get their solutions as well. Between all those participating, the right solution is probably out there.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 12 comments | Add to del.icio.us
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Things I Like About The Site

1. Giant phone number in the header. You can’t miss that call to action, now can you?

2. Map to the location to make it easy to find them – again right there above the fold, and in your face.

3. Menu that can be downloaded and printed out – again displayed prominently.

4. News feed, showing what’s going on, when they’re closed, what new items are available, etc. is great.

5. Reviews are great. That always makes a new potential customer feel more comfortable about ordering from you. Prominent position; good job.

Things I’d Change

1. Break up the paragraphs of text on the home page. Use headings for emphasis. For example, I’d use a big heading such as “Why People From Lancaster, Calgate and Morecambe Love Us, and then explain about their quality meat and fresh produce. A sharp photo of that high-quality food wouldn’t hurt either.

2. The ingredients list is a little weird. While I am a fan of tag clouds, it doesn’t make as much sense in this situation as it does in others. Clicking an ingredient takes you to a page showing the various meals offered that use that ingredient. It’s “kinda cool” but “kinda odd”, you know?

3. Hours of Service is preceded by a heading that says “Oriental Cuisine”. Huh? The heading should say “Hours of Service” or “When We’re Open” or something related. Sure, they do serve oriental cuisine, and that should be somewhere – but just not as the heading over the service hours. I’d also expect those hours to be a little more noticeable.

4. Subscribe for Offers list signup is a good idea, but I’d like to see a little more explanation to really convince the visitor to sign up. What kind of offers? Sell me on the really great deals I’ll get right in my email inbox, if only I’ll let you have my email address.

Summary

All in all, I really like the way this site has presented nearly everything I’d want to know right on the home page. I don’t have to work hard to find the information I need. My only real beef is that they could do a slightly better job of making a few things stand out, and really sell me on how awesome they are. But I like the site, and if I didn’t live 4,422 miles away, I’d place my order right now.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 10 comments | Add to del.icio.us
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Drupal 7, the cocoon and the butterfly by Dries Buytaert grabbed my attention immediately with the short tale of the man, the cocoon, and the butterfly. The little story was interesting. The “moral of the story” was educational. And the entire tale was the perfect lead-in to a topic that is technical in nature, and not generally one that would be all that engaging.

Sure, web geeks like to hear about upcoming versions of their favorite apps, but a quick scan is usually sufficient, and the blogger may not really connect with the reader in any significant way. Dries, however, does a great job of connecting with his readers by using the tale as a lead-in. The little story’s lesson was a great way to introduce the main topic Dries wanted to discuss.

If you’ve ever wanted to be better at engaging your blog readers, I recommend reading Dries’ post, whether you care about Drupal or not. Just as the story of the man and the cocoon had a lesson to be learned, Dries’ post also imparts a lesson in effective use of storytelling when blogging.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 10 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Dries Buytaert, storytelling
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Social Email Marketing

Integrating email marketing and social media

Join Brian Solis and other leading marketing experts, email companies and brands in a one-day conference to discuss innovations in integrated email and social media marketing. The fully interactive session include discussion panels, Q&A, presentations and case studies. Price includes refreshments, handbook with notes, networking drinks and access to the exhibition area.

When and Where

• Friday, September 17, 2010
• 9:00am – 5:30pm
• Hotel Nikko
• San Francisco, CA

Who Is Presenting?

• Brian Solis, FutureWorks (live via video)
• Kristin Hersant, Strongmail
• Dan Martell, Flowtown
• Chase McMichael, InfiniGraph
• Jennifer Neeley Lindsay, A-List Host, BlogTalkRadio
• Murray Newlands, Influence People
• Luke Brynley-Jones, Influence People
• Marissa Louie, HeroEx

What’s Covered

• Social Email Campaigns: What Works & What Doesn’t
• Using Social Media to Grow your Customer Base
• Rewards, Loyalty and Incentives
• Integrated Email & Social Media tools
• How Email Intelligence Enhance Social Media Engagement
• Innovations in Social CRM
• Tracking & Monitoring Social Email Campaigns
• How to use social media data to improve targeting and ROI

Things To Know

• Very limited number of early bird tickets left
• Tickets are non-refundable and non-transferable
• Tickets cannot be bought on the day
• Group discounts possible
• Tickets can only be booked online with a credit or debit card. You do not need a Paypal or Google Checkout account to buy a ticket.

The Discount Code Is iem3

I won’t be able to attend, but if you do, I hope you fill me in on the experience. Enjoy and learn!

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Brian Solis, Chase McMichael, conference, Dan Martell, email marketing, event, Jennifer Neeley Lindsay, Kristin Hersant, Luke Brynley-Jones, Marissa Louie, Murray Newlands, San Francisco, social media, Social Media Marketing
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Let’s Define “Content”

Content could be an outstanding article or blog post, but it can also be any number of other types of content. Here are a few examples:

• Infographics
• Widgets
• Online Tools
• Videos
• Incredible Images
• Presentations
• Podcasts
• Mashups

What Constitutes “Exciting Content”?

Think of exciting content as equivalent to “linkbait”. Exciting content is something that people will naturally want to link to, stumble, tweet about, etc. Exciting content is a level above standard blog posts or articles. It inspires users to share.

Typical Excuses For Not Creating Exciting Content

• I can’t think of anything to create.
• I don’t have the skills to make anything really cool.
• I don’t have time.
• I can’t afford it.

No Excuses – Take The Challenge

For every excuse, I can probably come up with a counter-argument to nullify the excuse.

Can’t think of anything to create? You haven’t really devoted time to thinking about it then. Inspiration can be found everywhere. Start with something you’ve unsuccessfully tried to find on the Internet (related to your site’s niche). It doesn’t exist? Create it! It exists, but is missing something? Create a better one!

You don’t have the skills needed to create it? You have several choices here.

1. Learn the skill. It will probably be useful to you many times in the future.
2. Outsource the project. These days, there are thousands of people with the skills you need waiting for the opportunity to use them for your project.
3. Barter or trade services with someone.

You don’t have time? If someone guaranteed 100,000 interested new visitors to your site today, would you find the time? Of course, there are no guarantees for traffic, but most people are pretty good at squeezing something into their day if the effort seems worth it. Creating exciting content usually falls into that category.

You need to outsource, but you can’t afford it? You might be surprised at the number of things you can buy for just a few bucks. Fiverr.com comes to mind as a prime example, but you can also have amazing things created at freelance sites for shockingly small amounts of money. Of course, look for signs that the freelancer is honest and produces good work. All of the good outsourcing sites allow clients to rate the freelancers’ work, so it’s not hard to find someone with a good reputation.

Commit Right Now

Many website owners just sort of flounder through each day, tackling tasks on a whim, or in between Facebook and Twitter socializing. I challenge you to reverse that trend today, and make a commitment right now to start creating an exciting piece of content. Begin the process. Think about what is needed. Think about how you can share information in a new, exciting way. Decide what to create and begin the process to make it happen. Now. Yes, right now. Grab a sticky note and write it down as a task.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 7 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: linkbait
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

DOH! (Can you see my forehead hitting my desk right about now?)

Luckily, it’s only been a week or two (who remembers) since I uploaded the new site, so I quickly looked through the checklist once I remembered I had it. Want to know what I noticed? The same 5 things I almost *always* forget to include were the ones I forgot to include this time as well. Oy.

Ok, so, just in case there’s some kind of weird synergy between you and I, and you always forget the same 5 things when you create a site, here’s my abbreviated checklist (which of course is nowhere near as comprehensive as the one I listed in the first sentence of this post).

Robots.txt file

A default robots.txt file that allows search engines to index every page should look like this:

User-Agent: *
Disallow:

Actually, if you just want everything indexed, there’s really no need for a robots.txt file, since “Index Everything” is the default if robots.txt doesn’t exist. I usually include one anyway, just to cover all my bases. I often follow the “just in case” method of site building.

Don’t get confused and accidentally add a / after Disallow: If your robots.txt says Disallow: / (note the /), then you will be preventing the search bots from indexing your entire site. Very very bad.

There are lots of different things you might want to exclude with a robots.txt file, but here’s the most common (sample directories, substitute yours as needed):

Exclude certain directories

User-agent: *
Disallow: /cgi-bin/
Disallow: /tmp/
Disallow: /junk/

You can generate a custom robots.txt file with a tool like http://tools.seobook.com/robots-txt/generator/ (Note that this tool will automatically default to Allow Everything, as soon as you load the tool).

TIP: Your robots.txt file MUST be in your top-level web (root) directory, not in a subdirectory.

For more info about what a robots.txt file is all about, go to http://www.robotstxt.org/robotstxt.html.

XML sitemap

In some ways, an XML sitemap is exactly the opposite of a robots.txt, in the sense that it is designed to make sure the search engines know which pages on your site you want them to index. It provides more information than just a list of URLs, however, such as giving search engines hints as to which pages are more important to you than others.

It’s not stricly necessary to have an XML sitemap. In most cases, the search engines will get around to indexing all (or most) of the pages you list at some point. However, any time you can exert some bit of control (or at least give strong hints) over your site’s inclusion in search engines, you should take advantage of it.

To read more about sitemaps, check out the site that Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft collaborated on at http://www.sitemaps.org/

If your site is powered by WordPress then just go download this plugin, and the job of adding a sitemap will be greatly simplified.

If your site isn’t WordPress-based, then one of the XML sitemap generator tools should work for you.

Custom 404 page

Don’t trust your visitors to stick around if they land on the generic 404 – Not Found page. Give them a custom error page and gently lead them to other areas of your site that might be useful to them.

To create a custom 404 page for WordPress blogs, simply edit your theme’s 404.php page template. The default WordPress theme has a 404.php file, but not all themes have their own custom 404 error template file. If your template has one, it will be named 404.php. WordPress will automatically use that page if a Page Not Found error occurs. Just edit it in your admin (Appearance / Editor) and include links back to your home page, your archives, your search box, etc. For more details, go to http://codex.wordpress.org/Creating_an_Error_404_Page.

To create a custom 404 page for non-Wordpress site that has a hosting account that uses Cpanel, login to cPanel and click Error Pages, under the Advanced block. Select the domain you want to create a custom 404 page for, and click the type of error page to edit – in this case, 404 (not found). Insert your own custom HTML code. The changes will be applied after you click Save. Here’s a screenshot of what my cPanel shows for the Error Pages section in my hosting account.

Favicon

It’s really easy to create a favicon for your site (the tiny little graphic that shows up when you bookmark a site). Just take any square image (like a square portion of your logo, for example) and run it through a favicon generator like this one. Place it in the root folder (where your home page is). Then add the following code to the head section of your pages.

<link rel="shortcut icon" type="image/x-icon" href="/favicon.ico">

Analytics code

I think just about *everyone* forgets to add their analytics or stats code to their new site at least once. I forget every time! Anyway, whether you are using Google Analytics, Clicky Web Analytics or any other stats application, don’t forget to find the directions for your analytics code, and place it where it belongs (usually in the head section or just before the end of the page).

Now, if I *still* forget those 5 things next time I create a new site, just hit me over the head with either this post or the Web Design Checklist, ok?

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 15 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Robots exclusion standard, Sitemaps, Web analytics, web design, Web Design Checklist
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.