David Walsh is an editor and music enthusiast that loves everything technological. He maintains his personal blog and admits to be somewhat of a besserwisser - but only sometimes. David is also very much into web related stuff like web development and hosting.
If you’ve read my blog before you know that I’ve written blog posts about domain names and related topics. To take it all a step longer I’ve now written a full article about domain names and registrars here at WebHostingSearch.com. If you wish to learn more about these two points I hope that you take the time to read it – and, of course, I hope that you will learn something new as well.
The subject of domain names and registrars might sound easy but there’s actually a lot to think about. Picking a registrar for example shouldn’t be done without careful planning and assessments. Anything from jurisdiction to services should be included in your calculations. Well… I think it’s better if you read the article or I would have to repeat myself too many times.
Ok, I’m 100 percent positive that you’ve all gotten them and I’m also sure that you all hate them. What I’m talking about is of course the so called Nigeria letters. Every morning when I get to work I have to take a couple of minutes to clean out my inbox from these scam letters. And yes, I do have an active spam filter… It doesn’t matter how much I try to keep them away – they just keep coming.
It’s weird when it has gone so far that it would feel strange if I didn’t get them one morning… But the strangest thing is probably that they’re still sending these e-mails. Honestly now – is anyone still getting fooled by these promises of great earnings. If so, these people must have been living in a cave for the latest 15 years or so. No, it’s time for the scammers to go do something else. Of course, they’ll be missed in my daily morning routine but I can handle it…
I know that you all probably already know about SEO and I’m also sure that many of you have incorporated it in your business. There’s of course nothing wrong that. It will probably only boost your business. The thing that irritates is me when people talk about being experts at SEO. The Internet is an ever changing market and this means that all types of marketing methods are as well. What was hot one day is not the other and it’s the same with SEO.
Google and other search engines find ways of disturbing people that utilizes search engine optimization to give their business a boost. In other words, what you knew about SEO one day is rubbish the other and it’s because of this that I get annoyed at people calling themselves experts. Probably it’s just me being cranky and it’s only semantics. However, I just felt as if I had to get this off my chest. I feel so much better now…
Ok, this is probably something you’ve been doing for years but I have totally missed out on the action when it comes to parking domain names. You have two options when it comes to parking domains – either purchase a new domain name (as I’ve said in an earlier post isn’t this exactly the easiest to do as all the good ones seem to be taken) or buy an expired domain name at for example GoDaddy. Some are very expensive and some are under $50 – I don’t think you should rush this moment as the name is crucial. So, what should you do with this domain? Fill it with niched content and sign up for relevant affiliate programs. If you’ve gotten your hands on a domain with an ace name you can be sure to get some targeted traffic. I don’t know about you but I’m at least going to try it!
Ok, now I’m gonna do like my fellow blogger Brian and ask for your participation. What I want to know from you have to do with applications. They’re everywhere on the Internet and they’re increasing faster than one thought was possible. Take a look at Facebook for example – I get new applications sent to me every day. Some are just annoying and some I kinda like. The worst one so far has to be the “Friends For Sale” application. Totally useless and nothing but annoying. One that I dig is the “I-like” application where you can compare what kind of music that you like with your friends. So, get of your asses and tell me what applications you like and which ones that you wished never was invented.
Sorry about not putting up a post for a while. Unfortunately I’ve been sick so I’ve just been lying in my bed. However, now I’m back, healthier than ever. I thought it would be a good idea to kick start this blog again. So, without any further ado here are some tools that can help you analyze your site. They’re in no particular order and do with them whatever you want. Hopefully they can help you in some way. Isn’t half the pleasure analyzing ones site?
SEO Analyser / Raven SEO tools
Free tool that helps you optimize your site from a SEO perspective. Easy one click analyze button
Crazy Egg
Great tool if you want to find out what people are doing on your site. Get heatmaps, overlays and lists.
Mint
In some ways similar to Crazy Egg since it also shows what people are up to when visiting your site. I guess that Mint is somewhat more extensive than Crazy Egg.
I gotta tell you guys that it’s been a rough week with lots and lots of work for me. Late nights and early mornings – you all probably know the deal… There is really only one thing that can pick me up after a week from hell – hanging out with friends, having a glass of red wine and listening to some sweet sweet music (ok, that’s three things but all together they count as one). I’m somewhat of a geek when it comes to music and has been so for quite some time now. Or, my friends call me a geek – I would like to describe it as a passion for the good things in life. Anyways… In this post I’ll simply put down five of my favorite songs that keeps my energy level up.
It’s now the year of 2008 and still many sites look as if they were done in 1998 – why is that? I mean honestly, I can’t come up with any good answers to this question. Setting up a good looking site is easy as A, B, C nowadays and you really don’t have to be an expert web designer to do it. For no cost at all you can get the help you need, through various programs and software, and it’s simply just to follow the instructions. I’m looking forward to see what sites/blogs that will present themselves in the contest that my fellow blogger Brian announced earlier this week. If you don’t know what I’m talking about then please that a look at his latest post.
I guess that many of you have seen the video about Google on Youtube – “About the Power of Google”. If you haven’t it’s a video, sort of done in the style of Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth”, where the people behind the video presents appalling facts about Google. The video begins with giving you the background story on how Google became the largest search engine, thanks to ranking websites by relevance, and the fact that they’re now making huge profits due to their advertising (AdSense and AdWords).
However, you’ll pretty quickly learn that Google controls what information that is to be sorted as relevant and that you should worry about your privacy. Google is said to store all the information that now is on the web and you’ll also learn that if you have Gmail all of your mails are scanned by Google, collecting personal data. “Merely to provide you with relevant text ads” they video asks you. A former CIA agent even claims that Google is cooperating with the American government, including the CIA. And so it goes on…
So, do I buy it? Yes and no… The newly launched browser “Google Chrome” collects and saves all the data on what you’ve been doing online. It can sometimes feel a bit uncomfortable knowing that such a big company sits on so much information about you. However, most other web browsers also withhold this information so I don’t know if I should be so afraid of Google Chrome. It’s always dangerous when one company tries to play God – and Google has a tendency of doing so. Scanning e-mails is always a dangerous thing to do as no one should be able to access your personal mail without the permission from you. As you probably can notice am I a bit split when it comes to the issue of Google. Perhaps it’s one of those companies that you love to hate and at the same time love’s to love…
You have probably had the same problems as me – finding an available domain name you like. It really bugs me that I can come up with good idea for a business but I can’t find a domain name matching it. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? I know the basics of what one should think about when picking a domain name, for example match domain name (as already mentioned) with the name of the website, using keywords in the name and so on…
Ok, I understand that there’s millions of websites and that most popular domain names will be taken but come on now, and yes… I know that I sound a bit cranky. However, a while ago did one of my friends tell me that I had to get creative and come up with a domain name that would stick in my visitors mind anyway and do you know what? It worked!! So with this blogpost I simply wanted to calm down any of you that might feel as if it’s an impossible task to come up with a top domain name. Take it easy and start thinking outside the box (I sound so much like Dr. Phil right now…) and I’m sure that you’ll find what you’ve been looking for. Happy hunting!
