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  • RSSHugger – A New Method of Generating Blog Traffic

    When I started this blog several months ago, one of the big questions was how to generate traffic. There is a lot of advice on the Internet about how to accomplish this goal, and for the most part it takes time.

    I have recently noticed, however, the many new sites that are appearing specifically targeting blogs. These new sites are designed to help generate traffic to our blog, and in this post I will discuss one of these new sites called RSSHugger.

    What is RSSHugger?

    RSSHugger allows a blogger to publish their blog’s feed and increase traffic to their blog. It was started by Collin LaHay, an experienced entrepreneur, search engine optimizer and Internet marketer (according to the about page on RSSHugger). The original goal of RSSHugger was to get 50,000 blogs to sign up with a $10 fee, however, the goal has now been increased to 250,000 blogs within the first year.

    Collin has changed the sign up procedure in that a blogger no longer needs to pay a fee to publish their RSS feed on the site. If you write a post about RSSHugger in your blog, you can publish the feed to your blog for free.

    Visitors to RSSHugger can search for blogs that interests them and then easily subscribe to that blog’s RSS feed. It seems sort of like a blog directory that you can search and find blogs you may not easily find through a search engine.

    I will be trying out RSSHugger to see if it indeed does increase the traffic to my blog. I will post results of this new site in the near future in case anyone is interested.

  • Tips To Speed Up Windows XP – Part 2

    I recently wrote a post titled Tips to Speed Up Windows XP, which provided easy ways of speeding up Windows XP. Many of those tips were easy to implement, and depending on your computer, you may not have noticed any large performance gain.

    In this post I will explain how to gain possible even more performance gain but stopping unneeded Windows XP services. This is a more advanced method of gaining performance from your computer.

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  • Review: The Path To Total Financial Freedom

    There is much information on the Internet today that discusses how to make money online. Everyone appears to have a method that works for them, but what it all comes down to is hard work and dedication.

    In this review I look at, not only a ways of making money, but also of increasing your traffic and online presence as well. This week I look at the blog The Path To Total Financial Freedom.

    The Path To Total Financial Freedom

    Design 2 stars

    When I first viewed the blog, I noticed that it consisted of a left navigation sidebar and a content section. As I scrolled down the page I quickly realized that the design of the blog was the weakest part of it.

    Although there is a navigation bar on the left, it didn’t help provide an easy means of navigating through the blog. A blog will usually consist of a category list and an archives selection method. Although there is an archives list further down the page, I had trouble finding anything that resembled a categories list.

    The sidebar was confusing as it consisted of many jumbled and unorganized images that may have some meaning to the blog, but I had difficulty associating them with it. If the navigation bar was more organized, it would make moving around the posts easier.

    The home page itself contains much information for a visitor provided in many posts. The downside of this, however, is that it increases the page size dramatically. Checking the properties of the page, I noticed it came in at a whopping 173KB, and that is without the images. Reducing the number of posts displayed on the home page, and including a nice navigation bar will help the design greatly.

    The design flaws show up in the posts themselves, as I noticed some posts had blue links, others had light green links that were hard to read, while others even had red. Being consistent with the link colours using CSS can make them easier to understand for visitors.

    The footer is just as confusing as the sidebar as it is a jumble of links and images.

    The design of the blog is by far the weakest part of the blog, but one that can be easily fixed with minimal effort.

    Focus 4.5 stars

    The focus of the blog is easy to determine since the author has conveniently provided a short definition below the title: “A Guide on how to succeed with the amazing Passport To Wealth Business Opportunity”. The posts he has written maintains this focus as the posts provide tips and tricks on succeeding the online business by increasing traffic and your online presence.

    To strengthen the online business called “Passport to Wealth”, the author uses it in the title of various posts. Although he has included the name in the title, many of the tips the author has provided can be used for various online opportunities as well.

    Overall, the focus of the blog is well defined and represented in the various posts by the author.

    Content 4 stars

    The content of The Path To Total Financial Freedom can at times be nice and summarized, while other times it can be quite long. For the long posts, it can take some time to download, especially if they are included on the same page. It was much easier to read the smaller posts as the author nicely summarizes the important points nicely.

    The posts in general focus on increasing traffic, and focus on such Web sites as Alexa, and Google. Many of the tips provided in the posts can also be used for other online opportunities, which makes this blog a valuable resource for generating traffic.

    The posts the author has written on the blog do provide some useful information, but finding them can be quite difficult because of the current navigation available at this time.

    Spelling and Grammar 3 stars

    There are a few spelling and grammar mistakes in several posts that could cause a visitor to go back and reread the sentence again. For the most part, however, the posts are easy to read and understand.

    Overall 3.5 stars

    The Path To Total Financial Freedom does have a clear focus and well written posts that do provide a visitor with many tips and tricks. The design of the blog, however, will need some major rework to make it easier for a visitor to retrieve the information they are looking for. Restructuring the navigation sidebar will go a long way to making the blog better.

  • Entrecard – An Easy Way to Get More Blog Traffic

    There is some buzz surrounding the newest way of generating traffic to your blog, and it costs nothing. It is a unique concept and is very easy to implement on your blog and use it on other blogs. Entrecard was founded by Graham Langdom, the creator of the Million Dollar Wiki, and is completely free to those who want to use it.

    I will provide an overview of what Entrecard is exactly and how you can use it to generate traffic.

    How it Works

    The who premise of Entrecard is based around a business card for you blog and credits. Every blog on Entrecard is allowed to upload on 125×125 pixel image to act as their business card. This business card is then placed on another blog as advertisement for your blog.

    This means that what image you upload has a great effect as to how many visitors your will get. If you create an interesting business card, then you will probably get many visitors.

    Now before you can submit your business card to any blog, you will first need to earn credits. Credits are the currency used on Entrecard. It is not hard to generate credits, but it does take some minor effort.

    Credits are earned by other blog authors buying advertising space on your blog, the same way you do for theirs. Each blog costs so many credits per day to advertise on, so you may not be able to advertising on some of the more expensive blogs until you have earned enough credits. If you blog costs 8 credits/day, and you approve of a blog to advertise on your blog, then you have just earned 8 credits.

    The cost of advertising on your blog is determined by a formula–meaning you can’t set the price yourself. The price is determined by twice the number of cards on that widget each day. If you get 20 cards dropped on your widget each day, then the price of advertising on your blog is 40 credits/day.

    When you visit a blog that has installed the Entrecard widget, you can drop your business card on the widget and earn 1 credit. Your business card will then appear in the blog authors’ inbox within Entrecard. This is also another way of building traffic to your blog, as the author can now click on your business card to visit your blog.

    For me, it has been interesting to discover, and visit, blogs that I may not have known existed. There are many great blogs out there, and this site allows you to visit many of them.

    Summary

    Like so many other blog authors, I have joined up with Entrecard and have immediately notice that traffic to my blog has increased. I’ll continue to earn credits by dropping my card on the widget, and then pay for advertising on other blogs. Since Entrecard is free to use, everyone with a blog should take advantage of this site to help increase traffic to their blog.

  • Downloaded Fonts not Showing in Windows

    I recently decided to design a logo for a new blog that someone I knew was about to start. While looking through the fonts installed on my computer, I couldn’t find the right font to use. I didn’t have any additional fonts other than the ones that were installed with Windows XP, so I decided to search online for some new fonts.

    I was able to find two fonts that I thought would work for the logo, so I downloaded and extracted the fonts into the correct directory. When I opened up Photoshop to use the new fonts, they didn’t show up in the list. I also checked Word to see if they appeared there, but they weren’t available in that application as well.

    I decided to look into the problem and see if I can get the fonts to work properly. I did manage to fix the problem, and have provided to solutions you can try if you are having problems with installing fonts.

    Extract and Copy Method

    Most fonts that you download from the Web are usually compressed inside zip files. To use these fonts, you will first need to extract the font file and then copy it to the correct directory.

    1. Open up the zip file in your application of choice, such as WinZip. If you don’t have Winzip, or an alternative application, Windows XP can natively open up zip files in Windows Explorer.
    2. Extract the file to the fonts directory, which is usually C:\Windows\Fonts.
    3. Open up the application you plan to use with the font and see if it appears in the list. If it does, then you have successfully installed the font. Continue on if you don’t see the font in the list.

    Using the Font Thing Application

    If the first method did not install the font correctly, you can always use a font manager application. These help you manage the many fonts that may be installed on your computer. The application I used was an old application (circa 1999), but I was able to use it with no problems on Windows XP. The application is called The Font Thing.

    1. Follow the first method, but instead of copying the font file to the fonts directory, copy the file to another directory on your computer.
    2. Download The Font Thing from the author’s Web site. The download link is in the upper right corner of the Web page.
    3. Install the application on your computer by unzipping the zip archive to a folder on your computer and running the setup.exe file.
    4. Run The Font Thing application and then click the Browse tab on the left side of the screen.
    5. Navigate to the folder that your uncompressed your font into in step 1. The font should be listed on the left below the directories.
    6. Select the font in the list, and then click Install in the toolbar. There should now be an icon (looks like the old Windows logo) beside the font in the list to indicate that it was installed.
    7. Open up the application you plan to use with the font and see if it appears in the list. If it does, then you have successfully installed the font.

    If you are still having problems with the font, try downloading another font that looks similar from another site and see if you can install that one. Some of the free font files may not be recognized by the application so you may not have success with all fonts. I have only downloaded a few fonts, but have not had any problems with them.

    Summary

    In this post I provided two methods that I have used to install fonts successfully. My recent problems with installing fonts was solved by using The Font Thing application. There are other font management applications on the market, but this was small, free and easy to use.

  • Review: tenforty

    Many blog authors like to write about personal experiences, which can be a refreshing change to those who like to read blogs. It’s nice to read about someone’s experiences on what they have done, or would like to do. For those that write a blog on their travels, the photos they take and display add to the enjoyment of the blogs as many of the photos provide a windows into another country and culture.

    In this post I review a blog that provides both great content and photos to locations in the eastern part of the world. You may not understand the title: tenforty, but once you read the description of the title on the blog you will understand.

    tenforty Blog

    Design 3.5 stars

    When I first looked at tenforty one word came to mind: blue. The entire site is mainly various shades of blue. If you are not a fan of that colour, then this may not be the blog for you. Blue is my favourite colour, however, I do have my limits to the amount of blue that I like to see.

    Unfortunately, the right navigation bar’s background colour is blue as well as the links. This makes the links more difficult to read as blue on blue doesn’t work too well. Once a link has been visited the colour changes to a light orange colour. This makes it also a little difficult to read.

    There are some items in the navigation bar that just don’t blend well with all the other items. An example of this is the Resources item, which stands out amongst all the other items since it has a faded book background. Making all items in the navigation bar similar will provide a nicer look to the entire right-side of the pages.

    One of the things I liked about the design of the blog were the design of the posts. The author has chosen a nice large and very readable font. The titles of the posts are even large so they stand out against the fonts chosen for the post content. I like how the posts are all surrounded by a thick border and are separated by other posts with a space. This provides some nice separation between the posts.

    The design of the blog could be improved if the author limited the amount of blue as a background colour, maybe possibly making the right navigation bar and the post background match and keeping the main body background as blue.

    Focus 4.5 stars

    For those that haven’t visited tenforty before may find it a little confusing as to the focus of the blog. There are many categories listed in the navigation bar, which may obscure the focus.

    To help visitors understand the focus of the blog, the author has provided a nice description in the upper right corner. There the author also explains the name of the blog: “The 10/40 Window is an area of the world extending from 10 degrees north to 40 degrees north of the equator, and includes countries in Africa, the Middle East and Asia.” This also helps to set the focus for the entire blog, which is really ingenious. Sometimes coming up with a name for a Web site or blog can be complicated and I feel that the name captures what the author is writing about.

    The focus of the blog is enhanced by the well written posts that also include photos of the authors experiences. Once you have visited the blog, the focus is more easy to determine as your read the posts on the blog.

    Content 4.5 stars

    As I have briefly touched upon in the focus, the main content of the blog is about the author’s experience in the eastern countries in the world. The author has gone into great detail in some posts, but not too much where they have lost the focus of the post. Many of the posts are enhanced with the inclusion of at least one photo followed by a brief description of the photo. This helps to picture what the author is illustrating in the posts.

    While the photos help the posts, those visitors on dial up may have to wait for the complete post to be downloaded. Some posts have one photo, while others may have several. Some of the photos can be rather large (80KB and larger) which can take longer if you are on dial up.

    The content overall is detailed and well illustrated with photos. The post length is not too long where the interest of the visitor can be lost, but are rather short and to the point, while at the same time not losing the focus of the post.

    Spelling and Grammar 4.5 stars

    As I read several posts I noticed that the author has obviously spent time checking both the spelling and grammar. I rarely found any problems with the spelling and grammar, which sometimes is a rarity in blogs. The very minor mistakes I did find, didn’t affect the readability of the posts. In this regard the author is very careful when writing the posts.

    Overall 4 stars

    I enjoyed reading many of the posts that have been written on tenforty, as well as view many of the photos that are available. The only issue I found with the blog is the amount of blue that was used. This made some of the links in the navigation bar hard to read as they almost blend into the background. Besides the blue colour, there were no real issues with the blog and was a really well written and detailed blog. It was worth the visit.

  • Tips to Speed Up Windows XP

    Although Windows XP is not the newest operating system from Microsoft (Windows Vista is the new version), I find that there are still many people that prefer XP over Vista. I, for one, am one of those people that prefers XP instead of Vista. I find it a faster more reliable operating system.

    I have been using XP for many years now, and have at times looked for ways to tweak the operating system to get the most performance out of my computer. There are many tweak tips on the Internet, many true and many false, but I have decided to put together a simple list that you can use to make you version of XP run faster.

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  • Getting Colour Values from Web Site Templates

    Many of us aren’t the greatest Web site designers, or just don’t have time to design one, and because of this we rely on templates that others have created. The only problem with this is we may not understand how the entire Web site is designed with regards to files used and the layout of the site.

    One issue that I have recently read about is getting the values for the site colours to use with Google Adsense. The template user wanted to know how to get the colours from the template to blend in the Adsense ads with the site. The problem a user may have is reading the cascading stylesheets that come with a template to find the correct colours. In this post I will show how to retreive a colour from a Web site without look at the cascading stylesheets.

    Using an Image Editor

    This method may seem long when you read it, but it basically involves taking a screenshot of the Web site, pasting it into an image editor and then retrieving the colour.

    In this example I will use Windows Paint and Windows calculator to get the colour. You can use any image editor that allows you to retrieve colours, such as Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro.

    To get the colours use the following steps:

    1. Open up your Web browser and navigate to the Web site.
    2. Press ALT+Print Screen to make a copy of the screen. The screen copy will be in memory, so you won’t see anything change.
    3. Click Start->Run and then enter mspaint.exe in the Run dialog. This will open up Windows Paint.
    4. In Paint, press CTRL+V to paste the screen copy from memory into the document. You should now see the screen in Windows Paint.
    5. From the toolbar on the left, click the eyedropper icon, also called Pick Color and then click the colour you want to find the value for.
    6. Once you have clicked the colour, click Colors and then Edit Colors from the menu at the top. You should now see the Edit Colors dialog box on the screen.
    7. Click the Define Custom Colors button to expand that dialog box.
    8. The colour you clicked with the eyedropper will be the selected colour in the dialog. Write down the three numbers beside Red, Green, and Blue labels. For the Web, we will be converting those three numbers to hexadecimal.
    9. Click Start->Run and then type calc.exe in the Run dialog box.
    10. With Windows calculator open, click View and then Scientific to get more advanced calculator functions.
    11. Near the upper-left corner of the calculator you will see four option buttons: Hex, Dec, Oct, Bin. These are the differernt number systems. We will focus on Hex (hexadecimal) and Dec (decimal) for now. Ensure that Dec is selected.
    12. Typein the Red value that you retrieved from Windows Paint in the calculator, and then click the Hex option. The value should now be converted to hexadecimal, which you should now record somewhere. If the number is not two characters in length, then append a leading zero to the value.
    13. Click the Dec option and then enter the Green value, and then select the Hex option. Write down that value beside the red value.
    14. Repeat the previous step for the Blue value and write that value down next to the green value.

      15. For example, if you had a value of Red=155, Green=98, and Blue = 201, then your new number should be 9B62C9.

    15. The number you should end up with will be 6 characters in length. This is the hexadecimal number that represents the colour you selected on your Web site. You can now use this number in Google Adsense, or any other place and the colour will match your Web site.

    Summary

    This post explained how to retrieve a colour value from a Web site without reading the cascading stylesheets. Windows Paint was used to retrieve the Red, Green, and Blue values of the colour, and Windows Calculator was then used to convert the three numbers to hexadecimal. Using this method, you can easily find out colour values of an colour on any Web site.