What Are The Top Ways To Make Money

December 23, 2009 by · 8 Comments 

Need money for your college education? Or just some extra funds to add to your allowance? You are probably asking, what are the top ways to make money online while staying in school at the same time? Here are some answers:

Take up Freelance Writing Jobs
The demand for solid and professionally written articles for online publishing has been on a steady rise since the launch of Google and article marketing. If you take time to search the Internet, you will stumble upon sites that offer a few bucks for a set of articles. The good thing about freelance writing is that you earn according to the amount of effort that you give into it, so that if you turn in assignments quick, you can get more assignments and earn more than the rest. Also, the topics are usually easy and resources abound in the Internet. If you know your way around the world wide web, you will find things to be pretty easy.

Be a Virtual Assistant
The big companies, especially those that market consumer goods, receive a lot of emails from all over the world every day. Ever wonder how they manage their inboxes? Simple: they hire virtual assistants whose job is to open their inboxes, read their emails, and file or sort out the mails according to topic, relevance and urgency. Sounds like a no-brainer? Go for it!

Make Money Taking Surveys
This is where you have to be really careful. While there are legitimate Internet marketing companies that do pay survey respondents, there are others who are only out to pick your brains, get you to give them your personal information, and don’t give you anything in return. If you want to try out earning by taking online surveys, be sure to research on possible websites or marketers that are safe to deal with.

Sell Stuff on Ebay
There are lots of ways to make money on ebay, sell your own stuff or sell other people’s stuff and get commissions out of closed deals. You probably already know how Ebay works. Some of those who have capital to spend find great deals or buy stuff wholesale and resell them on Ebay. Sounds like fun? It sure is.

Do Jury Duty—Virtually
If you think lawyers were born with perfect grandstanding skills, you are totally wrong. They don’t go to court without practicing their spiel. And just how do they do that? They stage mock trials before online jurors, whom they pay an average of $5 to $60 depending on how complicated the case to be heard is.

Be an Online Tutor or Give Webinars
You know things that others don’t. It could be expertise in MS Excel or in World of Warcraft or flower arrangement what have you. But remember that there will always be someone who will be interested to learn whatever you know. Work up a teaching module and explore how you can get people to sign up for an online course. Then follow through with online marketing tools like email blasts or social networking groups.

These are a few ways to make money fast, there are literally thousands of variations and methods that you can use.

New Dog Grooming Books

December 11, 2009 by · 4 Comments 

Dog grooming books are a great learning material for people who want to groom their pets at home without having to regularly pay for professional services. Moreover, dog grooming books represent a good course support for anyone who takes classes or attends a training program to get certification and licensing. You may however be at a loss because of the large number of publications. The material can be ordered on eBay, but only after you check reviews and the author. A special place among dog grooming books is occupied by e-guides and other materials available for download on the Internet. Here are a few tips to make selection easier.

Clearly state your objectives before purchasing dog grooming books. Do you plan to start a business or are you merely interested in learning how to care for your pet? In case you want to develop skills for business purposes it is worth mentioning the fact that studying dog grooming books is not enough; you’ll need qualifications from an institution specialized in dog grooming training. Check the list of contents before buying an e-guide! Sometimes there is a too general approach, because most books apply to different dog breeds. Try to identify the grooming element that raises most challenges for you: nail trimming, coat brushing, hair cutting or ear cleaning.

Finding mastiff puppies for sale, finding the right mastiff kennels and much much more you will find in mastiff secrets.

Dog grooming books can be more or less details on the topic that interests you. You may not need a few paragraphs but whole chapters dedicated to various topics or subtopics. Depending on the objective of the book and the author’s intention, some materials focus more on equipment and supplies, others on grooming techniques while many will follow a general course. Don’t neglect the importance of specialized books, individual publications that tackle with one topic alone definitely match professional requirements.

There are dog grooming books that focus on short-haired breeds only, while others cover medium and long-haired breeds. Moreover, very professional materials will describe hair cut options available for dogs with heavy coats, but this kind of dog grooming books target professional groomers first and foremost. The same can be said about the physiological peculiarities of certain dog breeds that need grooming in more special conditions. This happens with dog breeds that have hair in the eyes. If you lack experience with such breeds, you may want to cut this hair so as to improve vision, and you’d be making a great mistake. Good dog grooming books teach you how not to make such blunders!

Buying Flowers Online

October 26, 2009 by · 10 Comments 

The old way of buying Flowers is fast disappearing – remember when you used to stop at a street corner or market and select a bunch from a bucket  – remember all that?

These days of yesteryear are nearly all gone as more and more of us go online to browse for search through hundreds of stores offering everything from the humble sunflower to the most exotic gift baskets you have ever seen.

Whether it be to celebrate a newborn, an anniversary, a wedding, in sympathy or even a divorce! whatever the reason or occasion, it can easily be found and purchased with just a couple of taps on the keyboard – but are there any problems? Perceived or real?  Of course there are, so here are a couple of tips for you:

1.    Shipping: When comparing prices online don’t forget to include the shipping charges. Reducing the price of the product and having high shipping charges is an old ploy often used on EBAY to dupe the prospect into choosing their lower costing item.
2.    Returns: Check out their returns policy BEFORE you buy – you may get a shock – they differ widely.
3.    Delivery: How long will they take to deliver? You may need these Flowers for a special occasion so do not just assume they will be shipped the next day – some suppliers source from the manufacturer so it could take weeks before they are delivered. Check that the item is actually in stock.
4.    Always do a search for a coupon code BEFORE you purchase. I have often been pleasantly surprised to find a valid coupon code just by doing a Google search first. Here is an example of a Teleflora Coupon Code web site:  http://telefloracouponcode.com/

Most stores are reputable so do not be afraid to shop online for Flowers just be sensible.

Edna Wharry is a retired radiographer and writes articles from time to time on a variety of women’s topics – see here Teleflora Coupon Code website:  http://telefloracouponcode.com/

Why buy video games when you can rent

September 23, 2009 by · 5 Comments 

How can you be sure you’re getting the cheapest price on video games? It used to be that renting video games was a perfect solution and as inexpensive and pain-free as visiting your corner movie rental store. Unfortunately passionate gamers who rent a lot of games at once discovered how quickly the rental charges can add up. If you include the heartache of failing to return a bundle of games by the due date and you’ll see that those late fees can really cost you.

Check out these timely ideas for getting the best deal on games and game rentals.

First, check out your community library. Most offer free video game rentals to their patrons. You already pre-paid for their selections with your taxes so you might as well get your money’s worth.

Video Game Review Web Sites – Generally web sites offering video game reviews include game details, ESRB ratings, available platforms, even actual gameplay footage. Check out the video graphics online first. You might find the game is too violent for your tastes or unacceptable for your small children, even though the ratings indicate it’s appropriate.

Don’t Pay Retail – With online discount websites like eBay and Amazon, there is just no reason to pay retail ever again. Many times you’ll find games for Playstation on sale by checking these websites first.

Rent Games Online – Many companies offer online game rentals for a small monthly price. Members choose from over 6000 of the latest games, delivered right to their mailbox, can hold them as long as they like, never pay late fees for holding them too long, and return games to the company with pre-paid envelopes. If you find a game you like, simply tell the company and you can keep it for a small price. A few vendors include a free trial period. Check them out to see how the program works before you join.

Avid gamers who are serious about their hobby can save a bundle of money if they know where to look.

Here Are Some Dropshipping Web Site Ideas

July 16, 2009 by · 5 Comments 

There are actually thousands of ordinary people, many such as you, who have started earning an money on the Internet. These people did not create any great new invention, nor do they make their own merchandise. In fact, they don’t even keep in stock the products they are selling! How is this possible? It is easy to do with a drop shipping business.

How do you break into the drop shipping business? It’s actually very simple – you can do it with your own web page, or even without a web site by using free sites like eBay or Squidoo. Create a PayPal account, place your products out there, and you are done. But where do you get the products?

The system of drop shipping has been with us for a long time – even preceeding the Internet. The way it works is straightforward – you advertise and sell the merchandise- and your drop ship supplier sends the shipment to your clients – with your firm’s name on the paperwork. The customer has no idea or cares that the item did not come from your home or office. Some great product ideas include drop ship electronic items, drop ship clothes or drop ship electronic products.

The advantages of the technique are easy to see – no stock overhead, no stockroom, no shipping headaches. You need to use a honest source to locate your suppliers, however. Avoid web sites that want to sell you products directly, only buy direct from the company that actually produces or distributes the products to other businesses. You will be surprised how many vendors will agree to dropship their products.

Building My Website

July 15, 2009 by · 9 Comments 

Introduction

When I decided I needed a website for my business I had no idea of the very many processes involved. Like most people, I thought web design meant deciding on the graphics and the look of the pages and then by some magic it would all happen.

I have a friend who is in the business of web design and website development so I approached him for a quote. As a complete novice who is computer literate up to a point, I was amazed at the depth of initial questioning required to find out exactly what my requirements were.

I had no idea about the various aspects and the structure of the site and I found it mind blowing when I learned about the amount of work involved. So I thought other people would be interested to know more about this complicated process and I have asked my friend to supply the technical information for this article.

Stages in the Process

Target Audience

Before building a website there are important questions to consider. I was asked who would be my target audience. Who are my customers likely to be? Would they be children, businesses, home owners, sales people, parents or teenagers and so on?

The objective of the website

Then I was asked, what was the purpose of my website?
Did I want to sell services on line or use it to market my business and get more leads for possible customers? Maybe I would want to use it as an online brochure to showcase products. Another possibility was to use the website to foster a community so that I was in contact with other like-minded people, with chat rooms, online discussion and being supported by advertising on the site.

I hadn’t quite realised the scope of a website but as I was asked these questions it became clear that a lot of careful planning went into the preparation before building a website.

How to be Found on the Web

One of the first questions I was asked was, ‘Do you want it to be found by Google the main search engine?’ If I did then there was a whole process of establishing Keywords. So finding the best keywords are vital if you want to be found in Google. Generally most users only look at the first page of results so you will also want to promote your website to get on this page for your chosen keywords. By using a keyword research tool you can find the single most popular keyword for your industry.

Your Domain Name

Choosing a domain name is often quite a problem because every name you initially come up with will almost certainly have been taken. Domain names ending in .com are by far the most popular and internationally recognised; the snag is that it’s very popularity means that the majority of the shorter names have already been registered.

So looking at names with endings such as .net; .co.uk or .info may be able to provide you with the domain name you are after.

When a building is scheduled for demolition part of the process is to undertake asbestos survey research which our company does, we were able to register a domain name with the word demolition in it back in 2004 because we were given good advice and this ties in quite well with the service meaning we get quite a few enquiries about it via our website, apparently these days there are less choices for really good domain names but given enough time and creativity you can usually find something suitable.

When choosing your domain name it is very important to include one or more of your keywords if possible as this can apparently help with search engine rankings. So although the name of your business is the obvious choice for a domain name, it is not necessarily the only option.

Creating a Site Map

The importance of creating a site map is to get it clear in your mind of all the pages you will have on your website so you can prepare the content for each page and begin to design the flow through the website, such as when a user adds a product to their basket, then enters their delivery and billing address and makes the credit card payment in the correct order.

The aim is to make the site as user friendly as possible so that there are no barriers to getting into the website. For that reason often user name and passwordz are set for the customer so that they are not put off making a purchase by having to register.

For a non e-commerce site things are simpler with a contact form which allows you to receive enquiries by email without publishing your email address on the website, thus avoiding junk email.Web forms can also validate the information before you receive it, so ensuring that the phone number provided does not contain words, and that the email address is in the correct format, for example. These things may sound very technical to us lay-folk but I assure you everything has to be decided in advance before starting on the construction of the site.

Copy

The next stage is preparing the copy. This is not the design of your website – just the words and visuals you want to have one each of the pages.

Having gathered all the previous information you will need to decide what imagery you want to use within the website content. As we all know, a picture speaks a thousand words and remains in people’s memory far longer than just words.

For each image you could also have a caption, as the caption of an image is the next ‘most read’ words on the page after the page title. Images and their captions need to be clickable. When you click on a picture it should take you to the next stage of the process such as the sale page or placing an enquiry if your website is for lead generation.

Navigation

Another important consideration when building a website is how you want your navigation to work. You can have links within the content of your website, in the text, so there are not just links from the menu. You will need to decide whether the links will open into a new window, retaining your original page open. Next time you go online, you will realise how much thought has gone into the way in which a website works.

Website Design

Finally we come to the design of your website. My web design colleague says that due to the subjective nature of design it is a very difficult process to get right every time.

What one person might like, another person might not like. If you are setting up a website for yourself alone then you will probably have some idea of what you want to see on the site. But if, as so often happens, the website is for a large corporation there will be inputs from many people or departments and you can be sure that they will never all agree!

There are a number of ways to approach website design but ultimately you need to create a design brief for the designer(s) to work from. Look at other websites and your competitor’s websites to find out what you like or dislike. The design brief should give reference to the logo, any existing brand guidelines or schemes and fonts and colour schemes, and should also detail which pages of the website that the designer is being tasked with creating visuals for.

The very best results will be achieved by using a graphic designer, and beware – not all graphic designers are the same. A graphic designer who designs specifically for print is working in a different discipline than a graphic designer who designs for screen and specifically the web. So choose your designer carefully, look at other work that person has done and determine whether or not you like their style.

If you are working in the big time and budget allows, use multiple graphic designers who have all been given the same design brief and request three concept designs from each designer. If the client themselves also do a graphic design, even if it’s a back of the envelope scribble, you will then have 10 concept designs. The next step is to get them all together and select the preferred elements from each design. Then give the work to the selected graphic designer to work up as the final artwork.

The artwork should be finalised and agreed on by everybody before development of the site begins.

Production

Finally the preparation has been done and the site is ready to be built. Now for the more technical stuff! You will need to have decided which programming language to use to build the website. There are two main types for developing a website, one is Unix based, and the other is Windows based. Each one has advantages and disadvantages. If you are starting from scratch then it probably won’t matter, so you can go with the preference of your professional doing the work. My website is built on the Unix platform (apparently!) which is the same as many of the more well known websites such as Ebay, Facebook, Google and Amazon. Also your website hosting must be compatible with the development language with which your website is built.

Accessibility and Compliance

The website has to meet the current standards for website coding and doing so insures that disabled users, such as the visually impaired, can still access the entire website if they are using a screen reader.

Website Development

The best way to develop a website is on the web Server where the site is going to live. This way, those involved in reviewing the work can see work in progress and provide feedback throughout the development.

Unforeseen items

There are always some things that arise in any project which you suddenly realise you have forgotten, so no matter how well the web designer prepares and asks the right questions, there will always be a last minute change or addition. The main aim is to minimise the number of glitches that might arise because they aren’t calculated in and they could cause extra costs and delays on the date of the website going live.

Launching Your New Website

The moment of excitement comes when your site finally goes live and you see the results of all the thought that has gone into the whole process. I was over the moon to see my demolition website go live.

Reporting and Monitoring

Once your website is up and running, you will want to know how many people visit your website and from that number how many actually buy the products or place an enquiry. From these statistics you can work out the ratio of visits to sales and gradually make changes to improve the ratios. There are some reliable statistics packages such as Google Analytics or Web-Stat.com which allow you to collect and review website visitor data in near real time. All you need to do this is to have a small block of code inserted into each web page on your site.

Another useful service that Web-stat.com provides is to monitor the website and warn you by email or text message if the site goes down. Google Analytics doesn’t yet provide a comparable uptime monitoring service, maybe they just decided it was too much of a headache as it is an intensive service checking a website every 5 minutes to make sure it is still responding and indeed web-stat do promote this difference as one of their unique selling points but it is pretty hard to compete with free. In fact Google Analytics is not quite free, which makes it an even better marketing decision for Google because sometimes it is harder to give things away for free than it is to sell them! Google Analytics is a free service available to Google AdWords advertisers, you don’t actually have to have any AdWords campaigns running but it will cost you a one-time activation fee of £5 (or similar in your local currency) to open your AdWords account, but once you have done that you can go on to use Google Analytics for as many websites as you like.

Marketing

Once the website is live there are lots of things you can do to market your product or service. The first step is to submit it to the search engines and at the same time write articles, and press releases. Getting links to the site from forums, blogs and other social networking spaces are other options. For more on this subject ask your agency about SEO

Conclusion

Wheww. What an amazing amount of work! I hadn’t realised when I started the process of getting a website up and running, how complicated it all is and how many factors you have to consider before even designing the website. The word web design is really a misnomer, as people often think it’s just about the graphic design on the home page, and the branding of the product. Unless you are a computer buff, most people have no idea how much goes into designing and building a website and the systems that support the work you want it to do. I hope that this article will give readers an understanding and insight into the whole process of website development from start to finish.

 

 

How to Make Money Selling Other People Products

July 11, 2009 by · 17 Comments 

Affiliate marketing is one of the easiest ways to get started so here are some tips that may help. Affiliate marketing, in its simplest definition, is a relationship between an online merchant or retailer, who has products to sell, and his affiliates, who are willing to promote the merchant’s product on their website. Affiliates are these ads on its website and get payments, if the transport or sale is targeted at distributors website. Are often affiliated to the commission’s pay, although other Online Merchants would pay a fixed fee for partners of compensation.

Affiliate marketing is where you sell other people’s products online for a commission. You do not need to store their products in your home or anything like that. Affiliate marketing has a fairly simple concept. You need to advertise, promote and sell online products or services and you would be given a commission every time you make a sale.

Affiliate marketing is promoting other people’s products over the internet and with a sale or transaction you get a commission. The commissions can be very different depending on the affiliate marketing program. Affiliates are often paid on commission basis, although other online merchants would opt to pay a fixed fee for the affiliate’s compensation.

Online marketing does not require you to have your own products to start. In online marketing, we can begin to make a lot of money by selling or even just trying to sell other products. Online this can be done very easily. All that is required of you is to set up a website recommending the product and directing your visitors to the product website. Online buyers want to see photos of the product so they can gauge the condition of the product. Take four or five quality photos in a well lit setting.

Markets that consist of customer problems or things they are passionate about. You may even come up with a product idea yourself to offer people and start selling your very own product. If you do not have the time or ability to create graphics, sales pages or articles, choose affiliate programs that help you create these for your web site. It would be great if the company provides training on how to effectively market products online.

Dropshipping is a means of purchasing goods at a wholesale price, selling them for a profit, and having the distributor ship directly to the end user. You can sell goods on eBay, Yahoo! Dropshipping is a topic that I first addressed in my column way back in April, 2003, which is decades ago in Internet years. But with the continuing growth of eBay and it’s positioning of itself as a viable way for anyone looking to launch an ebusiness, the topic of dropshipping is now hotter than ever.

So You Want To Build A Website?

June 26, 2009 by · 13 Comments 

Introduction

When I decided I needed a website for my business I had no idea of the very many processes involved. Like most people, I thought web design meant deciding on the graphics and the look of the pages and then by some magic it would all happen.I simply hadn’t had any exposure to the planning and build process which I now know to be extensive!

I have a friend who is in the business of SEO web design and website development so I approached him for a quote. As a complete novice who is computer literate up to a point, I was amazed at the depth of initial questioning required to find out exactly what my requirements were.

I had no idea about the various elements and the structure of the site and I found it mind blowing when I learnt about the amount of work involved. So I thought other people would be interested to know more about this complicated process particularly if you consider yourself a non computer person and have to get a website built. I have asked my SEO friend to supply the technical information for this article.In case you are wondering ‘SEO’ stands for search engine optimisation, and refers to the practise of getting your website ranked as close to the top of the results for a particular search term in a search engine. You see you’re learning already!

Stages in the Process 

Target Audience

Before building a website there are important questions to consider. I was asked who would be my target audience. Who are my customers likely to be? Would they be children, businesses, home owners, sales people, parents or teenagers and so on? If you are not clear on your target audience then you are not going to be able to set the tone of the site correctly so this is a very important consideration.

The Objective of the Website

Then I was asked, what was the purpose of my website? Did I want to sell services on line or use it to market my business and get more leads for potential customers? Maybe I would want to use the site as an online brochure to showcase my services. Another possibility was to use the website to foster a community so that I was in contact with other like-minded people, with chat rooms, online discussions and being supported by advertising on the site. This didn’t really apply to my business, although I did think about offering to advertise allied services!

I hadn’t quite realised the scope of a website but as I was asked these questions it became clear that a lot of careful thought went into the preparation before building a website.

Creating a Site Map

The importance of creating a site map is to get it clear in your mind of all the pages you will have on your website so you can prepare the content for each page and begin to design the flow through the website, such as when a user adds a product to their basket, then enters their delivery and billing address and makes the credit card payment in the correct order.

By creating the sitemap well in advance of building the site will also help with all other aspects of the build and promotion of the site later. Yes even your search engine optimization strategy will benefit from a well thought out site map.

The aim is to make the site as simple to use as possible so that there are no barriers to getting into the website or making a purchase. For that reason often user name and passwords are set for the customer so that they are not put off making a purchase by having to register. How many times have you gone to buy something online and then been faced with having to choose a user name and password to create an account, and fill out all of your address details and decided not to bother in the end? Well they just lost a sale!

For a non e-commerce site things are simpler with a contact form which allows you to receive enquiries by email without publishing your email address on the website, thus avoiding spam.Web forms can also validate the information before you receive it, so ensuring that the phone number provided does not contain words, and that the email address is in the correct format, for example. These things may sound very technical to us lay-folk but I assure you everything has to be decided in advance before starting on the construction of the site. This avoids delays later, and it is best if your developers can complete the work in a single sitting, rather than having to keep putting it down and revisiting it.

Your Domain Name

Choosing a domain name is often quite a challenge because every name you initially come up with will almost certainly have been taken. Domain names ending in .com are by far the most popular and internationally recognised; the snag is that it’s very popularity means that the majority of the shorter names have probably already been registered. However, you can usually think of some domain name that is available, which is much less time consuming than trying to purchase a previously registered domain name from its existing owner, most of the time just contacting them, and getting a reply is a challenge.

So looking at names with endings such as .net; .org .co.uk or .info may be able to provide you with the domain name you want. When choosing your domain name it is very important to include one or more of your keywords if possible as this can apparently help with search engine rankings. So although the name of your business is the obvious choice for a domain name, it is not necessarily the only option.

Copy

The next stage is preparing the copy. This is not the design of your website – just the words and visuals you want to have one each of the pages.

Having gathered all the previous information you will need to decide what imagery you want to use within the website content. As we all know, a picture speaks a thousand words and remains in people’s memory far longer than just words. It is a popular concept that people don’t read, and is even more true on the web today, so use as many images, diagrams, cartoons and illustrations as possible.

For each image you should also have a caption, as the caption of an image is the next ‘most read’ words on the page after the page title. Images and their captions need to be clickable. When you click on a picture it should take you to the next stage of the process such as the sale page or placing an enquiry if your website is for lead generation. All images should also have alternative text or alt tags. Alt tags will display the hover text when you position your mouse over the picture, but also they are used by screen readers to assist visually impaired users know what the image is about. See the section below on Accessibility and Compliance.

Website Design

Finally we come to the design of your website.

With web design unlike something technical, it is not black and white, it is up to the person viewing the designs if they like it or not. This can make the actual design stage a bit tricky because there is no clear right or wrong.

There are a number of ways to approach website design but ultimately you need to create a design brief for the designer(s) to work from. Look at other websites and your competitor’s websites to find out what you like or dislike. The design brief should give reference to the logo, any existing brand guidelines or schemes and fonts and colour schemes, and should also detail which pages of the website that the designer is being tasked with creating visuals for. See the Sitemap section below.

The very best results will be achieved by using a graphic designer, and beware – not all graphic designers are the same. A graphic designer who designs specifically for print is working in a different discipline than a graphic designer who designs for screen and specifically the web. So choose your designer carefully, look at other work that person has done and determine whether or not you like their style. It is also worth remembering that design is a personal thing, just because you have used a company before and liked their work, do you know the same person will be doing the work if you use that company again?

If you are working in the big time and budget allows, use multiple graphic designers who have all been given the same design brief and request three concept designs from each designer. If the client themselves also do a graphic design, even if it’s a back of the envelope scribble, you will then have 10 concept designs. The next step is to get them all together and select the preferred elements from each design. Then give the work to the preferred graphic designer to work up as the final artwork. Once you have reviewed the final visuals the artwork files will then be provided to the developer, usually in layered Photoshop files.

The artwork should be finalised and agreed on by everybody before construction of the site begins.

Navigation

Another important aspect when building a website is how you want your navigation to work. You can have links within the content of your website, in the text, so there are not just links from the menu. You will need to decide whether the links will open into a new window, retaining your original page open or just change the page to the one clicked on. Next time you go online, you will realise how much thought has gone into the way in which a website works. You will may also have some ideas for improving how some of them work after reading all of this!

Production

Finally the preparation has been done and the site is ready to be constructed. Now for the more technical stuff! You will need to have decided which programming language to use to build the website. There are two main types for developing a website, one is Unix based, and the other is Windows based. Each one has pros and cons. If you are starting from scratch then it probably won’t matter, so you can go with the preference of your professional doing the work. My website is built on the Unix platform (apparently!) which is the same as many of the more well known websites such as Ebay, Facebook, Google and Amazon. Also your website hosting must be compatible with the development language with which your website is built.

Work In Progress

The best way to build a website and be able to monitor work in progress is on the web server where the site is ultimately going to live. This way, those involved in reviewing the work can see work in progress and provide feedback throughout the development process.

Going live

The moment of excitement comes when your site finally gets launched and you see the results of all the thought that has gone into the whole process.

I spent many hours working with the web agency to get the demolitions site just right for our company before taking it live, and when the day came to publish it I was really pleased at all our hard work.

As soon as the site has gone live there is no substitute for real world testing though, so ask as many of your friends and colleagues to view the website from their own offices and give feedback..

Accessibility and Compliance

The website has to meet the current standards for website coding and doing so insures that disabled users, such as the visually impaired, can still access the entire website if they are using a screen reader. It is also a good idea to also discuss conformance moving forward, particularly if you have a web content management system, because and accessible of compliant site may become un-accessible after six months of being edited by you if you do not add or edit the website content in an accessible manner.

Unforeseen Items

There are always things that arise in any project which you suddenly realise you have forgotten, so no matter how well the web designer prepares and asks the right questions, there is bound to be a last minute change of mind or addition to the site. The main aim is to minimise the number of glitches that might arise because they aren’t calculated in at the start and they could cause extra costs and delays on the date of the web site going live.As a general rule it is always a good idea to get he site live to the original plans and then look at an update after it has gone live, unless it is a very small deviation from the initial plans.

Reporting and Monitoring

Once your website is up and running, you might like to know how many people visit your website and from that number how many actually buy the products or place an enquiry. From these statistics you can work out the ratio of visits to sales and gradually make changes to improve the ratios. There are some reliable statistics packages such as Google Analytics or Web-Stat.com which allow you to collect and review website visitor data in near real time. All you need to do this is to have a small block of code inserted into each web page on your site.

Another useful service that Web-stat.com provides is to monitor the website and warn you by email or text message if the site is offline.

Marketing

Once the website is live there are lots of things you can do to market your product or service. The first step is to submit it to the search engines and at the same time write articles, and press releases. Getting links to the site from forums, blogs and other social networking spaces are other options. For more on this subject ask your agency about SEO, remember that’s search engine optimisation.

How to be Found on the Web

One of the first questions I was asked was, ‘Do you want it to be found by Google the main search engine?’ If I did then there was a whole process of establishing Keywords. So finding the best keywords are vital if you want to be found in Google. He says there are two main types of keywords. The first is the trophy, or generic, keyword for the industry which in my industry is simply ‘demolition’. The second kind of keyword is the long tail keyword. These are not searched for as frequently but if you can get a match then they are much more likely to convert into customers. A good example of this in my industry is ‘factory demolition company Derby’. So it is very important to do a lot of research on keywords to find both those that are the most popular and the most specific. Generally most users only look at the first page of results so you will want to get your website promoted so as to get on this page for your chosen keywords.

Conclusion

Wheww. What an amazing amount of work! I hadn’t realised when I started the process of getting a website up and running, how complicated it all is and how many factors you have to consider before even designing the website. The word web design is really a misnomer, as people often think it’s just about the graphic design on the home page, and the branding of the product. Unless you are a computer whizz, most people have no idea how much goes into designing and building a website and the systems that support the work you want it to do. I hope that this article gives you an understanding and insight into the whole process of website development from start to finish.

 

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Ways to Make Money Online

June 22, 2009 by · 10 Comments 

Information products are an excellent way of making money and can be in the form of e-books. Although eBay has now changed its rules you can still produce an e-book and burn it to disc in order to sell it. Information is king on the Internet and if you have it people will seek you out and pay you for it. PTC sites are another way that you can make money fast.

Affiliate programs and ad revenue make web sites and blogs very lucrative for anyone who wants to make some extra money, without doing a whole lot of work. Getting started takes a while, but in time it is easier and easier to get regular visitors. Affiliate programs can drive targeted traffic to your website. The articles have links to an affiliate or partnership websites which allow making money online from the affiliate activities. Affiliate programs make you purchase products by making customers visit their websites. This helps in kicking money over to the original source.

Affiliate marketing is without doubt the easiest way to make money online. Basically affiliate marketing is promoting someone else’s product for which you receive a commission if the product is sold via your link.

Blogs can make you money if you do what it takes. Blogging Zoom was a great resource for bloggers to promote their work and gain exposure. It puts me in mind of Swypefile. Blogging can help you make big money online. Everyday, diverse opportunities for making money online from blogging are being invented.

Internet marketing is now a very popular way to earn income. You have the convenience of working from home, you set the goals and you apply the necessary effort needed to achieve those goals. Internet is the greatest income opportunities for all the people around the world. A lot of internet marketers, bloggers, webmasters, and writers and so on are making a living from the internet every month. Internet marketing is the common way many people earn money online but there are many other parts and ways to it.

Selling software resell right made many people rich within a few months. No matter, what you are selling: others software with resell right or your own software, you can get big profit if this is the hottest tool which many people need for their business. Selling or promoting products and services on the internet! Sell other people’s products. You can become an affiliate and sell information products for them and earn a good commission, sometimes up to 75% of the price of the product.

Create your internet home business and start making money online. Make money with AdSense, affiliate programs, your own product, resell rights, private label rights and resell rights to PLR products. Create an ebook cover. Once you have written your ebook, you need to create an ebook cover . This will add an air of professionalism to your product.

Getting A Government Grant Is Great But Be Careful Of Scams When Applying For A Grant

June 10, 2009 by · 7 Comments 

Start-up grants can help benefit small or home business in many ways. Grants for home businesses are offered by federal or state agencies and other organizations. There are also offices such as small business development offices to help the small business grant seeker with advice on how to get grants. The grants for small businesses or home business are usually dollars that do not have to be repaid and can be used for anything from start-up expenses to inventory or construction expenses. You will find as you discover government grant applications that there are many issues and options to consider.

Using start up business grants to benefit small businesses are sometimes unknown to the new home business entrepreneur. They might not know these small business grants are available or they may think they all have to be repaid. Not true. Thousands of government dollars are given away each year to help small businesses through their start up process to ensure their success. Others think these start up business grants are only for rural or minority-owned businesses. This is also not true. While there are specific start up business grants for rural and minority owned businesses, they are not the only ones out there.

Be careful when using third party services to help you get your grant. There are many very good services out there, but there are also many bad ones – steer clear of government grant scams by doing your research first.

What are the requirements and how can a start up business grant really benefit my small home business you might ask? There are not as many requirements as you might think, nor will all of them require mounds of paperwork to obtain that small business grant. Here are some tips on how you too can benefit from small business start-up grants. First, it doesn’t matter if you’ve never owned a business before, or if you are a long-time business owner. Small businesses need help and government and state grants are available for the taking if you look in the right place.

These small business start-up grants can be used in every business area from starting up a daycare service to building your eBay business. Organizations that offer start up grants to help small businesses realize that people aren’t always able to get a bank loan or utilize personal funds. These organizations don’t want to see the small business owner fail and realize that small business are the backbone of the business industry today.

You will learn when applying for grants that most agencies that offer small business start up grants require an arm and a leg of work that you can’t tackle is simply not true. In fact, most agencies will help you through the grant process and offer seminars or effective ways to get your grant proposal noticed. Grant proposals firms are available, but not always necessary if you know what kind of things grant makers are looking for.

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