Blogger Tricks O Tips

Top 10 Tips For Increasing Blog Traffic - 2012

2012-06-19T04:32:00.000-07:00

Increasing blog's traffic is every blogger's aim. Whether for reaching out to a larger audience, or generating more income through a blog, or to create awareness about a particular topic, he needs more traffic on his blog for his efforts to be of any worth. You might spend all the time and hard work you want on your blog. But unless you don't have a decent traffic, all your struggles will be in vain. Hence, the more traffic, the better.

Are you waking up daily, eager to check out your blog's traffic, only to find out that there has been little or no improvement in your stats whatsoever? There must be something you are doing wrong, or not doing at all! Here is a list of things you can do to increase your blog's traffic. Or rather, here is a checklist to help you ensure that you are doing all the necessary things correctly.

Post frequency and Timings

Post frequency and timings are extremely important for your blog's rankings. First of all, search engines such as Google like to see fresh content on websites. If your blog is struggling for traffic, then you must publish at least one post daily. The more frequently you publish posts, the more quickly your rankings and traffic grows. For example, our other blog SEM had a million+ Alexa ranking when it started! We have been publishing two posts daily for the first two months. And in those two months, the Alexa improved dramatically and it now stands at around 50,000!

Post timings are important as well. Not only do you need to be consistent in your timings, you should also choose a time that's globally significant. Choose a time windows that best suits your majority audience. Our publish timings are 12 01 am each day! Not only does this suits our audience, it also is consistent timing. Once you choose a time, stick to it! Not publishing posts on your fixed time can drop your Alexa! This is what happened to me at SEM once or twice. I made a mistake in scheduling my post, and it didn't publish at the set time. As a result, the Alexa didn't improve, despite the two brand new posts published that day!

Build Backlinks

Backlinks are very important for a blog, but only the quality ones. Backlinks refer to in-bound links to your blog from other sites. Backlinks give you instant traffic from other sites. But be careful about them. Trust me, you don't want cheap backlinks to your blog. They will hurt your rank instead of improving it. Never buy a backlink package such as "1,000 backlinks for $9.99" etc. Try to build genuine backlinks on sites with a decent rank.

How to build backlinks? Well there are many ways. Participate in forum discussions, and recommend some content on your blog to others. Also add your blog's URL to your signatures. This will leave a link to your blog each time you post a comment on a forum. Another way of increasing backlinks is by guest posting on other blogs. Write for other blogs in return for backlinks.

Advertise!

If you've got some money on hand, then why not advertise your website? Advertising your blog is one of the best ways of increasing traffic, since it gives you instant exposure. Ads on sites relating to your niche can give you much more benefits as compared to other sites, since the traffic on similar niche sites is interested in exactly the kind of stuff you, or other similar sites have.

Interact!

Interacting with your audience is the key to retaining and increasing your traffic. Adding stuff like polls, questions, surveys and forums can increase your interactivity. Also, use such a writing style that addresses the readers directly. Be casual and friendly, and don't be (too) formal.

Write Articles

This method is highly effective. Not only does it give you immediate traffic, it also gives you quality backlinks that improve your traffic in the long run. Write an article on a topic relating to your website, and submit it to popular article directories, such as Squidoo, Hubpages, Ezine Articles etc. For example, say you have a blog about affiliate marketing. You can write an article on affiliate marketing tips, and then mention your own blog in that article. Then submit that article to popular directories for traffic and backlinks.

One thing though. Try not to write on sites that give no-follow links. Such sites include eHow, articlesbase, examiner etc. Sites like Squidoo and Ezine Articles don't give no-follow links, which is preferable.

Discuss Recent Trends

Discussing hot topics can get you in search engines' good favour. Google likes to see the latest content. Not only that, people also want to see latest content. Discussing latest topics gives a good impression of your blog being up to date. Not only that, it draws a lot of traffic, and indeed contributes a lot towards this very blog's traffic.

Guest Blogging

Encourage guest posting on your blog. There are many advantages of doing that. First of all, it will increase your post frequency, which, as we already discussed is a good thing. It will also reduce your workload and effort. Secondly, it will increase your traffic slightly, since fans from the guest's blog will want to read what their writer has written on another blog. Be careful about this though. You have to give out backlinks to the guests' blogs. Too many out going links without a nofollow attribute and your rank will start to drop!

Apart from inviting people to write for you, you can write for others as well. This will get you a backlink. Write multiple posts on quality blogs, and you will see your backlinks increase and your rankings soar! This is one of the best way of building genuine backlinks

Apply SEO techniques

Search Engine Optimization is so vast a topic that entire books have been written on it. But you don't need to read books. All you need do is learn some basic SEO techniques, and apply them to your blog. SEO is extremely important if you want search engines to find your blog easily.

You should be familiar with the most basic SEO methods. Keep keywords in mind while writing titles and introductory paragraphs. Also write two or three line meta descriptions for your posts. If you are using WordPress, then you'll need to add meta keywords as well. Complete these basic steps and you're done with the basic SEO, although this is, by no means, the end of it.

Also, learn how to generate and submit a sitemap for your blog to major search engines. This is an important SEO step that every blogger needs to take to ensure that all of his posts and pages are indexed properly.

Use Social Media

You'll be surprised at how useful social media can be. Make public profiles on popular networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Google+ etc. These will help you build a fan base of your blog. Social Media is also great in the sense that it provides you a much greater exposure through your fans than you could get on your own. So share your new blog posts on social media not only to gain extra traffic, but also to retain your existing traffic.

Use Q&A Websites

Q&A websites can be a great source of traffic for blogs. Get active on popular Q&A sites, such as Yahoo! Answers, Wiki Answers etc. Search for questions related to your area of expertise, and answer them. Then provide your website link as a source. For example, if you are an affiliate marketer, answer some questions regarding the field, and answer them well. Then give the link to your blog. You can also do this on popular forums such as Blogger Forum etc.

These were some of the tips for increasing blog traffic. These are, by no means, the only ways. There are literally thousands of ways you can increase your blog traffic. But hopefully, these basic tips will guide you in building your basic audience.

How Google Penguin Update Will Affect Your Blog ?

2012-06-17T02:29:00.001-07:00

In April, Google launched the Penguin algorithm aimed to detecting and filtering out websites and blogs classified as ‘spam’ from its search results. A month later, Google released an update to the Penguin algorithm to identify and blacklist websites which violate its quality guidelines.

While implementing Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a standard practice for websites and blogs, the Penguin update is aimed at scrutinizing over optimization and spamming. As a blog owner, if you’ve adopted over-optimization techniques, there’s a good chance that the Penguin update has already hit your blog.

Let’s try and understand what is the Google Penguin update and how does it affect you and your blog?

What is Penguin Update

Simply put, the Penguin update aims at identifying sites and blogs which use malpractices such as keyword stuffing and link spamming. The idea is to encourage bloggers to adopt white hat SEO techniques in order to build high-quality blogs with appealing visuals and stellar content.

At the same time, the Penguin update is likely to catch you in a net if you adopt black hat SEO techniques to promote your blog. Google says the Penguin update is an effort to detect ‘stuff in the middle’.

How does it affect you?

In general, if you follow Google’s quality guidelines, the Penguin update should cause no harm to your blog. However, if you actively pursue any of the following practices, there’s a good chance that your blog will be classified as ‘Spam’ by Penguin sooner than later.

Linking to unsafe & dangerous sites
Linking to low quality blogs
Backlinking to sources offering poor quality content
Linking to spam comments

In general, you should always link to trusted sites and blogs offering high-quality content.

Penguin Update classified my blog as Spam, what should I do?

Google admits that the Penguin update isn’t perfect and there may false positives. If you believe your blog has been unduly penalized by the Penguin update, Google recommends you fill this form and submit a spam report. Make sure to put the word ‘Penguin’ in your report. Once Google receives this report, they will scrutinize your blog/ site and provide you appropriate feedback.

Google recommends you use the above form only in case you’ve received a warning about the Penguin update’s implications for your blog.

Lessons from Penguin Update

Even if your blog hasn’t been affected the Penguin update, there are good lessons to be learnt. For a start, the Penguin update offers an insight that the SEO landscape is evolving and you need to keep up with the advancements to make the most of this opportunity. Secondly, it serves as a reminder that you MUST adhere to Google’s quality guidelines or else risk your and your blog’s future.

Has your blog been affected by the Google Penguin update? Do you think the Penguin Update is a step in the right direction by Google to streamline SEO? Please share your opinion by leaving a comment.

What’s better than Apple’s Siri? Android’s Tap & Speak, that’s what.

2012-06-17T02:09:00.000-07:00

It might be old news to some of you but for me, since I’m still discovering Android’s awesomeness, Vlingo’s Tap & Speak is a Siri killer. I wish Vlingo would port Tap & Speak to the iPhone. I’d pay $4.99 for it. I might pay more. I’d pay something to have a productive App like that at my disposal. Tap & Speak has a very cool ‘Driving Mode’ which allows you to use your phone for calling and texting without having to wreck your car to do it. Hands down (pardon the pun), Tap & Speak is way better than Siri.

Watching my wife get frustrated enough with Siri to fling her new iPhone 4S across the room and yell, “Siri is useless!” is enough to make me realize that I don’t need or want Siri. I have an iPhone 4, so I don’t have a choice but even if I did, I wouldn’t use it. I’m sure some people find it useful and helpful but I’m not one of them. Neither is my wife. Our 18-year-old son doesn’t use Siri on his 4S either. I believe he colorfully compared Siri’s usefulness to the operational nature of a vacuum cleaner.

I don’t think Siri is necessarily bad but I do think it requires some training and practice but there are no help files nor is there a website that helps train users how to better use it. And, before you give me that whole, “Apple is intuitive” thing, let me say that Siri is not your typical intuitive Apple application nor is it intuitive.

Tap & Speak gives me examples and a step-by-step how-to on first use. I like that. I also like that I can tap or just say, “Hi Galaxy” to begin a new conversation. No, Tap & Speak isn’t perfect but it’s a level above Siri. I can actually be productive with Tap & Speak. Siri is cute but virtually useless for me–the few times I’ve used it, that is.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m a big Apple device fan. In fact, if you’ve read this blog from the beginning, I didn’t want an Android device. At all. It was thrust upon me. But, the longer I use it, the better I like it. It has some really cool features that I wish my iPhone 4 had. One is the ability to connect to the device’s lower level self. With my Android phone, I can SSH to it from another computer or open a console to the OS from the device itself.

OK, not everyone needs to do that but I rather like having that feature. I don’t want to even think of jailbreaking a device just to get some “should be included from the factory” features.

I’m especially excited by Vlingo’s merger with Nuance. If you don’t know, Nuance is the company that makes Dragon Naturally Speaking software, which is the best speech recognition software on the market. I foresee a truly intelligent conversational device control coming soon to just about everything near you.

With the blend of those two intelligent speech recognition software companies on the same team, I think we’ll soon be able to actively navigate to addresses in our cars, make and receive phone calls, send and receive text messages and do all sorts of SciFi-type things using voice recognition. With superior voice recognition and communications plus Google Car type self-driving cars, even the visually impaired will be able to drive a car. These are exciting times.

You might find it somewhat of a stretch from making a phone call to driving a car but that’s just the way my mind works. Too bad I don’t get paid to come up with ideas and solutions for new products. I’d really like that gig. Heck, I came up with the idea of a self-driving car when I was a kid. I knew it could be done and I knew how to do it but convincing anyone to listen was the hard part. Now, with Siri and and Tap & Speak, I have a built-in audience for my ideas, my jokes and my disruptive dialog.
The best part is that, so far unlike their human counterparts, they just have to listen.

3 Free domain name websites : Advantages and Disadvantages

2012-06-15T18:23:00.004-07:00

It is a well known fact that a Domain Name adds a profession touch to your website/brand. But, it is sometimes a case of financial crisis or some other problem that a web publisher is not able to purchase a Generic Top-Level Domain for his brand or Website in general.

In such cases a need for free Domain names is required. So, I am going to tell you about three Services which allow you to register a Domain name for free. I mentioned above that these services will allow you to register a Domain name for free, but another bonus is that they will also allow you to manage your DNS entries like CNAME, A, MX, NS records for free! Now I will describe the benefits and Demerits of each of these service for you to decide which one is the Best suited for you.

CO.CC Advantages:

Zero Renewal fees for Personal Domain names
Allows registrations of two domain names for free
Web forwarding facility available
If you donate to co.cc, you can register 100 more free domains in your account
You can earn money by referrals

CO.CC Disadvantages:

If you place Ads on the Domain name, then you have to pay 3$ as renewal fee of the Domain name every year. If you don’t pay the required amount then your Domain name will be deleted
The domain name will be suspended without notice if it contains any illegal/ spam/ adult material
Not all the Domain names are free to register. Some domain names need you to pay a small amount to register
You need to Set-Up your Domain name before 48 hours of Registering, else it will be deleted

CO.TV Advantages:

Allows registrations of three domain names for free
Web Forwarding Facility available
Site Builder functionality available

CO.TV Disadvantages:

Domain name is registered only for one Year. You need to re-register it after one-year.
Registering a Premium Domain name costs you 199$ flat.[Premium domain names are usually keywords which are short, can easily be remembered, has multiple meanings or generic quality names]
The domain name will be suspended if any violent/ humiliating/ illegal/ spam/ ad*lt material is hosted on it
You need to Set-Up your Domain name before 24 hours of Registering, else it will be deleted
No referral system for earning through affiliates
They can Anytime convert any free services to paid services, remove a part or all of the services temporarily or permanently

UNI.CC Advantages:

Domain name is registered for Life-Time. Forget about renewals!

UNI.CC Disadvantages:

Only one domain name can be registered per IP Address
UNI.CC might serve Advertisements on your website (in some cases)
Your Domain name will be deleted without notice if you don’t get more than 10 Hits in 3 months duration
Domain name is deleted if any defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, obscene, infringing, or threatening content is hosted on it
Members need to pay a small maintenance fee to keep their sites free of banner Ads
You cannot manage CNAME entries in your DNS settings

Even though there are many more services like these ones, most of them are spam sites. Keep in mind that these services allow you to Manage your Domain names completely by giving access to DNS setting and these services are completely different from URL redirection services.

How To Get Free .com Domain Under Yourname.com

2012-06-15T18:13:00.006-07:00

Recently Google have launched Wisconsin Get Your Business Online Program . Wisconsin Get Your Business Online is designed to make it easy, free and fast for any business to get online. Any small business program with small and limited resources and products can now get their business online with the world within few minutes for free. Yes you got it right , you are going to bring your business online for free.
You don’t have to pay anything for this. It is provided by Google. Google partnered with Intuit Company, the Association of Small Business Development Centers, SCORE, and Meetup and they are hosting for free to help small business owners to to get started with their own basic .com website. The project is launched as WisconsinGetOnline (Wisconsin Get Your Business Online). This is a free program from Google. You can get signup for it from any country and get your business online easily and fast.
They are providing following things with free.com domain :

Free, easy-to-build Intuit website
Free customized domain name
Free web hosting for one year
Free online tools and training
A free customized domain name and hosting
$75 in Google AdWords credit

After reading about information and the features provided by it , you might be interested to get your own free.com domain. So now I am going to show you how to get your .com domain for free. Let’s begin the process.

Easy way to get Free .com Domain name registration for 1 year :

At first you need to Go to Wisconsin homepage via this link and there you need to click on GET YOUR FREE WEBSITE button.
Now you need to Sign up for your free Intuit website. Then you will get following screen.

If you have Google account then you can sign in with it else sign up for a Google account and then sign in with that account.
Allow access to it and then click on Continue button.
Next you need to you intuit websites password. Fill the details and accept term and conditions and click on continue button.

Then you will be redirected to Intuit Website to register a free .com domain name. Click continue as shown in the above screenshot. Then you will get the following screen.

It contains three steps. Select first one i.e – Choose a domain (www.yourname.com) for your website. You will get the following screen. If you are not sure, what domain name you should buy, I suggest you to read how to select great domain name for business & 5 domain name suggestion tools.

Since you are registering a new domain name so , make sure that the domain name you are going to register is available. You can do this by entering your desired domain name under “Get a New Domain” and clicking on Check Availability button. If it is available then you will be presented with following screen.

Now all you need to do it click on Get Domain button. Then you will be asked to enter your contact information as shown in the belwo screenshot.

Enter your contact information and click on Save & Continue button. Then you will be ask to review your information. Review it , agree to the terms of service and click on submit button. Note : You must uncheck the Yes (Recommended) option for domain privacy because if you check it you have to pay $1 per month.

As soon as you submit it for review you will get a pop up page asking for your Billing Information. They are asking this to protect against fraudulent activities. Though your website and .com domain name are free but they still need your billing information. Enter your address details and debit/credit card information in this page. Now the real problem comes. Many of us don’t have a real debit/credit card, so to solve this problem you need to create a virtual visa credit card. You can create a virtual visa from Entropay.com. Note : You can also use other websites to create virtual visa. If you don’t want to create virtual visa then use the following virtual visa details to fill the payment options and you will be able to purchase your domain for free.

Name on card : Jackie Chan
Card type : Visa
Credit card number : 4067424695632061
Expiration date : 12-2012
Card security number : 279

Now just enter your virtual visa details in the payment page and click on purchase button. Now you have successfully created your website with a free .com domain name registration. It may take an hour to activate. After it is activated, you can use their website builder to create a new website or just change the name servers by going in the domain manager to use with other webhost.

I hope this tip would help you to save some money and increase your online presence. If you find this post useful, don’t forget to share it on Google plus and Facebook.

Why to choose a SEO Website Design for blogs?

2012-06-15T05:49:00.004-07:00

When you give a thought to designing a website for your own website, chances are high that you think of a website with the bells and whistles – wonderful images with flash, viewing audio – the works! But, uncertain to you personally, these factors may very well destroy your enterprise because what shows up appealing on the face is detractive in terms of search results positioning.

In case your website has these factors, it is immediately downgrade to a considerably lower rank even if your unique content is relevant and you’re utilizing leading edge technology.

According to a recent survey, which showed some dreadful results, one out of every ten website designers believes that SEO is not their business. And more seriously, more than 24% of website designers don’t have the idea concerning what SEO is! Before discovering the causes to choose from an SEO friendly website design, it is necessary to know what this is all about.

You notice major search engines engage automated ‘web spiders’ to crawl via web pages. Each of these ‘web spiders’ collect information and facts relating to the website. The data they glean enables them to figure out the relevance of a website for particular keyword phrases. Now, you should understand that these are also automated software that has been hinted to crawl via websites in a certain method. They put the information they gather in a folder. Therefore, when a user requests a keyword, the search engine dips into this folder and displays sites based on relevance. Sites that ‘seem’ more related come out on the top, while those which are not, end up at the bottom.

Despite the fact that design factors alone are not liable for dismal search engine rankings, they also play a necessary role.

It doesn’t matter if you are a professional website designer or perhaps a company owner, it is recommended to know why you must always look for an SEO friendly website design.

Advantages Of Seo Optimized Website Designing :

A Search Engine Optimized website design is a great way to take care of traffic form the major search engines. If major search engines are not pleased with your design and layout, you can’t expect more traffic either from referral back link and direct traffic.
Research illustrate that about 45-65% of web traffic to any website comes from major search engines. Thus, a website design that isn’t search engine friendly is washing its hands off this amazing traffic volume.
Usually, an SEO friendly website design is likewise incredibly easy to use. Thus, making sure you use appropriate code of HTML, goal adequate keywords via content and meta tags, employ ALT tags, utilize proper links etc, get the website quick to download and easier for the user.
An SEO friendly website talks good quality webpage design. If you’re a firm with some more standing, like the ones of webpage you have got impacts your company value.
Google robots and the other search engine robots can easily crawl your blog if the site is well designed

Add A Comment Bubble Just Next To Blogger Post Titles

2012-06-13T19:36:00.000-07:00

If you want to show the number of comments just next to your blog post tiles then comment-bubble is a best way to show number of comments to that particular post in a small bubble icon.This little bubble will also increase the number of comments on your blog,because by clicking on the bubble your readers can directly access the comment-form of that post.Also you can add this in two easiest ways,just follow below steps carefully and you will easily add this to your blog.

How To Add Comment Bubble Just Next To Post Title?

Go to Blogger Dashboard > Template
Take a backup of your template
Click On Edit HTML
Hit Proceed
Check Expand Widget Templates chechbox.
Find below code in your template

]]></b:skin>

add below code just above it

.comment-bubble {
    float: right;
    width: 48px;
    height: 48px;
    background: url(https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvqzmM4p_nl9Asols5qoZMsQED4VoDDAXKwFMpyrv2exNFQpELt4W9tdR0CdAKDmvn6W9700Tdxr0ZY5gVJ0vxvCtZyuUlwpvkiVkme4eJRqLCXIzevh9mEzf9mqQHBb-IC_e8K-k2S2GD/s1600/helperblogger.com-commentbubble.png) no-repeat;
    font-size: 18px;
    float: right;
    margin-top: -15px;
    margin-right: 2px;
    text-align: center;
    position: float;
    text-align: center;
}

Now find for below code in your template

<b:if cond='data:post.link'>

replace it with below piece of code,

<b:if cond='data:post.allowComments'>
<a class='comment-bubble' expr:href='data:post.addCommentUrl' expr:onclick='data:post.addCommentOnclick'><data:post.numComments/></a>
</b:if>
<b:if cond='data:post.link'>

Now take a preview of your template,if you want to adjust the position of comment bubble then you can change the above CSS values as you need.When you feel that everything is ok then save your template.You can also replace the bubble with your own bubble,just replace the URL of bubble with your own bubble URL.

Add Image Just Next To Blogger Post Titles

2012-06-13T19:29:00.000-07:00

In this post we are sharing a cool hack which will add an your own image,favicon or whatever you choose just next to your blog's post titles.You can also add your own profile pic. it will give more personal touch to your blog.To apply this hack you just have to delete and put some code in your template.If you want to see live preview of the hack,then see the image below,

Now lets see how to apply this hack,

How To Add Image Just Next To Blogger Post Titles?

I have tried my best to keep this tutorial easy as easy as possible.For better understanding I am dividing this tutorial in three parts,but you just have to follow any one post because it depends upon the tag which you are using as post title.

Part 1: Finding the tag which you are using as Post Title
Part 2: For those who are using H3 tag as a Post Title
Part 2: For those who are using H2 tag as a Post Title

Part 1: Finding the tag which you are using as Post Title

First go to Blogger Dashboard > Template
Download a copy of your template
Click Edit HTML
Hit Proceed
Check Expand Widget Template checkbox
Find below code in your template

<h3 class='post-title entry-title'>

Now if you found above code in your template then you are using H3 tag as a post title.Now only follow second part of this tutorial

If you can't find above code then find for this one

<h2 class='post-title entry-title'>

If you found above code in your template then you are using H2 tag as a post title.Now only follow third part of this tutorial.

Part 2: For those who are using H3 tag as a Post Title

First go to Blogger Dashboard > Template
Click Edit HTML
Hit Proceed
Check Expand Widget Template checkbox
Find below piece of code in your template

<b:includable id='post' var='post'>

  <div class='post hentry'>

    <a expr:name='data:post.id'/>

    <b:if cond='data:post.title'>

      <h3 class='post-title entry-title'>

      <b:if cond='data:post.link'>

        <a expr:href='data:post.link'><data:post.title/></a>

      <b:else/>

        <b:if cond='data:post.url'>

          <b:if cond='data:blog.url != data:post.url'>

            <a expr:href='data:post.url'><data:post.title/></a>

          <b:else/>

            <data:post.title/>

          </b:if>

        <b:else/>

          <data:post.title/>

        </b:if>

      </b:if>

      </h3>

    </b:if>

replace it with below code, (be careful while deleting,only replace above exact code)

<b:includable id='post' var='post'>

  <div class='post hentry'>

    <a expr:name='data:post.id'/>

    <b:if cond='data:post.title'>

    <table><tr>

     <td class='ssybyposttitle'>

      <img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcs9PUroUAk4pDg01SYe7zP3Zed4Fhgcq-QkDFOfe9nd7uWWE7nPPkx3T9xkedRHuMBXCKaCaBN_NWBK6ZnRIgm0gB4Nnr-pjfU2BJvwTc7hgxvwYnbUGzIxOJXje2UzdAtT35IUu14lw/s1600/helperblogger-pencil.png'/></td>

     <td><h3 class='post-title entry-title'>

      <b:if cond='data:post.link'>

        <a expr:href='data:post.link'><data:post.title/></a>

      <b:else/>

        <b:if cond='data:post.url'>

          <b:if cond='data:blog.url != data:post.url'>

            <a expr:href='data:post.url'><data:post.title/></a>

          <b:else/>

            <data:post.title/>

          </b:if>

        <b:else/>

          <data:post.title/>

        </b:if>

      </b:if>

      </h3>

     </td>

    </tr></table>

     <style>

       h3.post-title {

       margin: 0px !important;

       }

     </style>

    </b:if>

Now replace the image URL in above highlighted line with your own image URL (image should be less than 64X64 pixels)

Part 3: For those who are using H2 tag as a Post Title

First go to Blogger Dashboard > Template
Click Edit HTML
Hit Proceed
Check Expand Widget Template checkbox
Find below piece of code in your template

<b:includable id='post' var='post'>

  <div class='post hentry'>

    <a expr:name='data:post.id'/>

    <b:if cond='data:post.title'>

      <h2 class='post-title entry-title'>

      <b:if cond='data:post.link'>

        <a expr:href='data:post.link'><data:post.title/></a>

      <b:else/>

        <b:if cond='data:post.url'>

          <b:if cond='data:blog.url != data:post.url'>

            <a expr:href='data:post.url'><data:post.title/></a>

          <b:else/>

            <data:post.title/>

          </b:if>

        <b:else/>

          <data:post.title/>

        </b:if>

      </b:if>

      </h2>

    </b:if>

replace it with below piece of code,

<b:includable id='post' var='post'>

  <div class='post hentry'>

    <a expr:name='data:post.id'/>

    <b:if cond='data:post.title'>

    <table><tr>

     <td class='ssybyposttitle'>

      <img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcs9PUroUAk4pDg01SYe7zP3Zed4Fhgcq-QkDFOfe9nd7uWWE7nPPkx3T9xkedRHuMBXCKaCaBN_NWBK6ZnRIgm0gB4Nnr-pjfU2BJvwTc7hgxvwYnbUGzIxOJXje2UzdAtT35IUu14lw/s1600/helperblogger-pencil.png'/></td>

     <td><h2 class='post-title entry-title'>

      <b:if cond='data:post.link'>

        <a expr:href='data:post.link'><data:post.title/></a>

      <b:else/>

        <b:if cond='data:post.url'>

          <b:if cond='data:blog.url != data:post.url'>

            <a expr:href='data:post.url'><data:post.title/></a>

          <b:else/>

            <data:post.title/>

          </b:if>

        <b:else/>

          <data:post.title/>

        </b:if>

      </b:if>

      </h2>

     </td>

    </tr></table>

     <style>

       h2.post-title {

       margin: 0px !important;

       }

     </style>

    </b:if>

Now replace the image URL in above highlighted line with your own image URL (image should be less than 64X64 pixels)

How to Create a Horizontal Dropdown Menu with HTML, CSS and jQuery

2012-06-06T18:32:00.001-07:00

Menus play an essential part on the web. They allow users to find their bearings and help them navigate your website. When designing menus, usability is the key.

Beginners often struggle with the basics. In this tutorial I'm going to show you how to create a simple, usable and functional horizontal menu with HTML and CSS. I will also dive a little bit into jQuery to add animations to your menu.

Basics

Let's start with the basic HTML structure of the menu:

<ul id="coolMenu">

<li><a href="#">Lorem</a></li>

<li><a href="#">Mauricii</a></li>

<li><a href="#">Periher</a></li>

<li><a href="#">Tyrio</a></li>

<li><a href="#">Quicumque</a></li>

</ul>

A menu consists of an unordered list, and each list item contains a link with the text. Don’t create unnecessary divs. You don’t need any.
To add a sub menu simply nest another unordered list inside the item that's going to have the sub menu, like this:

<ul id="coolMenu">

    <li><a href="#">Lorem</a></li>

    <li><a href="#">Mauricii</a></li>

    <li>

        <a href="#">Periher</a>

        <ul>

            <li><a href="#">Hellenico</a></li>

            <li><a href="#">Genere</a></li>

            <li><a href="#">Indulgentia</a></li>

        </ul>

    </li>

    <li><a href="#">Tyrio</a></li>

    <li><a href="#">Quicumque</a></li>

</ul>

As you can see, creating the structure is very simple. This is how it should look in your browser at this stage:

There are multiple ways to set up the CSS for a horizontal menu. After many years I found that this is the quickest and cleanest way to do it:

#coolMenu,

#coolMenu ul {

    list-style: none;

}

#coolMenu {

    float: left;

}

#coolMenu > li {

    float: left;

}

#coolMenu li a {

display: block;

    height: 2em;

    line-height: 2em;

    padding: 0 1.5em;

    text-decoration: none;

}

#coolMenu ul {

    position: absolute;

    display: none;

z-index: 999;

}

#coolMenu ul li a {

    width: 80px;

}

#coolMenu li:hover ul {

    display: block;

}

I decided to float the whole menu to contain it but you can use overflow hidden or even set a fixed width for the same purpose.
It is important to float the list elements rather than the links.
The links should be displayed as blocks, otherwise, they won’t behave as expected.
Absolute position the submenu and hide it to remove it from the regular flow and make it invisible. Also, set a high z-index to prevent the submenu from showing behind other elements.
Set a height for the link elements and the line-height equal to the height to center the text vertically. By specifying a fixed height instead of just using padding you avoid flickering problems with jQuery animations later on.
Even though it’s not necessary to set a fixed width for the submenu items, it’s always a good practice. It allows you to style them more consistently later on.
Notice that the hover state is set on the list element and not the link.

With all this set, the menu should be already working. Try opening it in your browser and hovering over the third option to show the sub menu.

Improving Usability

This step will cover how to style the menu with some basic CSS to make it more accessible.

1   /* Main menu

2   -------------------------*/

3   #coolMenu {

4   font-family: Arial;

5   font-size: 12px;

6   background: #2f8be8;

7      }

8      #coolMenu > li > a {

9   color: #fff;

10  font-weight: bold; 

11    }

12    #coolMenu > li:hover > a {

13     background: #f09d28;

14    color: #000;

15    }

16    /* 

17    Submenu

18    ------------------------------------------*/

19    #coolMenu ul {

20    }   

21    #coolMenu ul li a {

22    }

23    #coolMenu ul li:hover a {

24     background: #ffc97c;

25     }

Keep in mind this is very basic, and is meant to be just an example. You can style this however you want. The important thing to remember here is, as I mentioned before that the hover states, are styled in the list items and not the links.
This is how the menu looks so far:

Adding Animations

This final step is not necessary but it’ll help you add animations to your menu with simple jQuery. The first thing you need to do, of course, is to call the latest jQuery plugin on your website:

1	`<script` `type="text/javascript"` `src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.6.1/jquery.min.js"></script>`

Now, let’s add a "noJS" class to the submenu to be able to unhook the hover css state in jQuery. This will also ensure that the menu will still work when javascript is disabled.

 <li>

    <a href="#">Periher</a>

    <ul class="noJS">

        <li><a href="#">Hellenico</a></li>

        <li><a href="#">Genere</a></li>

        <li><a href="#">Indulgentia</a></li>

    </ul>

 </li>

You also need to add the class to the sub menu CSS hover state:

#coolMenu li:hover ul.noJS {

display: block;

}  

Now that everything is set let’s add some magic:

     
$(function(){

$('#coolMenu').find('> li').hover(function(){

        $(this).find('ul')

        .removeClass('noJS')

        .stop(true, true).slideToggle('fast');

    });

});

The code is pretty explanatory. The script finds the immediate children list items and adds a hover function. Inside the function it removes the "noJS" class since we’re using JavaScript, and then it tells the menu to slide down on hover and to slide up on un-hover. This is achieved with the slideToggle function. The stop function prevents the animation from repeating itself if we hover multiple times.

How To Create A Blog With Wordpress

2012-05-08T21:54:00.007-07:00

Wordpress, a better way to blog. I have shared a tutorial to you How To Create a Blog With Blogger. And i have said to you that blogger is the best service to create a professional blog, even when there is another site service that can helped you how to create a blog, like wordpress.com. Wordpress is the biggest rival for blogger. Many professional web designer used wordpress as their platform, wordpress used PHP as their language. Not like blogger, if you want to install some widget on wordpress, you need a plugin. Some plugin are free but there's many plugin that you must pay for it. Its your choice if you want to create a blog with blogger or wordpress. Ok so now i will share a tutorial to you how to create a blog with wordpress.

How To Create A Blog With Wordpress Service

Step 1. Go to wordpress.com

Step 2. Click the "Get Started Here" button on the top left.

Step 3. After that fill the form

Blog Adress :Insert your blog address that you wanted, if you want to used .wordpress.com domain its totally free but except .wordpress.com you must pay for that.
Username : Insert your username that you wanted for login
Password : Insert your password
Confirm : Re-type your password that have you entered before
E-mail address : Insert your email address
What your language : The language that displayed if you have login
Thinking about upgrading : Do you want to upgrade your wordpress account? If you want, you must pay US$99/year.

Step 4. If you have fill the form, click the "Create Blog" button on the bottom

Step 5. After that you must confirm your account, open email that have sent to you directly from wordpress

Step 6. And that's it, now you've a wordpress account!!!

Ok guys thanks for visit my blog, hope this article can helped you. How to create a blog with wordpress service

How To Create A Facebook LIke Box

2012-05-08T21:50:00.014-07:00

How To Create Facebook Like Box On Blogger. Until now, Facebook still be the first social media networking on the world. So if we optimize our facebook network (Fan page) we can earn more visitor to our site. But how to optimize our facebook network? I think put a like box on our site is a great way, more followers you have more visitor you get.

And now i will share a tutorial how to create facebook likebox on blogger

1. go to the facebook developers page

2. And now fill the form

Fill it with your facebook page url, if you doesnt have it you can create it first. Click here to create facebook page

The like box width

The like box height

The like box color

Do you want to show face of your page followers?

The likebox border color

Do you want to show the latest post of your site?

Show the "find us on facebook" text on the top of like box

3. After fill the form now click the 'get code' button

4. After copy that code the html code to your site.

How To Add The HTML Code to Blogger

1. Login to blogger

2. Go to layout page

3. Click add a gadget

4. Choose HTML/Javascript

5. And then paste the html code from facebook

6. Save it

Google Penguine And Google Panda Panalty...

2012-05-08T08:24:00.006-07:00

As we all know, Google is a pioneer, and the world leader in internet search. It owns around 2/3rd (66%) of the shares in the industry at the time of this writing, making it bigger than any other internet company. It has been around for quite some time now, and has been updating its search functionality regularly. Since the past few years though, we have seen some radical changes in its search model. For example, it was only last year that the dreaded Panda update was unleashed onto the world! And these days, everyone is talking about the new Penguin update that rolled out just a few days back. Head of Google's web-spam team, Matt Cutts tweeted a picture of a stuffed penguin along with a stuffed panda. How cute :). Or is it?

Some people would agree. But many will say quite the contrary. These animals are supposed to give out a friendly image about the updates. They are monsters in disguise though! Many websites have been punished and penalized by these two. So what actually are they all about? And how do they effect websites?

So why are these updates needed?

If this is about any one thing, it's about Quality Content vs Search Engine Optimization (SEO). The concept of SEO has evolved ever since search engines like Google have come along. SEO is good. It allows you to take your website ranking to a higher level. But that's precisely where the problem lies. You see, it provides a shortcut where you can skip writing quality content, and still be able to take the low quality content to a high ranking. In late 90s and early 2000s, when Google was still newborn, some webmasters started doing just that. They would spare themselves the trouble of writing good quality content, and would learn SEO tricks instead, which brought their poor quality content to the top.

Through he years, search engine optimizers kept at it. Google has been constantly improving its search module, but these people learned to duck and dodge everything Google had to throw at them. Fundamentally, this practice defeats the basic goal of Google, which is to provide good quality content to readers, instead of bogus websites that spam the web and gain the high ground in SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). Hence, the need for an advanced screening mechanism which would let quality through but not spam content.

Although Google has been implementing such a filter throughout the past few years, it only rolls out major algorithm updates once a year. Google Panda was just such an update last year. And may I say, it was the deadliest update yet. The major update for this year is the Google Penguin update, and it looks relatively less harmful than Panda, although it still has effected a lot of websites. So basically, these updates are aimed at promoting quality and filtering out spam.

Google Panda

Google unleashed the Panda on Feb 24 2011. And immediately, it made its mark and hit so many blogs and websites that the entire ranking structure was shaken, with new websites coming at the top while some old established websites dipping down. According to Google, it was aimed at filtering "thin or low quality content". Since its launch, Google have made changes to it 13 times as of 20th April 2012. And a total of 12% websites have been effected by this update.

Google Penguin

Google Penguin is another installment in Google's arsenal of weapons to be unloaded onto the online world. This was introduced on 24th April 2012. Again, it aimed at discouraging / punishing spam websites. By far, it has effected about 3% of the websites. Prior to its release, Google said;

In the next few days, we’re launching an important algorithm change targeted at web spam. The change will decrease rankings for sites that we believe are violating Google’s existing quality guidelines. We’ve always targeted web spam in our rankings, and this algorithm represents another improvement in our efforts to reduce webspam and promote high quality content. While we can’t divulge specific signals because we don’t want to give people a way to game our search results and worsen the experience for users, our advice for webmasters is to focus on creating high quality sites that create a good user experience and employ white hat SEO methods instead of engaging in aggressive webspam tactics.

Panda and Penguin penalty

Once again, these updates are aimed at punishing spam websites, although there could be a lot more reasons for the updates to hit your site. Sites that are hit have seen a demotion in their Google PageRank, and their traffic has dipped, while sites that have benefited from this update have seen a soar in their traffic. The saying "One man's gain is another man's loss" never seemed more appropriate.

Why have you been effected ?

There can be many reasons why you got hit. But the exact factors are known only to Google insiders. Google doesn't disclose this information, because if they do, search engine optimizers would grab on to those points and cheat Google once again. So Google does not give out the precise details, thank you very much. Here are, however, some probable causes as to why you took a hit.

Over optimization - This is very important. People who don't have quality content over optimize their websites. So you should do what is necessary, and no more!

High keyword density - This is like calling out loud to search engines; "check me! check me! I have the most keywords!". And they don't like it when you call them. Using excessive keywords is also a form of spamming, since you are seeking for search engines' attention. In the past, pages were ranked according to the number of keywords they had. Not anymore though. Always keep that in mind.

Virus and malware - People simply hate it when they land on a website infected with a virus. And so does Google. Having a virus on your site, or even having too many spam or bot scripts can trigger the alarm bells for Google. Please review your website regularly from now on.

Lack of user experience - Now this is very crucial, and Google has been stressing on this a lot lately. Pleasing the search engine is one thing. Pleasing the visitors is another. Even with adequate SEO, a website that lacks a good user experience might have been hit by Google.

Duplicate / copied content - Yeah you think you are making things easier for yourself when copying content, but actually, you aren't. In fact, quite the contrary, you are axing your own feet. Google hates it when it finds duplicate content on your website. Never copy from another source, and never use redundant content.

High Bounce Rate - Make sure to reduce the number of banners and other heavy graphics as much as possible to make sure your site loads faster. Slow loading blogs are hated by visitors and so by Google. Do not reduce the size of the page so much that it may begin looking dull and grey. Be creative yet smart!

These were some of the tips we had for you. This is the first post in a series that looks into these updates from Google in more detail. We will discuss reasons for failure (in more detail), how to avoid them, and best practices. We also hope to prepare you for the next major Google update. So stay tuned, and give us your feedback in the comment section below.

Why SEO Experts Use Reserve Proxy Servers?

2012-05-06T07:32:00.009-07:00

In digital networking system, a common term reserve proxy is used. It is a kind of server that is called the proxy server. That server gets back the possessions on demand of the customers from numerous servers connected. I also host my coupon site on these servers, where you will find havahart wireless promotion and Oakley Signs promo code on my site. These possessions are then revisited to the customers because these were released from the server of the customers. There is another kind of proxy server that is called forward proxy. The forward proxy is the link between the main server and client’s server. The reserve proxy server is used for the best SEO practices. The SEO experts always try to use the services that produce benefits for them. Because of this reason the value and demand of reserve proxy servers is increasing in online media.

What Are the Functions of Reserve Proxy ?

To understand the reasons the people should find the functions of these servers. The SEO experts look for the best solutions that are capable to reduce the workload by using different options. The functions of the reserve proxy should be searched in order to understand its importance and significance. Nowadays, SEO experts are looking forward to employ such methods and techniques that are helpful to promote the purposes as soon as possible. Companies and websites holders have no time to wait to see the performance of slow processing servers and hosting services. The reserve proxy offers the users to get many benefits in one packet that’s why it is preferred by most of the SEO experts.

Reserve Proxy Load Management Facilities :

The reserve proxy is well known for the reduction of loads and pressures. The SEO experts like the reserve proxy because of work load reducing features. However, these servers reduce the loads up to certain limits. The users can increase the limits by contacting the main server or hosting service providers. The reserve proxy is also popular for the load balancing. When the load on any online media becomes out of control the reserve proxy can check it. It equalizes the load to enable the online media for good performance.

Why Reserve Proxy Is Used ?

The reverse-proxy is a main server that is efficient to be used as a conciliator by the online users who are looking forward to send the access requests to the websites indirectly. These websites are main targets of these users so they use to send request to access that sites by using the reserve proxy. The reserve proxy strengthens the internal network by providing protection from the foreign invaders or attackers.

Reserve proxy as a server accelerator:

Because of load balancing, load management, administration and processing the reserve proxy is being popular among the SEO experts. These are some of the most important and popular factors and services that are required by the SEO experts in order to make the websites and blogs in better working condition. I also accelerated my coupon site where I offer Oakley Signs promo code and havahart wireless promotion with encryption, icon caching and compressing are some other features that make the reserve proxy more attractive and useful for the SEO experts working in the online sectors.

Expression Engine vs WordPress – Two Awesome CMS Compared

2012-05-06T01:20:00.015-07:00

Developers should select a platform that precisely meets their requirements, and at the same time fits their skills in order to obtain good end-results. Both WordPress and Expression engine are proved to be well-designed platforms with merits and demerits of their own.

We are presenting a comparative analysis of Expression engine vs WordPress in the following sections, by putting ourselves into the shoes of a regular user.

Comparing Noteworthy Features

We will begin by evaluating the standard noteworthy features that can be seen in each of these platforms.

WordPress Features

It is one of the most preferred Content Management Systems because of its simplicity. Suppose if it doesn’t come integrated with the Web Hosting, you can easily install it using scripts like Fantastico or manual setup which shouldn’t take more than 5-10 minutes.
It comes with absolutely free licensing fees.
It can be used to handle multiple websites, but it is not recommended for a beginner PHP user. Self-Hosted WordPress blog provides maximum resource for the bloggers. So, choosing the best WordPress Hosting solutions is one of the main duty of the webmaster.
It costs nothing to include additional add-ons.
It offers excellent usability. It just involves drag and drop kind of functionality, and its consistency is within menus. It has the potential to navigate within submenus.
User management with advanced role assignment and several other permissions won’t be provided with the normal WordPress set-up, but it can be easily included as an additional plug-in named
It offers exceptional documentation functionality for all basic needs, whereas documentation for some advanced functionalities is quite hard to locate.

Expression Engine Features

It comes with a starting licensing fee that ranges from $99 to $299.
Even with the help of this platform, one can easily manage with matching CMS, but you may have to spend another $80 to $200 to do this.
It fails to provide easy navigation between posts.
Add-ons are very expensive, and an EE add-on would cost $40.
It is not capable of providing fine-tuned settings to its users.
Even the records written by Expression engine fail to work efficiently.

Ease of Managing Content

WordPress

The biggest difference between Expression engine and WordPress is in the method in which the content is managed. As we all know, in WordPress you can create a fresh post. The new post that is created will have a section for adding content, and certain custom fields, which are usually determined either by the developer who has created the basic template’s structure.

As a result, when you make a new post using WordPress, the content will be presented in many different ways based on the category selected, and whether the category is a parent or sub-category. The items selected by the user decide how the final content will be presented. In this way, WordPress roots as a basic blogging platform.

Expression Engine

On the other hand, Expression engine manages content somewhat differently. In this case, the user labels channels, and then each channel can be regarded as a discrete blog. For every channel, you are allowed to define categories, custom fields, and behaviors.

All channels will be concealed from the regular user in the administration section of the website. Typically, the user will be having access only to publish and edit parts of the website and probably certain modules.

Conclusion

On the whole, it could be concluded that from user perspective, WordPress would be an ideal choice for beginners due to its excellent usability and documentation functionalities and of course its Free. But avid webmasters may not have to worry about this aspect, and they may consider using Expression engine for adding uniqueness to their blogs/websites!

Google Drive “the long awaited rumor” is Now Live.

2012-05-06T01:07:00.010-07:00

Google finally made Google Drive official, After years of rumors and over hyped features circulating internet boards.. Google finally made it all happen.

Earlier this day, Google mistakenly (I highly doubt that) leaked the Google Drive details on it French Blog.. Which didn’t stay long but as you expected Blog viewers copied it as soon as it was posted and it was all over the internet within seconds.. Probably this forced Google to officially announce the product today itself.

Google drive gives you another reason to throw your stuff on/in the cloud. The service comes with a 5GB free storage to all users and the paid storage plans are as follows:

25GB of space for $2.49 a month.
100GB for $4.99 a month.
1TB for $49.99 a month.
Also upgrading to a paid account will expand your Gmail storage to 25GB.

Google Docs is hard coded into Google Drive with functionality in Google Drive that will allow users to work with others in real-time, and includes the ability to share content with others, add and reply to comments, and receive notifications for new comments on documents or files.

Searching for files in Google Drive is simple (ought to! Guess what Google was actually made for?) by entering the keyword you can search for files in the Drive also you can set filters. Another interesting feature is the ability to read text from Scanned docs.

Users can attach photos to Drive to posts in Google+, and will soon be able to attach files from Drive directly to emails in Gmail. Google also says that Drive is an open platform, and that it is working with third-party developers to allow users to “send faxes, edit videos, and create website mockups directly from Drive.”

Google Drive is now available on the following platforms : PC, Mac, Android. iPhones and iPads will be compatible soon.

Although if you are still in the dilemma of moving out of Dropbox for Google Drive just because it offers 3GB extra space, Then you should check this out.

Google Drive is expected to give a tough competition to Dropbox and Apple iCloud mainly because of these reasons, Google Drive is offering more Free storage than Dropbox and that Google Drive is not a platform exclusive service unlike Apple iCloud which is only for iOS users.

Enjoy Google Drive here : Google Drive.

Earn Money By Using Google Affiliate

2012-05-04T20:12:00.011-07:00

Blogger is one of the most popular publishing platforms available for anyone who wants to voice their thoughts and opinions on the internet. You can also use blogs to earn money online. If you are a Blogger users, then here is a brand new opportunity for you to earn some extra cash right from your Blogger blog! Google has very recently announced another monetization option for Blogger blogs, i.e. the brand new Affiliate Ads!

The Google Affiliate Ads is a new Affiliate Marketing concept by Google, and a positive initiative towards benefiting publishers who are passionate about certain brands or products. Google says, "We believe your recommendation (about products and services) is valuable, and want you to benefit from it". Therefore, here is your chance to try out your hands at this latest Affiliate Marketing tool!

What Is Affiliate Marketing ?

In the most simplest terms, Affiliate Marketing refers to the promotion of services or products through customers. It works like this: I buy a certain product, and then recommend it to you. Then you buy that product too through my 'referral'. In that case, the product's company will pay me, an 'affiliate', a certain amount of your purchase, as a 'commission'. If you refer other people, then you will get the commission, and so on.

Most popular affiliate ad marketing companies include BuySellAds, ClickBank, Amazon etc. In fact, most of the companies nowadays are offering affiliate programs to anyone willing to join. It's high time that Google do the same. This was a much awaited feature among bloggers.

About Google Affiliate Ads

This great new feature has been introduced in the form of a widget, which you can easily add to your blog posts to earn money. Whenever you write a new post about a product or service from a featured advertiser, this Google Affiliate Ad widget will help you display an affiliate ad on your post. You can choose a relevant ad from the widget. This ad can be a text-link ad, an image or a fully fledged banner.

This feature is different from the pay-per-click model for AdSense Ads. Since Affiliate Marketing is all about the performance of the affiliates, this scheme pays on a par-per-action basis. Thus, you get a greater commission for a larger number of referrals that you make.

Get Started

Before getting started, you need to make sure that you have an AdSense account. If you don't have one, Google AdSense. You do not need to set up AdSense Ads for this program. Just sign in using your AdSense account.

Once signed up, go over to your blogger homepage, and click on the Earnings tab. There, you will find an option Get Started. You will be guided through the rest of the process. It's that simple really! Browse through available ad categories to pick an ad for your blog.

Here is a preview of the Google Affiliate Ads

Limitation

Since Google Affiliate Ads is a brand new program, it is still in its initial stages. Currently, the number of ad categories is limited. So if you don't see the select ad option, the maybe it's because your blog content does not match the ad categories. Google is working on expanding their reaches, so be patient please!

Secondly, this service is currently limited to the U.S. People outside of U.S. can't use this feature as yet. But then again, it's fresh feature, and will take time to mature. We are expecting Google to extend this limit to more countries in the near future.

If this feature is not available to you, don't worry. It will be made available very soon. We will notify you of any updates that Google makes.

Conclusion

Overall, we think that this is a great new initiative by Google that not only allows people to earn more money through Blogger, but also allows them to connect with their audience by selling products, as affiliate marketing is all about connecting with people and performance-based marketing. Do let us know about what you think about this exciting new feature. And for those who have this advertising option available, good luck with it For others, stay tuned.

By A Custom Domain

2012-04-29T18:47:00.009-07:00

many of us using blogger blogspot blog for blogging, because it is easy to use and editable.
but after a while you want to your blog look more professional and more credible by Publish on a custom domain .

because some people think that yourblogname.blogspot.com used by newbies only, That’s not always true, of course.

there is 2 ways to do it,

1- Point your already owned and registered domain name to your blog.
2- buy new domain name via your blogger account.

we’ll now talk about number 2.

buy new domain name via your blogger account.

now blogger makes it easier to convert your Blogspot Account Into A .com Domain

when you register a domain name via blogger account your Domain will be registered through a Google partner and cost $10 (USD) for one year.and as part of registration, you will also get a Google Apps account for your new domain.

and the great deal here is that YourBlogName.blogspot.com will redirect to your new custom domain. so you won’t leave your readers behind!

the first thing to to is to log into your blogger account,
Then got to Settings >>> Publishing

FIND : Switch to: • Custom Domain

and click Custom Domain

Watch This Video

Follow By E Mail Gedget

2012-04-28T18:36:00.013-07:00

Today in early time, blogger released an important gadget, “Follow by Email”, this gadget allow your readers to subscribe to your blogs updates by e-mail and get the latest updates and posts delivered to their Inbox.
What is this gadget features

The New Gadget Features.

Simple to add and use with only few clicks.

Delivering your blog’s posts and updated to your readers mail inbox.

Detailed stats about your number of subscribers and daily views.

How To Add It.

Just log into your blogger dashboard >>> design >>>and in page elements click Add A Gadget, and you will find the new “Follow by Email” gadget listed at the top of the gadgets page.when you click on “Follow by Email” link, you’ll see a new window like the above image,

Give it your prefered title, and leave the Feedburner as it is. then click Save,

and you can enjoy your new gadget,

Should You Drop Out Of School For Blogging ?

2012-04-28T18:31:00.007-07:00

Blogging provides people with the opportunity to share their thoughts and opinions with the world, and earn something out of it. Recent trends have shown that the young generation is taking more of an interest in blogging than ever. But blogging is a time-consuming and effort-intensive job. And in today's fast-paced life, it often becomes difficult to take time out of daily life to do something extra. As a result, many of you who are bloggers may be finding it hard to juggle your blogging career along with your academic / professional life. Does that mean you should drop out of your school? Is blogging really worth it?

In simple words, no. Blogging isn't worth it. In this post, we'll discuss why, and also, how to manage your blogging career along with your normal life.

Why People Quit School ?

Well, there can be many reasons for that. People quit school because studies are boring! What you study in school usually has little relevance to what's out there in professional life. Not only that, studies studies are long as well! It seems one never stops studying, until he enters professional life. This makes a man too busy to do much else.

Secondly, as expertise is growing globally, so is the competition with respect to jobs. It's hard to get a decent job, especially in developing countries. So why study when there won't be any jobs available? Such is the mentality of people who quit academics. They choose to go into other technical fields instead. I personally have a friend who quit academics after high school, and is now a self-taught freelance web developer!

Then, there are examples that so many people like to quote. And they make for excellent examples. Taking a look at history, we find some very famous people who quit school. And despite that, they went on to become rich or renowned. Albert Einstein is a good example. So is Thomas Edison, the inventor of the light bulb and motion picture camera etc, and Benjamin Franklin, the former American president. If you want more recent examples, then Bill Gates is a perfect one. Then, there is Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, and so on. All these men quit school / college / grad school and went on to become internationally famous and/or rich. People often quote such examples to support their reasons for quitting school.

Why Schooling Is Important ?

No matter what reasons you have for quitting school, the fact remains that your school is your Alma-mater, i.e. your "nourishing mother". proper schooling teaches you lessons in life, and grooms you for what is to come. It also shapes your character, and you build your own reserve of knowledge.

Grooming aside, you need to have a decent degree in your hand to survive in these times. A degree is the world's way of recognizing your abilities. If you apply for a job without a degree, you will be laughed at! Having knowledge at your side can help you redefine the limits you can reach.

Exceptions are always there though. Bill Gates is an exception. So was Steve Jobs. But not every drop-out can become a Mark Zuckerberg, mind you. Schooling is important for the rest of us mortals.

What Is Next ?

At the end of the day, it's all a matter of perspective. Blogging alongside schooling is only as hard as you perceive it to be. I am a student too, yet I can easily write one post per day, even though these are some of the busiest days of my life. I think it's all about time-management. If you can manage your time, then there is no reason for you to give up either blogging or school.

How To Manage Time ?

Posting Frequency

First of all, you need to decide how frequently you want to write blog posts. For a good blog, one post per day is enough. But if you don't get the time, then three or four posts per week are fine as well. Don't push your schedule every day.

Make a schedule

Making a schedule can be very helpful. You don't need to sit down and make a crazy time-table that no one cares follow. Just make a mental template and reserve a general time for blogging.

Jot Down Points

This is my favorite technique. I like to jot down points whenever they occur to me. This way, I can easily structure my posts , and add content to them whenever I get time.

Use your spare time

This is another useful technique that you might find useful. Use your spare time to think of points to write in your posts. For example, while traveling, I think of points and write down points. I can then easily transform them into a fully fledged post.

Get a smartphone!

If you have an adequate budget, then get a smartphone if don't already have one. With the wide range of smart-phones available these days, they are no longer than expensive. They make your life much easier! You can blog on the go! They can come in real handy for taking notes and writing posts.

Be patient!

And last, but not the least, be patient. Blogging is all about patience. Once does not simply 'get rich' through a blog. It takes time, and effort to build a blog. I'd recommend you start thinking along those lines if you are to succeed at all.

Some people set out goals in life to achieve. Some do, while others keep trying. In the end, it all boils down to the path they take. It does not matter whether you get what you want or not. You have failed if you have compromised other important things in achieving your goals. After all, life is all about balance, so live it to its fullest and don't complain.

Add An Animated Search Capsule To Blogger

2012-04-28T18:27:00.010-07:00

Hey there guys, I guess this is my first 'how to' guide for bloggers which should be easy to follow and implement. You might have seen the Twenty Eleven theme released by Wordpress during it's third iteration release. You might also have noticed a sweet sliding search box which animatedly expands on being clicked upon and contracts back when moused out. Therefore we can design a similar but more gorgeous search box and add it quite easily to blogspot oriented blogs.

1. We're gonna design a not so complicated input field in an elliptical shape which retracts a bit and expands on being focused upon while on being blurred it widens just a little bit and comes back to its original state. You can check out how it works in this blog's sidebar.

2. Don't worry, there's no actual designing involved using Photoshop but we shall achieve this using HTML, CSS3 and jQuery only. Let's start with the basic HTML markup.

We've added a simple input box with no button because you'll expect the searcher to hit enter and get their results. Note that we've also declared a class named search1 to which we'll later add CSS.

#search input[type="text"] { background: url(http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hJ8G7WLl1U8/T2xgdl1jK9I/AAAAAAAAAIQ/WBsH0YmWTVE/s1600/search-white.png) no-repeat 10px 6px #fcfcfc; border: 1px solid #d1d1d1; font-size: 14px; color: #bebebe; width: 150px; padding: 6px 15px 6px 35px; -webkit-border-radius: 25px; -moz-border-radius: 25px; border-radius: 25px; text-shadow: 0 2px 3px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.1); -webkit-box-shadow: 0 1px 3px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.15) inset; -moz-box-shadow: 0 1px 3px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.15) inset; box-shadow: 0 1px 3px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.15) inset; outline: none; }

There's a small magnifying glass icon depicting the search action with a light grey background.
A thin border to add a slight contrast.
Note that we've specified a width of 150px which shall vary on focus & blur.
Now, the CSS3 part includes a border radius of 25px (-moz and -webkit suffixes are for Firefox and Chrome respectively).
And a subtle text shadow of just 0.1 opacity.
Plus a slight box shadow to add some flair.
Lastly, removing the ugly yellow/blue outline on focusing the search input.

And now for the jQuery magic. For the ones now knowing, jQuery is a Javascript library which includes inbuilt classes and functions which we can directly call with the hellp of CSS selectors to avoid writing raw vanilla JavaScript.

If you don't have the jQuery library linked to your blog, you need to copy the above link before </head> and include the below code.

$(document).ready(function(){ $('.search1').focus(function(){ $(this).stop().animate({width:'140px'}).animate({width:'200px'}, 200); }); $('.search1').blur(function(){ $(this).stop().animate({width:'210px'}).animate({width:'150px'}, 200); }); });

The above jQuery code is quite self explanatory, when the search box is focused (clicked in) it goes in and out and on being blurred (clicked out) it goes a little bit out and comes back to its normal state. You need to add this code exactly above </head>.

And we're done, the good news is you don't need to add the HTML and CSS3 in your template directly. In the 'layout', go to the sidebar and 'add a widget'. Now select the HTML/JAVASCRIPT widget and paste the below final code. Save it and voilla.

Alright, I hope you've successfully incorporated the search capsule in your blog. However, if you face any problems, shoot your queries in the comments.

The Cheapest Android Phone Yet

2012-04-28T18:26:00.006-07:00

With the onset of the Android season since the last two years a number of significant takedowns and turnarounds have taken place in the cell phone world. Symbian is dead, Blackberrys have lost their charm and elegance, iOS is being threatened while cheap JAVA phones are just ridiculed. Gone are the days when the only use of one's cell phone was to make a call and send a text. Today, the platform markets are thriving with millions of applications which are being downloaded and becoming an addiction. The frequency of an app being launched in the market is so high you're gonna spend your lifetime in trying each and every app available.

The Android market boasts and delivers some of the best applications and games that have been developed which even the iPhone's market lacks. You're gonna agree with me on the fact that India is a country where a product can be sold with the help of cunning advertisement. The teen mob is so huge you're never gonna fail in selling a product which is appealing to them. Hundreds of Android phones have already been launched and sold so far but we're here to talk about a particular handset which I think might be the cheapest Android phone yet.

we're talking about the recently launched Vodafone (858) Smart by none other than the biggest service provider company themselves. It's cute, trendy, can be easily pocketed and flaunted about for running Android and the biggest advantage, it doesn't even burn a big hole in your pocket. Let's first go through the basic specifications of the phone.

Runs on Android OS v2.2 (Froyo)
CPU: 528 MHz ARM 11
Accelerator, proximity and compass sensors
Snapdragon S1 processor
2.8 inch capacitive touchscreen
2MP camera
Wi-Fi, GPS and Bluetooth 2.1
130MB of internal storage
2GB card included, extended upto 32GB

When tested with some of the well known apps from the market, the phone performed good except some sluggishness during high physics. It's not bulky and has a nice matte finish which becomes handy to use and hold. Apart from the above mentioned advantages, the mobile also comes with some drawbacks.

Camera quality is not up to the mark with 2MP and no flash
No multi touch. You're gonna miss the pinch and zoom
Processor is slow, not a smooth UI experience
Takes time to download Apps from the market
Text is not extremely sharp

And comes the most important point for which you've kept up the pace with me till here. Vodafone released SMART in India for just Rs 4,995 . A perfect entry level phone for some start up person who wants to taste Android. The inclusion of a capacitive touchscreen which gives a smooth touch experience is a plus point for a mobile phone in under 5,000 price range. Make up your mind to go for it or not.

Post Writing

2012-04-28T18:20:00.010-07:00

Blogging, with no doubt, has revolutionized our lifestyle today and the possibilities and effects of blogs seems endless. Blogs have become our medium of expression and it looks as there is nothing we can’t do without blog. Blog have not left even minor aspects of our life to be changed and it’s effects are seen to be limitless. Most interesting, you do not even require any technical knowledge for getting and running up a blog in no no time and the best part of it, vitally anyone can do it at ease. With some basic blogging framework sketched on your mind and with original qualitative and unique information published in your blogs, you can even make some extra cash out of it with very less effort. But to make most out of it, it requires your true enthusiasm to blog and your ability to carve some engaging content out there. If it is a problem for you, that’s where I’m going to make a breakthrough today and teach you how to enhance your art of writing best content ever!

If you are already running a blog by now, you must have known that your content is the best traffic generator for your blog and traffic is the blood of your blog. It is the information people are looking for in your blog, and if you are able to provide them with it, you can have a successful blog running up out there. But writing a better content is not an easy job every time and you have to keep several things in mind while writing the article for your blog. I’m sure the following tips or hints will be a great help for you to increase your blogging quality. Make sure to check them out:

1.Research, Research and research

If you are not well known or not confident enough to carve your posts smartly, research a lot. In such cases, what I usually do is I find out several articles about my topic in internet and download and print them. I then sped my time reading all of them carefully and highlighting the important part of them. I sketch a rough article or draft. Then when I start my actual writing, I keep all those articles spread around me and I try to include the highlighted points. Try this trick. It is very easy, effective and not much time consuming. This is the best trick I use myself to write down the posts.

2. Personal, engaging and straight

While writing posts, consider making them more personal engaging and straight. While you write your posts, add your personal touch and tone. This encourages the reader to continue reading and it makes them feel that somebody personally is teaching themselves. Make your post engaging, by trying to involve interesting facts, examples and blueprints. But always remember to put your thoughts in a straight manner so the readers aren’t distracted. Writing in points and help you doing this. Try your best to make your posts reader friendly too!

3.The KISS technique

I did not invent this term but at least, this is my one of the favorite abbreviation in blogging. It is the short form of KEEP IT SHORT AND SIMPLE. Yes, always keep your post simple and short and meaningful. Long posts may get your readers bored so make your post compact while also interesting because people nowadays want a lot of things very fast. You blog will be appreciated if you keep your blog post short and simple.

4. The title of your post

As Daniel Socosso said, Until you carve out your title smartly it will be the first and last thing that your reader will read on your blog. Title summaries your post and encourages to read the rest of the article. A catchy and unique post title makes your half business done and it is equally important as your post’s body. No matter how nicely you write your post body, if your title is bulky and boring, nobody would want to read your post. So don’t ever hesitate to spend as much time you can with your headline and come up with the best matching title for your post. Take suggestion from family and friends, do some research and use suspicious and staggering words that can easily drive the attention of the reader of your blog and have the best title you can ever think of.

5.The more you edit the better the content gets.

If you try this one, I’m sure you’ll really have a nice article with you. What I do to all of my posts is when I prepare a finished copy of my post, I do not publish it straight away. I keep it for a while (about 2-3 days) and work on other posts. Meanwhile I often have look on that post, read it and edit my the post. I do it many times and more I edit my article, consequently the better it gets. It helps you to have better content than the time you wrote it.

6.Final Proofreading.

Grammatical, informational, spelling and other types of blunders in your post can hamper it’s quality a lot. It can also decrease the reputation of the blog and blogger himself. So don”t rush to hit that Publish button just yet. Try to check for every kinds of errors and if there are any, correct them immediately.

Remember that the popularity, reputation, traffic’s volume and your success as a blogger depends upon how you write and carve your content.These steps are really very very effective and they help you to come up always with better content. So be consistent towards your content of your blog and watch the success coming your way.