<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" media="screen" href="/~d/styles/rss2full.xsl"?><?xml-stylesheet type="text/css" media="screen" href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~d/styles/itemcontent.css"?><rss xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/" xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/" xmlns:feedburner="http://rssnamespace.org/feedburner/ext/1.0" version="2.0"><channel><title>BradBlogging</title> <link>http://bradblogging.com</link> <description>Just another WordPress weblog</description> <lastBuildDate>Mon, 09 Aug 2010 18:41:42 +0000</lastBuildDate> <language>en</language> <sy:updatePeriod>hourly</sy:updatePeriod> <sy:updateFrequency>1</sy:updateFrequency> <atom10:link xmlns:atom10="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/BradBlogging" /><feedburner:info uri="bradblogging" /><atom10:link xmlns:atom10="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" rel="hub" href="http://pubsubhubbub.appspot.com/" /><feedburner:emailServiceId>BradBlogging</feedburner:emailServiceId><feedburner:feedburnerHostname>http://feedburner.google.com</feedburner:feedburnerHostname><feedburner:feedFlare href="http://add.my.yahoo.com/rss?url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2FBradBlogging" src="http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/us/my/addtomyyahoo4.gif">Subscribe with My Yahoo!</feedburner:feedFlare><feedburner:feedFlare href="http://www.newsgator.com/ngs/subscriber/subext.aspx?url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2FBradBlogging" src="http://www.newsgator.com/images/ngsub1.gif">Subscribe with NewsGator</feedburner:feedFlare><feedburner:feedFlare href="http://www.bloglines.com/sub/http://feeds.feedburner.com/BradBlogging" src="http://www.bloglines.com/images/sub_modern11.gif">Subscribe with Bloglines</feedburner:feedFlare><feedburner:feedFlare href="http://www.netvibes.com/subscribe.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2FBradBlogging" src="http://www.netvibes.com/img/add2netvibes.gif">Subscribe with Netvibes</feedburner:feedFlare><feedburner:feedFlare href="http://fusion.google.com/add?feedurl=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2FBradBlogging" src="http://buttons.googlesyndication.com/fusion/add.gif">Subscribe with Google</feedburner:feedFlare><feedburner:browserFriendly>Thanks for wanting to subscribe to BradBlogging.com - To the right is some ways you can subscribe (IE - Email, iGoogle, Netvibes, etc) and below are my latest posts. Alternatively, you could just add http://feeds.feedburner.com/bradblogging to your favourite RSS Reader. Thanks again! Look forward to seeing you back on http://bradblogging.com!</feedburner:browserFriendly><item><title>How to get Started in the Web Development Industry</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/blog-design/how-to-get-started-in-the-web-development-industry/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/blog-design/how-to-get-started-in-the-web-development-industry/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Mon, 09 Aug 2010 18:39:58 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Blog Design]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Blog]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Cascading Style Sheets]]></category> <category><![CDATA[HTML]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Templates]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Web design]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Web development]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Website]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Wordpress]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1242</guid> <description><![CDATA[I was recently contacted by a reader asking me how to take that &#8220;next step&#8221; in the web development industry. This was through my email contact form, but I feel that this would benefit you guys. Feel free to read what I told this aspiring web designer: &#8212;&#8211; Original Message &#8212;&#8211; From: Aspiring Web Designer [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>I was recently contacted by a reader asking me how to take that &#8220;next step&#8221; in the web development industry. This was through my email contact form, but I feel that this would benefit you guys.</p><h3>Feel free to read what I told this aspiring web designer:</h3><blockquote><h3>&#8212;&#8211; Original Message &#8212;&#8211;</h3><p>From: Aspiring Web Designer<br
/> &gt; To:  &lt;<a
href="mailto:brad@bradblogging.com">brad@bradblogging.com</a>&gt;<br
/> &gt;  Sent: Tuesday, August 03, 2010 2:05 PM<br
/> &gt; Subject: web  dev<br
/> &gt;&gt;<br
/> &gt;&gt; Message Body:<br
/> &gt;&gt; Hey Brad,<br
/> &gt;&gt;  I am new to web design and I absolutelty love doing it. I have been<br
/> &gt;&gt; checking out your stuff and it as really inspired me. I would love<br
/> &gt;&gt; to one day be able to create website for others, and especially<br
/> &gt;&gt; create themes for blogs. I feel like I&#8217;m getting decent with HTML,<br
/> &gt;&gt; CSS, and even a little javascript. I am at a point now where I  feel<br
/> &gt;&gt; a little stuck, like I reached the limit of what I can teach  myself<br
/> &gt;&gt; (which I know is not true). What advise if any could you  give me?<br
/> &gt;&gt; Thanks alot!<br
/> &gt;&gt;</p><h3>&#8220;Brad Ney&#8221; wrote:</h3><p>&gt; Hey Aspiring Web Designer,<br
/> &gt;<br
/> &gt; I know what you mean..  taking that next step is kind of difficult.<br
/> &gt;<br
/> &gt; Personally, I&#8217;ve  found great success in creating WordPress themes. I<br
/> &gt; usually decide on  what I want it to look like and then create the<br
/> &gt; design. You&#8217;d be  surprised at how much you can learn through<br
/> &gt;  experience.<br
/> &gt;<br
/> &gt; If you are not at the point of creating a WordPress  theme, you could<br
/> &gt; do one of two things:<br
/> &gt;<br
/> &gt; 1) Take an  existing theme and modify it.. Just choose something like<br
/> &gt; taking a 2  column theme and turning it into a 3 column one. How<br
/> &gt; about a Jquery  Slideshow plugin on the sidebar? Every little thing<br
/> &gt; you do adds  up.<br
/> &gt;<br
/> &gt; 2) Mess around with a WordPress Theme framework such as  Thematic,<br
/> &gt; break it and see what you did that doesn&#8217;t work, noting it  for the<br
/> &gt; future. Experiment with different functions and try anything  and<br
/> &gt; everything you can think of.<br
/> &gt;<br
/> &gt; That&#8217;s how I got  started with Web Development.<br
/> &gt;<br
/> &gt; Thanks for your  email!<br
/> &gt;<br
/> &gt; Brad Ney.<br
/> &gt;</p><h3>Reader Responded With:</h3><p>Brad,</p><p>Hey man, I just wanted to say thanks for the response and the  advice.<br
/> I am going to start messing with wordpress themes right away.  Anything<br
/> I can do to get better would be great. I have been trying to  create my<br
/> own from scratch a little bit but I keep hitting some road blocks  so<br
/> maybe just tweaking some that has already been create would help  me.</p><p>Thanks again,<br
/> Aspiring Web Designer</p></blockquote><h3>You can have your questions answered too.</h3><p>On anything web related. Seriously, try me out. I&#8217;m glad to answer any questions that you have. Don&#8217;t know how to modify your WordPress theme? Need help with article writing? Don&#8217;t know where to host your blog? I can answer that too <img
src='http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif' alt=':)' class='wp-smiley' /></p><p><em>I will not publish them on this blog without your permission (which this reader did give).</em></p><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/6LB-leZedrI" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/blog-design/how-to-get-started-in-the-web-development-industry/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>WordPress Plugin Developer Needed</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/asides/wordpress-plugin-developer-needed/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/asides/wordpress-plugin-developer-needed/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Tue, 03 Aug 2010 23:53:23 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Asides]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Blog]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Plugin]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Tools]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Wordpress]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1209</guid> <description><![CDATA[Hey Guys &#8211; Just a quick update. I&#8217;m looking for a person who can help me create a WordPress plugin.. Nothing too fancy, just simple enough to help the blogging community out. I have all the HTML/CSS/PHP code written, I just need help creating the actual plugin to allow the code to adapt to other [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Hey Guys &#8211; Just a quick update.</p><p>I&#8217;m looking for a person who can help me create a WordPress plugin.. Nothing too fancy, just simple enough to help the blogging community out.</p><p>I have all the HTML/CSS/PHP code written, I just need help creating the actual plugin to allow the code to adapt to other people&#8217;s WordPress blogs. I&#8217;d also like to submit it to the WordPress plugin directory as the current solutions for this aren&#8217;t working or have been very poorly translated.</p><p>If you know anyone that has some free time, please send this post to them or send me an email. I&#8217;d love to release this to the readers of the blog, I know some of you would love to use this.</p><p>Thanks in advance!</p><p>- Brad.</p><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/hw8uz6BHvlA" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/asides/wordpress-plugin-developer-needed/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>4</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>Caching WordPress – Preparing Your Blog For The Mainstream</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/how-to/caching-wordpress-preparing-your-blog-for-the-mainstream/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/how-to/caching-wordpress-preparing-your-blog-for-the-mainstream/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Tue, 20 Jul 2010 14:41:35 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[How To]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Cache]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Content Delivery Network]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Content Management System]]></category> <category><![CDATA[JavaScript]]></category> <category><![CDATA[W3 Total Cache]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Web hosting service]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Web server]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Wordpress]]></category> <category><![CDATA[WordPress 3.0]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1140</guid> <description><![CDATA[WordPress is great and I use it on every site I build. As I continually follow what is developed for this Content Management System, I realize that there are many things that blog owners can do to speed up their loading times. This doesn&#8217;t involve adding header codes to compress the content, rather utilizing a [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>WordPress is great and I use it on every site I build. As I continually follow what is developed for this Content Management System, I realize that there are many things that blog owners can do to speed up their loading times. This doesn&#8217;t involve adding <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/tutorials/speed-wordpress-up-3-times-as-fast-under-a-minute/">header codes to compress the content</a>, rather utilizing a plugin that creates a HTML based document of your dynamic WordPress blog.<br
/> <span
id="more-1140"></span></p><h3>How To Cache WordPress for Maximum Efficiency</h3><p>The caching techniques I&#8217;m going to be talking about later takes all of the dynamic PHP contents of your blog and puts it into a HTML document. That means this plugin takes your template (header, body, sidebar(s), footer) and articles and puts it into one document. The benefit of doing this is that the server does not need to &#8220;construct&#8221; the HTML document using various PHP calls to the MYSQL database and theme files each time a visitor loads your blog.</p><p><a
href="http://woorkup.com/2010/06/27/internet-censorship-report/"><img
class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-1194" title="Internet-Censorship-Report-Infographic" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Internet-Censorship-Report-Infographic.png" alt="Internet-Censorship-Report-Infographic" width="570" height="404" /></a></p><p>Let me put it to you in the simplest form possible &#8211; The difference  between a cached blog and a standard WordPress install is monumental. A cached blog is like giving a person an infographic &#8211; one image with all the important information on it, organized and concise. A standard WordPress install (uncached blog) is like giving a person a 20 page report filled with text and telling them to make sense out of it. As you can see the benefits of caching your WordPress website is a very good idea.</p><h3>The De Facto Standard for WordPress Caching &#8211; W3 Total Cache</h3><p>This plugin combines various aspects of other plug-ins to ensure that everything is running at maximum efficiency. In this tutorial were going to look at how to set up this plugin and configure it.</p><h4>Step One &#8211; Download and Install W3 Total Cache</h4><p>This plugin can be found at this <a
href="http://www.w3-edge.com/wordpress-plugins/w3-total-cache/">repository</a> and installation with WordPress 3.0 is very easy.  Simply upload it using WordPress&#8217;s built-in plug-in installation system and you&#8217;re ready to continue to step two.</p><h4>Step Two &#8211; Page Cache Settings and Configuration</h4><blockquote><p>Caching pages will reduce the response time of  your site and increase the concurrency (scale) of your web server.</p></blockquote><p>All right in this step were going to be setting up the page cache for your WordPress website. Click the &#8220;W3 Total Cache&#8221; option under the settings tab in your WordPress administration area.  You are now brought to the plugin&#8217;s main page with various settings and this step were just enough focus on the page cache configuration.</p><p>So go ahead and click the checkbox, enabling it. For most of you reading this, choosing Disk (Enhanced) is your best option for shared hosts. However if you happen to be on a dedicated or virtual server feel free to install APC caching which is what I use. Now click &#8220;save changes&#8221; to enable the caching on your site.</p><h4>Step Three &#8211; Minify settings and configuration</h4><blockquote><p>Minification can decrease file size of <acronym
title="Hypertext Markup Language">HTML</acronym>, <acronym
title="Cascading Style Sheet">CSS</acronym>, <acronym
title="JavaScript">JS</acronym> and feeds respectively by ~10% on average.</p></blockquote><p>Like in the previous step we are going to need to enable Minify for it to work on our WordPress blog, so enable it and click save changes, replicating the same option that you did in step two (IE &#8211; Disk Enhanced/APC). Now at the very top you&#8217;ll see &#8220;Minify Settings&#8221; &#8211; we&#8217;re going to need to configure it before this starts working.</p><p>Here&#8217;s what I have on my WordPress blog:</p><ul><li>HTML Minify settings: <span
style="color: #008000;"><strong>Enable</strong></span></li><li>JS Minify settings: <span
style="color: #008000;"><strong>Enable</strong></span></li><li>CSS Minify settings: <span
style="color: #008000;"><strong>Enable</strong></span></li></ul><p>There are a couple of them notes that you should be aware of:</p><p><img
class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-1198" title="W3-Total-Cache-‹-BradBlogging-—-WordPress_1279569579958" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/W3-Total-Cache-‹-BradBlogging-—-WordPress_1279569579958.png" alt="W3 Total Cache CSS Minification" width="570" height="425" /></p><ol><li>The JavaScript options are left unchecked due to various plugins dependencies on them. The plug-ins that depend on JavaScript to perform various tasks do not work if you combine them into one file and I know this from personal experience. This isn&#8217;t W3 total Cache&#8217;s fault rather the way the plugins are coated to specifically call the scripts in the document.</li><li>For CSS minification to work you&#8217;re going to need to add each stylesheet to the plugin by hand. For most themes the default is: wp-content/themes/YourThemeName/style.css -  <strong>if you need help finding yours feel free to ask me in the comments and I&#8217;ll take a look at your site.</strong></li></ol><h4>Step Four &#8211; Database cache settings</h4><blockquote><p>Caching database objects may decrease the  response time of your blog by up to 100x.</p></blockquote><p>This plugin will also cache your database to make it more efficient when generating a page cache. Feel free to go to the plugin&#8217;s page and enable it.</p><p>This step is pretty easy because there are no options that you need to configure specific settings page.</p><h4>Step five (optional) &#8211; CDN Configuration and Settings</h4><p>If you utilize a Content Delivery Network to serve your files faster to your visitors than this plugin will also rewrite your URLs to the files on the CDN.  This saves you a lot of time from having to go in manually to your theme files and edit each file accordingly. <strong> If you do not have a CDN then there&#8217;s no reason to do this step &#8211; you are finished! </strong>Although I would encourage you to take advantage of MaxCDN&#8217;s offer that I wrote about earlier which <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/blog-loading-speed/further-accelerate-your-blog-maxcdn-is-offering-1tb-of-bandwidth-for-10/">you can view here</a>.</p><p>We&#8217;re going to need to configure the CDN settings of this plugin, so please click the, &#8220;CDN Settings&#8221;. On this page there is a box for you to insert your content delivery network URL which you can obtain from your provider.   Simply enter your URL and click save changes in the plug-in will automatically start using the files on the CDN and rather than on your own web hosting server.</p><h3>Conclusion &#8212; A Mighty Fast (Cached) WordPress Blog</h3><p>Since utilizing this plug-in on my own personal blogs and clients blogs I&#8217;ve noticed a severe increase in the responsiveness and load times of each website.  If you are serious about taking your blog and expanding its reader base a fast website is critical. Luckily people like Fredrick Townes create excellent solutions to take a couple hour optimization job and turn it into a 10 minute &#8220;push-button&#8221; cache job.</p><p
style="text-align: center;">Do you currently use any caching plug-in for WordPress?</p><p
style="text-align: center;">How has this plug-in affected your load speed?</p><p
style="text-align: center;">Do you notice a difference?</p><h6 class="zemanta-related-title" style="font-size: 1em;">Related articles on the Internet.</h6><ul
class="zemanta-article-ul"><li
class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a
href="http://www.earnblogger.com/w3-total-cache-wordpress-caching-plugin/">W3 Total Cache : WordPress Caching Plugin</a> (earnblogger.com)</li><li
class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a
href="http://www.tutorial9.net/web-tutorials/wordpress-caching-whats-the-best-caching-plugin/">WordPress Caching: What&#8217;s the best Caching Plugin?</a> (tutorial9.net)</li></ul><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/CeuJ1wwmQfs" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/how-to/caching-wordpress-preparing-your-blog-for-the-mainstream/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>11</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>Market Samurai – Does it Live Up To The Hype?</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/website-reviews/market-samurai-does-it-live-up-to-the-hype/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/website-reviews/market-samurai-does-it-live-up-to-the-hype/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Fri, 25 Jun 2010 21:53:58 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Website Reviews]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1117</guid> <description><![CDATA[I recently downloaded a trial of Market Samurai to test it to see if it was any better than Website Auditor (I did a review of the tool a while back). After a thorough run through of the software, I&#8217;d say that it does an excellent job of showing untapped niches for your specified keywords. [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a
href="http://marketsamurai.com"><img
class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-1118" title="Market Samurai Banner" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/468x60-v2-2.png" alt="Market Samurai Banner" width="468" height="60" /></a>I recently downloaded a trial of <a
href="http://www.marketsamurai.com/">Market Samurai</a> to test it to see if it was any better than <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/website-reviews/website-auditor-the-invaluable-seo-tool-for-all-webmasters/">Website Auditor</a> (I did a review of the tool a while back). After a thorough run through of the software, I&#8217;d say that it does an excellent job of showing untapped niches for your specified keywords. I discovered various keywords that had a low amount of competition and a decent amount of search traffic.</p><p><span
id="more-1117"></span></p><h3>The Pros of Market Samurai:</h3><ul><li><strong>The Information it Acquires </strong>- Not only does it find a large amount of keywords related to your initial project keyword, it finds out important statistics like the <span
style="text-decoration: underline;">Searches per day</span>, <span
style="text-decoration: underline;">Competition Per Keyword</span> and more importantly the <span
style="text-decoration: underline;">Title Competition</span> for each keyword (the exact keyword in the title of the webpages). This information can make or break an SEO campaign and this tool makes it easy to find worthwhile keywords.</li><li><strong>The Domains it Finds</strong> &#8211; With their new product, DomainSamurai, you can find domains that include the keyword in the domain name, which makes SEO much easier. It will automatically find domains using its built in prefixes and suffixes, or you can <a
href="http://www.dailyblogtips.com/200-prefixes-and-suffixes-for-domain-names/">define your own</a>.</li><li><strong>The Monetization Opportunities</strong> &#8211; Market Samurai will automatically search Amazon, Commission Junction and Clickbank for relevant products to put on your niche sites. You can separate the results based on price and payout.</li></ul><h3>The Cons of Market Samurai:</h3><ul><li><strong>The &#8220;Promotion&#8221; Tool Isn&#8217;t The Greatest</strong> &#8211; This tool will find backlink opportunities for your keywords, the problem is that it relies on leaving a trackback to the website, hoping that the webmaster will link back to your website. That&#8217;s all fine and dandy if you have a willing webmaster that will give you a backlink, but most track backs now a days go unnoticed.</li></ul><p>Although, if your trying to create a niche based website based around a keyword, you should most likely know how to promote your site without the help of a tool, otherwise it might be a very hard task.</p><h3>Overall Impressions and Rating:</h3><p>I think this software is a must have for webmasters and bloggers alike. Due to its versatile uses and useful information it produces on any keyword that it is given, the tool is very helpful. For blogs, you can find untapped keywords for your next article and enjoy some free SEO traffic. For marketers, it takes 10 tools that you previously used and puts it into one.</p><p>You can download a free trial at <a
href="http://MarketSamurai.com">MarketSamurai.com</a> and get hooked like I did&#8230; the possibilities are endless.</p><p>Here&#8217;s a video about Market Samurai&#8217;s keyword research feature:<br
/> <object
classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" width="588" height="354" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0"><param
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name="src" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/cR05tDZLe88&amp;color1=0xb1b1b1&amp;color2=0xd0d0d0&amp;hl=en_US&amp;feature=player_embedded&amp;fs=1" /><param
name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><embed
type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="588" height="354" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/cR05tDZLe88&amp;color1=0xb1b1b1&amp;color2=0xd0d0d0&amp;hl=en_US&amp;feature=player_embedded&amp;fs=1" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></p><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/1-iqglyTrqs" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/website-reviews/market-samurai-does-it-live-up-to-the-hype/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>3</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>5 Underutilized Methods Of Free Website Promotion That You Can Use Today!</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/more-traffic/5-underutilized-methods-of-free-website-promotion-that-you-can-use-today/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/more-traffic/5-underutilized-methods-of-free-website-promotion-that-you-can-use-today/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Thu, 17 Jun 2010 21:14:14 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Increase Traffic]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1107</guid> <description><![CDATA[If you’re trying to promote your blog or business website online, it can be a daunting task to begin. In this article, I talk about 5 different (free) methods of website promotion that anyone can pick up and start utilizing today. You could always use Google Adwords to promote your website, but not everyone has [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>If you’re trying to promote your blog or business website online, it can be a daunting task to begin. In this article, I talk about 5 different (free) methods of website promotion that anyone can pick up and start utilizing today. You could always use Google Adwords to promote your website, but not everyone has the available capital to spend on this promotion method (especially the new webmasters).</p><p>Here are some of my favourite methods of free promotion that not many people use to their advantage:</p><p><span
id="more-1107"></span></p><p
style="text-align: center;"><a
title="SEO" href="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/1165440_seo_3.jpg"><img
class="attachment-full aligncenter" title="SEO" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/1165440_seo_3.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="224" /></a></p><h3>1) Using SEO Effectively:</h3><p>Use SEO or Search Engine Optimization to increase the flow of traffic to your website. SEO methods, if done properly will push your website on top of the search engine results. This is the most effective way to promote a website or business through the internet.</p><p>It can be time consuming to achieve this which is why most people hire SEO experts to promote their websites. You could also discover how to do it yourself if you had enough time to learn the techniques and tricks to getting on the first page of Google and Yahoo without paying horrendous amounts to the search engine companies.</p><p><a
title="All in one seo" href="http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/all-in-one-seo-pack/">All-In-One-SEO</a> is currently the only plugin I use for SEO &#8211; its a great tool.</p><h3>2) Consistent Blogging</h3><p>Aside from having your own company website, you can boost your presence on the net by creating a blog. A blog like WordPress, Blogger, etc, allow you to use plug-ins and its features to optimize your content, photos and posts on the search engines. By inputting keyword rich content on your blog, you enable the search engines to get a very good idea about what your article is about.</p><p>A blog also lets you actively participate in the blogging community, build internet relationships and links that lead back to your main website. A good tip to widening your presence in blog communities is to leave comments on other people’s blogs that are relevant to yours. This increases the chances of improving flow of traffic back to your own blog.</p><p
style="text-align: center;"><a
title="Link Building" href="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/1073029_chains___.jpg"><img
class="attachment-full aligncenter" title="Link Building" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/1073029_chains___.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="224" /></a></p><h3>3) Linking Out More Often</h3><p>Webmasters help each other by putting links of other sites and blogs on their own website. It’s a great way to get free promotion and helping each other on the internet. It is important that you link your site to a relevant website to be able to attract the right kind of people into your site. This method is usually reciprocal in nature where both parties benefit in posting each other’s links. If your site is linked by a highly reputable site then you’ve got a much better chance to succeed with  any SEO efforts.</p><h3>4) The Ezine Method</h3><p>Another highly effective SEO method is writing articles and submitting them to article websites such as Ezine Articles and Article Base. You can have your articles published for free on these websites, which serve as article directories on the net. It’s important to use keywords for these articles to make it easier for potential clients to find you. Your published articles will usually have a link or anchor text at the bottom or somewhere in the article that leads the readers back to your website.</p><p>This is a method that I&#8217;ve seen popping up more and more lately, probably because a good Ezine article can attract steady traffic from 3rd party sources. It would be worth your while to check out this method.</p><p
style="text-align: center;"><a
title="linkedin" href="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/linkedin.png"><img
class="attachment-full aligncenter" title="linkedin" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/linkedin.png" alt="" width="570" height="188" /></a></p><h3>5) Social Networking</h3><p>Another helpful way to improve your internet presence is to join social networking sites. You can create a profile for free on these social networking sites.  Choose networking sites that are more business related rather than sites that are more for personal chat purposes.  Join more than one of these sites to improve internet presence and gain more business contacts.</p><p>Linkedin is a very professional network that gives you direct access to other bloggers&#8217; contact information and websites.</p><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/4JrXjJhwD3c" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/more-traffic/5-underutilized-methods-of-free-website-promotion-that-you-can-use-today/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>18</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>How to Create Efficient Jquery Tabs – Full Tutorial and XHTML</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/jquery/how-to-create-efficient-jquery-tabs-full-tutorial-and-xhtml/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/jquery/how-to-create-efficient-jquery-tabs-full-tutorial-and-xhtml/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Tue, 18 May 2010 20:12:38 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Jquery Tools]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Jquery Tabbed Content]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Jquery Tabs]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1088</guid> <description><![CDATA[One of the biggest challenges to web designers is finding ways to place a lot of information on a page without losing usability. Tabbed content is a great way to handle this issue and has been widely used on blogs and websites. Today we’re going to build a simple tabbed information box in XHTML, then [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>One of the biggest challenges to web designers is finding ways to place a lot of information on a page without losing usability. Tabbed content is a great way to handle this issue and has been widely used on blogs and websites. Today we’re going to build a simple  tabbed information box in XHTML, then make it function using some  jQuery code.</p><p
style="text-align: center;"><img
class="attachment-full aligncenter" title="Lightweight-Jquery-Tabs-Tutorial" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/tabs-completed.png" alt="Lightweight Jquery Tabs Full Code Tutorial and Download" width="341" height="251" /></p><p
style="text-align: center;"><span
id="more-1088"></span></p><h3>Beginning the XHTML Structure.</h3><p>First build the structure using HTML lists. The first list is the head of our tabs:</p><pre class="brush: xml;">
&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;!-- These are the tab headers --&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Fruits&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Animals&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;People&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;!-- This is what is displayed when the first tab is clicked --&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Apple&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Banana&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Lemon&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Orange&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;!-- This is what is displayed when the second tab is clicked --&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Dog&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Cat&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Shark&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Parrot&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;!-- This is what is displayed when the third tab is clicked --&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Tim Barnes Lee&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Steve Jobs&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Richard M. Stallman&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Bill Gates&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
</pre><h3>Properly Formatting our Tabs in an XHTML Web Document:</h3><p>Now we change our tabs adding DIVs and Selectors to XHTML code and giving some CSS styles.</p><pre class="brush: xml;">
&lt;div id=&quot;content&quot;&gt;
&lt;h4&gt;Tabs with Jquery&lt;/h4&gt;
&lt;div id=&quot;tab_container&quot;&gt;
&lt;ul class=&quot;tab_header&quot;&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a class=&quot;active_tab&quot; title=&quot;content_1&quot; href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Fruits&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a class=&quot;tab&quot; title=&quot;content_2&quot; href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Animals&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a class=&quot;tab&quot; title=&quot;content_3&quot; href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;People&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;div id=&quot;tab_content&quot;&gt;
&lt;div id=&quot;content_1&quot; class=&quot;content&quot;&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Apple&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Banana&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Lemon&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Orange&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id=&quot;content_2&quot; class=&quot;content&quot;&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Dog&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Cat&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Shark&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Parrot&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id=&quot;content_3&quot; class=&quot;content&quot;&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Tim Barnes Lee&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Steve Jobs&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Richard M. Stallman&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
	&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;#&quot;&gt;Bill Gates&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
</pre><h3>Styling the Content with Basic Shape and Colour:</h3><pre class="brush: css;">
/*Giving page colour and font*/

body{font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; background: #001C3E; color:#FFFFFF;}

/*Remove the lists bullets*/

ul,li{list-style:none;}

/*Entire page container, assign a size and center it*/

#content{width:600px; margin:10px auto;}

/*tab_container is the DIV that contains all the tab area, tab_content is the div that contains each of the tabs' content*/

#tab_container{padding:8px 8px; width:300px; background:#005D8C; border:1px solid #E0E0E0;}

#tab_content{padding:5px; background:#FFFFFF; border:1px solid #04667f;}

/*The TAB header*/

ul.tab_header{margin:0px; padding:0px; margin-top:5px; margin-bottom:6px; }

ul.tab_header li{display:inline;}

/*The tab header links are converted to uppercase and give it a padding and a border */

ul.tab_header li a{

color:#097793;

padding:5px 10px 6px 10px;

text-transform:uppercase;

border:1px solid #04667f;

background:#FFFFFF;}

/*On a tab change, we change the bottom border to white and fuse it with the content colour*/

ul.tab_header li a:hover{border:1px solid #CCCCCC;}

ul.tab_header a.active{color:#000000;

border-bottom: 1px solid #ffffff; background:#FFFFFF; }

a.tab{font: bold 15px Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-decoration:none;}

/*Giving some style to content list, you can add styles for other elements that you like to include in the tabs */

.content ul{margin:10px 0px; padding:0 11px;}

.content ul li{ margin-bottom:3px; font-size:15px;}

.content ul li a{color:#3f4c4f;}

.content ul li a:hover{color:#899fa5;}

/*IMPORTANT, we give display none because with JQuery we show the content when it is clicked*/

#content_2, #content_3 { display:none; }
</pre><p>Now, you may think that the tabs look a little bare, but keep in mind that <strong>this is just a tutorial on how to use Jquery to create tabbed content</strong>. If you really want to make the tabs into something that will compliment your content, be sure to style it accordingly using CSS.</p><h3>Finishing (The JQuery Code):</h3><p>Now we use the Show and Hide JQuery  methods to activate the content when the user clicks on a tab header. Before that remember include the JQuery library (ex. version 1.2.6 ) on our HTML document.</p><p>Note, I just use <a
title="Google CDN" href="http://bradblogging.com/blog-loading-speed/save-money-save-time-use-the-worlds-largest-free-cdn/">GoogleAjax&#8217;s Javscript Library</a> to serve my Jquery:</p><pre class="brush: xml;">&lt;script src=&quot;http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.3/jquery.min.js&quot; type=&quot;text/javascript&quot;&gt;&lt;/script&gt;</pre><p>Here is the JQuery code that generates the tabs:</p><pre class="brush: jscript;">
&lt;script type=&quot;text/javascript&quot;&gt;
// &lt;![CDATA[
     // When the Document loads
    $(document).ready(function(){
     // When a tab link is clicked
    $(&quot;a.tab&quot;).click(function () {
         // Remove old active class
       $(&quot;.active&quot;).removeClass(&quot;active&quot;);
          // Give active class to actual tab link
       $(this).addClass(&quot;active&quot;);
          // Hide the content
          $(&quot;.content&quot;).hide('slow');
         // Show the content obtaining the title atribute of current link
        var title = $(this).attr(&quot;title&quot;);
         $(&quot;#&quot;+title).show('slow');
     });
 });
// ]]&gt;
&lt;/script&gt;
 </pre><h3>Conclusion and Jquery Tabs Demo Link:</h3><p>In conclusion, this method is probably the most lightweight of all the methods available on the web.. being only a few lines of code (without comments). These Jquery Tabs will function in browsers that have Javascript enabled (I remember seeing a statistic that 98% of them do).</p><p><strong>Demo Page: </strong><a
title="Jquery Tabs Demo Page" href="http://bradblogging.com/examples/JqueryTabs/tabs.html">Jquery Tabs Tutorial | BradBlogging.com</a></p><p><strong>Download Link:</strong> <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/examples/JqueryTabs/tabs.zip">Download all the code from the  Jquery Tabs Tutorial | BradBlogging.com</a></p><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/fHF74P1dLs8" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/jquery/how-to-create-efficient-jquery-tabs-full-tutorial-and-xhtml/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>5</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>9 Stellar Tips to Get More RSS Subscribers for Your Blog</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/increase-readers/9-stellar-tips-to-get-more-rss-subscribers-for-your-blog/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/increase-readers/9-stellar-tips-to-get-more-rss-subscribers-for-your-blog/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Mon, 19 Apr 2010 19:38:38 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Increase Readers]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1079</guid> <description><![CDATA[Creating a blog that holds reader’s attention is challenging enough. Then, getting the word out that your blog exists is even harder, yet essential if you want to get more subscribers. Following these ten steps will help you lure new readers in, entice them to subscribe to your blog, and ensure that they remain followers [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img
style="display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;" title="9 Ways to Get More RSS Subscribers for your Blog" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/RSS-Subscribers.png" border="0" alt="9 Ways to Get More RSS Subscribers for your Blog" width="570" height="150" /></p><p>Creating a blog that holds reader’s attention is challenging enough. Then, getting the word out that your blog exists is even harder, yet essential if you want to get more subscribers. Following these ten steps will help you lure new readers in, entice them to subscribe to your blog, and ensure that they remain followers for the long term.</p><h3>1. Focus on a Niche</h3><p>Blogs that offer an in depth look at a specific subject tend to have the highest readership. Instead of trying to please everyone by glossing over a wide variety of topics, pick one that you can really specialize in and make your blog the place to go for information on that topic. Advertising may get people to stop by and check out your blog, but quality content will inspire them to subscribe and read future posts.</p><p><span
id="more-1079"></span></p><h3>2. Prominently Feature Subscription Options</h3><p>Don’t be shy about the fact that you are recruiting subscribers. Place your RSS link above the fold on every page to increase awareness and also have a page that is dedicated to subscriptions. Make it simple for people to subscribe. Provide different subscription options and include a link to a page that explains what RSS is near the image for that particular option. Explain the advantages of RSS, especially the fact that it provides a way for people to stay current with the latest posts you publish. Also, address privacy concerns on this page to ally any fears people may have with regards their information securities. safe and will not be shared.</p><h3>3. Offer Email Updates</h3><p>The truth is that many readers are just more comfortable with old-fashioned email. Fortunately with services such as Feedburner, your posts can be sent directly to a subscriber’s inbox as soon as you publish something new. Apart from the obvious benefit of gaining more subscribers, you&#8217;ll also start to build an email list which can be used in the future for marketing purposes and feedback.</p><h3>4. Get More Traffic</h3><p>No matter how good your blog is, it won’t get subscribers if no one can find it. Make sure it ranks for relevant searches that pertain to your subject matter in Google and other search engines so that you get a steady stream of highly qualified visitors who are interested in what you discuss and who are more likely to subscribe for more updates.</p><h3>5. Get Active on Other Blogs</h3><p>Reaching out and getting involved with other bloggers in your niche is key to growing your subscriber base. One of the easiest ways to get noticed is to leave high quality, insightful comments on other bloggers&#8217; posts so that their readers can get to know you. As your profile grows you can also ask relevant bloggers in your space if they would consider letting you post on their blog, which is highly effective in boosting your profile.</p><h3>6. Participate in Relevant Forums</h3><p>Do some research and find all of the forums relevant to your subject matter and start writing creative posts relevant to your blog. You can create a forum signature that links to your blog so that as your reputation grows as an authority on various related forums, people will click through to your blog to see what you have to say. This is an effective technique that boosts your profile, increases your reputation as an authority on your chosen subject and helps drive more traffic to your blog.</p><h3>7. Start Podcasting</h3><p>Not everybody will want to subscribe to your blog&#8217;s feed simply because they already have enough reading material and have no time for more. However, a podcast means they can listen to you as they go about their daily life. Podcasting will really help build your reputation and also encourage people to interact with you, as well as help grow your readership by appealing to someone who prefers to listen instead of read. If you choose to start a podcast, make sure it gets into podcasting directories and iTunes to broaden your exposure.</p><h3>8. Use Competitions and Freebies</h3><p>Tempt visitors to subscribe to your blog by offering a free ebook, a chance to win a prize in a drawing, or whatever else you can afford that may help them to justify paying for a subscription. To maximise your return on investment, give away something that&#8217;s in hot demand such as an iPad or MacBook. You should also consider what your visitors would be more likely to respond to, for instance you won&#8217;t have much success giving away a book about knitting on a blog about basketball.</p><h3>9. Advertise Your Blog</h3><p>One way of growing your subscriber base that is underused is to advertise your blog. There are numerous ways to go about this, but the easiest and most cost effective would be to start a Pay Per Click campaign on search engines so that your blog comes up for relevant searches. Another means of advertising would be to buy banner space on other blogs in your niche.</p><p><em>This is a guest post written by Tom Walker who blogs for an online store offering <a
href="http://www.cartridgesave.co.uk/CC643EE.html">HP 300 ink cartridges</a>, toner and other supplies for the creative industry. <a
href="http://www.cartridgesave.co.uk/news/">Visit their blog</a> for his posts about advertising and design.</em></p><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/acCosoWnRi0" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/increase-readers/9-stellar-tips-to-get-more-rss-subscribers-for-your-blog/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>9</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>The Definitive Guide To Writing Magnificent Online Content – Part 2 – The Hook</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/article-readability/the-definitive-guide-to-writing-magnificent-online-content-part-2-the-hook/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/article-readability/the-definitive-guide-to-writing-magnificent-online-content-part-2-the-hook/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Mon, 15 Mar 2010 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Article Readability]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1076</guid> <description><![CDATA[In the last article, I talked about the importance about using an informative headline to attract readers to your content. Although a title is a crucial element in keeping your visitors on your blog, you must create an attention grabbing “hook” to further interest the reader in what your article is about. Hence, the graphic [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img
style="display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;" title="The-Hook-Writng-Magnificient-Online-Content" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/TheHookWritngMagnificientOnlineContent.png" border="0" alt="The-Hook-Writng-Magnificient-Online-Content" width="570" height="175" /></p><p>In the last article, I talked about the importance about using an informative headline to attract readers to your content. Although a title is a crucial element in keeping your visitors on your blog, you must create an attention grabbing “hook” to further interest the reader in what your article is about. Hence, the graphic above which signifies what this post is going to be about.</p><h3>The Thinking Behind The Hook</h3><p>Using an image after a headline attracts readers to an article like a moth is attracted to a flame. This technique works so well due to the massive amounts of media that have adopted this method in their articles for decades. Think of a newspaper – The front page has a large headline and then directly below it is a large image.</p><h3>San Francisco Chronicle – 1945:</h3><p><img
style="display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;" title="Newspaper" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Newspaper.jpg" border="0" alt="Newspaper" width="459" height="345" /></p><h3>The Examiner – 1962:</h3><p><img
style="display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;" title="r187111_698275" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/r187111_698275.jpg" border="0" alt="r187111_698275" width="521" height="473" /></p><h3>The Arizona Republic – 2008:</h3><p><img
style="display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;" title="patsstadiumedition" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/patsstadiumedition.jpg" border="0" alt="patsstadiumedition" width="444" height="800" /></p><h3>Why does this work so well?</h3><p>The human eye is drawn towards colour or complex shapes. It will try to figure out what the object is and the environment in which it is stationed in, all of this usually happening within hundreds of seconds of you first seeing it. <strong>By placing a relevant image after your headlines, you are replicating what has made newspapers (and print media in general) so successful in selling copies of their product. </strong></p><p>There’s no new science here folks, just a simple technique that will retain visitors better than just a straight jump to a body of text.</p><h3>Finding Pictures for your Headline “Hooks”</h3><p>There are thousands of sites that have stock photos for you to use, free of charge. Almost every article on here has an image from <a
href="http://www.sxc.hu/">Stock.xchng</a> (The leading stock photography site).. <strong>I have never needed to go to any other source for my pictures.</strong></p><p>Alternatively, you could visit these places for photos:</p><ul><li><a
href="http://Flickr.com">Flickr</a></li><li><a
href="http://www.morguefile.com/">Morguefile</a></li></ul><h3>Part 3 – The Opening Paragraph</h3><p>Stay tuned as we take a look at what makes an opening paragraph so crucial to the success of your article.</p><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/ieUPTQQBgSM" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/article-readability/the-definitive-guide-to-writing-magnificent-online-content-part-2-the-hook/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>11</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>The Definitive Guide To Writing Magnificent Online Content – Part 1 – The Headline</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/article-readability/the-definitive-guide-to-writing-magnificent-online-content-part-1-the-headline/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/article-readability/the-definitive-guide-to-writing-magnificent-online-content-part-1-the-headline/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Tue, 09 Mar 2010 00:26:23 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Article Readability]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1068</guid> <description><![CDATA[With more content being generated each day, a startup blog or website really needs to focus on their edge in the market. That being the content that is displayed when a visitor comes to the website needs to be both informative and high quality. However, those qualities are not enough anymore to keep a visitor [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img
style="display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border-width: 0px;" title="Writing-Magnificent-Articles" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/WritingMagnificentArticles.jpg" border="0" alt="Writing-Magnificent-Articles" width="570" height="221" /></p><p>With more content being generated each day, a startup blog or website really needs to focus on their edge in the market. That being the content that is displayed when a visitor comes to the website needs to be both informative and high quality. However, those qualities are not enough anymore to keep a visitor interested, which is why I have created this guide to writing magnificent online content that will attract and keep visitors on your website or blog.</p><h3>Understanding The Average Internet User’s Ideology:</h3><p>The web has changed how we read and absorb information. I guarantee that most readers of this site will skim through this content until something pops out at them, grabbing their attention for fractions of a second, before moving on. Don’t forget – you will always be competing for visitors interest with the billions of other websites on the internet.</p><p>There have been many <a
href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/1834682.stm">internet usage studies</a>, but they all conclude the same end result:</p><blockquote><p><span
style="color: #1a1a1a;"><strong>The average web user only spends a few seconds on each website before searching for another result.</strong></span></p></blockquote><p>What does this mean for web content producers? <strong>It means wasted bandwidth and a lower conversion rate.</strong> This is why I felt this series was necessary to increase visitor conversions and give anyone the knowledge they need to write “magnificent” online content.</p><h3>The Article Headline: It Makes or Breaks Your Visitor Commitment</h3><p>Ensure that the article headline is informative and makes the visitor want to continue reading.</p><ul><li>Try and get the visitor excited about what you have written – IE: <strong>“10 Ways you can Lose Weight without Dieting”</strong> <em>(this addresses people that want to lose weight, but also gives an insight into the added benefit of reading this article, which is not having to give up eating their favourite foods)</em></li><li>Alternatively, you could take advantage of controversy and create a debate question – IE: <strong>“Global Warming – The Biggest Scam in Human History”</strong> <em>(this title will offend environmentalists but will attract other people that agree with your opinion, the end result being both of the people fighting out their opinion in the comments area of your website)</em></li><li>A boring article title will nullify any emotional response to your content and most likely result in a loss of an interested reader – IE: <strong>“My Incredible Dog, Sparky”</strong> (…yawn.)</li></ul><h3>The Colour and Font also Play A Role:</h3><ul><li>Bold fonts (Arial, Helvetica) get the point across to the new visitor faster than thin fonts (Georgia).</li><li>Neutral colours such as Dark Blue, Black and Dark Grey appeal to the largest amount of web readers. Reds, Greens and Yellows are more of a niche colour – Use these with caution.</li></ul><h3>Coming Up Next – Part 2:</h3><p>The next post in the series will look at how to hook a reader into your content by placing one of the most basic (often overlooked) components of writing below your headline. <strong>Stay tuned, or better yet, <a
title="BradBlogging's RSS Feed" href="http://feedburner.google.com/fb/a/mailverify?uri=BradBlogging">subscribe via RSS</a>.</strong></p><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/41NvtXC5I5Y" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/article-readability/the-definitive-guide-to-writing-magnificent-online-content-part-1-the-headline/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>16</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>Further Accelerate Your Blog – MaxCDN is offering 1TB of Bandwidth for $10</title><link>http://bradblogging.com/blog-loading-speed/further-accelerate-your-blog-maxcdn-is-offering-1tb-of-bandwidth-for-10/</link> <comments>http://bradblogging.com/blog-loading-speed/further-accelerate-your-blog-maxcdn-is-offering-1tb-of-bandwidth-for-10/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Mon, 22 Feb 2010 20:44:27 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Brad Ney</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Blog Loading Speed]]></category> <category><![CDATA[CDN]]></category><guid isPermaLink="false">http://bradblogging.com/?p=1056</guid> <description><![CDATA[Update: 2010/07/20 &#8211; Maxcdn has since increased the price of their offer from $10 to $39.95 &#8211; 1000GB at $39.95 is still a steal, so I&#8217;d encourage you to utilize this offer. In the previous post, I talked about how to make use of Google’s Ajax Libraries CDN to serve Jquery, Mootools and other Javascript [...]<p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> ]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img
style="display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;" title="logo" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/logo.png" border="0" alt="logo" width="228" height="50" /></p><blockquote><p><em><strong>Update: 2010/07/20</strong> &#8211; Maxcdn has since increased the price of their offer from $10 to $39.95 &#8211; 1000GB at $39.95 is still a steal, so I&#8217;d encourage you to utilize this offer.</em></p></blockquote><p>In the previous post, I talked about how to make use of <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/load-speed/save-money-save-time-use-the-worlds-largest-free-cdn/">Google’s Ajax Libraries CDN</a> to serve Jquery, Mootools and other Javascript frameworks to your visitors, but to speed up everything else, MaxCDN is offering an amazing special (02/22/10) of 1 Terabyte (1000 GB) of bandwidth for $10. <strong>This works out to 1 cent per GB – take that Amazon S3!</strong></p><p>I’d encourage every webmaster that is <strong>serious about growth</strong> to consider this deal. As you all may know, load speed is one of the crucial factors that affects website conversions and overall enjoyment of a website or blog. By harnessing the powers of a Content Delivery Network, you can speed up the loading process of your blog and allow your users to access the content as fast as possible. Of course, <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/blog-loading-speed/optimize-css-repeated-background-images-in-photoshop/">other methods of optimization</a> always help load speed as well.</p><h3>Needless to say, I’m Impressed:</h3><p>I’ve recently purchased this package and I don’t think I’ll ever go back to hosting static files on a single server. MaxCDN (formerly NetDNA) has made this experience as easy as possible to set up. They answered all my questions about CDN support for WordPress (using W3 Total Cache) as well as supporting other sites.</p><p><img
style="display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;" title="na-network" src="http://bradblogging.lfw.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/nanetwork.png" border="0" alt="na-network" width="325" height="229" /></p><p>Not only do they have 10 Edge locations serving your content to your visitors (9 in the US and 1 in London), they also compress your static CSS and JS files “on-the-fly” to further increase load speed.</p><p><span
id="more-1056"></span></p><h3>Take advantage of this Amazing Deal:</h3><p><strong>I’m not even being paid for this</strong>… I just think all of you should know about the <a
href="http://www.maxcdn.com/">deal thats currently going on</a>!</p><h3>Questions:</h3><p><strong>Do you currently use a CDN? </strong></p><p><strong>If so, does it match the current deal of this company?</strong></p><p><h3> Optimized Overshadowed Wordpress Theme</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Wordpress Theme: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/free-overshadowed-theme/"> Download </a></p><h3> The Blog Manual Ebook</h3><p> Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed! Here is your direct download link for the Ebook: <a
href="http://bradblogging.com/go/FreeTheBlogManualEbook/"> Download </a></p></p> <img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BradBlogging/~4/YAsgvdgeg2A" height="1" width="1"/>]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://bradblogging.com/blog-loading-speed/further-accelerate-your-blog-maxcdn-is-offering-1tb-of-bandwidth-for-10/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>11</slash:comments> </item> </channel> </rss><!-- Performance optimized by W3 Total Cache. Learn more: http://www.w3-edge.com/wordpress-plugins/

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