123inkjets.com is a top supplier of discount ink cartridges and toner for nearly every model of inkjet and laser printer on the market today. During the past five years they have sold more than 5 million cartridges. As the industry leader they offer very substantial savings, usually 40% to 70% off the typical retail price found at your local discount office supply super-store.

Though much cheaper, their products are of good quality, thus they are confident to provide a 100% satisfaction guarantee on all products they sell. Excellent products and customer sevices have earned them BBB A+ rating and 2010 BizRate Circle of Excellence Award Winner

USA customers enjoy $4.95 S&H on all orders under $55 and FREE Shipping on orders over $55.

123inkjets.com, the best source for all your printing needs!

SEO report of http://ExuroFitness.com as of Dec 29, 2010

(baseline of Dec 7 numbers in red for comparison)

Website Grader

(http://websitegrader.com/site/exurofitness.com)
Score Summary of exurofitness.com
Website Grade 81 (36)
Moz Rank n/a (-1)
Google Indexed Pages 44 (20)
Traffic Rank 8,412,991 (16,546,517 ) (the smaller the better)
Blog Grade 92 (0)
Inbound Links 2
del.icio.us Bookmarks N/A

DomainTools SEO

(http://whois.domaintools.com/exurofitness.com)
Website Title: Exuro Fitness (Home)
Title Relevancy: 100%
Meta Description: Exuro Fitness, where you will be getting younger with age (NONE)
Relevancy: 70% relevant (N/A)
Meta Keywords: exuro, fitness, calgary, health (dotnetnuke, dnn)
Relevancy: 100% relevant (0%)
SEO Score: 91% (73%)
Terms: 478 (Unique: 255, Linked: 132) 396 (Unique: 188, Linked: 25)
Images: 14 (Alt tags missing: 0) 19 (Alt tags missing: 18)
Links: 53 (Internal: 45, Outbound: 14 (Internal: 11, Outbound: 1)
iFrames: 0 1 ( Parts of page not indexable by most search engines. )
Alexa rank http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/exurofitness.com 8,412,991 (16,546,517)

Hello Engine rating

(Hello Engine is a set of website search engine optimization tools)

20.15/100 (5/100)

W3C validator

Passed. (46 Errors, 1 warning) http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fexurofitness.com%2F&charset=%28detect+automatically%29&doctype=Inline&group=0&user-agent=W3C_Validator%2F1.1

Other issues found and fixed

image missing ALT tag: fixed, provided relevant ALT tags that include keywords
missing Meta Description: fixed, provided relevant Meta Description with keywords
missing H1 tags: fixed, the WordPress theme automatically takes the title of a page as a H1 tag
missing H2 tag: fixed on existing pages; website owner needs to designate H2 tags when writing new posts
missing Web Analytics: has signed up with Google Analytics for free

Roles of Web Masters

The success of a web design or makeover project doesn’t solely depend on the web developers. Most projects will fail if there is no cooperation from the web masters. This project is no exception. Aaron Lipsey, the owner of Exuro Fitness talked, emailed with me quite a few times before we finally started implementing this project. We discussed every details upfront to make sure there wouldn’t be any surprise during the transition from the old website to the new one. Ever since the new site was setup, Aaron has kept on posting new content in a pace of about one post each day. Thanks to his dedication, if you check the current status of http://ExuroFitness.com upon reading this post, I’m 100% sure you will see further improvement. It is the new WordPress platform that enables him to update his site on his own. On the other side, the website won’t be doing so well if without his passion and hard work.

Is your website also due for a makeover? Do you need a website that not only works but also works well?

Contact us to discuss your web design or makeover requirements now!

In the past month, I had the privilege to work with Mr. Aaron Lipsey on a makeover project of his business website Exuro Fitness. Under his permission, I’m writting a review of the project and the improvement we have achieved through this web redesign project.

A few months ago as a result of business strategy adjustment, Aaron wanted to totally redo his website. One of his nice clients offered to help and set it up on DotNetNuke CMS. It didn’t work out very well. Aaron couldn’t figure out how to add new posts to the blog. There’re also some other issues identified by me during a free website status evaluation. Two main issues are: lack of seach engine optimization(missing or irrelevant meta tags, missing image Alt tags, using iFrames, not utilizing text header tags, etc.) ; and failing W3C validation (with 46 markup syntax errors). Aaron also was in need of some other features in order to help online marketing. He was keen on launching a fully functional new website before end of 2010. After in talk for a few times and seeing my analysis, prototype, reports,  etc. Aaron decided to take the risk on me at the end of November. We successfully made the switch on December 7. The new website since has been performing well.

WebSite Makeover Process

Normally a website makeover would only be tougher than creating one from scratch. The only easier thing is that you can copy and paste some content from the existing site. The rest will have to be carefully planned out in order to have a smooth transition. One thing always is overlooked is to keep your search engine rankings and indexed pages as best as you can. I made a list and make sure I communicate well with Aaron to get the tasks done and done correctly. Here are something we did. You may use as a reference for your own website makeover project.

Website Requirement Gathering and Analysis

This can be done through email communication and telephone conversation. Face to face meetings in some occasions will help eliminating misunderstandings and can speed up the process.

Build the Site on My Own Hosting Account First

I have WordPress MultiSite setup on my hosting account so that creating a new WordPress sub-site is just a breeze. We agreed on the theme we were going to use plus some other important web design elements, then I could start building the home page and copying over old content. Normally this process contains the following sub-tasks:

Install and setup WordPress, or a WordPress sub site under WP MultiSite architecture.

Choose, upload and install a WordPress theme

Choose, upload and install WordPress Plugins

Plugins can extend WordPress to do almost anything you can imagine. I usually choose plugins for SEO, Social Media Integration, Anti-Spam, Secure Contact Form, etc.

Collecting and utilizing text, graphics, audio, video, etc.

At the end of this step, we have the new site pretty much done and fully functioning under my sub-domain http://ExuroFitness.ITExpert4U.com.

Domain and Hosting Setup on the Target Site

Usually you should do this a few days before the end of the above process.

If this is a brand new site, you will need to register for your domain and signup with a hosting plan. If hosting and domain registration are with two different companies, you’ll also need to setup DNS on your hosting account when your domain is ready.

Even if you already have hosting, you want to make sure your hosting plan meets the technical requirements of WordPress system. In this project, the site was on a Windows OS, we would like to change it to Linux OS instead. Factor in one or two days for that matter.

If this is an exiting site, make sure you have a complete backup before doing anything further, just in case anything goes wrong, or for any reason should you want your old site back.

If your hosting doesn’t provide one-click script installation of WordPress, you will need to download WordPress from WordPress.org and upload it to your site.

Upload your chosen WordPress theme and plugins.

Site Migration

At this point you may still keep your existing site showing (when required, a trick is to temporarily rename your WordPress index page index.php so that your existing index page still takes effect). When everything mentioned above is ready, here comes the big day for launching your new site.

WordPress provides export and import tools to help with easy site migration. So the site migration process will be:

Export all pages and posts from the mockup site

Turn on WordPress on the target hosting account if it’s off (renaming index.php)

Basic WordPress setup on the target site, such as setting up Permalinks, users

Import all pages and posts and asign them to a user on the target site

Manually add links(blogrolls) to the target site because they are not coming with the Export & Import

Configure plugins if needed

Go through the new site to make sure it’s functioning

One extra important step that is commonly skipped:

In case of an existing site like ExuroFitness.com, to preserve the rankings at major search engines, I found out all the pages that have been indexed by search engines using a query of “site:exurofitness.com”, use a WordPress plugin called “Redirection” to create 301 redirection for each of those indexed pages. Doing this essentially is telling search engines that these pages are not broken links, instead they have been moved to anther URL. Search engines will then update their databases and transfer the page rankings to the new URLs. Visitors who find links to your old pages from a Search Engine Result Page will also be presented with the proper new pages, instead of a “404 Page Not Found” error message.

Project Outcome

Since December 7, the new website has been functioning as expected. During this time, Aaron is working very hard on learning to make the most from the new site along with some other online marketing tactics. I worked closely with him to provide training, tutorial materials, directions and all kinds of support, such as helping him to integrate the website with email marketing, Twitter, Youtube, etc. In the web2.0 era, a website is not just a website. It is the centre of the marketing hub connecting with a variety of social media channels that will bring you online businesses and fame. This is how ITExpert Consulting Corp. approaches web design services differently from other companies. We build you a great website platform and help you to grow your businesses and fame through reaching out all possible online channels as well as attracting free traffic from search engines, while traditional web design is no more than printing your some business cards and brochures and hanging them on the world wide web, among other millions of websites. If the differences are still not so clear to you, in my next post, I’ll talk about the improvements we have achieved in the Exuro Fitness project. Stay tuned by signing up for our free newsletter at the right sidebar.

Affiliated with the largest and most trusted online store Amazon, ITExpert4U.com has launched an online store at http://itexpert4u.com/store/.

ITExpert Store Offers

The ITExpert Online Store offers the greatest selection of IT-related products, which include Software, Computer and Internet Books, Computer and Video Games, Electronics and ITExpert’s Picks.

How the Store Runs

ITExpert4U.com only provides a store front end in order to give visitors the convenience to find anything IT-related that they want to purchase online. The store is completely run by the Amazon company. Everything you buy from this store is professionally handled by Amazon company. You can expect world class quality of products and services and the highest safety and security. For any questions, requests or claims regarding transactions, billing, payment and shipping, etc. you should contact Amazon following the instructions on their website or email communications.

Why Shop at the ITExpert Store

As the store is actually run by Amazon, yes, you don’t have to shop at our ITExpert Online Store. Anytime you can click on the Powered By Amazon icon to head over to the official Amazon website. We do have some advantages over directly browsing Amazon website. First being we only include IT related products. You know there are literally tens of thousands products featuring on the Amazon website. If all you are looking for are IT products, you don’t want to be distracted by any other products at Amazon. Furthermore, we have a unique “ITExpert’s Picks” category where we feature some special products that we think worth mentioning. They may be best sellers, latest products or something really interesting. You should check it out on your own for your unique experience.

Enjoy Shopping Around Online

Now head over to our ITExpert Online Store Powered by Amazon to start shopping around. Christmas season is right at the corner!

I wrote about how Naheed Nenshi has done a great job utilizing social media tools to win the Calgary Mayoral campaign a while ago. Today I’m going to talk about some failures in web design that had contributed to Ric McIver’s loss in the competition.

I wasn’t too involved in politics. For most time during the Calgary Municipal Election season, I got an impression that long time Alderman Ric McIver would be the best fit for the next mayor chair and he had led the racing far ahead. About 10 days before the Election day.  I started to sense that the wind was turning direction. While Barb Higgins was still at the second place, I felt Nenshi was really the one who would be able to defeat Ric. So I took some time to look at their web presence and found out McIver actually was far behind Nenshi when gauged with some important Internet figures.

Website Performance Evaluation Comparison

Below are the comparison of some numbers that are very essential in evaluating website performance

Alexa 3 month traffic ranking

(from www.alexa.com, the smaller number, the better):
www.ricmciver.ca 2,026,223
barbhiggins.ca 1,165,891
www.nenshi.ca 1,212,312

Google Indexed Pages:

McIver       56
Higgins     120
Neshi           85

Inbound Links

McIver    587
Higgins    845
Neshi     1445

McIver Website Issues

I reviews Ric McIver’s official website and found a couple of issues, listed below:

Bigger Issues and My Suggestions

1. Obviously the website was built from WordPress, the best blogging system. However, I couldn’t find blog entries. See what Nenshi has done. He also uses WordPress and has been posting about one post each single day. This is important to express your policies, ideas, etc, to address and answer voters’ questions and concerns, it is also important to get a higher ranking in Google and other search engines in order to draw more visitors.

2. I see you’ve been active in Twitter, which is excellent (although not as active as other two, who tweeted thousands of updates). But not on blogging as stated at item 1. Twitter has word limit, which is a limitation to make yourself clear. Actually for a few simple steps to setup feedburner free services, you can write blog posts, and let feedburner automatically submit the title and link of your every post to twitter. This is what I’m doing to tweet my blog post automatically.

3. Ran a markup validation shows 54 errors, 34 warnings on your home page. This is really bad for both user experiences (although it’s not visible) and search engines (they can catch every error!). For the list of errors and warnings, see http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=www.ricmciver.ca&charset=%28detect+automatically%29&doctype=Inline&group=0. Every error needs to be fixed to satisfy search engines and human users.

Some Other More detail/technical/minor Issues and Suggestions:

1. domain Time To Expiration  1 month, 2 weeks. It’s only under $10/year for domain registration. Please prepay as many years as you can, otherwise Google would think you’re suspicious site which prepare to escape, and your visitors might think you’re not planning to continue after the election.

2. Last Google Crawl Date: October 1, 2010 @ 10:53:43 PM (EDT). This probably was caused by a meta date of <meta content=”7 days” name=”revisit-after” /> which tells search engines not to come so often. Obviously, the less search engines visit you, the lower your ranking (because you don’t think your own site is so important as to require them to come every day.)

3. the main content sheet on the website can be wider to hold more content. Now the background and the header occupy too much space, which takes up the eye-catching place for more important information.

4. the slider on the home page needs a switch. Now users have to wait for the slider to roll over one by one. No one likes to wait. With a switch, users can find out easier all slides.

5. Page meta title can include more keywords. Now the title is ‘Ric McIver’, can add some other words like Mayoral Candidate, calgary 2010 election, etc. Keep it shorter than 70 characters and make sure every page has a different title, not necessarily completely different but definitely no duplicate from page to page. Title is very important to SEO.

6. Missing meta descriptions. This is important because they are used as a snippet of your website on the Google search result. Should write an eye-catching sentence for about 160 character long.

7. Meta keywords don’t need to have some many words and all the combinations. For example, two words of “Mayor, Candidate”, search engine will combine them for as so you don’t need to list these two words along with the combination of “Mayor Candidate”.

8. More than one H1 tag found on the home page. This is caused by the slider. Should assign H2 tag to the title of each slide instead. Each page should only has one H1 tag and it should be the most important message on that page.

9. Too Many Images Found. Having many images on the web page means the user has to wait longer to view your page. Your home page has 44 images. It’s usually better to have fewer or smaller images. Sometimes simply resizing your images will make them smaller in size, and your web page will load faster.

10. some meta tags are in the format of <meta content=”the content” name=”the name”>. although it might not cause issues, good practice is to have the name before the content, like this: <meta name=”author” content=”Ric McIver, www.ricmciver.ca” />

Final Results

Well, most of us already knew the final result of the election. It sounds non-sense if I said the issues I found on Ric McIver’s website caused his loss in the competition. However, I can definitely say that loud, Ric McIver and his campaign office could have done it much better and could have won.

McIver has announced his intention of running in the upcoming Calgary Centre-North by-election, following the resignation of Jim Prentice from the House of Commons. Let’s wait and see if his team can learn some lessons and run a better campaign.

Next time, I would like to post about how many election candidates use WordPress as their website content management system.

Happy Halloween HTML website template, HalloweenIT version 1.0 is released for free download.

Adding horror and fun flavor to your website. Dark color, Two columns, left sidebar, flash animated header.

This skin is made for HTML website users. If you know where there is a free HTML Halloween template, please drop me a line and I’ll list it in this post.

HalloweenIT is also available in other popular formats of WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, Blogger and DotNetNuke. They were created and released by http://ITExpert4U.com. They are completely free to use and distribute. We only require you to please keep the credit links on the footer or blogroll. If you need to modify the header image or remove the footer credit link, it only costs you $10 CAD to get the layered PSD file and the right to remove the link.

We will keep releasing more free themes, templates and skins for WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, DotNetNuke, Blogger, HTML, etc. Please signup to get the notification when it is released. If you would like to support our works, Please donate any amounts through PayPal. Thanks!

License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0. You are free to copy, distribute, adapt the work for noncommercial purposes, but you must keep the link back in the footer unless you pay for it.

Note: You need to register as a member before you can download these files. By becoming a member, you will be able to receive timely updates, tips, tricks, special offers, and reviews, etc. from us. We will never sell your information to anybody! Your privacy is fully respected. We ensure you that your email address or any other information you provide will not be sold to any other party. Any personal and account data collected, through our website, and maintained by ITExpert Consulting Corp. is done so to fulfill our legal and regulatory requirements and to provide you with the products, information and services you have requested. Please refer to our Privacy Policy for more details.

Screenshot:

Other Resources:

For greatest selection of Premium HTML website Templates, please visit ThemeForst marketplace.

Happy Halloween Skin, HalloweenIT version 1.0 for DotNetNuke is released for free download.

Adding horror and fun flavor to your blog. Dark theme with admin option. Two columns, left sidebar and widget ready.

This skin is made for DotNetNuke users. It probably is the only free available Halloween template for DotNetNuke. If you know where there is a free DotNetNuke Halloween template, please drop me a line and I’ll list it in this post.

HalloweenIT is also available in other popular formats of WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, Blogger and HTML. They were created and released by http://ITExpert4U.com. They are completely free to use and distribute. We only require you to please keep the credit links on the footer or blogroll. If you need to modify the header image or remove the footer credit link, it only costs you $10 CAD to get the layered PSD file and the right to remove the link.

We will keep releasing more free themes, templates and skins for WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, DotNetNuke, Blogger, HTML, etc. Please signup to get the notification when it is released. If you would like to support our works, Please donate any amounts through PayPal. Thanks!

License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0. You are free to copy, distribute, adapt the work for noncommercial purposes, but you must keep the link back in the footer unless you pay for it.

Note: You need to register as a member before you can download these files. By becoming a member, you will be able to receive timely updates, tips, tricks, special offers, and reviews, etc. from us. We will never sell your information to anybody! Your privacy is fully respected. We ensure you that your email address or any other information you provide will not be sold to any other party. Any personal and account data collected, through our website, and maintained by ITExpert Consulting Corp. is done so to fulfill our legal and regulatory requirements and to provide you with the products, information and services you have requested. Please refer to our Privacy Policy for more details.

Screenshot:

Other Resources:

For greatest selection of Premium Themes and Templates, please visit ThemeForst marketplace.

Happy Halloween Template, HalloweenIT version 1.0 for Blogger is released for free download.

Adding horror and fun flavor to your blog. Dark theme with admin option. Two columns, left sidebar and widget ready.

This template is made for Blogger users. It probably is the only free available Halloween template for Blogger. If you know where there is a free Blogger Halloween template, please drop me a line and I’ll list it in this post.

HalloweenIT is also available in other popular formats of WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, DotNetNuke and HTML. They were created and released by http://ITExpert4U.com. They are completely free to use and distribute. We only require you to please keep the credit links on the footer or blogroll. If you need to modify the header image or remove the footer credit link, it only costs you $10 CAD to get the layered PSD file and the right to remove the link.

We will keep releasing more free themes, templates and skins for WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, DotNetNuke, Blogger, HTML, etc. Please signup to get the notification when it is released. If you would like to support our works, Please donate any amounts through PayPal. Thanks!

License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0. You are free to copy, distribute, adapt the work for noncommercial purposes, but you must keep the link back in the footer unless you pay for it.

Note: You need to register as a member before you can download these files. By becoming a member, you will be able to receive timely updates, tips, tricks, special offers, and reviews, etc. from us. We will never sell your information to anybody! Your privacy is fully respected. We ensure you that your email address or any other information you provide will not be sold to any other party. Any personal and account data collected, through our website, and maintained by ITExpert Consulting Corp. is done so to fulfill our legal and regulatory requirements and to provide you with the products, information and services you have requested. Please refer to our Privacy Policy for more details.

Screenshot:

Other Resources:

For greatest selection of Blogger Premium Templates, please visit ThemeForst marketplace.

Happy Halloween Theme, HalloweenIT version 1.0 for Drupal is released for free download.

Adding horror and fun flavor to your blog. Dark theme with admin option. Two columns, left sidebar, flash animated header and widget ready.

This Theme is made for Drupal users. It probably is the only free Halloween theme for Drupal. If you know where there is a free Drupal Halloween theme, please drop me a line and I’ll list it in this post.

HalloweenIT is also available in other popular formats of WordPress, Joomla, Blogger, DotNetNuke and HTML. They were created and released by http://ITExpert4U.com. They are completely free to use and distribute. We only require you to please keep the credit links on the footer or blogroll. If you need to modify the header image or remove the footer credit link, it only costs you $10 CAD to get the layered PSD file and the right to remove the link.

We will keep releasing more free themes, templates and skins for WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, DotNetNuke, Blogger, HTML, etc. Please signup to get the notification when it is released. If you would like to support our works, Please donate any amounts through PayPal. Thanks!

License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0. You are free to copy, distribute, adapt the work for noncommercial purposes, but you must keep the link back in the footer unless you pay for it.

Note: You need to register as a member before you can download these files. By becoming a member, you will be able to receive timely updates, tips, tricks, special offers, and reviews, etc. from us. We will never sell your information to anybody! Your privacy is fully respected. We ensure you that your email address or any other information you provide will not be sold to any other party. Any personal and account data collected, through our website, and maintained by ITExpert Consulting Corp. is done so to fulfill our legal and regulatory requirements and to provide you with the products, information and services you have requested. Please refer to our Privacy Policy for more details.

Screenshot:

Other Resources:

For greatest selection of Drupal Premium Templates, please visit ThemeForst marketplace.

Happy Halloween Template, HalloweenIT version 1.0 for Joomla is released for free download.

Adding horror and fun flavor to your blog. Dark theme with admin option. Two columns, left sidebar and widget ready.

This template is made for Joomla users. It probably is the only free Halloween template for Joomla. If you know where there is a free Joomla Halloween template, please drop me a line and I’ll list it in this post.

HalloweenIT is also available in other popular formats of WordPress, Drupal, Blogger, DotNetNuke and HTML. They were created and released by http://ITExpert4U.com. They are completely free to use and distribute. We only require you to please keep the credit links on the footer or blogroll. If you need to modify the header image or remove the footer credit link, it only costs you $10 CAD to get the layered PSD file and the right to remove the link.

We will keep releasing more free themes, templates and skins for WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, DotNetNuke, Blogger, HTML, etc. Please signup to get the notification when it is released. If you would like to support our works, Please donate any amounts through PayPal. Thanks!

License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0. You are free to copy, distribute, adapt the work for noncommercial purposes, but you must keep the link back in the footer unless you pay for it.

Note: You need to register as a member before you can download these files. By becoming a member, you will be able to receive timely updates, tips, tricks, special offers, and reviews, etc. from us. We will never sell your information to anybody! Your privacy is fully respected. We ensure you that your email address or any other information you provide will not be sold to any other party. Any personal and account data collected, through our website, and maintained by ITExpert Consulting Corp. is done so to fulfill our legal and regulatory requirements and to provide you with the products, information and services you have requested. Please refer to our Privacy Policy for more details.

Screenshot:

Other Resources:

For greatest selection of Joomla Premium Templates, please visit ThemeForst marketplace.