Web design tips, Joomla tips, Wordpress tips and Custom Website Design in PHP tips. http://www.tm4y.co.za 2011-09-08T14:27:52+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/images/M_images/joomla_rss.png text/html 2011-07-03T04:31:12+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/internet-marketing-tips/google-vs-facebook-infographic.html Here is an infographic that depicts how the two big Internet Giants, Google and Facebook, are stacking up against each other. It is telling that, if you look closely, it is mostly about paid advertisting since obviously Facebook does not offer 'search' as a service. Does that mean that the days of pure 'search' is over? Somehow that doesn't seem quite right either.... ++ Click to Enlarge Image ++MBAProgramInfo.com (http://mbaprograminfo.com/) text/html 2011-06-24T18:00:00+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/internet-marketing-tips/yahoo-site-explorer-alternatives-to-measure-backlinks.html For years and years now we all knew that the only reliable way to measure backlinks was to use the Yahoo Site Explorer. Google definitely does not show all the backlinks to a site (but we all know that, right?). Microsoft Live/Bing stopped showing this at some point, so the only remaining search engine that still offered this info was Yahoo. Last year at around November the site explorer started to show some strange results. It looked as if quite a huge number of links just disappeared. Then they came back again. Then the Yahoo Site Explorer team announced that the number of backlinks will not be available through their API any more, and that the Site Explorer as it is working in its current format will probably only be available until around 2012, due to the Yahoo/Bing integration So basically this means that it might be time to investigate alternative sources when checking the backlinks of your site There are a couple of alternatives although time will tell which one would offer the best results Most offer a free version that will display some basic link info, but most of them offer a subscription service where one can get a lot more info such as the 'quality' of the link, in other words, the PR of the page that the link would come from, whether the link is 'follow' or 'do not follow', the anchor text of the links etc. text/html 2011-06-06T15:36:33+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/internet-marketing-tips/dont-take-part-in-link-exchanges.html You also probably still get those email requests to exchange links. They are all written along the same lines � I saw your site on the Internet and it looked great and Google really values links so I will link to you, and then you can link to this site� We all know that reciprocal link exchanges do not provide much value in terms of link-juice since Google devalues most of these links. These link exchanges are clever enough though to offer three way links. They will link to your site and you will link to another site under their control that they are trying to promote through a link building campaign. As the manager of several SEO campaigns I regularly get emails from clients who ask if it is worth it to do this. Apart from the fact that Google frowns upon link exchanges, there are other reasons why it is just not worth taking part in these exchanges. Firstly, it is a lot of effort. You have to create a link on a page to another website. Then you actually need to go and check that they have placed their link on the page that they promised. Now you have gained exactly one link. But how do you know that the link that they have placed for you will stay in place? Are you going to check regularly, or are you just going to assume and trust that they will not remove your link? On the other hand, you have placed... text/html 2011-05-03T18:00:00+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/internet-marketing-tips/my-site-cant-be-found-in-google.html We often get a desperate cry for help from customers - we have just delivered their site and they can't find it anywhere in Google when they search for it, not even directly by company name or by URL. This is not uncommon - the biggest problem is that Google does not automatically 'know' about your site! Basically when a website is built it is very much like building a shop in the Namib desert with no roads or signposts to it. This happens to ALL websites when they are built and frankly, it does not actually matter whether you built a Macro or a little corner Greek Café – in other words, it does not matter whether your website is beautiful, ugly, userfriendly, not userfriendly, wonderful, horrible, big, small or anything like that. Google just does not know about your site, full stop. The only way for Google to get to know about your site to post signposts to it and build ‘roads’ to your site. This is, in Internet terms, getting other websites to link to your site. Those links are like signposts for Google to follow to find out about your site. This can take anything between 3 days to 3 weeks and even up to 3 months or 3 years if NO ONE on the Internet ever links to your site. Once again, this has nothing to do with your website itself but everything to do with what OTHER sites do or do not do.... text/html 2011-03-17T05:15:49+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/general-tips/should-i-use-html-5-instead-of-flash-for-my-website.html HTML5 is certainly the latest buzzword in the web development industry today probably due to Steve Jobs mentioning that HTML5 is the future and would probably replace Flash. This in turn is because Steve Jobs does not want to incorporate flash support on the Ipads, for whichever reason. Other mobile phones and Ipad devices ARE actually working on getting flash support in place. What needs to be taken into consideration is that HTML 5 is about more than just the flash part of it, but on the other hand, it is also not much MORE than just the flash and animation component. text/html 2010-10-25T03:50:25+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/internet-marketing-tips/seo-google-algorithm-change-impact.html The previous change that had everyone in a tizz (Google Instant Search) is nothing compared to what they have done now to the search engine results pages. It looks as if it was introduced in a very low key way since I am not hearing a lot of buzz about it but as far as I am concerned it is a disaster Google has started to present various results from one site on the first page of results. If you are the beneficiary recipient of this it is great, but if you are competing against it, it really sucks They started off by mostly saying that if people want to search for a specific domain, that they know that they are searching for more info about that domain and they will start to bring up multiple results for that specific domain on the first page So if you go to Google.com and you do a search for ‘apple', the first couple of results are all apple.com pages. Previously they would not have more than one page showing from the same site unless it was using indented results. The problem is that I have started to see them show results from the same website even if it is NOT domain name specific. For example, if you make the number of results 100 in google.co.za and you look for ‘basking lamp' - the first 20 or so results are absolutely dominated by the same sites - different pages from the same domain. This is not happening that... text/html 2010-09-17T03:28:15+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/general-tips/why-a-5-page-website-can-take-so-long.html We have a cool timeframe schematic in our website proposal documents. It shows a timeline where, if all goes well, the customer can have his 'five page' website up and running in two and a half weeks. text/html 2010-09-01T18:00:00+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/internet-marketing-tips/alexa-is-it-important-for-seo.html Recently a client told me that someone told him that he needs to rank well in Alexa for natural SEO. The client asked me what his friend meant by that. Frankly, I was puzzled myself... text/html 2010-08-02T14:48:07+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/general-tips/web-development-course-launches.html We are excited to announce the launch of our comprehensive web development course. We started off with Introduction to Joomla and Joomla Advanced, and we are now branching into the following courses as well: HTML and CSS training course (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=259 Itemid=246) Photoshop training (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=260 Itemid=247) Introduction to Javascript training course (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=261 Itemid=248) The PHPMyAdmin and MySQL interface (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=262 Itemid=249) Introduction to PHP training (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=264 Itemid=251) Introduction to SQL training (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=263 Itemid=250) Introduction to Joomla training (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=266 Itemid=252) Joomla Advanced training course (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=267 Itemid=253) Joomla Advanced Components training (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=265 Itemid=254) This course has been designed to give anyone who wants to become a professional web developer the necessary skills to understand and master the essentials and be able to deliver a professional web development service. Each of the modules can be booked for separately although there is a discount for booking for the full course. (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=268 Itemid=255) The course starts on the 23rd of August and runs until the 7th of September - so make your booking now (index.php?option=com_content task=view id=268 Itemid=255) ! text/html 2010-06-22T11:48:16+01:00 http://www.tm4y.co.za http://www.tm4y.co.za/internet-marketing-tips/follow-us-on-twitter.html We have finally succumbed to the Twitter bug and now has an account on Twitter for the company. Do follow us on http://twitter.com/tm4y (http://twitter.com/tm4y) - we will be running special offers and regular quick tips on Joomla, SEO and hosting through our Twitter account.