In any case if you want to use the Fan Box Widget on your WordPress website is is very easy. Here is some more detail on function and installation. After you get the Fan Box Widget script, it can be placed in a WordPress sidebar or page or post. Note – you will need to use the WP HTML edit view, the Visual view will break the script.

Let me know if you have any questions.

And please join me on my Facebook Page? Thanks!

• It seems that Network Solutions has finally gotten its act together for hosting WordPress. They now allow WordPress to auto update itself. #
• Why do they call it SEO? Its not optimizing the search engine, it's optimizing the website for the search engine. #
• How to bend the internet to your will. A quick lesson from Anthony Bourdain http://bit.ly/DrJRE #
• "Where did all the flowers come from?". Seems a blessing that they evolved are are now so many. http://tinyurl.com/NYT-flowers #
• Check this video out — Robert Reich explains the Public Option in 2.5 min http://bit.ly/3m1LYC #
• Technorati: Discussion about “WordPress Just Made Millions of Blogs Real-Time With RSSCloud” – http://shar.es/1mYLR #

I installed Kertesz2 on the same hosting account with his existing Bludomain site. This would allow for a better search engine friendly platform including management of an improved landing page, fully integrated Blog and better indexed About, Contact, Testimonials and Investment type page content. All on the same domain and integrated with his existing Bludomain site.

When he was ready after adding content and styling to his Kertesz2 template, I revisited his site, “wrapped” the existing Bludomain site with Kertesz2 and replaced the original splash page with the site’s new landing page and did some final SEO adjustments.

SEO Makeover Results

There is still a lot of content to add and details but almost instantly the site’s SEO score from websitegrader.com went from a low 29 all the way up to 67 in the same day (click the links to read the reports). Plus the site now sends automatic message updates notifying search engines like Google, Bing and Technorati almost every time content is added to the site.

Plus main page of the site has gone from a low engagement black to a more engaging and dynamic layout. Here is the new look -

If you want to reduce your website advertising cost and yet get more traffic to your Bludomain website send me an email. Be ready for the upcoming booking season. I can help you do it yourself or do a complete fully styled layout and site design/build to your design ideas and preference for you, depending upon your budget.

Rather than let your hosting company leave up its standard “under construction” or “coming soon” default page or an image of your logo, put up a simple WordPress blog with just a post or two of your basic content and a little about your business and contact info. This will shorten the time until it is indexed and greatly improve your site’s search recognition.

TECH 5 temp landing page

Recently (today) I took some time and did just this for a friend and his new telecommunications company, TECH 5.

His logo was done and he asked if I could replace the standard Network Solutions “coming soon” page with his new logo. I went a little further, I installed WordPress, uploaded the Atahualpa theme and a few plugins (cforms, All-in-One SEO and Google XML Sitemaps). Then added the logo and some content (that they already had put together for the new business) and voila … a temporary landing page that announces the new business with some major SEO mojo.

Admittedly it is not as pretty as the finished website will be, but it puts all the needed info out there right now in an easy to modify format, SEO optimized and it will make sure that the final website, when it is done, will enjoy as strong as possible search results from its first day on the domain.

If you have any questions feel free to send an email or leave a comment.

Over the next few days I will putting up Facebook Pages for a few of my small business clients. I have a checklist that I follow to make sure the Facebook Pages I create will be optimized within what Facebook allows in service and features.

If you want a Facebook Page for your business I would be pleased to do it for you for a small charge. Or if you are a DIY’er these are two of the best current online articles I know of to guide you through the best practice initial setup and creating a page with innovative features. To start a Facebook Page go here after you are logged into Facebook, but first read the two articles linked below.

The first article, “10 Key SEO Strategies Every Facebook Page Owner Should Know” is one you should read through before you even start a Facebook Page. Don’t even start your business’ Page until you know what you want to name it and what you would like as a good vanity URL

The second article showcases a few of the most innovative and ambitious Facebook Pages. “10 Successful Facebook Business Pages” has business pages with many features that may or may not be suited to your business or circumstance, but it shows what can be done with some of the applications in the Facebook application library.

Good luck, a Facebook Page will be a good thing for your business, any type of business, and let me know if I might help.

Fortunately it seems that Anthony Bourdain has a remarkably strong grip and understanding on the quicksilver that is the internet. And Robert Donoghue shares a lesson he learned from Bourdain which help may show the way to bend enough of your corner of the internet to achieve your goals.

The question at hand was how to find good restaurants, and his answer was to take the city you want to go to and just google up some restaurant names that serve the dish you’re after. Then got to chowhound or another foodie site, and rather than asking about restaurants, you put up an enthusiastic post talking about how you just had the best whatever you’re looking for at one of these restaurants.

… Posters will show up from nowhere to shower you with disdain, tell you how that place used to be good but has now totally sold out and – most important to your quest – will tell you where you would have gone if you were not some sort of mouth breathing water buffalo.

Very subtle but it shows the effect and the channel by which just one person and a few words can “harness” the internet for their goal. I came across this a couple of years ago, and I often remember it when I am trying to come up with some way to help a client achieve their internet marketing goal. Blindingly obvious once it is explained. And something to think about when facing the huge complexity of internet marketing.

Tonight I am contemplating how to use Bourdain’s subtle approach to help create more linkbacks to a new website. Don’t know yet exactly how/what I am going to do, but you gotta love Anthony Bourdain … smart creative insights into life, love, food and even the internet.

If anyone has similar ideas or lessons please leave a comment.

But Google does enforce and it is not only amateurs that run afoul of Google’s Guidelines. Expensive high priced professionals often intentionally do so. Do the detriment of their client’s interest. In some cases even getting the site they created kicked off Google. As a follow up to my post SEO Gone Wild, this report by ABC News not only shares the outcome of that site, but also Google’s actions against BMW and even Google themselves for improper SEO actions. Read the article, it does a good job of explaining what not to do and what can happen if you do it anyway.

In reality Google does a good job of enforcing its site guidelines. Not only for small business, but large and influential businesses as well. Even on site’s done by recognized professional website developers. As a small business you probably cannot afford to have your site’s rank lowered or removed Google, I couldn’t. Which is why for my client’s I strive to obtain the highest Google placement possible which following the intent of Google’s site guidelines. Send me an email if you have any questions about your site’s SEO.

Fortunately WordPress based websites, like what I provide, can integrate with Friendfeed now.  Look at the range of free WordPress plugins available for Friendfeed.  If you need help or have questions just send me an email.

And may you have a good Labor Day holiday!

When contrasting Twitter and Facebook in this way I am reminded of a passage from the Tao interpreted by John Heider in the “The Tao of Leadership”

Imagine that the life force is like water in the river and in the sea. The sea, greater than the river, lies below, open and receptive. The busy, rushing river enters the sea, is absorbed, and is transformed.

Here is a great post by Kevin Marks titled “How Twitter works in theory”, which could in my opinion be more accurately titled “The Way of Twitter” . Regardless, if you want a deeper understanding of Twitter, go read, now. And you will learn how to appreciate and better use the Twitter phenomenon to present your goods and services on the internet. And why I think it is so important that your website be able to actively participate and manage both social networks.

For my clients’ marketing purposes I am really looking forward to this feature. It will allow for targeted tweets marketing goods and services at the neighborhood or metro or larger area. In reality, don’t most businesses market to an area … a “market area”, a “service area” even a “delivery area”?

So this new feature will allow us to use Twitter even more effectively to market to our geographic target market area. And the tweet location feature will also encourage Twitter users to include following by area.

This means that Twitter users can become aware of events like concerts or fairs or even auctions or open houses as well as special offers from restaurants, florists, house maintenance, bridal salons … any business can benefit as can the consumer. Tweet lunch specials or even flu shots. People will be able to keep track of what is happing and special offers in their area with out having to first seek and follow a specific Twitter user. I look forward to a lot of new services developing that we can use for marketing around this new Twitter feature.

With new power comes new responsibility. Some of us will need to alter what we tweet. For example with the addition of location, it may not be wise to tweet that you will be on vacation for the next week with no one staying in your home.

And finally if you use a WordPress based website, like what I provide, you can launch, manage and archive all your tweets from one place.

To read and learn more about the new Twitter location feature, click here.

Matt Cutts works for the Search Quality group in Google, specializing in search engine optimization issues. He is well known in the SEO community for enforcing the Google Webmaster Guidelines and cracking down on link spam. Cutts also advises the public on how to get better website visibility in Google.

In other words … if you want to learn how Google indexes and ranks your website, Matt is the go-to guy. Fortunately for all of us he is a good teacher. His blog is a good resource, but the video below is outstanding for a short lesson on how you may improve your website’s or blog’s search rank, easily, particularly if it is WordPress based. The total video is about 45 minutes long, but take your time and just watch a few minutes at a time. Matt gives great tips on everything from site basics to writing content for maximum SEO results throughout the presentation below.  You will learn why I now build websites using only WordPress and how I work to maximize the internet marketing results for my website clients.

“Straight From Google What You Need To Know”, WordCamp San Francisco 2009

What happens is when you click on the Fantastico icon you will get a screen that reads something like this -

“Fantastico is not installed at the default location /usr/local/cpanel/3rdparty/fantastico. Either move the Fantastico directory from it’s current location to /usr/local/cpanel/3rdparty/fantastico OR enable ioncube loaders in WHM -> Tweak settings.”

I am not sure why some Bludomain hosting accounts have this variation, but that does not mean that WordPress cannot be hosted in your Bludomain hosting, just that the install will need to be done manually.

Manually means creating the MySQL database and then transferring the WordPress files via FTP. Here is the detailed instructions on how to do it -

http://codex.wordpress.org/Installing_WordPress#Detailed_Instructions

WordPress works just as well on Bludomain regardless of it being an automatic or manual install.

If you have this situation of Bludomain not having the Fantastico automatic install on your hosting account and want help to install WordPress manually, let me know. I can usually do it the same day and my charge is nominal.

• Check this video out — Trollbeads in the Garden of the Gods, Colorado http://bit.ly/VuDRu #
• Twitter Friendly Links: One of the best WordPress SEO plugins of the summer! http://bit.ly/Uaz5e #
• weirdest fun dream in many years – I had an aardvark house-pet that I was trying to get to use a litter box. (no i am not using drugs) #

The salon wanted all the advantages that goes along with our all WordPress based websites, including:

• Easy do it yourself content additions, upgrades, and site maintenance.
• Complete automatic interaction and cross posting with Facebook and Twitter
• Integrated blog
• Low cost hosting
• And the truly best SEO that only WordPress based websites can deliver.

All of this combined in a freshend style format that uses much of the established branding that The  Something Blue Shoppe is recognized for.

New Site

Step 1) Login to your Bludomain hosting account. This will bring you to the cpanel account management screen. Below is a screen capture from a typical Bludomain hosting account. Scroll down the screen until you find the section titled “Software / Services”. In that section you should see an icon for “Fantastico Deluxe”. Those elements are highlighted below in yellow. Click on the Fantastico Deluxe icon.

Step 2) The Fantastico Deluxe screen looks like the one below. Fantastico is a great script that will install WordPress for you. Just find the WordPress option in the left sidebar. In the image below it is highlighted in yellow. Click on the WordPress text link.

Step 3) You should now see the screen illustrated below. Take the time to read it. (Note is there is any current WordPress installation and if there is make note of where it is installed. In this hosting account there is not. ) To install WordPress click on the “New Installation” link.

Step 4) This is where you provide the setup information. As you can see in this screen you need to tell Fantastico where on your Bludomain hosting account to install WordPress. I usually instruct it to install into a subdirectory called “wp” or “blog”. It is not important what you call it, but WHAT IS IMPORTANT IS THAT WORDPRESS IS INSTALLED IN A SUBDIRECTORY. It it is installed in the main or root directory it may interfere with your Bludomain website. Just go through the screen.

• Choose the domain name
• Enter your subdirectory name
• In “Admin access data” section enter the admin name and password you want to have to be able to login into your WordPress intall
• In the “Base configuration” section enter the posting nickname you want to use, the email you want to have in case you lose your password, the name of your blog (east to change later) and the tag-line description of your new blog (also easy to change).

(Take a moment and save your username and password to a notebook or file.)

Now click on “Install WordPress”

Step 5) This is a confirmation screen. Read through it and if it is as you want, click “Finish installation”

Step 6) You are done! It will take just a minute or two. You now have a free self-hosted WordPress blog on your Bludomain website’s domain name.

The final screen will have your access and login details. You can copy them to a file for safe keeping, if you didn’t do already in Step 4. You can also click the URL for your new WordPress blog and login to its admin dashboard panel.

Just like any blog platform, there is a lot more to do; select a theme, style it to your preference and optimize it for security and SEO. I will touch on some of that in a future Bludomain / WordPress post in the future if there is sufficient interest.

Note: If you have any questions send me an email. Non-Bludomain hosting accounts supporting Bludomain sites should be similar, but there are often some small differences. Again if you have a question send me an email I’ll try to help.

Here are some important bullet points and a video prepared by Erik Qualman, VP of Global Vice President of Online Marketing for EF Education, the worlds largest private educator covering the present reality and importance of Social Media.

• By 2010, Gen Y will outnumber Baby Boomers — 96 percent of them have joined a social network.
• One out of eight couples married in the U.S. last year met via social media.
• Years to reach 50 millions users: Radio, 38 years; TV, 13 years; Internet, 4 years; iPod, 3 years. Facebook added 100 million users in less than nine months; iPhone applications hit 1 billion in nine months.
• Eighty percent of companies use LinkedIn as their primary tool to find employees.
• The fastest growing segment on Facebook is 55- to 65-year-old females.
• Generation Y and Z consider e-mail passé. Boston College stopped distributing e-mail addresses to incoming freshmen in 2009.
• YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world.
• Twenty-five percent of search results for the world’s top 20 largest brands are links to user-generated content.
• Seventy-eight percent of consumers trust peer recommendations.
• Only 14 percent trust advertisements.
• Only 18 percent of traditional TV campaigns generate a positive ROI.
• More than 1.5 million pieces of content (Web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photos, etc.) are shared on Facebook daily.
• Successful companies in social media act more like Dale Carnegie and less like David Ogilvy — listening first, selling second.

Erik Qualman is also an important contributor to Search Engine Watch, here are two of his recent articles which provide much more information on the impact and importance of Social Media:  Social Media: Fad or Revolution? and 15 Social Media Maxims for Marketers. Check out both of them.  And keep on blogging and tweeting and networking!