The OSP

How to Find Guest Blogging Opportunities

Jodie Burdette — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 17:55:19 +0000

There are a number of ways to find guest blogging opportunities and this guide will provide you an illustrated tour of how you can get great exposure through guest posting. Whether you search for blogs that publicly accept submissions, approach blogs directly, use a guest blogging site or a combination of all those methods, there are plenty of opportunities to be found. Assessing the Quality of the Opportunity There are a number of factors to consider when deciding whether or not you want to write for a particular blog. While you may have other considerations, the factors we cover in [...]

7 Reasons Why You Need To Start Guest Blogging

Jodie Burdette — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 12:55:54 +0000

Did you know that Google has reworked their top secret page ranking algorithm? One of the biggest changes has been the down grading of links to article marketing sites. Guest blogging is now the best way to build back links to your site. Good Back Links = Improved Google Ranking Here are 7 of the biggest reasons why I plan to start guest blogging and why I believe you should too. Check out this post for tips on how to get started guest blogging and how to come up with great content. Easily build quality back links to your site [...]

10 Reasons Why A Facebook Fan Page Is So Important

Jodie Burdette — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 15:03:23 +0000

[dropcapF[/dropcap]acebook is the latest rage online to communicate with your readers at a whole new level. Even a few months back we could say that Facebook fan pages were not very popular, but now it has become a necessity to have a Facebook page. It is an awesome social media tool with viral capabilities much like Twitter. Almost any blog you visit now-a-days will have a Facebook fan page. And the fan page is promoted in the sidebar for visitors to join. In this post I’m discussing 10 reasons why you need a Facebook Fan page: These are ten good [...]

Encourage Return Traffic: Super Charge The Facebook Like Button

Jodie Burdette — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 12:55:57 +0000

acebook Like buttons are everywhere. They are a great tool for sharing interesting information with your “friends”. They are also a great way to get your blog posts in front of more eyes. Up until now this ubiquitous button has represented a onetime sharing event. Well not any more. There is a new Like button on the block and it can help you build lasting, targeted connections with your readers! Facebook Like for Tags transforms the Like button into an ongoing personalized relationship builder to your users based on tags or categories. Say for example that someone stopped by this [...]

Creating Buzz – Make your Facebook Fan Page into an EXPERIENCE

Jodie Burdette — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 12:55:43 +0000

You business has a Facebook Fan page but now you are looking for (low-cost) ways make your page stand out of the zillions of others out there. A great way to make your business shine is to create a “Facebook Experience”. Host a Facebook page that is unique to your brand and relevant and valuable to your fans. It doesn’t have to be anything elaborate to be wildly successful. I have seen some pretty clever examples of “experiences” lately. Each of these has been successful (wildly so in some cases) but none of them cost much $$. If this sounds [...]

Cloud:Flood – Create buzz, drive traffic and it’s FREE

Jodie Burdette — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 12:55:29 +0000

found a really nifty new tool this week. It’s free, you don’t have to sign up AND it will both create buzz and drive traffic to your site. It’s call Cloud:Flood. All you need to do is have a promotional product that you’d like to giveaway such as an eBook, MP3, Zip etc. People who wish to download your giveway simply need to Tweet or Facebook share a link to your website, in order to download the PDF. To put it simply you provide a direct link to the freebie, and a message that will be tweeted / Facebook shared [...]

Leveraging Your Blog – Turning First Time Commenters Into Long Term Readers

Jodie Burdette — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 13:00:01 +0000

You know all about the funnel method of upselling. But have you ever applied that model to your blogging efforts? If you haven’t then you probably aren’t leveraging as effectively as you could be. Here is a very simple illustration of the funnel method as it applies to blogging. At the very top are your marketing efforts to drive people to your site and their initial awareness. This initial awareness phase is absolutely critical and you want to make the very best first impression you possibly can. Equally important is to find ways to leverage this fabulous first impression into [...]

Facebook Fan Page Changes Explained

Jodie Burdette — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 12:55:15 +0000

On March 10th Facebook rolled out a major change to its Pages in order to bring them closer in look and functionality to individual user profiles. For the most part I am really liking (pun intended) the change as it will really improve your ability to connect with your audience. The most obvious changes are the visual impact of the new layout that gives a more compelling look and feel to Pages. There are also a number of functional changes that will allow your business page to interact and operate more like the way individual users do. Facebook has also [...]

Facebook announces the end of FBML tabs. Is your fan page in danger?

Jodie Burdette — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 22:13:45 +0000

Facebook recently announced that on March 11, 2011, the Static FBML application will no longer be available to be added to Pages and that no new FBML applications can be created after that date. While Facebook indicates that current Static FBML and FBML tab applications will continue to function for now, it strongly encourages everyone to move from FBML to using iFrame applications. What this means to you is that as of Thursday you will not be able to add any new FBML custom tabs to your page. You will still be able to see and edit any custom tabs [...]

Yes you can transfer ownership of a Facebook Fan Page

Jodie Burdette — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 14:00:21 +0000

I was recently asked how someone could transfer ownership of a fan page they created to someone else. This person no longer wanted a personal profile but they did want to retain the business page and the large group of fans they had painstakingly built up. Thankfully Facebook has (finally!) made this very easy to do.

Turbo Boost Your Comments – Build a Community

Jodie Burdette — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 13:00:40 +0000

The folks behind Disqus are brilliant. They have taken the concept of leaving comments, souped it up, tricked it out and turned it into a lean mean community building machine. This is truly one of the most perfectly designed plugins I have ever used. It is easy to install, easy to manage and makes starting or joining a discussion insanely easy and enjoyable. Under The Hood One of the main components of Disqus is the totally kicking Disqus profile. Think of this as your universal management tool for your other online identities. You can pre-authenticate your Twitter, Facebook, or Open [...]

Hidden XP Tool : Create Your Own Font or Special Characters

Jodie Burdette — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 02:02:18 +0000

Have you ever wanted to create your own font? How about a special custom character - for example, a character showing your initials that you can use when you approve documents with your “signature”? There is a hidden tool in Windows XP called the Private Character Editor that will let you easily create your own special characters or even a font. Here’s how: You can now paste your font character in any document that you want.

Separate First And Last Names Into Two Columns In Excel

Jodie Burdette — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 02:05:07 +0000

Inevitably, when you import information into Excel you will need to separate a cell’s contents into two columns. Let’s say you have imported a list of addresses but you need to separate the first and last names so you can use them in a mail merge letter. Step 1: Highlight the cells containing the information you wish to separate Step 2: Go to Data | Text To Columns. In Excel 2007, click the Data tab and then click the Text To Columns command in the Data Tools group. Step 3: You are now looking at the Convert Text To Columns [...]

Make Office’s Spell Checker Ignore Internet Addresses

Jodie Burdette — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 04:00:30 +0000

I don’t know about you but sometimes spell check drives me crazy!! As a web designer it is rare that I type a document that doesn’t include a web address somewhere. And there goes spell checker underlining each one with that annoying red sqiggle, even in my email (Outlook) and password logs (Excel)! Well no longer! I put my foot down and have banished this particular annoyance from my computer forever and you can too!! From the Tools menu, choose Options/Spelling & Grammer Check the Ignore Internet And File Addresses option. Click OK. If you’re using Office 2007, do the [...]

Is your WordPress software secure and up-to-date?

Jodie Burdette — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 20:08:26 +0000

Historically WordPress releases at least one and often 2 updates a month. Many of these are critical security updates and a few are bug fixes. Along with these WordPress updates many of the plugins that help run your site also need to be upgraded, and in some cases reconfigured. I can’t stress enough how important it is to keep your WordPress software up to date. I have worked on quite a few sites that were hacked and the main reason they were vulnerable was that they had not kept WordPress current and left themselves open to malicious people who get [...]

Convert

Jodie Burdette — Sat, 04 Dec 2010 17:52:45 +0000

Turn your ideas into products, incorporate a shopping cart into your site and turn those visitors into paying customer or clients.

The Telephone Challenge: How I added a 2nd line AND eliminated my phone bill for 2 years!

Jodie Burdette — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 04:03:12 +0000

As many of you know I am a work at home mom. When I first opened Out Sourcing Pro one of the most annoying issues facing myself and my family centered around the telephone. Anyone with a teenager in the house, especially a teenage girl, knows what a pain in the rear it can be to get the opportunity to just touch the phone much less actually place a call. Well, add into this trying to run a business and the need to send and receive faxes, it was an adventure to say the least! As I was basically operating [...]

10 Little Known MS Word Tricks

Jodie Burdette — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 04:03:15 +0000

Move Table Rows Up Or Down This tip is probably most useful when you’re working in a table, although you can use it to reorder paragraphs outside a table, too. Let’s say you decide you want the third row of a table to be the top row. Just click within the third row, hold down [Alt][Shift] and press the up arrow key twice. Each time you press the arrow key, Word will move the row up one. You can select multiple rows to move them as a block, and you can use the down arrow key if you want to [...]

Design

Jodie Burdette — Sun, 20 Feb 2011 07:09:51 +0000

This where it all starts…. with a distinctive, professional, visually captivating website that reflects the personality of your business.

Attract

Jodie Burdette — Sun, 20 Feb 2011 07:09:20 +0000

Harness the power of social media and email marketing to build awareness of your brand and drive traffic to your site

Get Rid Of Default My Pictures or My Music Windows Folders

Jodie Burdette — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 01:20:10 +0000

If you have ever tried to delete one of those default Windows folders like “My Music”, “My Pictures”, “My Vidoes’ and the like you know that as soon as you reboot they come right back. I don’t know about you but I prefer to save my pictures in a file called “My Moments” but you can apply this tweak to any default windows folder. For this example I am going to use “My Pictures” and assume you would rather be using a file called My Moments, but any new file name would work. You’ll have to make some a couple [...]

Is Your Computer Back Up Plan Fool Proof?

Jodie Burdette — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 01:57:05 +0000

I don’t know about you but around my house (and in my business) my computer has become as indispensable as the kitchen sink, microwave popcorn or ice cubes. I use it for everything from running my web design/web tech business to keeping in touch with my friends and family. It sounds clique but my entire life, and I am sure yours as well, in locked inside its silicon innards. With so much important, and often irreplaceable, data in our computers we often overlook or plan forget that we need to protect it. If your computer fails will you be able [...]

Need A Free Alternative to PhotoShop? Here you go!

Jodie Burdette — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 09:43:58 +0000

IMP is not Adobe Photoshop CS4, but it is an amazingly powerful and efficient open-source bitmap-editing package that can look just as confusing as Adobe Photoshop CS4if you open all its floating toolbars and sidebars. You’ll need to get used to its nonstandard menus. If you make your living from graphics or photo editing, you’ll probably go commercial, but GIMP gets the job done free. Get it here: www.gimp.org

Make Your Website More Interactive

Jodie Burdette — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 13:00:23 +0000

Making your site more interactive can increase the number of visitors who return and who tell others about your site. In other words you want to give you visitor’s reasons to keep coming back again and again. First and foremost content is king. You must have good, informative content or all the window dressing in the world is wasted. You must also update your content frequently. Now that you have the content in place you need to find ways to encourage your visitors to stick around and interact with your site and each other. If you are not blogging every [...]

Convert Audio Rip CDs and More

Jodie Burdette — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 10:38:50 +0000

ere are two good (and of course free) options for manipulating audio files. dBpowerAMP lets you rip CDs, convert files, and record audio. It supports MP3, MP4, M4a, WMA, OGG, AAC, APE, FLAC, Apple Lossless, and more. This app integrates with Windows, so you can simply right-click on a file to convert it. Get it here: www.dbpoweramp.com CDex is a CD-ripping and file-conversion app for the extremely picky. It includes many different encoders, including LAME MP3, Fraunhofer MP3, MP2, APE, OGG, WMA, WAV, VQF, and FAAC. It also has jitter correction for error-free CD ripping and works with the CDDB database. Get it [...]