Archive for the ‘Virtual Business Resources’ Category

5 Quick Home Business Tips

Monday, April 12th, 2010

1. There’s no shame in looking for free options. However, more often than not, you get what you pay for.

2. If you have kids or visitors, make sure you know where the “mute” button is on your phone.

3. Make sure you get references, everytime.

4. It’s OK to invite your friends to try stuff with you or go to events. As long as that’s not all you’re doing. Use social media to share, not annoy. So no more than one promo every two weeks or so. Does that sound reasonable? See my earlier post: Invite Me Too! (Once.)

5. Never underestimate the power of before & after photos!!! Whether you are a personal organizer, video/photo editors, web designers, chefs, or even home theater system installers!

If you can think of more, do share. :)

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit

GoDaddy Domain Registrar

Sunday, March 7th, 2010

Ready for a website? Got a niche? Get your URL!

Register a Domain

The place to register your web address.


Host a Domain

The place to put all of your web files.

Affiliate Links

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit

Google PageRank

Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010

Google PageRank imageI am sharing this Google pagerank checker because until about 4 or 5 months ago, I didn’t really understand the whole Google pagerank numbering system.

I thought if you had a page rank of 1, that meant you were number 1! However, that isn’t how it works. If you have a pagerank of 1, that’s 1 out of 10! Being 1 out of 10 isn’t as exciting as being number one right?

Use this nifty tool to see what your business or personal website’s Google pagerank is.

Check Page Rank of any web site pages instantly:
This free page rank checking tool is powered by Page Rank Checker service

That’s my number! -> Check PageRank Kinda puny, but it’s only a place to start.

It just means we have some work to do. :)

Wired Magazine Exclusive: How Google’s Algorithm Rules the Web really gives you some good info on how the whole Google Algorithm/Ranking system works.

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit

Mr Tweet Error Message

Wednesday, February 17th, 2010

So, last night I was checking out Mr. Tweet & I got this error:
Mr. Tweet  Error

LOL! I was so entertained by it, I wasn’t even annoyed that it didn’t load my page right away! (It fixed itself soon after.) But HAD to share! :)

full view on twitpic: http://www.twitpic.com/13rgt4

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit

Fun with Photos

Thursday, February 11th, 2010

In class, we were assigned to find an image editor for a website project, and if we couldn’t find one then we are to use Microsoft paint. (Ew.)

Well, I already had two websites lunapic and picnik I previously posted about that are online photo editors where you could do all kinds of nifty edits and special effects.

I decided to look up other free online/no download editors and I found two more fun sites for profile pics and what not.

Be on the cover of a magazine!



fakemagazinecover.com

Upload your photo and play with the Photo Trix.


fototrix.com

Photo Trix aren’t just for kids. :D Even grownups can have fun with these photo special effects.

These could be fun for

  • Facebook
  • Myspace
  • Twitter Avatars
  • Blogs
  • Websites
  • Fansites

Just thought I’d share. Have fun!

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit

Ultimate Collection of Free Stock Photo Sites

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

See the bottom of this post to read about why I am reposting it here.
Originaly Posted by Softalize . com, originally titled: “16 Ultimate Collection of Free Stock Photo Sites”
April 14, 2009
Today I bring a fabulous collection of sites where you can get nice images and photos. I have made a list of sites where to search for amazing and quality photos and images. So no need to waste your time with old images and photo sites that do not work properly. Just have a look at these sites, and do not forget to share your comments with us.
Some of the sites listed offer free stock photos only for personal use, All photos are the property of their respective authors check their policy before using their collection.

Everystockphoto

Everystockphoto

 

Photobucket

 

Onexposure.1X

Onexposure.1X

 

EyeFetch

EyeFetch

 

Stock.Xchng

Stock.Xchng

 

Stockvault

Stockvault

 

Photo.net

Photo.net

 

Life

Life

 

PopPhotos

PopPhotos

 

PBase

PBase

 

Openphoto

Openphoto

 

Freerange

Freerange

 

Free digital photos

Free digital photos


Please NOTE: I do not own this post. I copied this information from another blog that has been down for a while now. I had it bookmarked in my browser because I would often search for free or cheap photo stock for blog posts. For reasons unknown, the Softalize site suddenly became unavailable since early this year. So I decided to go ahead and quote word for word the entire post and share it with you since I had found it so helpful.

This is Google’s cache of http://www.softalize.com/2009/04/14/16-ultimate-collection-of-free-stock-photo-sites/. It is a snapshot of the page as it appeared on Jan 27, 2010 21:10:51 GMT. These terms only appear in links pointing to this page: http www softalize com 2009 04 14 16 ultimate collection of free stock photo sites

PLEASE READ the disclaimers before downloading and using anyone’s images on anything for your business!

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit

Find It Quicker

Friday, January 22nd, 2010
save ur time

Learn these search engine “tricks”, and you’ll save yourself some time! These shortcuts work on almost any search engine, but they definitely work for Google. This information is helpful for market research, office calculations, personal and people searches, file searches and website backlink lookups.

Filter Searches

For words that have multiple meanings read the following short article: narrow-down your search results.

Perform Calculations

Read this next linked short article for a better way to perform calculations in the Google search field

Specialized Search Tips

Click here for more great Google search tips from Jenny Gallaher including:

  • Tracking flights
  • Locating packages
  • Movie showing times
  • Finding files (e.g. PDF’s, Excel spreadsheets or even PowerPoint presentations)

and more! Jenny wrote the preceding articles; and kept them short, sweet, and to the point. I like how she never rambles. She’s one of the best time saving VA for sure!

BackLink Search Tips

Find how many websites are linking back to your website.

On Google search for:
[links:www.yourdomain.com]

On Bing & Yahoo search for:
links: www.yourdomain.com

This will simply give you more accurate results than simple doing a search on www.yourdomain.com.

Happy Searching!

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit

Invite Me Too! (once.)

Wednesday, January 6th, 2010

Whoever wrote this post about what they think of fan pages reminded me of an issue with

  • fan pages
  • webinars
  • friending and adding requests
  • and other fun social media activism campaigns.

The issue?

Forgetting who you’ve already invited, suggested, mentioned, or proposed to!

I am sad to say that I am guilty of this. As I was first setting up fan pages and started social media activism, I wasn’t documenting who I had already  “hit up” to join! This is BAD. Learn from my mistake, which luckily didn’t cost me any friends or anything, but I am sure I invited or suggested to my site to my friends more than once . :{ Sorry guys, I love you all for being so wonderfully patient!

Anyways, I deemed this inspiration worthy of a post and a mention and a warning.

Your friends and partners are all great people, and I am sure they are very supportive of you. However, when it comes to business:

“You can and should ask for their support once. If they are interested in joining, they will. When you ask repeatedly, that’s called nagging. “

To prevent myself from being a nag, I now keep lists of people I invite to any new event now. I make sure that whenever I send an auto invite, the invite once is checked. Now that I have more business associates online, I try to keep my friends out of it. (Except when I think it’s REALLY cool!)

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit

Social Media’s Real Power

Monday, January 4th, 2010

I was browsing some websites during lunch today, and I happened across Chris Brogan‘s newest blog post called: Soul of a New Business. Of course, Chris had some great incite on building new business. He has become quite the success story because of tools like social media and then writing an inspiring book about it called “Trust Agents” along with his partner in crime, Julien Smith.

It never ceases to amaze me how social networking really can make or break a business! These days, it’s all about reputation. So, if you are a new business, how do you compete? I found Chris’s business soul is a set of questions to ask yourself important to share. And I will at the bottom of this post. However, before that, I want to share a simple, yet most profound statement, from one of his commenters, Natalie of Stark Media. She said,

Social media has done a great job of revealing which businesses prove helpful.

Simple right? Well, sometimes you “know” something without every really communicating it effectively. And you know what? I can’t think of a better way to say this. In a nutshell, this is what makes social media really powerful. Even if you are a brand new business with no reputation, social media will give you the opportunity to actually be helpful. It’s the best way of advertisement there is!

Anyone can buy air time or ads in the yellow pages and say: “Hey! I can make your life better!” Right? Social media, when used correctly, will PROVE you are awesome.

Now, for Chris’s List of Business Soul Set of Questions to Ask Yourself:

  • Would I want my mother or spouse to be marketed to the way I am marketing my business?
  • Are the products I am selling something I’d give to my family?
  • Are better/easier/more helpful ways of doing what I’m doing?
  • Am I approaching my business relationships in a balanced way, or am I just sitting here chomping at the bit to sell ? (People can tell the difference.)
  • At what price are my products and services worth?
  • Am I giving real value? or am I  just selling?

I changed this list into first person and put it in a bullet list, but you will find them and thousands of helpful tips for social networking and “how this human business” at ChrisBrogan.com.

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit

Moving WordPress

Saturday, January 2nd, 2010

Move WordPress from a subdirectory to website root

This example should work for any WordPress deployment, this article describes how to move WordPress on IIS 7 using ASP.Net

Benefits

  • Move WordPress
  • Preserve old links and permalinks
  • Preserve old images and uploads in posts and pages
  • Notify crawls of change with HTTP Response 301 Moved Permanently

This configuration will allow you to move WordPress to a different directory within your site and maintain you old links, permalinks, images, and uploads. All of the content will move with WordPress, this will just setup redirects to the new location. Each time an old link is used a HTTP Response 301 will be issued, this will help update search engines and backlinks. Custom HTTP Response 404 handling will be used to issue the HTTP Response 301.

Steps

  • Setup HTTP Response 301 Moved Permanently using ASP.Net (default.aspx)
  • Modify HTTP Response 404 Not Found handling using IIS 7 (web.config)
  • Modify rewrite rule to exclude old path using IIS 7 (web.config)
  • Update WordPress settings in database using MySQL
  • Update WordPress posts in database using MySQL

HTTP Response 301 Moved Permanently using ASP.Net
example default.aspx

<%@Page Language=”VB” %>
<%@Import Namespace=”System.Uri” %>
<%@Import Namespace=”System.Web” %>

<script runat=”server”>

Sub Page_Load(sender As Object, e As System.EventArgs)

Dim sUrl As System.String = HttpContext.Current.Request.RawUrl

Dim bChange As System.Boolean
bChange = False

If sUrl.IndexOf(“?404;”) > 0 Then
sUrl = sUrl.SubString(sUrl.IndexOf(“?404;”) + 5)
sUrl = sUrl.SubString(sUrl.IndexOf(“//”) + 2)
sUrl = sUrl.SubString(sUrl.IndexOf(“/”) + 1)
Else
sUrl = “”
End If

If sUrl.IndexOf(“blog/”) = 0 Then
sUrl = sUrl.SubString(5)
End If

Response.Status = “301 Moved Permanently”
Response.AddHeader(“Location”, “http://www.domain.com/” & sUrl)

End Sub

</script>

Web Server/IIS updates
example web.config


<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?/>
<configuration>
<system.webServer>
<httpErrors>
...
<error statusCode="404" subStatusCode="-1" prefixLanguageFilePath="" path="/default.aspx" responseMode="ExecuteURL" />
...
</httpErrors>
<rewrite>
<rules>
<rule name="WordPress" stopProcessing="true">
<match url="/*" ignoreCase="true" />
<conditions>
<add input="{REQUEST_FILENAME}" matchType="IsFile" negate="true" />
<add input="{REQUEST_FILENAME}" matchType="IsDirectory" negate="true" />
<add input="{REQUEST_FILENAME}" pattern="blog/*" matchType="Pattern" negate="true" />
</conditions>
<action type="Rewrite" url="/index.php" />
</rule>
</rules>
</rewrite>
</system.webServer>
</configuration>

WordPress updates
example MySQL synax


/* Update WordPress siteurl attribute */
update database_name.wp_options set option_value='http://www.domain.com' where option_name='siteurl';

/* Update WordPress home attribute */
update database_name.wp_options set option_value=’http://www.domain.com’ where option_name=’home’;

/* Update WordPress upload_path atribute, this is a local path */
update database_name.wp_options set option_value=’C:\\Inetpub\\website\\wp-content\\uploads’ where option_name=’upload_path’;

Pass it on!
  • Digg
  • email
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Netvibes
  • RSS
  • StumbleUpon
  • Yahoo! Buzz
  • Live
  • MySpace
  • Technorati
  • Twitter
  • del.icio.us
  • Reddit