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I 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.

That’s my number! -> 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.

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. 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!

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

Photobucket

Onexposure.1X

EyeFetch

Stock.Xchng

Stockvault

Photo.net

Life

PopPhotos

PBase

Openphoto

Freerange

Free digital photos

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!

How long should I register your domain for?

Even for a startup business, it is advisable to register a domain for a minimum of 2 years. Search engines look at the date your domain expires, and if it is less than a year you will get a lower page score (Bing) and page rank (Google) right away.

Often it is cheaper to go ahead and register for 2 years than it is to register for 1 year and then 6 months down the road you realize that it is better search engine optimization to go ahead and tack on 1 or 2 more years of ownership.

★ Just renewed darkbluesun.com for 5 more years today.

So, you’ve named your business. What’s next? Get a logo! Professional logos can really get expensive.

So try one of these two great websites, they offer free online logo creators. I posted 2 samples from each site.

LogoEase.com 

These 2 are from logoease.com. This site offers you free little clipart that you can customize your logo with. Edit fonts, colors of the little pics etc. Good setup.

1.

 2.

CoolText.com

And these 2 are from cooltext.com. CoolText is great because, it’s fast and you don’t have to sign up to use the app. But there are no pictures to include in your logo. This one is kind of my favorite

1.

2. 

Business Cards

And when it’s time to get it printed on business cards, PrintsMadeEasy.com has very competitive pricing for business cards and more. . .

www.PrintsMadeEasy.com

This is just an example of one of PrintsMadeEasy.com  Free Business Cards offered under “Learn More about Business Cards”

Affiliate Link

The five places to get website traffic.

1. Search Engines

After make sure your site has the best search engine optimizers, add your website to the top search engines.

Submit here to add your site to Google.

Submit here to add your site to Bing.

Submit here to add your site to Yahoo.

This site allows you to submit your site to the web’s 50 top search engines for free and all at once.

2. Directories

DMOZ – the Open Directory Project

Once you are listed, check out the following options for generating website traffic and getting exposure.

3. Social Bookmarks

Use Social Bookmarks to your advantage!

My Profiles on My Favorite Social Bookmarking Services:
virtualitassistants on Delicious
FindingAnswers on Digg
darkbluesun on Reddit
FindingAnswers on StumbleUpon

4. Link Referral Sites

If you have a website and would like to generate traffic and get opinions on what you should change, then sign up for this service:

You, check out a few of there sites and leave them comments or suggestions and your rating goes up. Then others visit your site and leave you comments and your rating goes up more! ( Unless you have a site that is irrelevant to the topic you posted it under, or it needs a lot of work. In either case, someone will let you know! ) Here are the requirements:

• visit 30 sites (they are grouped by categories.)
• review 5 sites
• post 1 post to their forum
• and finally choose one favorite

It e-mails you reports of visits to your site, it’s working great so far!

5. Random Dynamic Sites

Vine Fire

So far, darkbluesun.com hasn’t received a lot of traffic from this site. But I think it is important to post due to the global traffic it generated for The XtremeBaking Blog – another site I run through Virtual IT Assistants.

As you can see, I made 12$ the first day because you get 10$ to start, but I haven’t been back. And it’s not really clear HOW you get your money! LOL, the only reason I am leaving it up is because of the 20 hits I got on the xtreme baking blog. . . It has potential, but if I never see my 12$ I won’t be surprised, but I’ll let you know. It’ll be a new post. . . SCAMS & Time Wasters!

I will keep you posted on the effectiveness of these little traffic generators so stay tuned . . .

Twitter

Twitter traffic tools.

and many other social networking sites. Why Social Networking?

If you have any suggestions to add to this site, leave a comment and let me know! If you add value to this site, you will get the credit for it and we will link to your website or blog post that is relevant to the material.

Websites and Blog Sites

The best way to get free web presence is to start one of these blogs : WordPress, WebNode, Blogger, LiveJournal, or Squidoo. Squidoo calls their sub sites “lenses”. Use your business name for example mine is darkbluesun So I have a website with blogger: http://darkbluesun.blogspot.com (I know it says blogspot instead of blogger, I don’t know why they did that but it is, in fact, blogger.) And I have a Squidoo lens: http://www.squidoo.com/darkbluesun/ see? I found a name that was unique that I could use on most of my online profiles. But if I’d recommend any of them to start out with, it’d have to be Blogger it ties in to Google, if you’ve signed up for your Google account and they allow adding Google Ads where WordPress.com sub sites don’t.

When you setup your business site, if you use more than one word like I did: dark, blue, sun. You can capitalize them in a way that will separate them from each other in on your website address.

E.G.  Which is easier to read?

http://yourwebsiteaddress.blogspot.com/

or

http://YourWebsiteAddress.blogspot.com/

List of other Blog Options:

WordPress http://wordpresssamplesite.wordpress.com/
Blog http://darkbluesun.blog.com
Blogger http://BloggerSampleSite.blogspot.com/
Live Journal http://darkbluesun.livejournal.com/
Social Go
WebNode
BlogLines
ScrapBlog – this would be great for an online catalog.
Google Sites

Misc Resources:
When you get a website setup, check out the “MyBlogLog” service.

Then when you are an established Online Business, you can hire a professional to build this and get even MORE business!