What Is Trust And Authority In SEO - Off Page Optimisation

What Is Trust And Authority In SEO - Off Page Optimisation

Now those who are new to this SEO things.... might be thinking, what the hell is Diwakar Dhyani writing about..

But grown up men will take this knowledge’s advantage.. So here you go:

Website’s trust factor has a significant role buddy, do u know that search engines trust links and social accounts, so if they do so, they can also learn to trust websites, but question is .. on what basis?

Ok below I am Sharing something you might like:

Factor TA: whcih is “trust authority” It gives a +3 weightage to your SEO

Ask your self.. are you a trusted authority? means is your website a trusted authority? Is it widely recognises in its area, business, field, or some other way? now that is what you have to do. well now no one actually knows how search Engines actually calculate authority, and there are many “authority” signals that are traced by search engines.

Now the Type of Links your website recieves, some of which are quality.. or how much are quality?? or Social references (are they from respected accounts?) and your website’s engagement metrics may all comprise of the factors.

NOte: Negative reviews might also hurt, Google now likely use online merchant reviews as ranking signals.. so be cautious

But now there is a little question.. do the search engines try to access an overall aurthorty figure or what??? we have to look through these questions that google told publishes to ask themselves, somewhere in may 2011 it happened, you might be surprised on what they said

If you are hit by Panda update… Trust, Authority, expertise, these all things come up to help you.. I will also wrtie about how to be protected by panda in the coming posts..

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

What Is Trust And Authority In SEO - Off Page Optimisation

Posted by Unknown No comments

What Is Trust And Authority In SEO - Off Page Optimisation

Now those who are new to this SEO things.... might be thinking, what the hell is Diwakar Dhyani writing about..

But grown up men will take this knowledge’s advantage.. So here you go:

Website’s trust factor has a significant role buddy, do u know that search engines trust links and social accounts, so if they do so, they can also learn to trust websites, but question is .. on what basis?

Ok below I am Sharing something you might like:

Factor TA: whcih is “trust authority” It gives a +3 weightage to your SEO

Ask your self.. are you a trusted authority? means is your website a trusted authority? Is it widely recognises in its area, business, field, or some other way? now that is what you have to do. well now no one actually knows how search Engines actually calculate authority, and there are many “authority” signals that are traced by search engines.

Now the Type of Links your website recieves, some of which are quality.. or how much are quality?? or Social references (are they from respected accounts?) and your website’s engagement metrics may all comprise of the factors.

NOte: Negative reviews might also hurt, Google now likely use online merchant reviews as ranking signals.. so be cautious

But now there is a little question.. do the search engines try to access an overall aurthorty figure or what??? we have to look through these questions that google told publishes to ask themselves, somewhere in may 2011 it happened, you might be surprised on what they said

If you are hit by Panda update… Trust, Authority, expertise, these all things come up to help you.. I will also wrtie about how to be protected by panda in the coming posts..

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

What Is Lynx......?

What Is Lynx......?

Lynx is a text browser for the World Wide Web.

Lynx 2.8.7 runs on Un*x, VMS, Windows 95/98/NT, DOS386+ but not 3.1, 3.11, or OS/2 EMX. The current developmental version is also available for testing.  Ports to Mac are in beta test.

Many user questions are answered in the  online help provided with Lynx. Press the ‘?’ key to find this help. If you are encountering difficulty with Lynx you may write to lynx-dev@nongnu.org.  Be as detailed as you can about the URL where you were on the Web when you had trouble, what you did, what Lynx version you have (try ‘=’ key), and what OS you have.  If you are using an older version, you may well need to upgrade.

Lynx is a text-based web browser for use on cursor-addressable character cell terminals and is very configurable.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynx_(browser)

Lynx is a “browser” program like Netscape or Internet Explorer that can access information on World Wide Web, but without access to images, film, or sound. It is used often from slow modems to eliminate the need to wait to download images and other features. …

www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/Glossary

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

What Is Lynx......?

Posted by Unknown No comments

What Is Lynx......?

Lynx is a text browser for the World Wide Web.

Lynx 2.8.7 runs on Un*x, VMS, Windows 95/98/NT, DOS386+ but not 3.1, 3.11, or OS/2 EMX. The current developmental version is also available for testing.  Ports to Mac are in beta test.

Many user questions are answered in the  online help provided with Lynx. Press the ‘?’ key to find this help. If you are encountering difficulty with Lynx you may write to lynx-dev@nongnu.org.  Be as detailed as you can about the URL where you were on the Web when you had trouble, what you did, what Lynx version you have (try ‘=’ key), and what OS you have.  If you are using an older version, you may well need to upgrade.

Lynx is a text-based web browser for use on cursor-addressable character cell terminals and is very configurable.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynx_(browser)

Lynx is a “browser” program like Netscape or Internet Explorer that can access information on World Wide Web, but without access to images, film, or sound. It is used often from slow modems to eliminate the need to wait to download images and other features. …

www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/Glossary

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

How To Protect Your Images And Text From Getting Copied

How To Protect Your Images And Text From Getting Copied

Well you spend such a long time in writing all those posts and some one just copied it and pasted it into his website..and You are writing emails to that person, complaining here and there, and you havent taken copyright or your article from any authority or Digital millineum copyright act, or whatsoever, so this is what you need to do:

    Go To Plugins

    Add New Plugin

    Search Sor “WP-Copyright-Protection” 
    Plugin

    Click On Install........ After That Press,

    Activate Plugin

What is WP-Copyright-protection plugin?

Simple copyright protection for your images and text.

A simple way to protect the content on your website. For most browsers: disables text copy, image copy and will keep your site out of an iframe.

This plugin is clean and easy.

NOTE: I still do not recommend Copyright plugin for those people who want to work on SEO. I m not sure but it might or might not affect your SEO

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

How To Protect Your Images And Text From Getting Copied

Posted by Unknown No comments

How To Protect Your Images And Text From Getting Copied

Well you spend such a long time in writing all those posts and some one just copied it and pasted it into his website..and You are writing emails to that person, complaining here and there, and you havent taken copyright or your article from any authority or Digital millineum copyright act, or whatsoever, so this is what you need to do:

    Go To Plugins

    Add New Plugin

    Search Sor “WP-Copyright-Protection” 
    Plugin

    Click On Install........ After That Press,

    Activate Plugin

What is WP-Copyright-protection plugin?

Simple copyright protection for your images and text.

A simple way to protect the content on your website. For most browsers: disables text copy, image copy and will keep your site out of an iframe.

This plugin is clean and easy.

NOTE: I still do not recommend Copyright plugin for those people who want to work on SEO. I m not sure but it might or might not affect your SEO

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Your Website History And SEO

Your Website History And SEO

Th: which stands for your website history.. +2 weightage to this.. according to the periodic table of SEO

Well buddy the search engines contantly visit your website, they will get a sense how you have behaved over the passing time. Or are you suddenly linking out, this is what they call BAD Neighborhoods behaviour.

Lets make it more clear, means are you publishing about a topic which you havent even typically covered?? 

This will raise the siren my dear friends. Now again websites do change just like the people change, and yes most of the times for betterment. Changes are not just the only factor actually, other factors are also there.

So a good overall tracking record will help you, like if someone is caught by the police, and he has a prior history of F***ng up some crime, be it small or large, cops will not leave him easily.. same thing happends here also .

An older, established site may find it can keep cruising along with search success, while a new site may have to “pay its dues,” so to speak, for weeks, months or even longer to gain its own respect. So time plays an important role my friend. Just remember to have a never quit attitute and keep on working.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Your Website History And SEO

Posted by Unknown No comments

Your Website History And SEO

Th: which stands for your website history.. +2 weightage to this.. according to the periodic table of SEO

Well buddy the search engines contantly visit your website, they will get a sense how you have behaved over the passing time. Or are you suddenly linking out, this is what they call BAD Neighborhoods behaviour.

Lets make it more clear, means are you publishing about a topic which you havent even typically covered?? 

This will raise the siren my dear friends. Now again websites do change just like the people change, and yes most of the times for betterment. Changes are not just the only factor actually, other factors are also there.

So a good overall tracking record will help you, like if someone is caught by the police, and he has a prior history of F***ng up some crime, be it small or large, cops will not leave him easily.. same thing happends here also .

An older, established site may find it can keep cruising along with search success, while a new site may have to “pay its dues,” so to speak, for weeks, months or even longer to gain its own respect. So time plays an important role my friend. Just remember to have a never quit attitute and keep on working.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

What Type Of Websites Generate Revenue...?

What Type Of Websites Generate Revenue...?

Greetings people.

I have been asked lot of times, and people often come to me saying i want to start a website or I had started a website but I am not able to drive revenue from it. So here are few things which you should know.

    What type of websites generate revenue?

Ans:  People use google for searching information, you the website which you prepare should be a informative website, portal, blog or something like that, you may also prepare it with a good Idea.

Now if I see popular websites or the highest paid websites by google, i can see that all of them are informative blogs, but not blogs on blogspot.in they use wordpress, jhoomla, etc means open source tools only, but they are informative portals only.

But some of the websites are also there which like help people in things like downloading music, games, etc, some websites have idea of delivering some service like ONLINE PDF Converter, etc etc, So choice is yours but focus more on content and Search engine optimisation if you really wana work.

Even if your website is very good, excellent content or whatever, if you dont work on Search Engine Optimisation, no income is ever going to be generated. So work for SEO, thats the only key to success.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

What Type Of Websites Generate Revenue...?

Posted by Unknown No comments

What Type Of Websites Generate Revenue...?

Greetings people.

I have been asked lot of times, and people often come to me saying i want to start a website or I had started a website but I am not able to drive revenue from it. So here are few things which you should know.

    What type of websites generate revenue?

Ans:  People use google for searching information, you the website which you prepare should be a informative website, portal, blog or something like that, you may also prepare it with a good Idea.

Now if I see popular websites or the highest paid websites by google, i can see that all of them are informative blogs, but not blogs on blogspot.in they use wordpress, jhoomla, etc means open source tools only, but they are informative portals only.

But some of the websites are also there which like help people in things like downloading music, games, etc, some websites have idea of delivering some service like ONLINE PDF Converter, etc etc, So choice is yours but focus more on content and Search engine optimisation if you really wana work.

Even if your website is very good, excellent content or whatever, if you dont work on Search Engine Optimisation, no income is ever going to be generated. So work for SEO, thats the only key to success.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Top 6 Tips to Speed up Performance of Your Website and SEO

Top 6 Tips to Speed up Performance of Your Website and SEO

If you have reached at this level that you want to read this post, because though wordpress is pretty efficient and easy to use, but once you start loading it with lots of plugins, the performace of your website and responsiveness which we call loading time, may get very low. On top of that the consumption of the resources of your server become too big, possibly which will lead to a suspension of your hosting account, if you are not using a VPS(virtual Dedicated server or Dedicated server).

Over the years I played with and tweaked my WordPress plugins trying to achieve a good performance level, and below you’ll find the tips I learned along the way:-

1.Use a Cache Plugin :- Serving cached versions of your pages is one of the most efficient ways to speed up your site and to reduce the CPU and memory consumption on your server. Also, if you are not using the WP Super Cache Plugin yet I highly recommend you switch to it, as it works much more efficiently than the other plugins available.

2. Remove All Unnecessary Plugins :- Unless your site absolutely relies on a plugin to work I would recommend removing it. Sure, you might need to lose a functionality or two, but in the long run this will keep your site running fast and securely. Keep in mind that it’s possible to hard code what some plugins do, as well. For example, instead of using a plugin to generate a list of “Popular Posts” on your sidebar you could create the list yourself with raw HTML. Instead of using a contact form plugin you could simply write a paragraph on your “Contact” page including your email address there. So on and so forth.

3. Pay Special Attention to Post-Level Plugins :-  On most WordPress sites and blogs, the bulk of the traffic goes to the posts. The homepage, the category and archive pages receive around 20% of the overall traffic, if that, while the posts receive 80%.

This means that plugins that act at post-level will consume most of your resources. Examples include plugins to change SEO aspects of your posts (e.g., All in One SEO Pack), plugins to display related posts and so on. As a result you should put an extra effort to either remove or optimize those plugins (more on that below).

4. Consider Substituting All In One SEO Pack :-   The All in One SEO Pack plugin is certainly one of the best SEO plugins around, but it’s also pretty intensive on the resources of your server. For small sites this won’t be a problem, but once your traffic starts growing you might start to feel it.

A good alternative is called Greg’s High Performance SEO. According to the author All in One SEO Pack outputs 2000 lines of code per page load/view, while Greg’s plugin output only 700 lines.

In my opinion the main benefit of those SEO plugins is the ability to customize the title tag. If that is the most important factor for you as well you can be even more extreme and use no plugin at all.

Instead use the piece of code below to create optimized title tags for your posts:  

5. Consider Substituting YARPP :- Along with All In One SEO Pack there’s another plugin that is very popular and yet very resource intensive: YARPP (Yet Another Relate Posts Plugin).

One alternative you can consider is the Efficient Related Posts plugin. The main difference is that the database of related posts is updated only when a post is created/updated, while other plugins tend to build the list on the fly, whenever a post is loaded.

6. Optimize Your Database Tables :- As with any dynamic content management system, great part of the work your WordPress site does is related to getting, storing, removing and updating information on its database. That’s why optimizing your database tables can affect your site’s performance.

A nice plugin you can use for this purpose is WP-Optimize. It will remove your post revisions, clean your comments (e.g., spam and deleted ones), run optimization queries and so on.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Top 6 Tips to Speed up Performance of Your Website and SEO

Posted by Unknown No comments

Top 6 Tips to Speed up Performance of Your Website and SEO

If you have reached at this level that you want to read this post, because though wordpress is pretty efficient and easy to use, but once you start loading it with lots of plugins, the performace of your website and responsiveness which we call loading time, may get very low. On top of that the consumption of the resources of your server become too big, possibly which will lead to a suspension of your hosting account, if you are not using a VPS(virtual Dedicated server or Dedicated server).

Over the years I played with and tweaked my WordPress plugins trying to achieve a good performance level, and below you’ll find the tips I learned along the way:-

1.Use a Cache Plugin :- Serving cached versions of your pages is one of the most efficient ways to speed up your site and to reduce the CPU and memory consumption on your server. Also, if you are not using the WP Super Cache Plugin yet I highly recommend you switch to it, as it works much more efficiently than the other plugins available.

2. Remove All Unnecessary Plugins :- Unless your site absolutely relies on a plugin to work I would recommend removing it. Sure, you might need to lose a functionality or two, but in the long run this will keep your site running fast and securely. Keep in mind that it’s possible to hard code what some plugins do, as well. For example, instead of using a plugin to generate a list of “Popular Posts” on your sidebar you could create the list yourself with raw HTML. Instead of using a contact form plugin you could simply write a paragraph on your “Contact” page including your email address there. So on and so forth.

3. Pay Special Attention to Post-Level Plugins :-  On most WordPress sites and blogs, the bulk of the traffic goes to the posts. The homepage, the category and archive pages receive around 20% of the overall traffic, if that, while the posts receive 80%.

This means that plugins that act at post-level will consume most of your resources. Examples include plugins to change SEO aspects of your posts (e.g., All in One SEO Pack), plugins to display related posts and so on. As a result you should put an extra effort to either remove or optimize those plugins (more on that below).

4. Consider Substituting All In One SEO Pack :-   The All in One SEO Pack plugin is certainly one of the best SEO plugins around, but it’s also pretty intensive on the resources of your server. For small sites this won’t be a problem, but once your traffic starts growing you might start to feel it.

A good alternative is called Greg’s High Performance SEO. According to the author All in One SEO Pack outputs 2000 lines of code per page load/view, while Greg’s plugin output only 700 lines.

In my opinion the main benefit of those SEO plugins is the ability to customize the title tag. If that is the most important factor for you as well you can be even more extreme and use no plugin at all.

Instead use the piece of code below to create optimized title tags for your posts:  

5. Consider Substituting YARPP :- Along with All In One SEO Pack there’s another plugin that is very popular and yet very resource intensive: YARPP (Yet Another Relate Posts Plugin).

One alternative you can consider is the Efficient Related Posts plugin. The main difference is that the database of related posts is updated only when a post is created/updated, while other plugins tend to build the list on the fly, whenever a post is loaded.

6. Optimize Your Database Tables :- As with any dynamic content management system, great part of the work your WordPress site does is related to getting, storing, removing and updating information on its database. That’s why optimizing your database tables can affect your site’s performance.

A nice plugin you can use for this purpose is WP-Optimize. It will remove your post revisions, clean your comments (e.g., spam and deleted ones), run optimization queries and so on.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Blog Project: 30 Traffic Generation Tips

Blog Project: 30 Traffic Generation Tips

First of all a big “thank you” for every one who participated. As I said before the number of entries surprised me (and the quality as well, I will definitely apply some of those tips myself).

Now, without further delay, the 30 Traffic Generation Tips:

1. Sridhar Katakam

Keep track of blogs and leave comments on them. A good way to keep the conversation going is to install a MyBlogLog widget and visit the blog of people visiting your site.

2. Ian Delaney

Nothing creates long-term traffic more than value. Consider writing posts with resources or explaining how things work. Useful things get linked to and they get onto del.icio.us, which is far better long-term than a digg front page.

3. Scott Townsend

Inform search engines and aggregators like Technorati (using the ping functionality) when your blog is updated, this should ensure maximum traffic coming from those sources. (check the List of Ping Services)

4. Kyle

Simplify. Pay attention to complex issues in your field of work. It may be a big long publication that is hard to wade through or a concept that is hard to grasp. Reference it and make a shorter “for dummies” version with your own lessons learned and relevant tips. When doing this, I have been surprised to find that the simplified post will appear before the more complex version in search results. Perhaps this is why it results in increased traffic; people looking for more help or clarification on the subject will land on your blog.

5. Grant Gerver

Try to be polemic. I write obsessively about all-things political from the left-wing perspective in the form of humorous, sarcastic one-liners.

6. Daniel

A simple tip that will probably boost your page views: install a translator plugin. I decided to use a paid plugin for this, but if I am not wrong there are some free ones as well. The translation is not very good, as you can imagine, but it helps to attract readers that are not fluent in English.

7. Rory

Submit articles to blog carnivals (http://blogcarnival.com) that are related to your niche. Your article almost always gets posted, and it must generate a handful of visitors, at least.

8. Ramen Junkie

Newsgroups. I always see a spike when I post a review to a newsgroup.

9. Eric Atkins

Create a new design for your website. Not only will it be more attractive to your regular readers, but you can submit it to some CSS gallery showcase sites that feature great designs. This will give you exposure on those sites while generating a lot of traffic and backlinks from those types of sites.

10. Megan Taylor

Participate in conversations on related blogs. Start conversations on your own blog. Don’t just post about a story and leave it at that, engage your audience, ask questions and call to action.

11. GuidoComment on blogs, write useful content and make good friends on forums.

12. Brian Auer

You must be active to generate traffic. I post comments on other blogs that are related to mine, and I post my site link in my signature at the forums. Spread the word about your blog and it will certainly attract readers.

13. Shankar Ganesh

Just browse around MyBlogLog.com and you will surely get visitors to your blog. Also try to join as many communities as possible that are related to your topic.

14. Andrew Timberlake

A great tip for generating traffic is off-line by including your url in all your off-line liturature from business cards, letterheads, pamphlets, adverts through in-store signage if applicable. I even have our website on my vehicle.

15. Cory OBrien

Read lots of other blogs. Leave trackbacks. Make sure your blog is optimized for search engines. Leverage social bookmarking sites like digg (both for new ideas and for traffic).

16. Jester

Leave comments on other blogs. If you’re already reading them, it takes

just a couple of seconds to leave a message agreeing or disagreeing

with the author, you get to leave a link to your site, and you will almost

ALWAYS get traffic from your comments.

17. Goerge Manty

Post 3-5 times a day. Use ping services like pingomatic or set up wordpress to ping some of the ping services. Engage your readers. Put up polls, ask them questions, give them quizes, free tools, etc. Make them want to come back and tell their friends about you.

18. Engtech

Community. It’s one word but it is the most important one when it comes to blogging. The only “blog metric” that makes sense is the vibrant community of readers it has. Building a community around your blog will bring you increased traffic, but how do you start? The boilerplate response to building traffic is always “SEO, social networking sites, and commenting on blogs” but it can be simplified to “be part of a community”. The easiest way to seed your blog is with an already existing community. But the only way to do that is to be part of the community yourself.

19. Chris

Squidoo Lenses are a good way to generate traffic. By using a lense,

you can generate your own custom “community” of webpages, including some

of the more popular pages in your “neighborhood.” Including your own

webpage in such a list is a good way of generating traffic.

20. Splork

I’ve had good success writing articles and submitting them to EzineArticles. Articles that have been written from well-researched keyword phrases and accepted by EzineArticles tend to rank very high in Google for that search term. Placing anchor text in the footer of those articles so the reader can visit my relevant website has always increased my site traffic.

21. Jen Gordon

I came upon some unexpected traffic when my blog popped up on some css design portals like www.cssmania.com and www.webcreme.com. If you can put some time into the concept behind and design for your blog, I’d recommend submitting your site to a design portal not only for

additional traffic but to build an additional community around your site.

22. Kat

I’ve recently gotten involved with several “MySpace-like” community sites that focus on my target audience. I share my thoughts in their forums, post intros to my real blog on their system blog and I’ve even created a group for my specific niche. It’s been very, very successful for me.

23. Inspirationbit

Well, obviously everyone knows that social bookmarking sites like Digg, del.icio.us, etc. bring lots of traffic. But I’m now submitting some of my articles to blogg-buzz.com (a digg like site for bloggers), and I always get not a bad traffic from there.

24. Mark Alves

Participate in Yahoo Answers and LinkedIn Answers where you can demonstrate your expertise, get associated with relevant keywords and put your URL out there.

25. Tillerman

Be the first to write a post about the ‘Top Ten Blogs’ in your niche. The post will rank highly in any general search for blogs in your niche and other bloggers in your niche write about the post and link to it.

26. Nick

Participating in forums is a great way to get loyal readers. Either link baiting people in your signature or posting great advice and tips will give you high quality traffic, which will result in return visitors.

27. Brandon Wood

A simple trick I’ve used to increase traffic to my blog is participate in group writing projects. In fact, that’s what I’m doing right now.

28. Alan Thomas

Don’t forget your archives. I just posted a roundup of all interviews I did over the past seven months. One of them generated a new link and a big traffic spike from a group of users that look like they will be loyal readers now.

29. KWiz

Write something controversial. I don’t think it’s good to write something controversial just for the purpose of getting traffic necessarily (especially if it’s only for that purpose and you’re being disingenuous), but it works.

30. Dennis Coughlin

Find the best blogs on your niche and contact the authors. Introduce yourself and send a link of your blog. This might help them to discover your blog, read it and possibly link to it.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Blog Project: 30 Traffic Generation Tips

Posted by Unknown No comments

Blog Project: 30 Traffic Generation Tips

First of all a big “thank you” for every one who participated. As I said before the number of entries surprised me (and the quality as well, I will definitely apply some of those tips myself).

Now, without further delay, the 30 Traffic Generation Tips:

1. Sridhar Katakam

Keep track of blogs and leave comments on them. A good way to keep the conversation going is to install a MyBlogLog widget and visit the blog of people visiting your site.

2. Ian Delaney

Nothing creates long-term traffic more than value. Consider writing posts with resources or explaining how things work. Useful things get linked to and they get onto del.icio.us, which is far better long-term than a digg front page.

3. Scott Townsend

Inform search engines and aggregators like Technorati (using the ping functionality) when your blog is updated, this should ensure maximum traffic coming from those sources. (check the List of Ping Services)

4. Kyle

Simplify. Pay attention to complex issues in your field of work. It may be a big long publication that is hard to wade through or a concept that is hard to grasp. Reference it and make a shorter “for dummies” version with your own lessons learned and relevant tips. When doing this, I have been surprised to find that the simplified post will appear before the more complex version in search results. Perhaps this is why it results in increased traffic; people looking for more help or clarification on the subject will land on your blog.

5. Grant Gerver

Try to be polemic. I write obsessively about all-things political from the left-wing perspective in the form of humorous, sarcastic one-liners.

6. Daniel

A simple tip that will probably boost your page views: install a translator plugin. I decided to use a paid plugin for this, but if I am not wrong there are some free ones as well. The translation is not very good, as you can imagine, but it helps to attract readers that are not fluent in English.

7. Rory

Submit articles to blog carnivals (http://blogcarnival.com) that are related to your niche. Your article almost always gets posted, and it must generate a handful of visitors, at least.

8. Ramen Junkie

Newsgroups. I always see a spike when I post a review to a newsgroup.

9. Eric Atkins

Create a new design for your website. Not only will it be more attractive to your regular readers, but you can submit it to some CSS gallery showcase sites that feature great designs. This will give you exposure on those sites while generating a lot of traffic and backlinks from those types of sites.

10. Megan Taylor

Participate in conversations on related blogs. Start conversations on your own blog. Don’t just post about a story and leave it at that, engage your audience, ask questions and call to action.

11. GuidoComment on blogs, write useful content and make good friends on forums.

12. Brian Auer

You must be active to generate traffic. I post comments on other blogs that are related to mine, and I post my site link in my signature at the forums. Spread the word about your blog and it will certainly attract readers.

13. Shankar Ganesh

Just browse around MyBlogLog.com and you will surely get visitors to your blog. Also try to join as many communities as possible that are related to your topic.

14. Andrew Timberlake

A great tip for generating traffic is off-line by including your url in all your off-line liturature from business cards, letterheads, pamphlets, adverts through in-store signage if applicable. I even have our website on my vehicle.

15. Cory OBrien

Read lots of other blogs. Leave trackbacks. Make sure your blog is optimized for search engines. Leverage social bookmarking sites like digg (both for new ideas and for traffic).

16. Jester

Leave comments on other blogs. If you’re already reading them, it takes

just a couple of seconds to leave a message agreeing or disagreeing

with the author, you get to leave a link to your site, and you will almost

ALWAYS get traffic from your comments.

17. Goerge Manty

Post 3-5 times a day. Use ping services like pingomatic or set up wordpress to ping some of the ping services. Engage your readers. Put up polls, ask them questions, give them quizes, free tools, etc. Make them want to come back and tell their friends about you.

18. Engtech

Community. It’s one word but it is the most important one when it comes to blogging. The only “blog metric” that makes sense is the vibrant community of readers it has. Building a community around your blog will bring you increased traffic, but how do you start? The boilerplate response to building traffic is always “SEO, social networking sites, and commenting on blogs” but it can be simplified to “be part of a community”. The easiest way to seed your blog is with an already existing community. But the only way to do that is to be part of the community yourself.

19. Chris

Squidoo Lenses are a good way to generate traffic. By using a lense,

you can generate your own custom “community” of webpages, including some

of the more popular pages in your “neighborhood.” Including your own

webpage in such a list is a good way of generating traffic.

20. Splork

I’ve had good success writing articles and submitting them to EzineArticles. Articles that have been written from well-researched keyword phrases and accepted by EzineArticles tend to rank very high in Google for that search term. Placing anchor text in the footer of those articles so the reader can visit my relevant website has always increased my site traffic.

21. Jen Gordon

I came upon some unexpected traffic when my blog popped up on some css design portals like www.cssmania.com and www.webcreme.com. If you can put some time into the concept behind and design for your blog, I’d recommend submitting your site to a design portal not only for

additional traffic but to build an additional community around your site.

22. Kat

I’ve recently gotten involved with several “MySpace-like” community sites that focus on my target audience. I share my thoughts in their forums, post intros to my real blog on their system blog and I’ve even created a group for my specific niche. It’s been very, very successful for me.

23. Inspirationbit

Well, obviously everyone knows that social bookmarking sites like Digg, del.icio.us, etc. bring lots of traffic. But I’m now submitting some of my articles to blogg-buzz.com (a digg like site for bloggers), and I always get not a bad traffic from there.

24. Mark Alves

Participate in Yahoo Answers and LinkedIn Answers where you can demonstrate your expertise, get associated with relevant keywords and put your URL out there.

25. Tillerman

Be the first to write a post about the ‘Top Ten Blogs’ in your niche. The post will rank highly in any general search for blogs in your niche and other bloggers in your niche write about the post and link to it.

26. Nick

Participating in forums is a great way to get loyal readers. Either link baiting people in your signature or posting great advice and tips will give you high quality traffic, which will result in return visitors.

27. Brandon Wood

A simple trick I’ve used to increase traffic to my blog is participate in group writing projects. In fact, that’s what I’m doing right now.

28. Alan Thomas

Don’t forget your archives. I just posted a roundup of all interviews I did over the past seven months. One of them generated a new link and a big traffic spike from a group of users that look like they will be loyal readers now.

29. KWiz

Write something controversial. I don’t think it’s good to write something controversial just for the purpose of getting traffic necessarily (especially if it’s only for that purpose and you’re being disingenuous), but it works.

30. Dennis Coughlin

Find the best blogs on your niche and contact the authors. Introduce yourself and send a link of your blog. This might help them to discover your blog, read it and possibly link to it.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

28 Ways to Make Money with Your Website

28 Ways to Make Money with Your Website

There are several lists with “ways to make money with a website” on the Internet, but none of them seem to be complete. That is why I decided to create this one. If you know a method that is not listed below, just let us know and we’ll update it.

Notice that ways to make money with a website are different from ways to make more money from it. Methods to increase your traffic or click-through rate will help you make more money, but they do not represent a method of making money per se.

For example, one could suggest that blending AdSense ads with the content is a way to make money from a website. In reality it’s not; it’s just a way to make more money by improving your ad click-through rate. The real monetization method behind it is a PPC ad network.

The list is divided into direct and indirect methods, and examples and links are provided for each point. Enjoy!

Direct Methods

1. PPC Advertising Networks

Google AdSense is the most popular option under this category, but there are also others. Basically you need to sign up with the network and paste some code snippets on your website. The network will then serve contextual ads (either text or images) relevant to your website, and you will earn a certain amount of money for every click.

The profitability of PPC advertising depends on the general traffic levels of the website and, most importantly, on the click-through rate (CTR) and cost per click (CPC). The CTR depends on the design of the website. Ads placed abode the fold or blended with content, for instance, tend to get higher CTRs. The CPC, on the other hand, depends on the nice of the website. Mortgages, financial products and college education are examples of profitable niches (clicks worth a couple of dollars are not rare), while tech-related topics tend to receive a smaller CPC (sometimes as low as a couple of cents per click).

If your website takes off and becomes an authority on its niche, you could create a conference around it. Depending on the size of your audience, the event could attract thousands of people, and you could make money directly from conference passes and sponsors.

Search Engine Land, for instance, created a series of conferences that visit several cities on the United States and on other countries as well. The conferences are called Search Marketing Expo, and the tickets and passes cost thousands of dollars. List of popular CPC advertising networks:

    Google Adsense

    Yahoo! Publisher Network (YPN)

    BidVertiser

    Chitika

    Clicksor

2. CPM Advertising Networks

CPM advertising networks behave pretty much as PPC networks, except that you get paid according to the number of impressions (i.e., page views) that the ads displayed on your site will generate. CPM stands for Cost per Mille, and it refers to the cost for 1,000 impressions.

A blog that generates 100,000 page views monthly displaying an advertising banner with a $1 CPM, therefore, will earn $100 monthly.

CPM rates vary with the network, the position of the ad and the format. The better the network, the higher the CPM rate (because they have access to more advertisers). The closer you put the ad to the top of the page, the higher the CPM. The bigger the format (in terms of pixels), the higher the CPM.

You can get as low as $0,10 and as high as $10 per 1,000 impressions (more in some special cases). CPM advertising tends to work well on websites with a high page views per visitor ratio (e.g., online forums, magazines and so on).

List of popular CPM advertising networks:

    Casale Media

    Burst Media

    Value Click

    Advertising.com

    Tribal Fusion

    Right Media

3. Direct Banner Advertising

Selling your own advertising space is one of the most lucrative monetization methods. First and foremost because it enables you to cut out the middleman commissions and to determine your own rates. The most popular banner formats on the web are the 728×90 leaderboard, the 120×600 skyscraper, the 300×250 rectangle and the 125×125 button.

The downside of direct banner advertising is that you need to have a big audience to get qualified advertisers, and you will need to spend time managing the sales process, the banners and the payments.

Related links:

    How to Find Advertisers for Your Website

    Finding Advertisers for Your Blog

    Direct Advertising Sales for Beginners

    Openads Ad Server

    OIO Publisher Ad Platform

4. Text Link Ads

After Google declared that sites selling text links without the nofollow tag would be penalized, this monetization method became less popular.

Many website owners are still using text links to monetize their sites, though, some using the nofollow tag and some not.

The advantage of this method is that it is not intrusive. One can sell text links directly through his website or use specialized networks like Text-Link-Ads and Text-Link-Brokers to automate the process.

Text link marketplaces and networks:

    DigitalPoint Link Sales Forum

    Text-Link-Ads

    Text-Link-Brokers

    TNX

    LinkWorth

5. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a very popular practice on the Internet. Under this system you have a merchant that is willing to let other people (the affiliates) sell directly or indirectly its products and services, in exchange for a commission. Sometimes this type of advertising is also called CPA (cost per action) or CPL (cost per lead) based.

Affiliates can send potential customers to the merchant using several tools, from banners to text links and product reviews.

In order to find suitable affiliate programs you can turn to individual companies and publishers like Dreamhost and SEOBook, or join affiliate marketplaces and networks.

List of popular affiliate marketplaces and networks:

    Commission Junction

    ClickBank

    Azoogle Ads

    Link Share

6. Monetization Widgets

The latest trend on the web are widgets that let you monetize your website. Examples include Widgetbucks and SmartLinks. Some of these services operate under a PPC scheme, others behave like text link ads, others yet leverage affiliate links.

Their main differentiator, however, is the fact that they work as web widgets, making it easier for the user to plug and play the service on its website.

List of companies that provide monetization widgets:

    WidgetBucks

    ScratchBack

    SmartLinks

7. Sponsored Reviews

PayPerPost pioneered this model, with much controversy on the beginning (related to the fact that they did not require disclosure on paid posts). Soon other companies followed, most notably Sponsored Reviews and ReviewMe, refining the process and expanding the paid blogging model.

Joining one of these sponsored reviews marketplaces will give you the opportunity to write sponsored posts on a wide range of topics. Not all bloggers are willing to get paid to write about a specific product or website (because it might compromise the editorial credibility), but the ones who do are making good money out of it.

If your blog has a big audience you could also offer sponsored reviews directly, cutting off the commissions of the middleman.

List of sponsored reviews and paid blogging networks:

    PayPerPost

    Sponsored Reviews

    ReviewMe

    BlogVertise

    Smorty

8. RSS Feed Ads

With the quick adoption of the RSS technology by millions of Internet users, website owners are starting to find ways to monetize this new content distribution channel.

Feedburber already has its own publisher network, and you can sign-up to start displaying CPM based advertising on your feed footer. Bidvertiser recently introduced a RSS feed ad option as well, with a PPC scheme.

Finally, some blogs are also opting to sell banners or sponsored messages on their feed directly. John Chow and Marketing Pilgrim are two examples.

Related links:

    Feedburner

    BidVertiser

    Pheedo

9. Sponsors for Single Columns or Events

If you website has specific columns or events (e.g., a weekly podcast, an interview series, a monthly survey, a special project) you could find companies to sponsor them individually.

This method increases the monetization options for website owner, while giving advertisers the possibility to target a more specific audience and with a reduced commitment.

Mashable illustrates the case well. They have several advertising options on the site, including the possibility to sponsor specific columns and articles, including the “Daily Poll” and the “Web 2.0 Invites.”

Problogger also runs group writing projects occasionally, and before proceeding he publicly announce the project asking for sponsors.

10.Premium Content

Some websites and blogs give away part of their content for free, and charge for access to the premium content and exclusive tools.

SEOMoz is a good example. They have a very popular blog that gives advice and information on wide range of SEO related topics. On top of that visitors can decide to become premium members. It costs $48 monthly and it grants them access to guides, tools and other exclusive material.

11. Private Forums

While the Internet is populated with free forums, there is also the possibility to create a private one where members need to pay a single or recurring fee to join.

SEO Blackhat charges $100 monthly from its members, and they have thousands of them. Obviously in order to charge such a price for a forum membership you need to provide real value for the members (e.g., secret techniques, tools, and so on).

Performancing also launched a private forum recently, focused on the networking aspect. It is called The Hive, and the monthly cost is $10.

These are just two examples. There are many possibilities to create a private and profitable forum, you just need to find an appealing angle that will make it worth for the members.

List of popular forum software:

    vBulletin

    Simple Machines Forum

    phpBB

    Vanilla

12. Job Boards

All the popular blogs are trying to leverage job boards to make some extra income. Guy Kawasaki, ReadWriteWeb, Problogger… you name it.

Needless to say that in order to create an active and profitable job board you need first to have a blog focused on a specific niche, and a decent amount traffic.

The advantage of this method is that it is passive. Once you have the structure in place, the job listings will come naturally, and you can charge anywhere from $10 up to $100 for each.

List of popular job board software:

    JobThread

    Web Scribe Job Board

    SimplyHired Job-o-matic

    Jobbex

13. Marketplaces

Sitepoint is the online marketplace by excellence. Some websites and blogs, however, are trying to replicate that model on a smaller scale.

Depending on your niche, a market place that allows your visitors to buy, sell and trade products could work well. Over the time you could start charging a small fee for new product listings.

The problem with this method is that there are no standard software on the web, so you would need to hire a coder to get a marketplace integrated into your website.

You can see an example of a marketplaces being used on EasyWordpress and on Mashable.

14. Paid Surveys and Polls

There are services that will pay you money to run a small survey or poll on your website. The most popular one is called Vizu Answers.

Basically you need to sign up with them, and select the kind of polls that you want to run your site. Most of these services operate under a CPM model.

15. Selling or Renting Internal Pages

Million Dollar Wiki made this concept popular, but it was being used on the web for a long time around (check Pagerank10.co.uk for instance).

These websites sell for a single fee or rent for a recurring fee internal pages on their domain. Usually they have either high Pagerak or high traffic, so that people purchasing a page will be able to benefit in some way.

Implementing this method on a small blog would be difficult, but the concept is interesting and could be explored further.

16. Highlighted Posts from Sponsors

Techmeme probably pioneered this idea, but somehow it has not spread to other websites. The tech news aggregator displays editorial posts on the left column, and on the sidebar they have a section titled “Techmeme Sponsor Posts.”

On that section posts from the blog of the advertisers get highlighted, sending qualified traffic their way. Considering that the monthly cost for one spot is $5000 and that they have around 6 sponsors at any given time, it must be working well.

17. Donations

Placing a “Donate” link or button on a website can be an efficient way to earn money, especially if your blog is on a niche where readers learn and gain value from your content.

Personal development and productivity blogs, for instance, tend to perform well with donation based systems (one good example being Steve Pavlina).

A small variation of this method appeared sometime ago with the Buy Me a Beer plugin. This WordPress plugin enables you to insert a customized message at the bottom of each article, asking the readers to chip in for a beer or coffee.

18. In-text Adverting

In-text adverting networks like Kontera and Vibrant Media will place sponsored links inside your text. These links come with a double underline to differentiate them from normal links, and once the user rolls the mouse over the link the advertising will pop. Should the user click on it the site owner will make some money.

Some people make good money with this method, but others refrain from using it due to its intrusiveness. It is also interesting to note that very few mainstream websites have experimented with in-text advertising.

19. Pop-ups and Pop-unders

Pop-ups are a common yet annoying form of advertising on the Internet. If you are just trying to make a much money as possible from your website, you could experiment with them.

If you are trying to grow the traffic and generate loyal visitors, however, you probably should stay away from them. Just consider the hundreds of pop-up blockers out there: there is a reason why they are so popular.

Ad networks that use pop-ups:

    Tribal Fusion

    PayPopup

    PopupAd

    Adversal

20. Audio Ads

Also called PPP (Pay Per Play), this advertising method was introduce by Net Audio Ads. the concept is pretty simple: play a small audio advertising (usually 5 seconds) every time a visitor enters into your website. The user should not be able to stop it, creating a 100% conversion rate based on unique visitors.

The company is still rolling tests, but some users are reporting to get from a $4 to a $6 CPM. Regardless of the pay rate, though, this is a very intrusive form of advertising, so think twice before using it.

21. Selling the Website

Selling your website could be your last resource, but it has the potential to generate a big sum of money in a short period of time.

Market places on online forums like DigitalPoint and Sitepoint are always active with website buyers and sellers. Keep in mind that they most used parameter to determine the value of a website is the monthly revenue that it generates, multiplied by a certain number (the multiplier can be anything from 5 to 30, depending on the expectations of the seller, on the quality of the site, on the niche and other factors).

Some people also make money trading and flipping websites. They either create them from scratch or buy existing ones, and after some revamping they sell them for a profit.

Related links:

    How To Buy A Website And Flip It For Profit

    How To Sell A Website – How Much Is Your Website Worth?

    Where to sell a website? How to go about selling it?

Indirect Methods

22. Selling an Ebook

Perhaps one of the oldest money making strategies on the web, using a website to promote a related ebook is a very efficient way to generate revenue.

You could either structure the website around the book itself, like SEOBook.com, or launch the ebook based on the success of the website, like FreelanceSwitch did we the book How to be a Rockstar Freelancer.

Related links:

    Writing an ebook for your blog

    How to sell ebooks

    Processing payments for your ebook

    How to sell digital products online

    List of ebook selling software

23. Selling a Hardcover Book

Many authors and journalists leverage their blogs or websites to sell copies of hardcover books. Examples include Guy Kawasaki, Seth Godin and Malcolm Gladwell.

While most of these people were already renowned authors before they created their website, one could also follow the other way around. Lorelle VanFossen did exactly that with her Blogging Tips book. First she built her authority on the subject via her blog, and afterwards she published the book.

List of self publishing and publishing services:

    Lulu

    Self Publishing

    iUniverse

    WordClay

24. Selling Templates or WordPress Themes

As more and more people decide to get an online presence, website templates and WordPress themes become hotter and hotter.

On this segment you have mainstream websites like TemplateMonster, as well as individual designers who decide to promote and sell their work independently.

Brian Gardner and Unique Blog Designs are two examples of websites that make money with the sales of premium and custom WordPress themes.

25. Offering Consulting and Related Services

Depending on your niche, you could make money by offering consulting and related services. If you are also the author of your blog, the articles and information that you will share will build your profile and possibly certify your expertise on that niche, making it easier to gain customers.

Chris Garrett used a similar strategy. First he created a highly influential blog on the blogging and new media niche, and afterwards he started offering consulting services to clients with related problems and needs.

26. Creating an Email List or Newsletter

Email lists and newsletters represent one of the most powerful marketing and money making tools on the Internet. They offer incredible conversion rates, and the possibility to call people to action in a very efficient way.

Creating a big list is a difficult task though, so if you have a popular website you could leverage it to increase the number of subscribers on your list.

Yaro Starak is a famous Internet marketer, and if you visit his blog you will notice that right on top he has a section encouraging visitors to subscribe to his email newsletter. Yaro generates five figures in revenues each month from his email newsletters, proving that this method works.

List of software to manage email newsletters:

    AWeber

    SendStudio NX

    PHP Autoresponder

    Constant Contact

27. Mentoring programs

People are willing to pay for someone or something that will teach them and give them knowledge (as opposed to mere information). Education is one of the biggest industries in the world, and the online landscape behaves in a similar way.

Creating a mentoring program related to the niche of your website could be very profitable if you manage to structure and promote it adequately. There is a wide range of media and tools that you can use to deliver the information, from text articles to audio and video lessons.

Brian Clark leveraged the success of Copyblogger to launch a mentoring program teaching people how to build membership and how to sell content online. The program is titled Teaching Sells, and it costs $97 monthly. Sounds expensive, but they have over 1,000 members.

28. Creating a conference around the website

If your website takes off and becomes an authority on its niche, you could create a conference around it. Depending on the size of your audience, the event could attract thousands of people, and you could make money directly from conference passes and sponsors.

Search Engine Land, for instance, created a series of conferences that visit several cities on the United States and on other countries as well. The conferences are called Search Marketing Expo, and the tickets and passes cost thousands of dollars.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

28 Ways to Make Money with Your Website

Posted by Unknown No comments

28 Ways to Make Money with Your Website

There are several lists with “ways to make money with a website” on the Internet, but none of them seem to be complete. That is why I decided to create this one. If you know a method that is not listed below, just let us know and we’ll update it.

Notice that ways to make money with a website are different from ways to make more money from it. Methods to increase your traffic or click-through rate will help you make more money, but they do not represent a method of making money per se.

For example, one could suggest that blending AdSense ads with the content is a way to make money from a website. In reality it’s not; it’s just a way to make more money by improving your ad click-through rate. The real monetization method behind it is a PPC ad network.

The list is divided into direct and indirect methods, and examples and links are provided for each point. Enjoy!

Direct Methods

1. PPC Advertising Networks

Google AdSense is the most popular option under this category, but there are also others. Basically you need to sign up with the network and paste some code snippets on your website. The network will then serve contextual ads (either text or images) relevant to your website, and you will earn a certain amount of money for every click.

The profitability of PPC advertising depends on the general traffic levels of the website and, most importantly, on the click-through rate (CTR) and cost per click (CPC). The CTR depends on the design of the website. Ads placed abode the fold or blended with content, for instance, tend to get higher CTRs. The CPC, on the other hand, depends on the nice of the website. Mortgages, financial products and college education are examples of profitable niches (clicks worth a couple of dollars are not rare), while tech-related topics tend to receive a smaller CPC (sometimes as low as a couple of cents per click).

If your website takes off and becomes an authority on its niche, you could create a conference around it. Depending on the size of your audience, the event could attract thousands of people, and you could make money directly from conference passes and sponsors.

Search Engine Land, for instance, created a series of conferences that visit several cities on the United States and on other countries as well. The conferences are called Search Marketing Expo, and the tickets and passes cost thousands of dollars. List of popular CPC advertising networks:

    Google Adsense

    Yahoo! Publisher Network (YPN)

    BidVertiser

    Chitika

    Clicksor

2. CPM Advertising Networks

CPM advertising networks behave pretty much as PPC networks, except that you get paid according to the number of impressions (i.e., page views) that the ads displayed on your site will generate. CPM stands for Cost per Mille, and it refers to the cost for 1,000 impressions.

A blog that generates 100,000 page views monthly displaying an advertising banner with a $1 CPM, therefore, will earn $100 monthly.

CPM rates vary with the network, the position of the ad and the format. The better the network, the higher the CPM rate (because they have access to more advertisers). The closer you put the ad to the top of the page, the higher the CPM. The bigger the format (in terms of pixels), the higher the CPM.

You can get as low as $0,10 and as high as $10 per 1,000 impressions (more in some special cases). CPM advertising tends to work well on websites with a high page views per visitor ratio (e.g., online forums, magazines and so on).

List of popular CPM advertising networks:

    Casale Media

    Burst Media

    Value Click

    Advertising.com

    Tribal Fusion

    Right Media

3. Direct Banner Advertising

Selling your own advertising space is one of the most lucrative monetization methods. First and foremost because it enables you to cut out the middleman commissions and to determine your own rates. The most popular banner formats on the web are the 728×90 leaderboard, the 120×600 skyscraper, the 300×250 rectangle and the 125×125 button.

The downside of direct banner advertising is that you need to have a big audience to get qualified advertisers, and you will need to spend time managing the sales process, the banners and the payments.

Related links:

    How to Find Advertisers for Your Website

    Finding Advertisers for Your Blog

    Direct Advertising Sales for Beginners

    Openads Ad Server

    OIO Publisher Ad Platform

4. Text Link Ads

After Google declared that sites selling text links without the nofollow tag would be penalized, this monetization method became less popular.

Many website owners are still using text links to monetize their sites, though, some using the nofollow tag and some not.

The advantage of this method is that it is not intrusive. One can sell text links directly through his website or use specialized networks like Text-Link-Ads and Text-Link-Brokers to automate the process.

Text link marketplaces and networks:

    DigitalPoint Link Sales Forum

    Text-Link-Ads

    Text-Link-Brokers

    TNX

    LinkWorth

5. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a very popular practice on the Internet. Under this system you have a merchant that is willing to let other people (the affiliates) sell directly or indirectly its products and services, in exchange for a commission. Sometimes this type of advertising is also called CPA (cost per action) or CPL (cost per lead) based.

Affiliates can send potential customers to the merchant using several tools, from banners to text links and product reviews.

In order to find suitable affiliate programs you can turn to individual companies and publishers like Dreamhost and SEOBook, or join affiliate marketplaces and networks.

List of popular affiliate marketplaces and networks:

    Commission Junction

    ClickBank

    Azoogle Ads

    Link Share

6. Monetization Widgets

The latest trend on the web are widgets that let you monetize your website. Examples include Widgetbucks and SmartLinks. Some of these services operate under a PPC scheme, others behave like text link ads, others yet leverage affiliate links.

Their main differentiator, however, is the fact that they work as web widgets, making it easier for the user to plug and play the service on its website.

List of companies that provide monetization widgets:

    WidgetBucks

    ScratchBack

    SmartLinks

7. Sponsored Reviews

PayPerPost pioneered this model, with much controversy on the beginning (related to the fact that they did not require disclosure on paid posts). Soon other companies followed, most notably Sponsored Reviews and ReviewMe, refining the process and expanding the paid blogging model.

Joining one of these sponsored reviews marketplaces will give you the opportunity to write sponsored posts on a wide range of topics. Not all bloggers are willing to get paid to write about a specific product or website (because it might compromise the editorial credibility), but the ones who do are making good money out of it.

If your blog has a big audience you could also offer sponsored reviews directly, cutting off the commissions of the middleman.

List of sponsored reviews and paid blogging networks:

    PayPerPost

    Sponsored Reviews

    ReviewMe

    BlogVertise

    Smorty

8. RSS Feed Ads

With the quick adoption of the RSS technology by millions of Internet users, website owners are starting to find ways to monetize this new content distribution channel.

Feedburber already has its own publisher network, and you can sign-up to start displaying CPM based advertising on your feed footer. Bidvertiser recently introduced a RSS feed ad option as well, with a PPC scheme.

Finally, some blogs are also opting to sell banners or sponsored messages on their feed directly. John Chow and Marketing Pilgrim are two examples.

Related links:

    Feedburner

    BidVertiser

    Pheedo

9. Sponsors for Single Columns or Events

If you website has specific columns or events (e.g., a weekly podcast, an interview series, a monthly survey, a special project) you could find companies to sponsor them individually.

This method increases the monetization options for website owner, while giving advertisers the possibility to target a more specific audience and with a reduced commitment.

Mashable illustrates the case well. They have several advertising options on the site, including the possibility to sponsor specific columns and articles, including the “Daily Poll” and the “Web 2.0 Invites.”

Problogger also runs group writing projects occasionally, and before proceeding he publicly announce the project asking for sponsors.

10.Premium Content

Some websites and blogs give away part of their content for free, and charge for access to the premium content and exclusive tools.

SEOMoz is a good example. They have a very popular blog that gives advice and information on wide range of SEO related topics. On top of that visitors can decide to become premium members. It costs $48 monthly and it grants them access to guides, tools and other exclusive material.

11. Private Forums

While the Internet is populated with free forums, there is also the possibility to create a private one where members need to pay a single or recurring fee to join.

SEO Blackhat charges $100 monthly from its members, and they have thousands of them. Obviously in order to charge such a price for a forum membership you need to provide real value for the members (e.g., secret techniques, tools, and so on).

Performancing also launched a private forum recently, focused on the networking aspect. It is called The Hive, and the monthly cost is $10.

These are just two examples. There are many possibilities to create a private and profitable forum, you just need to find an appealing angle that will make it worth for the members.

List of popular forum software:

    vBulletin

    Simple Machines Forum

    phpBB

    Vanilla

12. Job Boards

All the popular blogs are trying to leverage job boards to make some extra income. Guy Kawasaki, ReadWriteWeb, Problogger… you name it.

Needless to say that in order to create an active and profitable job board you need first to have a blog focused on a specific niche, and a decent amount traffic.

The advantage of this method is that it is passive. Once you have the structure in place, the job listings will come naturally, and you can charge anywhere from $10 up to $100 for each.

List of popular job board software:

    JobThread

    Web Scribe Job Board

    SimplyHired Job-o-matic

    Jobbex

13. Marketplaces

Sitepoint is the online marketplace by excellence. Some websites and blogs, however, are trying to replicate that model on a smaller scale.

Depending on your niche, a market place that allows your visitors to buy, sell and trade products could work well. Over the time you could start charging a small fee for new product listings.

The problem with this method is that there are no standard software on the web, so you would need to hire a coder to get a marketplace integrated into your website.

You can see an example of a marketplaces being used on EasyWordpress and on Mashable.

14. Paid Surveys and Polls

There are services that will pay you money to run a small survey or poll on your website. The most popular one is called Vizu Answers.

Basically you need to sign up with them, and select the kind of polls that you want to run your site. Most of these services operate under a CPM model.

15. Selling or Renting Internal Pages

Million Dollar Wiki made this concept popular, but it was being used on the web for a long time around (check Pagerank10.co.uk for instance).

These websites sell for a single fee or rent for a recurring fee internal pages on their domain. Usually they have either high Pagerak or high traffic, so that people purchasing a page will be able to benefit in some way.

Implementing this method on a small blog would be difficult, but the concept is interesting and could be explored further.

16. Highlighted Posts from Sponsors

Techmeme probably pioneered this idea, but somehow it has not spread to other websites. The tech news aggregator displays editorial posts on the left column, and on the sidebar they have a section titled “Techmeme Sponsor Posts.”

On that section posts from the blog of the advertisers get highlighted, sending qualified traffic their way. Considering that the monthly cost for one spot is $5000 and that they have around 6 sponsors at any given time, it must be working well.

17. Donations

Placing a “Donate” link or button on a website can be an efficient way to earn money, especially if your blog is on a niche where readers learn and gain value from your content.

Personal development and productivity blogs, for instance, tend to perform well with donation based systems (one good example being Steve Pavlina).

A small variation of this method appeared sometime ago with the Buy Me a Beer plugin. This WordPress plugin enables you to insert a customized message at the bottom of each article, asking the readers to chip in for a beer or coffee.

18. In-text Adverting

In-text adverting networks like Kontera and Vibrant Media will place sponsored links inside your text. These links come with a double underline to differentiate them from normal links, and once the user rolls the mouse over the link the advertising will pop. Should the user click on it the site owner will make some money.

Some people make good money with this method, but others refrain from using it due to its intrusiveness. It is also interesting to note that very few mainstream websites have experimented with in-text advertising.

19. Pop-ups and Pop-unders

Pop-ups are a common yet annoying form of advertising on the Internet. If you are just trying to make a much money as possible from your website, you could experiment with them.

If you are trying to grow the traffic and generate loyal visitors, however, you probably should stay away from them. Just consider the hundreds of pop-up blockers out there: there is a reason why they are so popular.

Ad networks that use pop-ups:

    Tribal Fusion

    PayPopup

    PopupAd

    Adversal

20. Audio Ads

Also called PPP (Pay Per Play), this advertising method was introduce by Net Audio Ads. the concept is pretty simple: play a small audio advertising (usually 5 seconds) every time a visitor enters into your website. The user should not be able to stop it, creating a 100% conversion rate based on unique visitors.

The company is still rolling tests, but some users are reporting to get from a $4 to a $6 CPM. Regardless of the pay rate, though, this is a very intrusive form of advertising, so think twice before using it.

21. Selling the Website

Selling your website could be your last resource, but it has the potential to generate a big sum of money in a short period of time.

Market places on online forums like DigitalPoint and Sitepoint are always active with website buyers and sellers. Keep in mind that they most used parameter to determine the value of a website is the monthly revenue that it generates, multiplied by a certain number (the multiplier can be anything from 5 to 30, depending on the expectations of the seller, on the quality of the site, on the niche and other factors).

Some people also make money trading and flipping websites. They either create them from scratch or buy existing ones, and after some revamping they sell them for a profit.

Related links:

    How To Buy A Website And Flip It For Profit

    How To Sell A Website – How Much Is Your Website Worth?

    Where to sell a website? How to go about selling it?

Indirect Methods

22. Selling an Ebook

Perhaps one of the oldest money making strategies on the web, using a website to promote a related ebook is a very efficient way to generate revenue.

You could either structure the website around the book itself, like SEOBook.com, or launch the ebook based on the success of the website, like FreelanceSwitch did we the book How to be a Rockstar Freelancer.

Related links:

    Writing an ebook for your blog

    How to sell ebooks

    Processing payments for your ebook

    How to sell digital products online

    List of ebook selling software

23. Selling a Hardcover Book

Many authors and journalists leverage their blogs or websites to sell copies of hardcover books. Examples include Guy Kawasaki, Seth Godin and Malcolm Gladwell.

While most of these people were already renowned authors before they created their website, one could also follow the other way around. Lorelle VanFossen did exactly that with her Blogging Tips book. First she built her authority on the subject via her blog, and afterwards she published the book.

List of self publishing and publishing services:

    Lulu

    Self Publishing

    iUniverse

    WordClay

24. Selling Templates or WordPress Themes

As more and more people decide to get an online presence, website templates and WordPress themes become hotter and hotter.

On this segment you have mainstream websites like TemplateMonster, as well as individual designers who decide to promote and sell their work independently.

Brian Gardner and Unique Blog Designs are two examples of websites that make money with the sales of premium and custom WordPress themes.

25. Offering Consulting and Related Services

Depending on your niche, you could make money by offering consulting and related services. If you are also the author of your blog, the articles and information that you will share will build your profile and possibly certify your expertise on that niche, making it easier to gain customers.

Chris Garrett used a similar strategy. First he created a highly influential blog on the blogging and new media niche, and afterwards he started offering consulting services to clients with related problems and needs.

26. Creating an Email List or Newsletter

Email lists and newsletters represent one of the most powerful marketing and money making tools on the Internet. They offer incredible conversion rates, and the possibility to call people to action in a very efficient way.

Creating a big list is a difficult task though, so if you have a popular website you could leverage it to increase the number of subscribers on your list.

Yaro Starak is a famous Internet marketer, and if you visit his blog you will notice that right on top he has a section encouraging visitors to subscribe to his email newsletter. Yaro generates five figures in revenues each month from his email newsletters, proving that this method works.

List of software to manage email newsletters:

    AWeber

    SendStudio NX

    PHP Autoresponder

    Constant Contact

27. Mentoring programs

People are willing to pay for someone or something that will teach them and give them knowledge (as opposed to mere information). Education is one of the biggest industries in the world, and the online landscape behaves in a similar way.

Creating a mentoring program related to the niche of your website could be very profitable if you manage to structure and promote it adequately. There is a wide range of media and tools that you can use to deliver the information, from text articles to audio and video lessons.

Brian Clark leveraged the success of Copyblogger to launch a mentoring program teaching people how to build membership and how to sell content online. The program is titled Teaching Sells, and it costs $97 monthly. Sounds expensive, but they have over 1,000 members.

28. Creating a conference around the website

If your website takes off and becomes an authority on its niche, you could create a conference around it. Depending on the size of your audience, the event could attract thousands of people, and you could make money directly from conference passes and sponsors.

Search Engine Land, for instance, created a series of conferences that visit several cities on the United States and on other countries as well. The conferences are called Search Marketing Expo, and the tickets and passes cost thousands of dollars.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Going To Register For AdSense? Did You Read This Before Doing That?

Going To Register For AdSense? Did You Read This Before Doing That?

Disclaimer: This content and its copyrights are a property of Google.com. The Sole moto of this site is to provide people with the right information about adsense policies.

Webmaster Guidelines

Best practices to help Google find, crawl, and index your site

Following these guidelines will help Google find, index, and rank your site. Even if you choose not to implement any of these suggestions, we strongly encourage you to pay very close attention to the “Quality Guidelines,” which outline some of the illicit practices that may lead to a site being removed entirely from the Google index or otherwise impacted by an algorithmic or manual spam action. If a site has been affected by a spam action, it may no longer show up in results on Google.com or on any of Google’s partner sites.

When your site is ready:-

    Submit it to Google at http://www.google.com/submityourcontent/.

    Submit a Sitemap using Google Webmaster Tools. Google uses your Sitemap to learn about the structure of your site and to increase our coverage of your webpages.

    Make sure all the sites that should know about your pages are aware your site is online.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Going To Register For AdSense? Did You Read This Before Doing That?

Posted by Unknown No comments

Going To Register For AdSense? Did You Read This Before Doing That?

Disclaimer: This content and its copyrights are a property of Google.com. The Sole moto of this site is to provide people with the right information about adsense policies.

Webmaster Guidelines

Best practices to help Google find, crawl, and index your site

Following these guidelines will help Google find, index, and rank your site. Even if you choose not to implement any of these suggestions, we strongly encourage you to pay very close attention to the “Quality Guidelines,” which outline some of the illicit practices that may lead to a site being removed entirely from the Google index or otherwise impacted by an algorithmic or manual spam action. If a site has been affected by a spam action, it may no longer show up in results on Google.com or on any of Google’s partner sites.

When your site is ready:-

    Submit it to Google at http://www.google.com/submityourcontent/.

    Submit a Sitemap using Google Webmaster Tools. Google uses your Sitemap to learn about the structure of your site and to increase our coverage of your webpages.

    Make sure all the sites that should know about your pages are aware your site is online.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Quality Guidelines – Basic Principles

Quality Guidelines – Basic Principles

     Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines. Don’t deceive your users or present different content to search engines than you display to users, which is commonly referred to as “cloaking.”

     Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings. A good rule of thumb is whether you’d feel comfortable explaining what you’ve done to a website that competes with you. Another useful test is to ask, “Does this help my users? Would I do this if search engines didn’t exist?”

     Don’t participate in link schemes designed to increase your site’s ranking or PageRank. In particular, avoid links to web spammers or “bad neighborhoods” on the web, as your own ranking may be affected adversely by those links.

    Don’t use unauthorized computer programs to submit pages, check rankings, etc. Such programs consume computing resources and violate our Terms of Service. Google does not recommend the use of products such as WebPosition Gold™ that send automatic or programmatic queries to Google.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Quality Guidelines – Basic Principles

Posted by Unknown No comments

Quality Guidelines – Basic Principles

     Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines. Don’t deceive your users or present different content to search engines than you display to users, which is commonly referred to as “cloaking.”

     Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings. A good rule of thumb is whether you’d feel comfortable explaining what you’ve done to a website that competes with you. Another useful test is to ask, “Does this help my users? Would I do this if search engines didn’t exist?”

     Don’t participate in link schemes designed to increase your site’s ranking or PageRank. In particular, avoid links to web spammers or “bad neighborhoods” on the web, as your own ranking may be affected adversely by those links.

    Don’t use unauthorized computer programs to submit pages, check rankings, etc. Such programs consume computing resources and violate our Terms of Service. Google does not recommend the use of products such as WebPosition Gold™ that send automatic or programmatic queries to Google.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Pevent Your Website From Being Hacked

Pevent Your Website From Being Hacked

As I have been providing supoort for websites being hacked, I advice you to implement these securities to Pevent Your Website From Being Hacked.

Also  there are over  millions of results in google for the keyword “prevent wordpress hack“. Everyone has their own opinion and I dont think all of these posts are updated frequently. It’s been a while I have posted here. If you have been following me on my twitter then you should know what I have been up to. First, here are few things you should know- I have made several changes to this blog.

Recently, some of my blogs were hacked. It was funny how the index file had an image of a smurf showing the middle finger with a text saying “where’s your security?” I was glad the hacker left his email address so I could thank him for mocking the security of my blogs and so, I did. The amazing part- This guy didn’t even touch the database; he didn’t even inject any shit virus. I felt it was weird but after checking out each files, I found they were all clean.

I was so involved in other projects that I didn’t pay much attention to security which is actually the most important thing here. If this dude didn’t breach my security, I wouldn’t have known it was vulnerable and hence wouldn’t have bothered to take action. Whatever it is, I have sent him a “Thank You” Note

I have removed some shitty plugins, transferred to HostGator, tweaked codes and more…Today, I have decided to write a post on how I did what I did- that is, strengthen the security of my blog to keep off hackers and all creepy people. I will have a video tutorial created for this later this month but for now, check this out. Some basic tweaks can help protect all your hard earned content. Check out the following tips to prevent wordpress hack.

14 Tips To Prevent WordPress Hack

1. Backup

This is the first step and the most important. Before you plan on making any changes, make sure you backup your entire DB. You can do this manually or use an available plugin. I recommend backup buddy which backs up your entire wordpress blog. Unlike free plugins which only backup your database, backup buddy exports your entire database with images, files and whatever you have in your blog’s content folder- Pretty sweeet!

2. Update WordPress Version

Second crucial step after backing up your blog is to update it to the latest version. You should always make sure that your blog’s version is up to date. WordPress team creates patches to help fix security holes. Follow wordpress feed to find out about the latest updates or you could simply login to your admin.

I would also recommend that you follow WordPress Development and BlogSecurity as they will inform you whenever a new patch/fix is released.

I also strongly advice to keep on following these two website's rss feeds or keep a check on whats latest : 1. http://blogsecurity.net/ 2. http://wordpress.org/development/feed/

3. Change your Login/Password to safeguard from BRUTE FORCE TOOL of hackers

The default wordpress login is “admin” and most hackers know that. We should change this to something else that would be difficult to guess. Something like “rogers12” or “donhoe2” is good examples. The best thing to do is delete the default admin and create a new custom login.

I suggest that you use strong passwords which include upper/lower keys, numbers and symbols. Something like “rockSTAR19!@” or “Anabel2@!” is a great example of a strong password.

Most hackers try to brute force the password so if your password is really strong as I mentioned earlier, you should be fine.

Do not use birth days, names, pet names or hobbies as passwords. People who are close to you know a little more about you; you don’t want any wild guesses.

4. WordPress Keys in wp-config.php( most important)  as this is already done in latest wordpress, so no need to do this

I didn’t know much about wordpress keys but it is another important security measure. These keys work as salts for WordPress cookies thus, ensuring better encryption of user data.

Use the WordPress Key Generator to generate these keys. Now open up your wp-config.php, find the lines that look like below and simply replace with the generated ones:

define(‘AUTH_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);  define(‘SECURE_AUTH_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);  define(‘LOGGED_IN_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);  define(‘NONCE_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);

Save and you are done!

5. Install WP Security Scan or bullet proof security plugin

This plugin is the real deal. It’s simple and automates stuff. It will scan your wordpress blog for vulnerabilities and inform you if it finds any malicious codes etc. If the texts are in green in the admin panel then you should be good. However, they will not just be green; sometimes you have to make them . And I will tell you how.

6. Change Table Prefix(very very very important)

The default table prefix for wordpress is wp_ . I know that, you know it and I am sure the hacker does too. SQL Injection attacks are easier with the default table prefix because it is easier to guess. A good prefix would be “mashjg23_” or “sasdoe265_”. Changing your database table prefix is highly recommended and you can do this in two ways. The manual way requires some work and is not suitable for newbie; here’s when WP Security Scan Plugin makes your work much easier. It has a tab called “Database”. Once you are in it, you have the option to rename your entire table prefix to something that is tough to guess. Do this and you will be a step closer to strengthening your blog’s security.

DB Password: How strong is your database password? Both your wordpress login password and database password should be strong. Include upper/lower keys, numbers and symbols.

7. Prevent WordPress Hack by Blocking Search Engine Spiders from Indexing the Admin Section(very important)

Search engine spiders crawl over your entire blog and index every content unless they are told not to do so. We do not want to index the admin section as it contains all the sensitive information. The easiest way to prevent the crawlers from indexing the admin directory, is to create a robots.txt file in your root directory. Then place the following code in the file:

#  User-agent: *  Disallow: /cgi-bin  Disallow: /wp-admin  Disallow: /wp-includes  Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/  Disallow: /wp-content/cache/  Disallow: /wp-content/themes/  Disallow: */trackback/  Disallow: */feed/  Disallow: /*/feed/rss/$  Disallow: /category/*

8. .htaccess Hacks (most imporatant)

.htaccess (hypertext access) is the default name of directory-level configuration files that allow for decentralized management of configuration when placed inside the web tree. .htaccess files are often used to specify the security restrictions for the particular directory. This is not an exact tip that falls under the list but you should know about .htaccess because you can do a lot with it to prevent wordpress hack. I am not going to get in depth for this term but I found out some sweet .htaccess hacks which can tighten your wordpress security. See them below.

9. Protect your .htaccess

After tweaking your .htaccess to protect your blog from hackers, you cannot simply leave the .htaccess open itself to attacks. The hack below prevents external access to any file with .hta . Simply place the code in your domain’s root .htaccess file.

# STRONG HTACCESS PROTECTION

   order allow,deny  deny from all  satisfy all  

10. No Directory Browsing

Its not a good idea to allow your visitors to browse through your entire directory. This is an easy way to find out about directory structures and this makes it easier for hackers to lookout for security holes.

In order to stop this, simply add the piece of 2 lines in your .htaccess in the root directory of your WordPress blog.

# disable directory browsing  Options All -Indexes

11. Secure wp-config.php

Wp-config.php is important because it contains all the sensitive data and configuration of your blog and therefore we must secure it through .htaccess. Simply adding the code below to the .htaccess file in the root directory can do the trick

# protect wp-config.php    Order deny,allow  Deny from all  

The code denies access to the wp-config.php file to everyone (including me )

12. Limit Access to the Wp-Content Directory

Wp-content contains everything. This is a very important folder and you should secure it. You don’t want users to browse and get access to unwanted/other data. Users should be only able to view and access certain file types like images (jpg, gif, png), Javascript, css and XML.

Place the code below in the .htaccess file within the wp-content folder (not the root).

Order deny,allow  Deny from all    Allow from all  

13. Protect WordPress Admin Files

Wp-admin should be accessed only by you and your fellow bloggers (if any).  You may use .htaccess to restrict access and allow only specific IP addresses to this directory.

If you have static IP address and you always blog from your computer, then this can be a good option for you. However, if you run a multiple user blog then either you can opt out from this or you can allow access from a range of IPs. You can refer to Apache’s documentation on mod_access for complete instruction on how to set this up.

Copy and paste the code below to the .htaccess in wp-admin folder (not root folder)

# deny access to wp admin  order deny,allow  allow from xx.xx.xx.xx # This is your static IP  deny from all

The above code will prevent browser access to any file in these directories other than “xx.xx.xx.xx” which should be your static IP address.

There is another way you could restrict access to the directory and that is by using a password in the .htaccess. I am planning to write a detailed .htacess hack where I will include all of these.

14. Prevent script injection

I found this code on wprecipes and it works like a charm. Now you can protect your WordPress blog from script injection, and unwanted modification of _REQUEST and/or GLOBALS.

Simple copy and paste the code below to your .htaccess in the root

# protect from sql injection  Options +FollowSymLinks  RewriteEngine On  RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} (\<|%3C).*script.*(\>|%3E) [NC,OR]  RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} GLOBALS(=|\[|\%[0-9A-Z]{0,2}) [OR]  RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} _REQUEST(=|\[|\%[0-9A-Z]{0,2})  RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php [F,L]

Bonus

Take a note at the files permission. Wp Security scan shows this in a nice way. Browse the specific files on your root using your favorite ftp client and Chmod the files if required.

Last but not the least; you can install WordPress Firewall 2 which actually protects your blog from malicious hackers. It blocks the attempts of the hacker and notifies you when abused. Only the negative point of this plug-in is, it sometimes even blocks our action. This can really get annoying and I do not really recommend this plug-in unless you have SUPER Hackers and bots screwing up your blog. Stick with the .htaccess hacks since they do the job pretty well and your blog should be just fine.

Makes Your World HappyyYYY...

Pevent Your Website From Being Hacked

Posted by Unknown No comments

Pevent Your Website From Being Hacked

As I have been providing supoort for websites being hacked, I advice you to implement these securities to Pevent Your Website From Being Hacked.

Also  there are over  millions of results in google for the keyword “prevent wordpress hack“. Everyone has their own opinion and I dont think all of these posts are updated frequently. It’s been a while I have posted here. If you have been following me on my twitter then you should know what I have been up to. First, here are few things you should know- I have made several changes to this blog.

Recently, some of my blogs were hacked. It was funny how the index file had an image of a smurf showing the middle finger with a text saying “where’s your security?” I was glad the hacker left his email address so I could thank him for mocking the security of my blogs and so, I did. The amazing part- This guy didn’t even touch the database; he didn’t even inject any shit virus. I felt it was weird but after checking out each files, I found they were all clean.

I was so involved in other projects that I didn’t pay much attention to security which is actually the most important thing here. If this dude didn’t breach my security, I wouldn’t have known it was vulnerable and hence wouldn’t have bothered to take action. Whatever it is, I have sent him a “Thank You” Note

I have removed some shitty plugins, transferred to HostGator, tweaked codes and more…Today, I have decided to write a post on how I did what I did- that is, strengthen the security of my blog to keep off hackers and all creepy people. I will have a video tutorial created for this later this month but for now, check this out. Some basic tweaks can help protect all your hard earned content. Check out the following tips to prevent wordpress hack.

14 Tips To Prevent WordPress Hack

1. Backup

This is the first step and the most important. Before you plan on making any changes, make sure you backup your entire DB. You can do this manually or use an available plugin. I recommend backup buddy which backs up your entire wordpress blog. Unlike free plugins which only backup your database, backup buddy exports your entire database with images, files and whatever you have in your blog’s content folder- Pretty sweeet!

2. Update WordPress Version

Second crucial step after backing up your blog is to update it to the latest version. You should always make sure that your blog’s version is up to date. WordPress team creates patches to help fix security holes. Follow wordpress feed to find out about the latest updates or you could simply login to your admin.

I would also recommend that you follow WordPress Development and BlogSecurity as they will inform you whenever a new patch/fix is released.

I also strongly advice to keep on following these two website's rss feeds or keep a check on whats latest : 1. http://blogsecurity.net/ 2. http://wordpress.org/development/feed/

3. Change your Login/Password to safeguard from BRUTE FORCE TOOL of hackers

The default wordpress login is “admin” and most hackers know that. We should change this to something else that would be difficult to guess. Something like “rogers12” or “donhoe2” is good examples. The best thing to do is delete the default admin and create a new custom login.

I suggest that you use strong passwords which include upper/lower keys, numbers and symbols. Something like “rockSTAR19!@” or “Anabel2@!” is a great example of a strong password.

Most hackers try to brute force the password so if your password is really strong as I mentioned earlier, you should be fine.

Do not use birth days, names, pet names or hobbies as passwords. People who are close to you know a little more about you; you don’t want any wild guesses.

4. WordPress Keys in wp-config.php( most important)  as this is already done in latest wordpress, so no need to do this

I didn’t know much about wordpress keys but it is another important security measure. These keys work as salts for WordPress cookies thus, ensuring better encryption of user data.

Use the WordPress Key Generator to generate these keys. Now open up your wp-config.php, find the lines that look like below and simply replace with the generated ones:

define(‘AUTH_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);  define(‘SECURE_AUTH_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);  define(‘LOGGED_IN_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);  define(‘NONCE_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);

Save and you are done!

5. Install WP Security Scan or bullet proof security plugin

This plugin is the real deal. It’s simple and automates stuff. It will scan your wordpress blog for vulnerabilities and inform you if it finds any malicious codes etc. If the texts are in green in the admin panel then you should be good. However, they will not just be green; sometimes you have to make them . And I will tell you how.

6. Change Table Prefix(very very very important)

The default table prefix for wordpress is wp_ . I know that, you know it and I am sure the hacker does too. SQL Injection attacks are easier with the default table prefix because it is easier to guess. A good prefix would be “mashjg23_” or “sasdoe265_”. Changing your database table prefix is highly recommended and you can do this in two ways. The manual way requires some work and is not suitable for newbie; here’s when WP Security Scan Plugin makes your work much easier. It has a tab called “Database”. Once you are in it, you have the option to rename your entire table prefix to something that is tough to guess. Do this and you will be a step closer to strengthening your blog’s security.

DB Password: How strong is your database password? Both your wordpress login password and database password should be strong. Include upper/lower keys, numbers and symbols.

7. Prevent WordPress Hack by Blocking Search Engine Spiders from Indexing the Admin Section(very important)

Search engine spiders crawl over your entire blog and index every content unless they are told not to do so. We do not want to index the admin section as it contains all the sensitive information. The easiest way to prevent the crawlers from indexing the admin directory, is to create a robots.txt file in your root directory. Then place the following code in the file:

#  User-agent: *  Disallow: /cgi-bin  Disallow: /wp-admin  Disallow: /wp-includes  Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/  Disallow: /wp-content/cache/  Disallow: /wp-content/themes/  Disallow: */trackback/  Disallow: */feed/  Disallow: /*/feed/rss/$  Disallow: /category/*

8. .htaccess Hacks (most imporatant)

.htaccess (hypertext access) is the default name of directory-level configuration files that allow for decentralized management of configuration when placed inside the web tree. .htaccess files are often used to specify the security restrictions for the particular directory. This is not an exact tip that falls under the list but you should know about .htaccess because you can do a lot with it to prevent wordpress hack. I am not going to get in depth for this term but I found out some sweet .htaccess hacks which can tighten your wordpress security. See them below.

9. Protect your .htaccess

After tweaking your .htaccess to protect your blog from hackers, you cannot simply leave the .htaccess open itself to attacks. The hack below prevents external access to any file with .hta . Simply place the code in your domain’s root .htaccess file.

# STRONG HTACCESS PROTECTION

   order allow,deny  deny from all  satisfy all  

10. No Directory Browsing

Its not a good idea to allow your visitors to browse through your entire directory. This is an easy way to find out about directory structures and this makes it easier for hackers to lookout for security holes.

In order to stop this, simply add the piece of 2 lines in your .htaccess in the root directory of your WordPress blog.

# disable directory browsing  Options All -Indexes

11. Secure wp-config.php

Wp-config.php is important because it contains all the sensitive data and configuration of your blog and therefore we must secure it through .htaccess. Simply adding the code below to the .htaccess file in the root directory can do the trick

# protect wp-config.php    Order deny,allow  Deny from all  

The code denies access to the wp-config.php file to everyone (including me )

12. Limit Access to the Wp-Content Directory

Wp-content contains everything. This is a very important folder and you should secure it. You don’t want users to browse and get access to unwanted/other data. Users should be only able to view and access certain file types like images (jpg, gif, png), Javascript, css and XML.

Place the code below in the .htaccess file within the wp-content folder (not the root).

Order deny,allow  Deny from all    Allow from all  

13. Protect WordPress Admin Files

Wp-admin should be accessed only by you and your fellow bloggers (if any).  You may use .htaccess to restrict access and allow only specific IP addresses to this directory.

If you have static IP address and you always blog from your computer, then this can be a good option for you. However, if you run a multiple user blog then either you can opt out from this or you can allow access from a range of IPs. You can refer to Apache’s documentation on mod_access for complete instruction on how to set this up.

Copy and paste the code below to the .htaccess in wp-admin folder (not root folder)

# deny access to wp admin  order deny,allow  allow from xx.xx.xx.xx # This is your static IP  deny from all

The above code will prevent browser access to any file in these directories other than “xx.xx.xx.xx” which should be your static IP address.

There is another way you could restrict access to the directory and that is by using a password in the .htaccess. I am planning to write a detailed .htacess hack where I will include all of these.

14. Prevent script injection

I found this code on wprecipes and it works like a charm. Now you can protect your WordPress blog from script injection, and unwanted modification of _REQUEST and/or GLOBALS.

Simple copy and paste the code below to your .htaccess in the root

# protect from sql injection  Options +FollowSymLinks  RewriteEngine On  RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} (\<|%3C).*script.*(\>|%3E) [NC,OR]  RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} GLOBALS(=|\[|\%[0-9A-Z]{0,2}) [OR]  RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} _REQUEST(=|\[|\%[0-9A-Z]{0,2})  RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php [F,L]

Bonus

Take a note at the files permission. Wp Security scan shows this in a nice way. Browse the specific files on your root using your favorite ftp client and Chmod the files if required.

Last but not the least; you can install WordPress Firewall 2 which actually protects your blog from malicious hackers. It blocks the attempts of the hacker and notifies you when abused. Only the negative point of this plug-in is, it sometimes even blocks our action. This can really get annoying and I do not really recommend this plug-in unless you have SUPER Hackers and bots screwing up your blog. Stick with the .htaccess hacks since they do the job pretty well and your blog should be just fine.

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