The Importance Of Choosing The Right Domain Name

Posted on August 12, 2009 by H W in Domain Names, Domains

Choosing the right top level domain name for your new website is one of the first and most important steps when building your web presence. Your domain will be the name, the brand and your own virtual piece of Internet real estate. As with any investment, the initial phase of prospecting is critical. When searching for your domain name you have to remember that it should be short, descriptive and match your business name, products or services. The shorter your domain, the better, as people will obviously have a much easier time remembering it.

Which is better: .com, .net or .org?

These domain extensions are the most popular and are associated with Commercial, Network and Organizational web sites. While you may register any domain extension you prefer, the .com is still king for most commercial and popular web sites. If your website is for a non-profit organization than a .org extension will be more appropriate. A .net extension was initially intended to be used only for network providers (such as Internet service providers). However, there are no formal restrictions on who can register a .net domain name. Therefore, while still popular with network operators, it is often treated as a second .com.

Should I use dashes in my domain?

Dashes in a domain name can be used as a last resort if your first choice for a name might not be available. Also try to keep no more than one dash in your name. Remember the more dashes and or number in your domain the harder it will be for people to remember it.

Start searching for a domain now:

Alternatives to finding a good domain

Another option to try is to look for expired domain names. Sometimes if luck is on your side you can grab some real gems if you keep an eye out for them.

Tags: choosing the right domain name, dashes, domain extension, domain extensions, expired domain names, first choice, internet real estate, internet service providers, network operators, network providers, non profit organization, org extension, organizational web, top level domain, web presence

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Amazon outage June 29th, 2010

Posted on June 29, 2010 by H W in Network

Outages at Amazon.com are causing issues throughout the net. This outage seems to also affect Amazon affiliates which rely on the content feeds from Amazon.com. It is being estimated that Amazon could be losing roughly $1.7 million per hour of downtime.Tags: amazon affiliates, amazon outage, downtime

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Writing Prompts for Bloggers (Part 2)

As creative people, it is easy to get distracted by this or that project, or worse, by the dwindling zeroes in your bank account. This week’s prompts will focus on consistency and discipline in your blogging.

Writing Prompt #1: Think of the things you DO have and write about them. For example, maybe you don’t have much money and/or no one is responding to your pitches. So what should you do? Fret about it? Waste of energy! Instead, use your free time to take inventory and then write them down in your blog. This inventory can help remind yourself and your readers who you are and what you do, and perhaps attract new readers who are searching your particular keywords. You may opt to “stick this post to the front page” (check the box next to the Visibility option on the right hand nav in your admin).

Writing Prompt #2: Now, let’s build on the previous writing prompt. You’ve got your inventory, now how about writing a separate blog post about each of those items in your inventory? Expand on each item by adding research from online articles, quotes from previous clients, a flickr or lightbox photo gallery that illustrates this particular item in your inventory, and if you’re really feeling inspired, use your web cam to make a video of yourself talking about that item by creating a free account on Ustream.tv (or you can use YouTube, if you know how to edit a video and upload it).

Writing Prompt #3: If your already exhausted from prompts #1 and #2, you may want to have a guest blogger write about your particular inventory items. It should preferably be someone who has first-hand experience with your inventory. Having someone else’s opinion helps you add things you didn’t consider, or delete things that shouldn’t have been published for public consumption. You are also building a relationship with this other blogger, and this will both of you increase traffic to both your sites.

Writing Prompt #4: You’ve got quite a lot of content now, so post each blog entry to your Facebook or Twitter account so that your friends, family and colleagues can check them out if they are interested. But don’t post them all at once. Milk this time so that you can rest before you get to the next writing prompt.

Writing Prompt #5: Open up a Paypal account so you can charge for your inventory now – whether they are products or services. Sure, you are counting on banner ads and affiliate marketing to make you money, but this is your opportunity to create other potential revenue streams you never thought about before embarking on this series of writing prompts.

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Protected: The Official Hostwire Blog. Beyond Hosting.

Posted on August 12, 2009 by H W in Blogging

Tags: blog, blogger, bottom line, ceo, educate, hostwire, installing wordpress, journalists, money back satisfaction, open source software, traffic websites, uptime, web host, writers block

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Setting Up a Four Drive RAID 10 Array on CentOS 6.2 (64-bit)

Posted on April 24, 2012 by H W in How-to

Sorry, I could not read the content fromt this page.

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How to Start Up a Blog

Posted on August 17, 2009 by H W in Blogging

You are a recently laid-off journalist/lawyer/doctor – whatever…it’s an unstable economy, but you’ve heard that people are making money by blogging about what they know best. You’re smart. You’ve got time. How about building a blog that showcases all the knowledge you’ve amassed over your stellar career? Here are 7 steps to get you started: 1. This will help you figure out your “niches,” as well as make the best use of your Rolodex of reputable sources. If you were a court reporter for 10 years, you could create a blog that fictionalizes some of the articles you wrote for your newspaper or magazine. “But I didn’t know I could write fiction in a blog!” Why not? Get your head out of that box and start using that big brain of yours. 2. “But all the good domain names are already taken!”Whine, whine, whine. This may have worked when you were working for someone else, but now you are an entrepreneur and it’s time to start seeing opportunity rather than doom and gloom.If your name was well-known in your industry, perhaps the name of your blog will be YourName.com.Or maybe you want to be more creative. Just like there are defunct, empty strip malls throughout the U.S., there are tons of defunct, available domain names that never got a chance to be developed: THISLITTLEPIGGYSHOES.COM, FOXYGIRLSHOES.COM, EATMYSHOES.COM are all available, and are just waiting for your little creative mind to add content to their otherwise pointless existences. Can’t be bothered to DIY? Hire Hostwire.com’s sister design company 4fx.com.3. Now that you’ve come up with a domain name that is catchy and will get the attention of a Googlebot, it’s time to register the name and get a year-long web hosting account with Hostwire.com. Why Hostwire.com? Have you seen our prices? 4. After getting your Hostwire account, you can install WordPress with a theme that suits your niche/personality, and includes banner ads that will make you a few cents per click/impression. Could you do this yourself? Yes. Stay tuned this week for a blog post that will give you step-by-step instructions (with screenshots too!). 5. You need to decide how often you will update your blog. Perhaps you will post when you feel like it or when inspiration strikes. This may be OK in the beginning, but if you expect consistent traffic and a steady revenue stream, your blogging should be consistent and steady as well. Updating 2-3 times a week should suffice, and then you can work yourself up to one post per day. It’s kind of like exercising. If you want results, you’ve got to train. You may also want to jot down a list of topics you plan to cover each week. It’s much easier to determine if you follow the calendar cycle of seasons and holidays. For example, when it’s close to Labor Day, write about that holiday in the context of your subject. 6. Hire 4fx.com to design your business cards and then get them printed with our holistic printing friend, Carey Stokes, who has been sourcing printers for clients for 12 years. 7. Sign up for affiliate programs that will help you make money as you build traffic to your site – Amazon.com, Hostwire.com, SeedsofChange.com, Linkshare…there are a bunch, just do a Google search for the specific product you would like to sell.There are lots more things you could do, but these 7 steps will get you started.Tags: available domain names, Blogging, creative mind, doom and gloom, entrepreneur, googlebot, hostwire, journalist, memoir, niche, niches, showcases, unstable economy, web hosting account

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How to Track Traffic to Your Blog

Posted on August 19, 2009 by H W in Blogging

There are a few options in tracking traffic to your blog, and you can employ one of them, or all of them, if you choose. The most popular is Google Analytics (click here). Create an account and click on “Add Website Profile.” Type in the url of your web site (www.MyDomain.com) and click “Finish.” Google Analytics will generate code that you will paste into the “Footer” of your blog.To do that, login to your blog (www.MyDomain.com/wp-admin), and then click on “Appearance” on the left hand navigation bar. Click on “Editor,” which will take you to your theme’s files. Click on footer.php and then paste the code from Google Analytics into the document. Save it and that’s it! Google Analytics will start tracking such information as the amount of unique visitors to your site, the keywords they are using to find your site, where in the world they are coming from and which articles they are clicking most frequently, among other useful things that will help you get to know your audience better.You can also set up Google Analytics to send you a report on a regular basis – daily, weekly, monthly – whatever. We recommend weekly so that you have enough data to compare. Remeber that it will take a while for the code to start tracking traffic, so don’t expect much from your graphs for about a month.Another useful traffic tracker – although much younger than Google Analytics since it launched in 2006 – is Quantcast.com. This service actually tells you if your audience is mostly male or mostly female; whether or not they are educated – how?“The service analyzes your traffic by using the actual data your site generates, based on certain check points. You can learn about your traffic’s demographics, as provided by advertisers, ad networks, ISPS and publishers. It then comes up with an analysis of traffic rankings of millions of websites (20 million and counting).”Does this make sense to the average blogger? Probably not. But like most things, there is a learning curve involved, and once you start reading traffic spreadsheets, you may even become addicted to comparing and contrasting their daily fluctuations. Yeah – there is a little bit of nerd in everyone, so embrace it as closely as the subject about which you blog everyday.Tags: advertisers, audience, blog, blogger, demographics, google, graphs, hand navigation bar, isps, learning curve, left hand navigation bar, profile type, publishers, traffic rankings, unique visitors

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