Do You Use Drupal or Wordpress?

Running an online business is frustrating. I know that there are several people here running IT businesses that can add their own horror stories to this blog post.

Building a web platform (website) on a software program that promises to do 10 times what you need, and then only produces half of what you need - and that is with continual updates, bug reports, and a multitude of widgets and plug ins. We did that this year - twice.

Then there are programmers. I can say one name Bxxca and a cold child will run down the spine of any TE at www.inspiredauthor.com who was with us about 15 months ago. Yes, the programmer who did half the job and then demanded more money than my car is worth to finish, that is after we found porn running out of the back end of our server. That hit our Page Rank hard for a good long time.

I have been trying to hire a programmer for months at places like ifreelance. Most of the time I get people who want to be paid to learn their trade. When asked, they don't know the software program - but that is no problem..they are use to being paid to learn. I can't afford that. I doubt many of you can.

Then comes a good day. You find someone that actually knows what you are talking about. I found someone like that in Sheldon www.gamedevguru.com who is not expensive, because he doesn't need to spend fifteen hours figuring out the software before he gets started. He did more on my www.inspiredauthor.com in 2hours than anyone else I've met.

I wanted to let you know about him, one - because he not only knows Drupal but he is great with Worpress, too. I know that many of you are on wordpress - which is a good content management system (as Sharon HH has taught me :).

So, next time you are stuck, want to do something new, want to fix a bug. Don't panic - there is someone who can help you at: www.gamedevguru.com


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Compare Web Hosting Services

Many writers maintain multiple blogs, web pages, and even start critique groups in forums. It can be difficult to manage. Myself, I have more than 10 blogs, 3 websites, 2 forums, and a newsletter. That is why I decided to discuss web hosting today.

One question most new web owners tackle is the hosting problem. Trust me, I've been on every level. From buying into a great marketing campaign, only to find that the company is a reseller and doesn't know what they are doing, to owning virtual server space and hiring a programmer to run things (expensive!).

I've been through several hosting companies. Now I use siteground. I can host all of my sites from one dashboard. The service is great. In fact, in a year I only heard of them failing to fix a problem once, and that was a programming problem.

They install scripts free, from wordpress to moodle. And they have alwasy fixed my small problems - like when a script stops working. In fact, they are so good at fixing problems, I've only paid programmers $100 this year! And that was for improving, not fixing.

All of this for a cost of $70 a year for my first site, and about $50 a year for the rest of the sites.

I haven't moved to a dedicated server yet, because my bandwidth allotment is more than it was on the dedicated server, and I have less 404 messages - meaning that the system isn't clogging with traffic. In fact, at one site that claimed to be one of the top 10 in the country, I had 20% 404 messages!!!

They use Cpanel, with excelent stat information, more than 30 scripts for blogs and websites, chats, newsletters, forums, etc - everything you need.

There is a good reason why this site is the #1 hosting site for many of the top ecommerce scripts.



Most important, I have never been hacked, but at the same time, there is no probelm with search engines. I found out - the hard way - that many resllers or 'amateur' hosting services work through Internet companies which make it difficult for search engines.

In fact, our response from Google changed from 2 - 3 months, to days, after switching from the other 'big host' to siteground.

However, to be fair. Godaddy is a better place for newbies. You can phone about everything, you can get 'instant' websites, and they will help you with problems - but they are more expensive. While siteground does offer a domain service - I still manage my domains through godaddy. One thing I did learn, is that many resellers work for godaddy-which gives them the right to say they are the biggest.










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The New Online World

It is impossible to learn how to become a freelance writer without becoming an expert on the web. Not only do you need 'net' tools to deal with clients, but you also need to familiarize yourself with tools that other writers use.

One that you'll become familiar with quickly is web and video conferencing. At first, web writers thought this new Social Media would hurt their careers. However, they have improved the web writing world. Writers are now needed to supply better dcontent. The 'evergreen' content is now posted on videos, web writers are now supplying the in-depth, cutting edge knowledge.

It won't take long before you find yourself in a web conference. It is an interesting experience, talking to someone with video and audio feed, as if they were in the next room.

Pro Bloggers - Diva Networking

I've finally stepped out of the 'newbie' teaching arena and into the pro market. More than three years ago I started to teach people how I make enough money to launch a magazine, publishing company, buy a house, and be the only income earner in the house.

I've posted hundreds of free articles for new writers, encouraging them, and helping them learn that a) it can be done b) they can do it, and c) there is money.

Now, the mentoring group is growing, but so is the network of bloggers and freelance writers who I work with. I am learning as much from them as they learn from me.

The next step is to help everyone increase their PR rating. This gave birth to a new site:

Diva Networking

This base site will be a place of resources and news.

A few months ago I ran a project for bloggers, exchanging links, and helping each other with our PR rating. This worked, so I decided to make a group for bloggers who are interested in becoming full time bloggers - that is, making $1000 a month or more.

Blogger Promotion

I have set it up so that we can work toward improving our PR ratings, with only 1 hour a month invested. I also want to create an opportunity for people to earn money posting blogs to search engines, building links, etc.

I am not interested in this being a 1000 member group. Instead, I would rather have 50-100 great bloggers, who are dedicated to creating a strong network.



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How Much $$ Does Multitasking Costing You?

I use to be an amazing multitasker. I can still hold up to six IM conversations while checking my emails.

However, I have learned that multitasking increases stress, drains me so that I do not want to spend time with 'life' at the end of the day, and it actually decreases my productivity.

It can be difficult to conduct a business without multitasking. Many freelance writers find themselves working on several projects at once. Work at Home professionals are forced to promote, manage the home, manage their business, and have a life - all at the same time.

However, multitasking costs time, and is money.
It took me about two years to learn how to organize my time, reducing the need for multitasking, and improving my productivity.

There is no secret. Everyone must find their own comfort-zone. I can give you some tips though.
1. Plan to do one job a
day - if possible. When done that job, then start a second task.
2. Open your emails, etc. first thing in the morning - then don't go back that day unless you finish your work.
3. Turn MSN and the telephone off when you have a major task to complete in one day.
4. Set a time limit for research. Do not research until you have 'enough.' A time limit will force you to work faster and smarter. When you have reached the end of your time limit, start writing. When finished, decide then if you need more research. Or, write your project in parts.
5. Do not do housework in 'work' time.
6. Expect your family to assist in house cleaning, laundry, etc...as if you worked out of the house. OR, tell them that the business money is business money. Hubby cannot dip into it because he is low this month. Business money is not bill money. If the family wants it, they help around the house, if not - then you can write off a maid (in Canada and the USA) and it is part of the business expenses.
7. Have a set number of work hours.
8. Learn to say no.
9. Do not let your emotional state control what you do. I've noticed that many work at home professionals make comments like 'I don't feel well', 'I didn't feel like it.'
10. Keep track of how many hours you devote to each task. Over time, this will teach you to work more productively, and it will help you determine how much time you really invest in a week.

One woman I talked to was frustrated. She had tried to get into freelance writing for seven months, but was still not making any money. After writing down her week, she found she only 'actively' worked for 19 - 22 hours. So, I told her she hadn't 'worked' for seven months - but if she considered a 40 hour work week, then she only worked for about three months.







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Securing Wi Fi Internet from Intruders

Every time a person logs on to a public Wi-Fi access point, they are transmitting their login name and password over open airwaves, and often a credit card number as well, and sensitive business information.
Businesses are intrigued with the idea of Wi Fi blocking paint. In theory, it will keep your wireless in, and more importantly, keep others out. Radio wave blocking shields have been used in theaters for years. More than the fear that this paint contains lead has stirred the controversy.

Business is always looking for a way to keep corporate secrets a secret.

Keeping a network's susceptibility to malicious attacks as low as possible is an ongoing concern for many businesses. Cell phones, black berries, and wi fi are all at risk. Private residents only need to worry about neighbors or strangers who park outside th ir home and overload their network with spam and illegal downloads.

The best way people currently keep intruders out of their internet is by enabling WEP or WPA encryption on the network and by changing the password on the router, something very few people realize must be done.

EM-SEC currently sells laptop inserts and phone holsters with an electromagnetic shield, which restricts the detection of Wi-Fi signals. This is meant to deter laptop thieves.

Boyd, Vice President and Director of Technology for EM-SEC Technologies, LLC. -
“As hackers, identity thieves and even terrorists become more sophisticated in the methods they use to obtain information or inflict damage, this experiment confirmed EM-SEC Coating reduces the threat from electronic eavesdropping and blocks out electromagnetic interference for the protection of electronic data.”

Now, SEC Technologies provides another option: wireless blocking paint. One coat of this paint "creates an electromagnetic fortress by preventing airborne hackers from intercepting signals."

Great for a business who leases an office in a building with several competing businesses, but does it work? Some theaters use this paint, but it doesn’t stop cell signals. In fact, random tests on this product show that it reduces the flow of RF signals but does not stop them.

One problem is that you’d need to paint floors, ceiling, walls, and windows with a thick layer of paint that contains a metal if you want to stop all the leakage.

The EM-SEC Coating was initially developed to aid the U.S. Government and Military in shielding operation centers. “We have developed an innovative shielding system that cannot only be utilized by corporate offices, boardrooms, server and computer rooms and research and development laboratories to protect their digital assets from electronic eavesdropping, but it will also ensure the safe operation of wireless networks”, said Wayne LeGrande, President and Chief Technical Officer, EM-SEC Technologies, LLC.

Businesses are not in a hurry to incorporate the new paint. Their fear is that cell phone and Wi Fi blocking paint will disrupt service and quickly drive the cases to the Federal court.

Should business worry? As recently as two years ago, surveys revealed that most Wi Fi networks used no encryption. Anyone with a laptop and Wi Fi card can intercept and read data packets sent and received by users. While most networks use encryption now, they use WEP, which is easily by hackers with readily downloadable "sniffing" tools, such as those used by "wardrivers." Haven’t heard the term? Wardrivers wander the streets looking for networks to join. Most are hobbyists or bandwidth seekers, but some are malicious.

Home improvement company Lowe's learned this the hard way. A Wi-Fi network was transmitting credit card and data from cashiers. Three college-age men in the parking lot of the Southfield, Michigan store broke it into the system and captured credit card information,. altering the software code used by Lowe's to process credit cards, and gained access to computers in six other stores.



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3 Elements of a Successful Advertising Campaign

Most business owners do not explore new marketing strategies until they experience a sharp decline in their revenue. Avertising campaigns are not evergreen. They evolve and grow, improve and degenerate. Most work at home, or small business owners shell out a substantial amount of money for a good ad campaign and then let it run dry.

The first strategy for success is found in the way you view the advertising campaign’s purpose. A good advertising campaign needs to do three things. First, it needs to collect data on the market. Who is buying. What is hot, and what is not.

Second, it needs to collect vital information about the people who make a purchase from your website. This can be compiled into a profile that helps you determine how to best reach your target market. It is a market research tool that helps determine what types of advertising works, at what times of the year.

Third, it should ‘brand’ your name and logo. A successful advertising campaign will imprint the company name and logo onto people’s subconscious. This increase their ‘decision to buy’ response when they visit the website

For example, online shopping increases dramatically just before Christmas, but only if the payment gateway is fast and easy to use. However, if the user must leave the website to use the payment gateway, like paypal.com uses, then the statistics do not change. However, the payment gateway does not effect sales in the summer.

You’ll notice that no aspect of an advertising campaign is to sell the product – that is your website’s job. A successful marketing campaign manager never measure’s an advertising campaign’s success based on sales.

Large corporations will tell you that a successful advertising campaign may run for months before the results appear on the income statement.

The advertising campaign should be reviewed often, and compared to new methods, in the hunt for new ‘hot markets.’ However, hot markets burn out very quickly. The whirlwind of change that continuously sweeps through the marketplace is a powerful balancer. It gives small businesses an edge over the elephants that move slow and react to change in months, not weeks.

This is true, but there needs to be balance. Always keep 80% of the marketing budget in the tried and true marketing methods – even if they do not offer the big rewards. The other 20% of the marketing budget is free for exploration of new advertising mediums. Don’t discount anything. Look at the fortunes made when youtube.com and myspace.com skyrocketed to fame. For a few months, advertisers were raking in millions.

It is also important to keep a finger on the pulse of the population. There is a time to brand your company, and a time to break away from the pack and create a new image for yourself like Calvin Cline did with their underwear commercials.

The important thing to remember is to focus. Calvin Cline didn’t try to sell underwear to all age groups, they focused on a narrow niche. Work at home and small business owners need to learn this lesson – niche marketing is the secret to making millions.

The potential is expansive. Clever competition and new technology should be seen as marketing tools, not threats. Staying on the cutting edge is all about innovation and creativity. Money is no longer the #1 element to success. Many small businesses are becoming international on small budgets.





My 'teaching blog' for people who want a 'real' freelance writing career.

Novel Writer Magazine

The ‘You and Them’ Them Marketing Principal

Work at home opportunities offer business owners an advantage over the big companies. Here are 5 secrets to help work at home businesses gain the upper hand over the competition – every time.

It doesn’t matter what you sell, what market you are in, or how much you have to invest. Everyone has competition. Even the local farmer’s market must compete against the big box conglomerate which owns the local grocery store chain.

Any business who wants to survive and thrive in today’s market needs to manage the competition and outperform their competitors. You can get caught up in the scams, writing long pages of testimonials that are suppose to separate ‘fools from their money.’ Or, you can follow the tried and true, marketing strategies that were used to help the international franchises grow.

Building the X factor - You

Customers are always looking for something different. Shopping is just the primal urge to find items the ‘clan’ needs for survival, and look for something new and better that will give your family the edge.

Ebook marketers may all sell the same ebook as one thousand other resellers, but one will emerge and profit while 900 fail to make money, and quit. The successful retailers knew what made their customers buy. They were not interested in hits, they only wanted sales.

In most cases, they created a brand, an image for their company and promoted that – not the product. People are tired of having advertisements shove down the ‘over-inflated’ advantages of a product or service.

The first step is to create an image that will speak to your ‘target audience.’ Do they want professionalism, a helping hand, a friend, or to feel that they are receiving something for nothing?

Customer service is still the #1 sales tool. In fact, most companies are now branding the company owner – not the product. This is called the X factor. No competitor can undermined this, reproduce it, or steal it.

A marketer, John Colanzi, says "stop promoting products and start promoting you"

Become Friends

People buy from someone they trust. The #1 reason why those long pages of testimonials do not work is because there is no ‘face’ to attach to the product.

However, you can also form a Joint Venture with another company. Two companies can work together cheaper than one can. The important factor when hunting down a Joint Venture is to look for a company with the same target market, the same strengths.

A great principal is to find your closest competitor and learn to work together. Joint Ventures can be as simple as sharing links, content exchange, ezine swaps, affiliate selling, endorsements, interviews, joint authorship of books, sharing the cost of promotional products – the scope is limitless.

The ‘You and Them’ marketing principal can work in any market. The product is no longer important, because you are branding yourself, selling yourself, and then working with other like minded people so that you can both secure a larger segment of the market.











My 'teaching blog' for people who want a 'real' freelance writing career.

Novel Writer Magazine

Article Tips and Tricks From the Pros

Many work at home business owners post a hundred free content articles in the article directories, before they realize that there is more to the free content link building program then first meets the eye.

While the article directories work, there is a little more involved for Internet Marketers who want to max out their links in a short time.

Article Directories And Newsletters

The article directories are divided by category, but most of the time, they are so vague that web publishers need to waste hours finding a great article.
The most common application for web articles is in newsletters. Most webmasters promise their visitors a bi-weekly, or monthly newsletter. Instead of collecting articles from writers, they use free content.

The way to appeal to these publishers is to write ‘dynamite’ titles. To many article writers use titles like, how to start a work at home business, start a business in ten days, etc.. Instead, solve a problem for the readers and use titles to sell the article. Titles like ‘WHAM! Make Money This Week,” “I Will Help You Earn a Living in Less Than a Year,” “Toss Internet Marketing Out the Door.”

This type of title makes the publisher look good in their subscribers eye. It looks like the publisher is giving their subscribers something new and innovative.

Evergreen Content

Many people ask what evergreen content really is. In short, it is anything which has been written about thousands of times, and can be found on any website.

It is easy to write evergreen content. Find a few versions on the web, compile the information, rewrite it, and there is another article ready for the web.

Unfortunately, most publishers have already published a few articles with the same information. They need something new.

Build an Article

1. The trick is adding one new piece of information near the top of the article. And – forget the introduction. The business is not writing for magazine publication. Keep To The Point.

2. Start the article by highlighting a problem, and then promise to solve the problem.

3. Break the article into easy to ‘skim’ sections. Each section shouldn’t just tell someone how to do something, it should show them HOW to do it.

4. End on a positive point that encourages the reader to move on to the next article. While it might be nice to have people click the link- it never happens. In fact, articles that end with a ‘hard sell’ and try to steal the reader, are often overlooked by newsletter publishers who want the visitor to buy from their site.
This section ‘Build an Article’ is an example of showing people HOW to write a good article.

Example of Telling people WHAT needs to be done: You need to build good web articles that solve problems the reader will face.

Pro Active Marketing

After a few months go to Google or Yahoo and search the article titles. Find out who is using the content, and why. Thy to gear future articles to favour the products sold on those web pages.

Another good idea is to contact the webmaster and ask them if they would like to receive a free article each month. Many will love the time saving idea.
Taking control of the article distribution will also give writers the opportunity to embed their link in the article using keywords. This creates an executive link, which is given a higher rank by the search engines.

Happy article writing -



My 'teaching blog' for people who want a 'real' freelance writing career.

Novel Writer Magazine