Awesome WordPress Plugins

So I’ve been surfing like a mad thing (the internet that is) and trawling for useful WordPress plugins – well additional plugins – and I’ve got a reasonably useful list now that I’ll share with y’all.

The primary reason for getting all these is to see what is useful and what isn’t and also to satisfy my craving for new and exciting things to play with on my ‘puter.

So what did I download today? Check out this list:

Latest WordPress plugins I downloaded just now

So what do I think of them all? Well I created this post two weeka ago so I’ve had ample time to test them all and work out what I like. Check out my review findings here.

Writing a business plan

Everyone worth their salt knows that any serious contender in the business world needs a business plan. This includes everyone from the café owner to the budding blogger. Over the coming days I’m going to share with you the key points to putting a business plan together.

This isn’t new to me and I’ve successfully completed a few now.

I cannot stress how crucial they are to ensuring your endeavour, whatever it is, has real focus and a good chance of succeeding. I’ll demonstrate the key elements using the example of a budding blogger to provide some real life insight into how one might go about this.

Here are the broad headings I’ll cover:

1. Executive Summary

2. Introduction

3. The Vision

4. Background to the Business Opportunity

5. The Service Being Offered

6. Marketing

7. Operations

8. Management and Ownership

9. Finance 10. Action Plan

11. Suggestions I’ll provide examples and commentary to help get you down the path to realising your dream endeavour.

So lets get straight into it by looking at the Executive Summary……..[Read more]

A featured blog and 3rd on Google

A blurry-eyed morning, struggling to move from the bed to the shower just because it’s Monday. Pull the curtains and WHAM – sunlight is blinding. Slowley waking and finally sitting down to a large cheese omelete (the breakfast of champions). Lots of work related issues and tasks start bouncing around in my skull and then the other daily ritual begins … check and see – has anyone at all read any of my blogs?

Begin ritual:

Google for clannz (lower case in case it might be cheating to have it match my blog site). It’s my main focus so most likely to have visibility I figure. Nope – nothing added while I slept. Okay – next step.

Check for comments. Okay – can’t see anyone has looked and commented on any of my sites (ngatai.com, clannz.com and riking7.wordpress.com). Onwards to the next step of the ritual.

Do at least one research task a day. Okay. I decide to look at the top three Goggle results from the step above to see what ideas I can come up with. First site. Check. Okay. Lawyers. Cool. Looks professional. Clean and tight looking site. Second site. Check. hmmmm. Funding for education. Don’t like the site colours and style but then they’re not selling anything. They’re giving away money! Doesn’t really matter I guess. Right – third site. hmmm – it’s a WordPress page. Interesting. Hold on … this featured blog looks familiar. Hey. That’s me!!!!! Yikes. I’m a featured blog! NICE ONE!!! Okay. Deep breathing. Maybe they do this for everyone? “Who cares”, I say. Ring the wife and tell her, “Hey I’m third on a Google search and a ‘featured blog’ on the WordPress site”.

What can I say? This morning I’m now fizzing.

Searching on Google I found me - at number three!

Look - I'm a 'featured blog'

Best articles on Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Well I’ve been scouring the internet and am starting to get some good information on getting a blog site listed on Google. I strongly recommend that you read the information listed on the Google Webmasters site which has some great information. Of course the real test is to put it to the test so here’s the challenge – go from nothing to something. What do I mean? Well check out the following screen dump:

Here's a screen shot off my PC taken a few moments ago

Google doesn’t know who I am. Actually I did go to thier webmasters site the day before yesterday and added this site which was then verified (you load a bogus html file into the root directory of your site via FTP and they check to see that it’s there).

So now I’m going to load a sitemap (which is also there in the Webmasters site) and look at other optimisation techniques. I can’t wait till I’m actually in Google! It will be  a milestone achieved.

Now before I forget, I did label this blog ‘Best articles on Search Engine Optimisation’ so I’ll share some of the sites I found which I reckon have the best information on them.

• The first is Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide which covers the basics. I have the assumption that everyone uses Google these days so forgive me if this seems limiting. This site covers the basics and is a ‘must read’ site.
• Next is a UK website www.hobo-web.co.uk which provides new bloggers excellent information on SEO. I’ve bookmarked this site and have reread the info here a number of times.
• Next there is Problogger. Darren Rowse is this guys’ name and he has a wealth of info for the new blogger.
• Finally I’m going to recommend Yoast. This has a strong focus on WordPress (which is what I use and STRONGLY recommend). Yoast has a stack of WordPress optimisation stuff to keep the noob blogger engaged for while.

Best affiliate programs for Kiwis

Yesterday I shared some of the things I had learnt in setting up a blog as far as the foundation work goes. I’ll do a more in depth version of that when I’ve gained a little more momentum. Today I’m looking further at search engine optimisation (SEO) and also affilliate programs.
A colleague at work is already making $500 odd a month so I KNOW that it works. And even better, his sites are loaded with free offerings for the public at large – information and entertainment. It’s not about scamming or trickery. It’s about contribution – something that appeals greatly to me.
So how do you know what the best affiliate programs are? ASK!
I’m meeting with a local group to find out what works best for Kiwis. Can’t wait – and I’ll share what I learn so that others can know. If you look on the internet by ‘googling’ affiliate programs you’ll be swamped with a sqillion pages to wade through. Which one is best?
Watch this space!

Ready for SEO

SEO – Search Engine Optimisation (or ‘optimiZation’ for our american brothers and sisters) is how the humble blogger makes a quid or three via the google ads (and the like). I’ve managed to get a reasonably good looking website together (you’re allowed to disagree) thanks to the creators of the template I’m using. I’ve tweaked all the php pages and code to ensure that the site looks as I expect it. I do love WordPress and the features and the support and all the extra development that goes on. One of the things that I found is a WordPress plugin specifically for Search Engine Optimisation (SEO – I’ll use the acronym from now on). After watching a brief video I’ve worked out how it works and so will give it a shot.

So for anyone wanting to go through the necessary steps to setting up a blog and hosting it etc I do have a few pointers now. Experience, if you will …

• Plan your site. Take the time to really think over what you want it to look like. Think about the content and the focus. There are a squillion sites out there that tell you all about this and it will DEFINITELY save you time in the long run.
• Research other blog sites. You’ll quickly see why the popular sites are popular and what really works. This will help you decide which direction you’ll go in regarding style and content. You’ll also realise that it takes some effort, which leads me to the next point …
• Be prepared to work. I’ve spent a good 20 hours on getting things set-up and in place. It’s not like mowing lawns or clearing the guttering but it is work all the same. I don’t mind th effort – I’m just acknowledging that there is effort involved.
• Be resourceful. You’ll hit minor hurdles and you’ll need to find your own solutions. Don’t panic – everything has been done before and the answers are out there. You may have to hunt them out is all.
• Stay focussed. Family and friends may offer ‘suggestions’ or even ‘help’ but sometimes they’ll be unwittingly negative. Don’t be deterred. You’ve got a plan. Stick with it.