Shape Up Your Domain Name!

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Internet marketing is an extremely broad topic, including too many specialties for anyone to really be an expert in everything. I make no claims to be an expert in anything, however, I’d like to share a few key points with you about domain name composition and structure.

1. The letters and words of your domain name should form a shape, because the eye recognises the shape first, and then identifies the word and meaning.

Letters that sit on, above and through the line create the shape of the words.

The above example is just a block of letters, it doesn’t have a defined shape for the eye to recognise.

However, here’s an excellent example, rewardrebel.com uses letters that sit both on and above the line, forming a spikey shape that’s easy for the eye to recognise and retain.

2. Avoid running the same letters together, as in the first example above - ourownnames – the two n’s running together, makes it difficult for the eye to differentiate the words.

3. Don’t assume that a group of words that makes sense to you, will make the same sense to someone else. When I worked in the hospice/cancer sector, one day a new online publication titled canceri (Cancer I) was launched, and my colleague Ceri asked, “why have they called it Can Ceri?“! Everyone’s perspective has a subjective individuality!

4. Include keywords in your domain name, as this helps improve your website’s ranking by the search engines.

Search engines determine a website’s page rank, in part, by where the keywords appear in the site’s structure. This is why it’s essential that your website has a site map, and you can download Google [XML] Sitemap Generator Plugin here

Enjoy your internet marketing adventure.

Reward Rebel

Popularity: 17% [?]

Blogspot Comments Settings

I’ve encountered quite a number of Blogspot sites on which the Comments settings remain as per the default, and this means that many people are unable to contribute to the topic under discussion.

The default setting for Comments on Blogspot sites is for ‘Users with a Google account’ (Blogger ID), however, this is frustrating for those of us who do not have, or do not like to use, a Blogger ID.

If you’re uncertain how your blog’s comments are set up, I’d like to recommend that you follow this exercise.

Sign into your Blogspot dashboard, and select Settings tab, then select Comments. For the second option down, ‘Who can comment’, you need to select the first option – ‘anyone’.

[Click image to view enlargement.]

SAVE your updated settings, and you’re away — it’s that simple.

Hopefully, you should now receive more comments to your blog than previously, so be prepared to respond to them all!

Of course, if you have a Blogspot site and don’t want any ol’ Tom, Dick or Harry commenting on your posts, you can completely ignore this.

Happy blogging.

Reward Rebel

Popularity: 39% [?]

Working From Home Getting A Tan!

This week, Londoners have enjoyed basking in brilliant sunshine and, as if overnight, my garden has become a jungle, requiring a skilfully wielded machèté to traverse it to the far end!

In the time it takes to blink, the lawn (using the term in its broadest sense) is knee-high, and new foliage is sprouting all around. Blossoms are readying themselves to burst, and I’m especially thrilled that my Magnolia is smothered in buds, as it didn’t flower last Summer.

A smattering of bluebells sprung up this year, but they’re now shrugging off their bright petals to reveal seed pods, which will soon drop, ensuring a more abundant display next Spring.

New life is profoundly inspiring, and a comforting reminder that every living entity renews itself, and that everything has its time.

Yesterday afternoon, I enjoyed a thorough physical workout, attempting to tame the backyard jungle, and today my arms, shoulders, back and legs all attest to how much I am in need of ‘away from the computer’ activities!

I’d just started to cut the grass, when it occurred to me to take a photo - my apologies for the quality.

[Click image to view enlargement.]

Below is a shot of the garden last Summer, after I’d started to knock it into shape.

[Click image to view enlargement.]

There was a spell yesterday when I took a break from hacking down the grass and pulling up weeds, and I sat in the dappled sunlight, listening to the melodic birdsong, and contemplating whatever came into my mind.

Then I realised how privileged I was to be seated in the sun, smelling the fresh cut grass and glimpsing the tiny frogs leaping about their newly-disturbed world.

I’m privileged to be working from home building my own online business. Internet marketing offers many options for making money online, however, my recent experience with blogging has taught me that many people start a blog thinking that they’ll be making money (a full-time living) by blogging alone — this is rare. Making money online with one blog alone is very rare.

Diversify. Your blog can be used as an internet marketing tool to help grow a mailing list, by offering a subscription to a newsletter, updates, or special offers. But don’t immediately start promoting products to your list, first you must gain people’s trust and respect — you have to convince your readers that they can rely on your opinion and recommendation.

They say that an internet marketer, actively promoting to his or her list, earns a minimum of $1 per month for each name on it. That’s why the internet marketing gurus with multiple lists of 50,000 plus are millionaires!

When you have established a reputation, you can email the occasional promotion — your own product, or as an affiliate marketer you could promote other people’s. But be careful. This is an area that’s been highly abused, and I don’t hold with daily mailings, promoting each and every ‘latest and greatest’.

Internet marketers practising this type of email vomit-a-thon in my Inbox don’t retain my name on their list for long. A surprising number do send too many mailings, which makes me wonder if they are making good sales, because people succumb to the pressure. I’d prefer not be making an income by annoying the contacts on my list, and I’d rather retain some dignity, too.

Recommend products that you have purchased, and genuinely consider to be quality and worth the bucks. Once again, I soon unsubscribe when I’m frequently sent recommendations for products from the marketer’s ‘good friend’ who has just launched some new something that he thinks I shouldn’t be without. Phoney, baloney.

Diversify. Develop your own product to promote or, as an affiliate marketer, you can save yourself a whole heap of effort, and earn generous commission, promoting other people’s products.

So many internet marketing strategies can be managed via auto-responders and, once set up, they require the minimum of maintenance. You could be making more money online by doing the same amount of work!

Step back from your blog, view the bigger picture, and apply leverage.

Reward Rebel

Popularity: 44% [?]

4 Day Build-A-Biz Challenge ~ Don’t Miss A Valuable Opportunity

I want to remind you not to miss Derek Gehl’s 4 Day Build-a-Biz Challenge - the first video is released on Monday, 21st April, to qualify for free access, sign-up in advance at 4 Day Build-a-Biz Challenge.

Click the image to link to opt-in form

Derek Gehl, CEO of the highly successful Internet Marketing Center is going to build a fully functioning internet business ~ from scratch ~ in only 4 days, and he’s filming it ‘live’!

I don’t earn anything from you signing-up — I simply believe that if you’re involved in internet marketing, this is a valuable opportunity.

Reward Rebel

Popularity: 25% [?]

How To Write A Popular Post

Peoples’ reactions to my posts constantly surprise me. So often the posts that I expect to generate a response will lie dormant, and the posts that I’ve hurriedly thrown together become the most popular.

Why is this? It suggests that my spontaneous and intuitive posts are better. If this is so, is it because they are spontaneous and intuitive?

Could I practise reverse psychology on myself? Ya know, deliberately don’t prepare a post, brainstorm at the last moment, schlap together a quick article, and I’ll have a winner.

Nah, I don’t think that’ll work.

The aptly titled Spring Surprise is a recent example of a successful last-minute posting.

Because it was snowing hard when I got up that day, I quickly nipped into the garden, pointed the camera in a few different directions to ensure a good picture, downloaded the shots and saved a couple of versions in Photoshop, uploaded to my server and — Bob’s your uncle.

The post was ‘live’, and receiving comments a matter of moments later.

[I was glad that I’d taken the photos, because by the afternoon all evidence of the snow had been completely eradicated!]

But why did that picture generate so much interest? There are articles on this site over which I’ve laboured to find the right word and phrasing. Disconcertingly, they just sit there, all lonely and unloved.

Nope, I’ll never understand it.

I don’t know how you organise writing your posts and articles, but fortunately, my very nature guarantees that there will always be a generous sprinkling of spontaneous, intuitive, last-minute items!

Reward Rebel

Popularity: 21% [?]

Build A Custom Wordpress Theme

What do you think of Reward Rebel’s new interim header? ‘Interim’ because the entire theme is being rebuilt. The most exciting aspect of this piece of news is that it’s being rebuilt by me!

In case you’ve not visited this website previously, this is Reward Rebel prior to the revamp.

Click the image to ENLARGE

There’s still a long way to go - the first thing I have to do is reduce the depth of the header graphic*, but at last my website now has a unique appearance.

[* I’ve reduced the depth of the header graphic from 343px to 275px, which is more balanced.]

I’m working hard learning CSS, PHP and all routes in between. However, I have a particular debt of gratitude to John Pratt on whose blog, JT Pratt’s Blogging Mistakes reside the most awesome tutorials, in particular, tutorials covering various elements of Wordpress.

John also introduced me to Theme Test Drive, an empowering Wordpress plug-in that enables you to play with a new theme, whilst your readers still see the regular theme!

As long as you’re logged into your Wordpress Dashboard as Administrator, you’ll see the new ‘test’ theme and its changes on your website. Log out as Administrator, and you’ll see your blog just as the rest of the blogosphere sees it. Cool, huh? I think so, and I’m sure you’ll agree.

Check out John’s tutorial on Theme Test Drive for yourself. It’ll help you achieve your own unique blog theme, and if you also study John’s articles, you’ll avoid blogging mistakes of your own!

Have fun building your unique custom Wordpress theme… and don’t forget to let me know how you get on!

Reward Rebel

Popularity: 26% [?]

4 Day “Build-a-Biz Challenge”

Have you heard of Derek Gehl? Derek is the CEO of The Internet Marketing Center [IMC] - a highly successful, multi-faceted internet marketing venture offering guidance to the budding entrepreneur.

Last year I purchased a copy of ‘The Insider Secrets (To Marketing Your Business On The Internet)’, published by IMC, and have never regretted it - mind you, it was on special offer and a steal! But seriously, this is a course I often refer to, and IMC and Derek Gehl know their internet marketing stuff.

Click the image below to sign up for free to a series of videos Derek is producing, in which he will spend four days creating a website from scratch, nothing left out - he’ll show us everything.

Wow, I hear you say, what’s so special about that?

Click the image to link to video optin

Well, when I say a website, you have to bear in mind that this is Derek Gehl – the internet marketing millionaire – so it’s not just a website, it’ll be a website that sells!

As Derek himself puts it, “I’ll walk you through the exact steps you need to follow to create a website that sells”.

Ah, now you’re interested.

The complete 4 Day “Build-a-Biz Challenge” video course will be released over a four-day period: April 21-24th. What’s more, it will be absolutely FREE — but only for people who pre-register for it here.

Look, I don’t earn anything by telling you about this – that’s not an affiliate link. This is a valuable opportunity that I wanted to ensure you knew about — I’ll be watching these videos, and I hope you’ll do the same.

When we’ve all made our millions, we can get together in the Caribbean and boastfully compare yachts! LOL!

Reward Rebel

Popularity: 22% [?]