Serene Destiny http://serenedestiny.com/blog The Development Blog of Nicole Foster Wed, 17 Feb 2010 04:12:27 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 en hourly 1 Create a Light-Weight jQuery Accordion Plugin http://serenedestiny.com/blog/create-a-light-weight-jquery-accordion-plugin/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/create-a-light-weight-jquery-accordion-plugin/#comments Tue, 16 Feb 2010 17:59:36 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=619

With the release of jQuery’s UI plugins, making different plugins such as accordions, drop down menus and etc, much easier.

With an accordion plugin, you can easily show off your work in a stylish and user-friendly manner.

Today, you will be learning how to create a light-weight jquery accordion plugin and how easy it is to make one.

The Image

To make the accordion more appealing, it is a good idea to have a nice interface image for different areas of the accordion.

In this tutorial, I have created a very simple sprite for the headers of the accordions. The top image is for the normal state of the headers, and the bottom image for when the head are selected and hovered.

The Markup

To start off you need to download three javascript files:

Once those are download, set up your HTML file like this:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
<title>Light-Weight Accordion</title>
<script type="text/javascript" src="jquery.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="dimensions.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="accordion.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
$(document).ready(function(){
// You can change #accordian to whatever div you want and it will still work
jQuery('#accordion').accordion();
});
</script>
<link href="style.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" />
</head>

<body>
<div id="accordion">
<a href="#">First header</a>
<div>
<p>First content</p>
</div>

<a href="#">Second header</a>
<div>
<p>Second content</p>
</div>

<a href="#">Third header</a>
<div>
<p>Third content</p>
</div>

<a href="#">Fourth header</a>
<div>
<p>Fourth content</p>
</div>
</div>
</body>
</html>
  • The a tags are used to show the header of the content in that accordion. An example would be if you had a portfolio piece in the content, you would name the header after the project’s name.
  • In the div tag is the actual content of the accordion. Use this to describe whatever you want.

The CSS

The CSS is also very easy. Each element of the accordion has #accordion before it’s name and is followed by an a declaration.

Since I am using image sprites, it makes the CSS code more compact and easy to use. If you don’t know how image sprites work, please follow this tutorial on What CSS Sprites are, How to use them and Why they’re cool.

@charset "utf-8";
/* CSS Document */

/* bad reset */
* { margin: 0; padding: 0;}

/* layout elements */
a { text-decoration: none; color: black; border: 0; }
body { background: #CCC; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; }

/* accordion*/
#accordion {
	width: 400px;
	margin: 10px auto 0 auto;

}
/* change the header colors and background image with this code */
#accordion a {
	background: url(images/a-imgs.png) 0 0;
	border: 1px solid white;
	height: 17px;
	padding: 12px 5px;
	display:block;
	font-weight: bold;
}
/* change the hover image with this code */
#accordion a:hover {
	background: url(images/a-imgs.png) 0 41px;
	border: 1px solid #0086e4;
	height: 17px;
}
/* change what it looks like when it is selected with this code */
#accordion a.selected{
	background: url(images/a-imgs.png) 0 41px;
	border: 1px solid #0086e4;
	height: 17px;
}

/* this is the code for the content in the dropdown part of the accordion */
#accordion div {
	padding: 5px 5px;
	background: #FFF;
	height: auto;
}
  • The #accordion styles the general accordion. You can set a width the element and spacing.
  • The #accordion a styles the header link in between the a tags. You can set a background to it like I did, change the color of the link and add many different things.
  • The #accordion a:hover styles what the header link will look like when hovered. You can set a different background image and a different link color.
  • The #accordion a.selected styles what the header link will look like when it is selected. You can do the same options as the #accordion a:hover element.
  • The #accordion div styles the content below the header link. You can change the background, change the text color, change the spacing and really anything you want.

View the Source Download the Code

PG

Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
]]> http://serenedestiny.com/blog/create-a-light-weight-jquery-accordion-plugin/feed/ 2 5 Reliable and Affordable Web Hosts http://serenedestiny.com/blog/5-reliable-and-affordable-web-hosts/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/5-reliable-and-affordable-web-hosts/#comments Sun, 14 Feb 2010 16:55:20 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=605

Now that you have a website (hopefully created by a talented freelancer), it’s time to think about where you will host your website.

For those who don’t know what a host is, it is:

a type of Internet hosting service that allows individuals and organizations to make their own website accessible via the World Wide Web. Web hosts are companies that provide space on a server they own or lease for use by their clients as well as providing Internet connectivity, typically in a data center. -Wikipedia

Every host is different in its own way whether it’s price or storage. You need to carefully select a host that fits your website. So without further adieu, here are 5 reliable and affordable hosts you should consider.

Host Gator

Price: Starts at $4.95 a month

My thoughts: Host Gator is a good option for businesses that are just starting out and need an affordable plan. Though I have personally never used Host Gator, I haven’t seen many bad reviews about Host Gator. They are affordable, reliable and solid hosting company.

Dream Host

Price: Starts at $5.95 a month

My thoughts: I personally use this host and I love it. It’s affordable and  very reliable, which is great for a web designer like me. This host is great for everybody, but if you need a lot of spaces and some creative freedom; this is the host for you.

Globat Hosting

affiliate_link

Price: Starting at $4.44 a month

My thoughts: Globat is known for having affordable plans and good customer service. Nonetheless, if you search the web, you may see some bad reviews. Though, I recommend Globat as an affordable and reliable hosting, be sure to read over the reviews and make your decision.

Blue Host

Price: Starting at $6.95 a month

My thoughts: Before I switched over to Dream Host, I used Blue Host and I loved it as well. Blue host is very reliable and offers a great deal for their packages. They are loved by their customers and I have seen nothing but good reviews for them.

Think Host

Price: Starting at $7.95 a month

My thoughts: When I found they are powered by wind and solar energy, I was shocked and happy. Think Host powers its servers by harnessing wind and sun; I can’t think of another host that does that! Besides that, they a very good prices for the many, many features it offers. For the love of the environment, I would suggest Think Host to anybody.

What is your favorite host and why? Post in the comments and I might add your suggestions in a future post.

PG

Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
]]> http://serenedestiny.com/blog/5-reliable-and-affordable-web-hosts/feed/ 7 6 Elements of a Successful Website http://serenedestiny.com/blog/6-elements-of-a-successful-website/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/6-elements-of-a-successful-website/#comments Thu, 11 Feb 2010 04:43:24 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=580

Okay, now you’re convinced that your business needs a website and you are looking to build a successful website. That sounds easy, right? Wrong. It’s not impossible, but it takes more than just a pretty design; it takes unique content, a clear purpose, fast loading and much more than you think.

Luckily, you are graced by a freelance website designer who knows her stuff.

Content

This is listed first for a reason: unique and informative content is key to a successful website.

  • Write your content according to your target market – It is important to recognize the traits of your target market. You need to make sure that you are writing content that is interesting and understandable to that target audience.
  • Your content needs to be informative – Remember that you’re trying to sell your product/services, not just trying to impress people with your design. You need to describe your product/service in the most informative and simplest form or your visitors will have no clue what your product/service is and leave your website.
  • Make sure your content is unique and fresh – There will always be competitors in your market, so you need to make sure your content is unique and updated regularly. If your content is not updated regularly and not unique, visitors are more likely to go towards your competitor because their content is more appealing and fresh.

Purpose

Before you even create a website, you need to think of what your purpose is. You need to figure out why your business exists and how you can help the visitor with your product/service.

  • Research your target audience – Before you start any project with your business, you should always research information about your target audience such as their ages, their demographics, their interests, their abilities and etc. With that information, you can come up with your purpose.
  • Create an Elevator Pitch – Once you know your website’s purpose, you need to come up with an elevator pitch to reel in your visitors. An elevator pitch should only be 1-3 sentences that sum up your business in simplest terms.

Loading Time

Internet users are very picky and impatient. If your website is taking too long to load, they will not wait around for it. To keep your visitors at your website you need to make sure your website is fast loading.

  • Optimize your images – Besides code, images are the number one reason why sites load slow. If your site has a large amount of images, you should always optimize them. Check out Yahoo’s Smush.it to “smush” your images and reduce the amount of time it takes to load your website.
  • Optimize your website’s code – Like I said, a website’s code is usually the main reason websites are slow. You may have too much going on in your CSS and HTML. Here is a useful article on the 7 Principles of Clean and Optimized CSS.
  • Do you really need it? - Look around your website. Do you see an unnecessary javascript code or an unnecessary HTML code? If so, you should remove it immediately. If it is not going to benefit your visitors and your website, then you should remove the code.

Navigation

Navigation is a very key part of a website. For a user to fully immerse themselves in your website, you need to make sure your navigation is easy to use.

  • Help them get to where they want to go – The whole point of a navigation scheme is to help your users get to the important parts of a website. You need to make sure the links to your pages are short and to the point. If you want to direct them to your services, the best way to word it would be “Services”.
  • Tell them what’s available on your website - The navigation scheme is a great way to promote what’s available on your website. Make sure you take advantage of your scheme to give important information to your users.
  • Make it easy for them to reach you – The deal-breaker for most visitors wanting to purchase your product/services is making it easy for them to reach you. You must always have a way for the user to contact you or you will see a lack of purchases/sales.

Usability

Usability is an easy to concept to understand, but very hard to apply. Usability involves making sure the average visitor can understand and navigate through your website.

  • Remember users have short attention spans – You have to keep in mind that users have short attention spans, so you need to grab their attention with images and bold or italicized words. Use those sparingly though because it can backfire and the visitor may  be too distracted from the main content.
  • Use Call to Action buttons – One of the main tips of usability is to use call to action buttons. Call to action buttons are guides for the visitor to direct them to where they want to go. On my main website, I have two call to action buttons, one to direct visitors to my portfolio and one to direct visitors to my contact form. Those two buttons act as guide for potential clients to go to the important parts of my website.

Design

Lastly, the design is an important factor a successful website. If the design lacks personality, creativity and professionalism, then the visitor will not be attracted to your website because it’s not unique.

  • Use your personality to your advantage – The best way to stand out from your competitor is to put personality into the website. Whether it’s a personality of the company or of you, it is a great way to stand out.
  • Keep it Simple Stupid! – The design should not confuse the visitor from the main point of your website. If your design has elements that confuse or distract the visitor, then they will leave.
  • Add a hint of creativity – It never hurts to add a hint of creativity with your business. Like adding your personality, it is another great way to make your business unique and to stand out from your competitors.
PG

Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
]]> http://serenedestiny.com/blog/6-elements-of-a-successful-website/feed/ 4 Why You Should Hire a Freelancer http://serenedestiny.com/blog/why-you-should-hire-a-freelancer/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/why-you-should-hire-a-freelancer/#comments Sun, 17 Jan 2010 11:40:04 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=432

No matter what you need done; freelancers are a valuable resource to any business owner. They are experts in their field, they are always up-to-date, they are cost effective, they are dedicated to deadlines and they are creative.

They are experts in their field.

Freelancers spend years at a time learning and perfecting their skills. Whether they design websites, create content or program applications; freelancers spend all of their time on their niche.

They are always up to date.

Freelancers are truly committed to their niche and they spend hours learning new techniques. If you look around on the web, you will see several blogs that keep freelancers up to date on their niche and they are always very popular.

They are cost effective.

Freelancers are independent people who do not working for agencies. This means you do not have to pay for additional fees for the agency or for an employer and they can work with your budget.

They are dedicated to deadlines.

Freelancers are very dependent on their deadlines. If freelancers do not stick by their deadlines, they feel as if they have failed in their task and because of this, they are very dependable to get the job done.

They are creative.

Most importantly, all freelancers are different from each other. They all have different styles that are equally creative. They know how to put sparkle on your website and they know how to make the viewer go “Wow!”

PG

Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
]]> http://serenedestiny.com/blog/why-you-should-hire-a-freelancer/feed/ 5 Why YOUR business needs a website http://serenedestiny.com/blog/why-your-business-needs-a-website/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/why-your-business-needs-a-website/#comments Sat, 16 Jan 2010 17:22:44 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=562

When starting a business, you may ask yourself “Do I need a website?” Look around on the internet and you can answer your question with a yes.

There are 20+ million online shoppers these days. One day, a shopper may come across your business. Even if your business is too small or your idea is too obscure, somebody will be attracted your business.

A website can establish your brand.

If you are a new business looking to establish your brand, a website is the best way to establish your brand. A website with rich content and a professional design is a poster-board for your brand. You can put your logo and message directly on the website and viewers will immediately see your brand. If you can put your brand next to your message, your brand will become recognizable to your viewers.

A website can reach new markets.

The internet is a global tool and can be used everywhere in the world. Websites are accessible across many countries because the domain name of your website will always be the same in all countries and areas. With a website, you have the option to reach only local customers or you can expand your business globally.

A website can build a good image.

A website is perfect for building a good image. A good image is very important to attracting customers. Without a good image or having a bad image will drive away customers from your business. A website that has a good, user-friendly design and rich, organized content will show professionalism to your customers, thus making customers interested in your business.

A website can always be changed.

If you decides to change an aspect of your business such as a product or service; a website can be easily changed. Websites are very flexible because you have the power of changing the code of the website itself. You can always change what will be displayed and what will not be displayed.

A website can increase your competitive advantage.

Even though there are millions of shoppers online, many businesses choose not to have a website. When your competition decides not to have a website for their company, you can gain a competitive edge against them.

Say a customer is looking for a digital camera and you sell digital cameras. Their first step would be search “digital cameras”. Now imagine only a few businesses like yours have a website and you have one too. The customer will see your website in the midst of others and may decide to buy from you because you had a website and the other businesses did not.

PG

Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
]]> http://serenedestiny.com/blog/why-your-business-needs-a-website/feed/ 1 HTML5 CSS Reset http://serenedestiny.com/blog/html5-css-reset/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/html5-css-reset/#comments Mon, 03 Aug 2009 04:04:04 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=470

HTML5, the shiny, and new HTML for all coders to flee to. For those who have coded in HTML5, you will see new elements, new attributes, and so much more!

We all know: I advocate CSS resets. I believe CSS resets are essential to any project. They help reset elements, and attributes so you can work with them easily. Well, you can guess what I stumbled upon.

A HTML5 reset.

I happened to stumble upon a HTML5 Reset Stylesheet thanks to HTML5 Doctor. Without delay, here is the HTML5 reset:

/*
html5doctor.com Reset Stylesheet
v1.4
2009-07-27
Author: Richard Clark – http://richclarkdesign.com
*/

html, body, div, span, object, iframe,
h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, p, blockquote, pre,
abbr, address, cite, code,
del, dfn, em, img, ins, kbd, q, samp,
small, strong, sub, sup, var,
b, i,
dl, dt, dd, ol, ul, li,
fieldset, form, label, legend,
table, caption, tbody, tfoot, thead, tr, th, td,
article, aside, dialog, figure, footer, header,
hgroup, menu, nav, section,
time, mark, audio, video {
margin:0;
padding:0;
border:0;
outline:0;
font-size:100%;
vertical-align:baseline;
background:transparent;
}
body {
line-height:1;
}

article, aside, dialog, figure, footer, header,
hgroup, nav, section {
display:block;
}

nav ul {
list-style:none;
}

blockquote, q {
quotes:none;
}

blockquote:before, blockquote:after,
q:before, q:after {
content:”;
content:none;
}

a {
margin:0;
padding:0;
border:0;
font-size:100%;
vertical-align:baseline;
background:transparent;
}

ins {
background-color:#ff9;
color:#000;
text-decoration:none;
}

mark {
background-color:#ff9;
color:#000;
font-style:italic;
font-weight:bold;
}

del {
text-decoration: line-through;
}

abbr[title], dfn[title] {
border-bottom:1px dotted #000;
cursor:help;
}

table {
border-collapse:collapse;
border-spacing:0;
}

hr {
display:block;
height:1px;
border:0;
border-top:1px solid #cccccc;
margin:1em 0;
padding:0;
}

input, select {
vertical-align:middle;
}

Original Source: http://html5doctor.com/html-5-reset-stylesheet/

PG

Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
]]> http://serenedestiny.com/blog/html5-css-reset/feed/ 10 Become a Peaceful DoFollow Blog http://serenedestiny.com/blog/becoming-a-peaceful-dofollow-blog/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/becoming-a-peaceful-dofollow-blog/#comments Thu, 23 Jul 2009 02:19:53 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=450

A peaceful DoFollow blog sounds impossible. The responsibility of managing a DoFollow blog includes picking through spam and constantly moderating comments. It is inevitable, but you can still have peaceful DoFollow blog.

Why Become a DoFollow Blog?

The reason I decided to make this web design and development blog dofollow was to give the commenters a reward. A reward for quality, and contributing comments. The pros and cons weighted in my mind; nonetheless, I knew I was going to get spammed out of the wazoo, but it didn’t matter. Weigh out the Pros and the Cons before you make your decision.

Pros

  • Encourages Comments – Anybody who knows SEO knows DoFollow blogs are key to link building. Having a DoFollow blog encourages webmasters to put quality comments in order to get a backlink. With this, conversations are encouraged and quality comments will appear.
  • Gets Listed in DoFollow Search Engines – Webmasters intentionally look for DoFollow blogs. It is essential to link building. To make life easier, people have created DoFollow Search Engines and use it to find DoFollow blogs for certain niches. You can easily add your blog to the search engine and expose it. There are many DoFollow Search Engines, and they would be glad to add your blog to their search engine.
  • Can Be Helpful in Earning Money – You can use your DoFollow blog to your advantage. You can sell links on your blog for more money. It is not encouraged as Google does not like it, but it is an option. Webmasters need their links on a DoFollow, so let people know you are DoFollow.

Cons

  • Encourages Spam – You can never avoid spam: it will always be there. Unfortunately, having a DoFollow also gives incentive to spammers to whore their links. They will use every trick in the book to get their link on your website.
  • Too Much Generosity – Some people would rather not worrying about spam, and they know DoFollow equals spam. It’s difficult to deal with and troublesome without the right plugins.

How Do I Become a DoFollow Blog?

Simply download the DoFollow Plugin, upload it to the /wp-content/plugins/ directory, activate it through the ‘Plugin’ menu in Wordpress, and buy yourself an ice cream. The ice cream is optional.

How Do I Become Peaceful?

Another simple task: find a spam-fighting plugin. The plugin I use, and personally recommend is Akismet. Akismet will detect if a comment is spam and will count it as spam. I would suggest looking through your spam and making sure it didn’t count a friend’s comment as spam. It checks EVERYTHING.

Simple eh?

I told you peace and spam can coexist with the right plugins. Now go out there and become a peaceful DoFollow blog! Feel free to recommend any spam-fighting plugins in the comments.

PG

Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
]]> http://serenedestiny.com/blog/becoming-a-peaceful-dofollow-blog/feed/ 32 The Massive List of Web Design and Development Tutorials http://serenedestiny.com/blog/the-massive-list-of-web-design-and-development-tutorials/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/the-massive-list-of-web-design-and-development-tutorials/#comments Thu, 11 Jun 2009 02:28:35 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=276

Whether you are a new web designer/developer or you are experienced: tutorials are very important. They help sharpen your skills and get better at what you love. This list provides high quality and easy to learn tutorials for web design and development.

Who doesn’t love a massive list of web design and development tutorials?

Web Design Tutorials

Design a Beautiful Website From Scratch
Design and Code a Slick Website From Scratch Part I
Design and Code a Slick Website From Scratch Part II
Creating a Cool 3D Web Design Effect
How to Create a Stunning Vista Inspired Menu
Design a Cartoon Grunge Web site Layout
Create a Sleek, High-End Web Design From Scratch
Create a Dark Themed Web Design From Scratch
How to Create a Grunge Web Design in Photoshop
How a Simple Layout Can Be Mixed ‘n’ Matched with Patterns, Photos and Backgrounds
Photoshop Paper Texture from Scratch then Create a Grungy Web Design with it!
Create a Magic Night Themed Web Design from Scratch in Photoshop
Use Adobe Illustrator to Create a Clean Website Layout
Vista Style Layout
How To Build Your Own Single Page Portfolio Website
Create a Vibrant Modern Blog Design in Photoshop
Black Website Design Create a Clean Modern Web Design in Photoshop
5 Must Know Web Design Polishing Techniques
Design a Sleek Real Estate Site
Create a Professional Portfolio Design in 17 Easy Steps
Making the ‘Clean Grunge’ Blog Design
Design a Clean Business Layout
Design a Unique Grungy Website Layout 12 Ways to Improve Your Websites Design
Create a Dark and Sleek Web Layout Using Photoshop
How to Create a Clean Web 2.0 Style Web Design in Photoshop
How to Create a “Worn Paper” Web Layout Using Photoshop
How to Create a Sleek and Textured Web Layout in Photoshop

Web Development Tutorials

30 HTML Best Practices for Beginners
How to Add Variables to Your CSS Files
5 Ways to Instantly Write Better CSS
5 Techniques to Acquaint You With CSS 3
10 Challenging But Awesome CSS Techniques
10 Principles of the CSS Masters
Evening Tip: Force IE6 To Display Alpha Transparency
Evening Tip: Save Time By Using Multiple Classes
Evening Tip: Insert Flash The Correct Way
Weekend Quick Tip: Create Your Own Simple Reset.css File
Solving 5 Common CSS Headaches
Creating a Floating HTML Menu Using jQuery and CSS
Which CSS Grid Framework Should You Use for Web Design?
Create a Slick Tabbed Content Area using CSS & jQuery
Creating a PayPal Payment Form
40 Excellent jQuery Tutorials
15 Effective Tips and Tricks from the Masters of CSS
Sexy Drop Down Menu w/ jQuery & CSS
CSS Layouts: 40+ Tutorials, Tips, Demos and Best Practices
Using CSS to Fix Anything: 20+ Common Bugs and Fixes
51+ Best of jQuery Tutorials and Examples
Using CSS to Do Anything: 50+ Creative Examples and Tutorials
10 HTML Tag Crimes You Really Shouldn’t Commit
How to Convert a Photoshop Mockup to xHTML/CSS
30 Awesome Design Enhancing jQuery Plugins
How to Create a Dark and Sleek Web Design from Photoshop
Coding a Clean Web 2.0 Style Web Design from Photoshop
Create a Slick and Accessible Slideshow Using jQuery
Create a Nice, Lightweight JavaScript Tooltip

Related Articles

PG

Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
]]> http://serenedestiny.com/blog/the-massive-list-of-web-design-and-development-tutorials/feed/ 10 51 Free Ebooks for Webmasters, Freelancers and Everybody Else http://serenedestiny.com/blog/51-free-ebooks/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/51-free-ebooks/#comments Sun, 31 May 2009 16:27:37 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=267

As a freelancer, a webmaster and a student, I find myself busy all the time. Busy with client work, updating my portfolio and school work. I don’t have the time to learn techniques to bring traffic to my site or to do anything related to websites.

This is where ebooks come in. Finding a quality ebook to help you learn new techniques that work, saves you time and money on learning new techniques that may not even work. Ebooks are written by all kinds of authors and provide useful tips and tricks for every subject.

I am offering every busy webmaster, freelancer, and any other busy person with 51 free ebooks to download. The ebooks included are:

10 Basics for Starting Your Online Business
101 Basics to Search Engine Optimization
12 Ways to Promote Your Website
18,077 Visitors in 7 Days
5 Easy Tips to Website Traffic
7 Steps to Making Money Online Fast
7 Tips to Make Crazy Money in Photography
70 Of the Most Motivational Quotes You Will Ever Find
Adsense Revenue Exposed
An Introduction to Domain Names 101
Beginners Guide to Article Marketing
Blog for Dollar$
Building Your Own Adsense Empire
CB Affiliate Formula
Directory Submission Secrets
Freelancing for Fun and Profit
Getting Traffic to All Your Websites
Glossary of Search Engine Ranking Terms
Go Web 2.0 Traffic Free Report
Golden Adsense Strategy
Google Adsense Secrets Revealed
Guide to Web 2.0 and Link Baiting
How I Easily Make $1100 Every Month Online
How to Bookmark for Free Web Traffic
How to Get At Least One-Million Visitors To Your Website
How to Get Freebies Online
How to Write Your Own Killer Salesletter
Interview with Lee McIntyre
Introduction to AJAX
Introduction to the Free Google Adsense Money Making Miracle
Landing Page Success Guide
Link Building Made Easy
My SEO E-Guide
PageRank Paranoia
PC Safety 101
Questions to Ask Your Web Designer
SEO & Website Report for [CUSTOMER]
SEO Secrets
So You Want to Write an Ebook
The 10 Steps to Making a Living Online
The 2nd Edition Encyclopedia of Free Online Advertising
The A to Z About RSS
The Ultimate SEO Book
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Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
]]> http://serenedestiny.com/blog/51-free-ebooks/feed/ 3 50 SEO Tips for Web Masters http://serenedestiny.com/blog/50-seo-tips-for-web-masters/ http://serenedestiny.com/blog/50-seo-tips-for-web-masters/#comments Thu, 21 May 2009 22:47:53 +0000 Nicole Foster http://serenedestiny.com/blog/?p=225

In my daily postings on Digital Point, I came across a very interesting post in the Search Engine Optimization forum. If you are a freelancer, like myself, trying to get your services out on the internet:  you know Search Engine Optimization is important. Search Engine Optimization ranks your website in important search engines and brings traffic to your website. With these 50 tips, it will help you know more about SEO.

You can view the original source here: http://www.scenetube.net/55-quick-seo-tips-even-your/

1. If you absolutely MUST use Java script drop down menus, image maps or image links, be sure to put text links somewhere on the page for the spiders to follow.

2. Content is king, so be sure to have good, well-written and unique content that will focus on your primary keyword or keyword phrase.

3. If content is king, then links are queen. Build a network of quality backlinks using your keyword phrase as the link. Remember, if there is no good, logical reason for that site to link to you, you don’t want the link.

4. Don’t be obsessed with PageRank. It is just one isty bitsy part of the ranking algorithm. A site with lower PR can actually outrank one with a higher PR.

5. Be sure you have a unique, keyword focused Title tag on every page of your site. And, if you MUST have the name of your company in it, put it at the end. Unless you are a major brand name that is a household name, your business name will probably get few searches.

6. Fresh content can help improve your rankings. Add new, useful content to your pages on a regular basis. Content freshness adds relevancy to your site in the eyes of the search engines.

7. Be sure links to your site and within your site use your keyword phrase. In other words, if your target is “blue widgets” then link to “blue widgets” instead of a “Click here” link.

8. Focus on search phrases, not single keywords, and put your location in your text (“our Palm Springs store” not “our store”) to help you get found in local searches.

9. Don’t design your web site without considering SEO. Make sure your web designer understands your expectations for organic SEO. Doing a retrofit on your shiny new Flash-based site after it is built won’t cut it. Spiders can crawl text, not Flash or images.

10. Use keywords and keyword phrases appropriately in text links, image ALT attributes and even your domain name.

11. Check for canonicalization issues – www and non-www domains. Decide which you want to use and 301 redirect the other to it. In other words, if http://www.domain.com is your preference, then http://domain.com should redirect to it.

12. Check the link to your home page throughout your site. Is index.html appended to your domain name? If so, you’re splitting your links. Outside links go to http://www.domain.com and internal links go to http://www.domain.com/index.html.

Ditch the index.html or default.php or whatever the page is and always link back to your domain.

13. Frames, Flash and AJAX all share a common problem – you can’t link to a single page. It’s either all or nothing. Don’t use Frames at all and use Flash and AJAX sparingly for best SEO results.

14. Your URL file extension doesn’t matter. You can use .html, .htm, .asp, .php, etc. and it won’t make a difference as far as your SEO is concerned.

15. Got a new web site you want spidered? Submitting through Google’s regular submission form can take weeks. The quickest way to get your site spidered is by getting a link to it through another quality site.

16. If your site content doesn’t change often, your site needs a blog because search spiders like fresh text. Blog at least three time a week with good, fresh content to feed those little crawlers.

17. When link building, think quality, not quantity. One single, good, authoritative link can do a lot more for you than a dozen poor quality links, which can actually hurt you.

18. Search engines want natural language content. Don’t try to stuff your text with keywords. It won’t work. Search engines look at how many times a term is in your content and if it is abnormally high, will count this against you rather than for you.

19. Not only should your links use keyword anchor text, but the text around the links should also be related to your keywords. In other words, surround the link with descriptive text.

20. If you are on a shared server, do a blacklist check to be sure you’re not on a proxy with a spammer or banned site. Their negative notoriety could affect your own rankings.

21. Be aware that by using services that block domain ownership information when you register a domain, Google might see you as a potential spammer.

22. When optimizing your blog posts, optimize your post title tag independently from your blog title.

23. The bottom line in SEO is Text, Links, Popularity and Reputation.

24. Make sure your site is easy to use. This can influence your link building ability and popularity and, thus, your ranking.

25. Give link love, Get link love. Don’t be stingy with linking out. That will encourage others to link to you.

26. Search engines like unique content that is also quality content. There can be a difference between unique content and quality content. Make sure your content is both.

27. If you absolutely MUST have your main page as a splash page that is all Flash or one big image, place text and navigation links below the fold.

28. Some of your most valuable links might not appear in web sites at all but be in the form of e-mail communications such as newletters and zines.

29. You get NOTHING from paid links except a few clicks unless the links are embedded in body text and NOT obvious sponsored links.

30. Links from .edu domains are given nice weight by the search engines. Run a search for possible non-profit .edu sites that are looking for sponsors.

31. Give them something to talk about. Linkbaiting is simply good content.

32. Give each page a focus on a single keyword phrase. Don’t try to optimize the page for several keywords at once.

33. SEO is useless if you have a weak or non-existent call to action. Make sure your call to action is clear and present.

34. SEO is not a one-shot process. The search landscape changes daily, so expect to work on your optimization daily.

35. Cater to influential bloggers and authority sites who might link to you, your images, videos, podcasts, etc. or ask to reprint your content.

36. Get the owner or CEO blogging. It’s priceless! CEO influence on a blog is incredible as this is the VOICE of the company. Response from the owner to reader comments will cause your credibility to skyrocket!

37. Optimize the text in your RSS feed just like you should with your posts and web pages. Use descriptive, keyword rich text in your title and description.

38. Use captions with your images. As with newspaper photos, place keyword rich captions with your images.

39. Pay attention to the context surrounding your images. Images can rank based on text that surrounds them on the page. Pay attention to keyword text, headings, etc.

40. You’re better off letting your site pages be found naturally by the crawler. Good global navigation and linking will serve you much better than relying only on an XML Sitemap.

41. There are two ways to NOT see Google’s Personalized Search results:

(1) Log out of Google

(2) Append &pws=0 to the end of your search URL in the search bar

42. Links (especially deep links) from a high PageRank site are golden. High PR indicates high trust, so the back links will carry more weight.

43. Use absolute links. Not only will it make your on-site link navigation less prone to problems (like links to and from https pages), but if someone scrapes your content, you’ll get backlink juice out of it.

44. See if your hosting company offers “Sticky” forwarding when moving to a new domain. This allows temporary forwarding to the new domain from the old, retaining the new URL in the address bar so that users can gradually get used to the new URL.

45. Understand social marketing. It IS part of SEO. The more you understand about sites like Digg, Yelp, del.icio.us, Facebook, etc., the better you will be able to compete in search.

46. To get the best chance for your videos to be found by the crawlers, create a video sitemap and list it in your Google Webmaster Central account.

47. Videos that show up in Google blended search results don’t just come from YouTube. Be sure to submit your videos to other quality video sites like Metacafe, AOL, MSN and Yahoo to name a few.

48. Surround video content on your pages with keyword rich text. The search engines look at surrounding content to define the usefulness of the video for the query.

49. Use the words “image” or “picture” in your photo ALT descriptions and captions. A lot of searches are for a keyword plus one of those words.

50. Enable “Enhanced image search” in your Google Webmaster Central account. Images are a big part of the new blended search results, so allowing Google to find your photos will help your SEO efforts.

Search Engine Optimization techniques are always changing to adapt to the search engines algorithms. If you know a tip that the blog post missed: feel free to post a comment and we can discuss why it is important.

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Nicole Foster

Nicole Foster is a freelance website designer and developer offering website design services. She loves makes rocking websites that are both professional and creative.
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