The Context Machine

So you want to have a website of your own? You worked overtime to design and code that beautiful website. Or might be you hired a web designer. But now comes the time to upload this to a web server, so that the world can find your amazing site. So you do a search for webhosting, and are bomabarded with a million people trying to sell you the web hosting. So what choices do you have? How do you separate the grain from the chaff? Let us begin by seeing what choices you have.

Free web hosting with Tripod/Lycos/Geocities or similar sites: Pros:

Totally free.

Cons:

Large, Irritating ads on your website.

No support for PHP, MySql etc.

Generally no support for FTP.

Control panel is limited.

Go for this if you have a very basic/personal website. Not at all recommended for professional websites.

Professional webhosting. Pros:

Very reliable.

Quick support.

Feature packed.

Cons:

Generally very costly.

Go for this if your budget can afford it or you have a very demanding website.

Budget webhosting: They try to balance free and professional webhsoting.

Pros:

Cheap yet somewhat reliable.

Cons:

Some features may be missing.

Might be plagued with downtime, server crashes etc.

Go for this if you can accept your site being down.

When your visitors browse a webpage, their browsing experience depends on many things that you already know - connection speed, computer hardware and software, internet provider are just a few. However, the role that good web design plays in browsing speed is often under-recognized. Pictures and graphics as a navigation aid are often a powerful ‘hook’ for customers, and can easily enhance a browsing session. When incorrectly used, they can create bottlenecks that hamper the message your site needs to send.

Basically, if you are making an image mosaic, you need to remember a pair of important rules:

Rule 1: The page load time increases together with the number of page elements, even if their total size remains the same.

Rule 2: However, merging page elements will lead to a longer wait until you visitor sees the first portion of your webpage. You need to keep a balance.

In designing a webpage, you have to set priorities. Is your goal a fast browsing experience or maximum visual impact? Will your customers wait for long enough or will they go elsewhere?

Web designers using graphical navigation have many choices - to include graphics and text, to just work from one large image with several navigation elements, or to load many small ones. The latter is a popular method today, but can lead to slow access times. This slowdown is particularly noticeable on dialup connections, but because server requests are less affected by download speed, if you have a bottleneck in this area it can affect all of your users.

Let us examine the server request process:

Step 1: User clicks a link, and the browser sends an HTTP request to the server;
Step 2: The request goes through Internet hosts and routers, and then reaches the server;
Step 3: The server processes the request and sends the HTTP response and data back;
Step 4: The response goes through the Internet, usually on a different route, and then reaches the browser and the element rendered by your browser, and displayed on your screen.

How can you calculate the effect of this complex process on the customer experience? There are two main factors involved: the “Internet latency time” and the “HTTP request”.

The typical minimum size of an HTTP request is 256 bytes. This means that when browsers request an image of one byte in size, the browser needs to send a 256 byte HTTP request on both of its server connections, and the server has to send back an HTTP response of the same size, along with the one byte of content. You can use the following formula when calculating the contribution of HTTP request delays:

HTTP Time Loss = (4 kilobits) * Elements / Bandwidth in kilobits per second

In essence this means that on a regular website, where the number of page elements is between 10 and 30, HTTP overheads will add significantly to your load time. For example, in a page with 50 elements, and a 56kbps connection speed, 3.57 seconds of page load time is wasted. Let’s say the page size is 100KB. It means that the ‘expected load time’ is 14.28 seconds but actual time is 25% greater.

Internet latency time involves how the packet (request) gets to the server and back (steps 2 and 4). The amount of time this journey takes is known as “ping time”. The shortest possible ping time to the other side of the world is 85 milliseconds. That is because 85ms is the time the electrical signal needs to travel to the other side and back in a straight line through the Earth. Of course, the shortest possible ping across the world is 133ms, as we cannot cut through the Earth. In practice on overseas websites, the actual ping is often higher, over 300ms not being unusual. To local sites inside the USA and Europe, typical ping time can be 100ms or lower (Source: http://www.internettrafficreport.com).

Internet latency time loss = Elements * (PING in milliseconds / 1000) / 2

In the above formula, “2″ is the necessary correction factor given that browsers usually make more than one connection to the server.

It is possible to incorporate ping delay time and HTTP header request delays, described above, into a final formula:

Total loss of time = Elements * (4 kilobits / Bandwidth + PING / 2000)

Despite the growing penetration of broadband in the world - according to Nielsen NetRatings, over 60% of US households and 85% of US work users are now broadband equipped - many users still suffer from slow page load time. This can drive users away and does not encourage return visits.

Remember that just decreasing the size of the smaller images on your site doesn’t help significantly if they are already less than 500 bytes. Try to decrease the number of images by combining them into one or more large images. You can use image maps for this purpose, which work from the position of the mouse on the image, and are a good way of cutting down on the problems caused by fragmented images.

The quickest way in grasping the “Mosaic Layouts” concept is that every ten elements you add to your site - no matter what their size - will commonly add an extra second to your load time.

Article Source: http://www.softwaretalks.com/mosaic-layouts/

Jonathan Tunn is a staff writer for SoftLogica covering personal technology. He studied Journalism at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, and acquired his IT background at a transnational telecommunications company.

Alexander Grasmik is a marketing manager for SoftLogica. He specializes in web development and performance testing with 4 years of experience on board.

The trick to building profitable web sites to get high ranking through indexing by Major Search Engines is Good Design. You don’t have to pay costly fees. Get that?

Yes, getting to the top 1% ranking comes from the art of putting careful thought in crafting and setting up your Internet Business. How you arrange your products and services in your web site pages is very critical for getting thousands of buyers clamoring for your products. Your site will be so appealing it motivates them to open their wallets, take out their credit cards and willingly give it to you, so you send them your products.

Here are the steps to higher Search Engine ranking::

Firstly, you zero in on your highly targeted audience. Let’s say you plan to sell DVD players. This term is too broad to use in your small internet business. Leave this category/term for the big giants of the industry. They have the big advertising budgets to capture the broad market with massive advertising.

You, however, have to look for a piece of this big market. You are looking for a niche. You want to capture a highly defined target audience. These people already know what they want and are ready to give you their credit card number to order.

Secondly, suppose you came up with a target group who are looking for lightweight DVD players. You can devise a name like: lightweightdvdplayers.com, register it with a reputable hosting company with all the correct security, virus protection , marketing and other effective money making tools for your web site and you are ready to build your site.

NOTE: Remember to register related sub-domain names of your product and services too. Use them in your site or separate sites or just park them with you web registry company for use later when you can expand your product line.

Thirdly, you must develop additional product pages under your URL name you just registered above, as follows:

One page for say, the SUNNY brand name products, with further sub-categories1… like deluxe model, standard model, etc., and sub-category2 different colors etc.
Another page for say, the Tohibba brand name products… with similar sub-categories like before.

Another page for the Samsoong products… with similar sub-categories like before and so on This is called the drill down method of designing your web site. Another way to look at this design is like drilling a hole inside a cone that is standing on the tip. You start from a wide area, the base of the cone, then proceed to a very small pointy area. The final point you want to hit. You get it? Practice a little on a scratch pad of your ideas and I sure you’ll come up with a winner!

Fourthly, you must link these pages together. This linking process helps your site develop credibility with the Search Engines. When the Search Engine robot spiders crawl around the superhighway looking for content you’ll have plenty content for them to feed on. Good content and a lot of it is what Search Engines hunger for. You have to give them that and they will love you for it.

Fifth, You must create a Site Map, particularly on your home page, as this will tie in your entire web site in a form the Search Engines are dying for, that further allows them to crawl your site and rank it higher on the internet.

These are the major actions you must take to get customers drawn to your site by the thousands of visitors a day. The sooner you implement these strategies on your site, the sooner you will see your ranking on Alexa, Yahoo, MSN , Alta Vista and other major Search Engines soar. Soaring high means more traffic. More traffic means more orders and more orders mean more money in your bank account. That is why you have an on line business. To make money 24/7 running on auto pilot.

So, let us back up a little. This might take some work and you will have to put in some time to develop your site. In about three to four weeks, I would say, if you are diligent about making money with your site, you can craft a strong pulling web site with all its pages intact. If you want to make money with your web site, you’ll know that it is worth the time. This three weeks diligence is going to put a lot of money in your pocket fast.

However, if you do not want to take the time to design your own money making web site, there is another solution. You can let the professionals do it for you. Just click on the site below and you’ll be amazed of how attractive and Search Engine friendly they will make you site. Plus, the will give you some more tips and tricks that I cannot address here in this article, due to space limitations.

But, I encourage you to give it a try on your own first. Give up? Then, you’ll make a wise decision if you click on the link below and you’ll be all set to go to creat a money pulling site.

Do all this and then watch the money roll in.

The author has a broad range of expertise in Business, Science, Engineering and Technology. He is an avid a researcher, copywriter and on-line internet marketer and controls several high traffic web-sites. He researches and simplifies complex topics and translates them to layman’s terms for their benefit and to reach broader audiences for products and services. This article can be re-distributed electronically to others providing that there is no change whatsoever in its entirety, and link back to http://www.bestdomainprofits.com and links remain active.

And, to start your own successful internet home based business now that you know what works, visit: http://www.createbigprofits.com

We are clearly well past the innocent “golden age” of the Internet - Darwinian economics have become the order of the day today. Any company worth their salt must maintain a web site as an information resource and/or to generate incremental ecommerce revenue. Qualified traffic is the name of the game, as it’s the oxygen that keeps a good ecommerce web site thriving. Consequently, it’s very important to have an understanding of your web site traffic or visitor activity; i.e. baseline information that includes the number of visitors during specific time periods, originating location (domain), where the visitors went on a site and how long they stayed on specific sections or pages of a web site. The de facto industry standard traffic analysis tool application is Web Trends, manufactured/supported by netiQ, Inc., which we will focus on in this article.

Fundamentals and Jargon Watch

All traffic analysis tools rely primarily upon information that is extracted from log files; i.e. files that are maintained on your server which show where a visitor came from, what keyword(s) they used to find your site (if applicable), what Operating System and Browser versions they are using, etc. There are literally hundreds of excellent log file analysis tools that can be located via CNet’s Download.com or TuCows - both sites are excellent resources for software and information.

It’s critical in today’s bottom line business environment to have the ability to analyze web traffic (visitors) and patterns and then integrate this knowledge with your overall business processes - what do you pay for traffic, is it converting (people are buying your goods and services), how long are people staying on specific sections or pages of your web site, what marketing expenditures are working and which aren’t!

You know your entering the reality distortion field (we marketing types need to justify our fees & services) and need to raise your jargon filters to stun level when you here and/or see these keywords; i.e. clickstream traffic (fancy way of saying traffic or visitors delivered via mouse clicks to your web site), ebusiness solutions (meaning - selling your products/services via an ecommerce site) or my all-time personal favorite, “ebusiness intelligence” (what’s ebusiness and what determines if it’s “intelligent”).

Traffic Counter Applications

First and foremost, do you really need a comprehensive product like Web Trends (more on the different applications later) or can you get by with a click (traffic) counter application like the Hit Box? The latter company provides a free plain vanilla traffic counter which can be easily set up in minutes via your web site. Hit Box is a great product and used by hundreds of thousands of web sites, so it may be sufficient for your business, if you just want very basic info (”Page Views and Daily Unique Visitors) and don’t mind advertising for another company via your web site.

But, there are some downsides to utilizing Hit Box, you must install their “button” on your Index (home) page and it only provides you with basic traffic information (how much per day with a forecast based on these numbers). You can upgrade to their HitBox Professional which is very similar to Web Trends basic application (”Web Trends Log Analyzer”) - but, you have to pay for this service on a traffic basis which can get expensive, depending on your overall traffic

Web Trends Applications and Interface

Web Trends (the company) was acquired by netiQ, Inc. the parent company about 18 months ago due to their strong market leadership position with web traffic analysis software. Like many good web-focused software companies, netiQ enables you to download all of their apps for a 30 day trial period. Estimates range from 60-80% market share for one of their three primary products; i.e. “Web Trends Log Analyzer,” their baseline $500. USD application which is a good solution for most web sites that have a single domain or under 25 in total; “Web Trends Analysis Suite” (SRP $2.5K USD), which incorporates the functionality of the Log Analyzer product and adds more features for managing bandwidth usage (interior and external), monitoring and alerting an IT Manager or Department for server related problems and handles up to 100 domains (sites); the “Web Trends Intelligence Suite” is their top of the line product (pricing varies depending on bundled services) geared for enterprise customers, it includes integration and training services for integrating the application with Online Analytics Processing Tools (”OLAP” yes another ebiz acronym) or other types of reporting tools.

We’ve been using and recommending Web Trends to clients for years primarily because of its interface and functionality. It’s a browser-enabled app, meaning anyone with a browser (IE or Netscape) can view reports and data. The reports are presented in a straightforward manner that includes basic pie chart or bar types of graphics - you can easily tell at a glance what your visitor traffic was for a given period, where they came from, what pages they visited and how long they stayed on specific pages. You don’t need to be a technologist or a marketing geek to use this application - see below for practical tips.

Practical Usage

So what do you want to measure and what type of custom reports do you want to run once you get the software installed? You will want to measure how much traffic (visitors) is coming to your web site per day, week, month, where they are coming from (country of origin), and where visitors going on your web site; i.e. home page, internal pages and of these what specific pages; i.e. About Us Products, Services your Shopping Cart, etc. Pay careful attention to usage times, how long people are staying on specific pages; too long may indicate they can’t figure out your content, or your content is so good its meaningful and educational. For example, if your “White Paper Resource” section is the most frequently visited and the visitor sessions (time elements) are long (2-4 minutes) then this means your content is being well received. But, if everyone is just reading your White Papers but not filling out your response forms then you may need to alter some aspects of your business processes and how you communicate them via your web site.

Web Trends compliments ongoing advertising campaigns and processes - it lets you capture critical ROI (”Return on Investment”) information by giving you an accurate picture of traffic and usage patterns that should correlate with what your ad agency or marketing partner is telling you or confirming with their own reports. For example: If your deploying an opt-in e-mail campaign and bringing people to a specific “landing page” (specific page where people are directed to that may include an “offer”) you need to carefully monitor if people are clicking through to the page and how long they are staying and/or going to your shopping cart to purchase a product or a registration fulfillment page. If the session times (how long they stay on a page) are short and people aren’t filling out a form or converting (purchasing or taking a specific action) then you clearly have some work to do on your web site content and or business processes.

About The Author

Lee Traupel has 20 plus years of business development and marketing experience - he is the founder of Intelective Communications, Inc., http://www.intelective.com a results-driven marketing services company providing proprietary services to clients encompassing startups to public companies.

Lee@intelective.com

Free is a magic word. There’s nothing that rings in people’s
ears more than the word free. Let’s face it, everybody loves
freebies. Who wouldn’t want to get something for nothing? This
adds an extra incentive for people to pay interest to whatever
deal your business is offering, if they know that they’ll be
getting something in return for their efforts.

Using this tactic gives online marketers an edge over the
competition. In the world of online marketing, you need all the
advantages you can get. Given that the internet is a global
market. The chances of earning some serious profits is enormous.

Nowadays the internet has become an integral part of our lives.
It has become an essential tool that adds convenience to our
everyday living. Imagine that with a simple click of a button
you can get hooked up with all types of information, and
services you can possibly want.

It is no wonder that online businesses is clamoring to get in on
the action. This is the new trend in marketing nowadays, and in
order to stay afloat you need to come up with a strategy that
will sure to put your online business ahead of the competition.

One of the most effective ways you can do this is to utilize the
word free in your online promotion. It is one of the most
powerful words that you can use when it comes to the world
advertisement.

This word could make the difference between success and failure.
A lot of people who will not otherwise click on a website or
subscribe to an ezine will change their minds if they know that
there’d be something in it that could be beneficial for them.

It doesn’t matter what type of products or services you are
offering. If your business specializes in hair products, or
you’re offering services for pet care, using the work free will
instantly make these offers more appealing to people.

Even if those online surfers are not thinking of getting the
latest cure for balding, or it has not even occurred to them to
get their pets signed up for a weekend get away in a pet resort,
they might suddenly think twice, if they see a nice deal that
offers free perks.

One of the most important things to remember when it comes to
using this magic word, is to actually make true on your promise!
So you don’t get a bad wrap for false advertisement.

One of the best free offers that an online business can give
away is a free e-book! This is a great promotional give away
that you can offer regardless of what type of product you are
selling online.

Also, you can use this free e-book to actually promote the
product or services you are offering. You can offer to give away
a free e-book that contains information about your online
business.

By making people aware of the fine points of your business
through an e-book , you are increasing the numbers of your
potential customers by sending the work out that you have a
viable enterprise.

For ezines- a free trial subscription will be a great way to
bring in more subscribers. Look at it this way, if the content
material you are producing is that good, people won’t be able to
resist, they will keep on coming back.

For business websites who are going to have their websites
listed in a search engine, include a promotional campaign using
the word free in the brief description of your website.
Littering your descriptions with keywords are important. Using
the word free will add an additional appeal to your content, and
entice readers to click on the url of your website.

Although you have to be careful that you don’t overuse the word
free in your promotional campaign. People regard this word as a
special offer. When they see this word posted on an
advertisement, they actually believe that they are getting the
best deal. So make this word count by using it meaningfully.

Make sure that if you use the word free that you actually do
offer something for free. This way, you will not lose
credibility by making false claims.

Also, when you use the word free in a promotion campaign, make
sure that online consumers understand how this term applies. So
in the end there will not be any confusion and bad feedback from
online consumers. After all, you wouldn’t want to get a bad
reputation. This might turn off prospective customers.

Remember that promotion is an important part of why a business
succeeds. That’s why you need to concentrate on generating the
right positive response from your target market. Using the word
free could just be your golden ticket to success!

There are plenty of web sites out there in which basic elements of design are ignored. The viewer may experience overkill and frustration, instead of gently receiving the message or information. Here are some simple ways to help clarify your web site’s message for your company or organization. Use the web as a tool for sales, community contact, and to improve, rather than detract from a business entity’s image.

Choosing Your Images

Choose site images carefully. Collect simple illustrations or photographs that are in sync with company mission or philosophy. A few select images will have more impact than many images competing for the eye’s attention. Avoid images that are distracting or trendy. Don’t simply use graphics to be cool.

How many photos or images are appropriate? A good rule of thumb is one to two images per web page. Select photos and images as carefully as you select the text, and you’ll be on your way to a better site. The exception to the rule is for sites that market a large amount of products or contain many points of interest, where small thumbnail images may be more appropriate.

Placement of Images on the Page

Do you want the photo or graphic to be the centerpiece? The first thing the eye sees? If so, place it in the central position. If not, maybe the photo or graphic is related to some of the text, and it can be placed nearby this text to accentuate it. Remember, we read from left to right. Some say the left represents the past, the center the present, and the right the future. Content may be organized this way on the page intentionally, to heighten this resonance with the viewer.

Don’t let site images be a distraction or hindrance to understanding. Instead, they should blend well into site content and not be a contrast to the message on the page. Images should not compete with content, they should enhance it.

Image Quality

Images should look as nice and clear as possible. There is an important balance to keep between image file size and quality. Always keep in mind that the file size and dimensions of your images will ultimately control overall page loading time. A slow-loading site will be frustrating to any user. Generally, pages load from the top down, so it is an important point to remember not to design your pages with large image files that fill the top of each page.

Site Text

It’s important not to overdo the writing on a page. Consider how much the user will read and write site content to capture the typically short attention spans of the viewers. Be succinct, and most importantly: be clear. Write subheads and set them in bold, slightly larger type. Carefully placed subheads allow the casual viewer to scan the content of your site.

Write for Search Engines

Research your clientele, and your targeted audience, and always develop content that sells your products, services, or organization. If you or your organization are lacking the expertise to write good copy, hire a professional writer to do the job.

Some web specific writing techniques are important. Try to use select keywords on each page that will lead new users to consider your business or services. Write this text directly into your copy. The first 20 words of your web site text should be what you want people to see in search engine results as a summary of your site.

Site Organization

To simplify the user’s experience, set your site up so that he can get to the intended location easily with no more than three clicks. The overall design of your site must be clear and intuitive so the user can navigate the content easily. If you must use symbols to direct the reader, always attach some explanatory text for the user, so they know where clicking the symbol will take them.

These are just a few of the basics of effective and clear web design. These tips provide ways to guide the user around your site, rather than frustrate them. With site clarity and ease of use, your clients and prospects are educated about your products and services, and have more reason to purchase them.

About The Author

Edward Robirds is a success-driven artist and interactive media developer based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Since 1996, Edward has been building business relationships with several association and commercial clients around the world. Founder of www.DreamseaArtworks.com, Edward uses his artistic skills, expertise and passion to design and develop web sites, interactive CD-ROMs, and print media for his clients.

mail@dreamseaartworks.com

Flash as the latest fad in web design

The use of Flash has picked momentum in recent years and web has started to look more visually appealing and trendier than ever before. The growing acceptability of Flash to enliven web site is not only restricted to designers alone but it is increasingly finding its lovers across all displines of web technology. In sphere of web design professionals, beginners as well as considerably experienced web designers are trying their hands on Flash to showcase their creative potential and design skills.

Some pundits from the industry predict that with this kind of extensive use of Flash in web design, that day, in fair possibility, is not far off when World Wide Web will transform into some sort of web multimedia show. Here at this juncture in future Flash will lead to such a possibility where people gradually dumps HyperText Markup Language (HTML) as this is not compatible with a colorful web experience.

Whatever be the possibility of this prediction to come true, Flash is afforded a warm and cozy embrace by one and all at the moment. It remains to be seen how long this fad will continue to reign. Or people will be gradually lured to some another trend in that is yet to hit the web space?

Nonetheless, this fad has made an impressive number of web sites artistic and good looking giving opportunities to web designer to express themselves the way they have always wanted. Thanks to this technological fade which has brought yet another feature of World Wide Web: the repository of art and design in web sites.

What promotes the popularity of Flash use?

Flash helps a great deal in getting a web site which is vibrant in color, graphics, animations and sounds. There are all the more reasons why people will not be captivated in its persistent use. Even the users, on the face value, do get a great look and feel factor. The thing which is even more important in the popularity of Flash use is the fact that when web sites all around boast of charisma of design with the use of flash, people tend to follow suit.

This is understandable that why people should not refrain from giving their web site a stroke of creative touch especially when this trend is in the air. Probably this is an instance of how craze of a trend develops and how it influences collective behavior of masses; this time around it is about a bulk of techies from web design.

How does Flash design affect user’s experience and accessibility of your web site?

Undoubtedly, Flash design makes a web site look great. However, what just follows this so great component of the web site is annoying user experience. In cases where Flash has been used in extremes in a creative endeavor, user experience turns out to be profoundly terrible.

Apart form beautification aspect, Flash just does not value add to the user experience. Flash web sites take considerable time to load, and hence put users patience to put. The condition is further aggravated with the fact that still most of the users have slow Internet connection. As is pretty clear up to this point that Flash is not at all bandwidth friendly.

Worse still, since Flash files might contain not only moving images but moving text, and not all browsers are compatible to read Flash files. This is not all. This fact can also not be overlooked that not many people have got Flash player installed on their PCs.

One interesting observation on the human behavior is that the same folks who feel wow on the visual appeal of web site do not feel the same once they are there on the net as users and seeks certain information. They no longer cherish the beauty of web site, and loading time begins to be disgusting for them. Interesting enough, they switch to another web site or wish to hop off to other web site where they not are subjected to the tyranny of wait and watch.

Moreover, Flash is fundamentally used to bring in pleasing visual effects in web site. What web folks forget to realize that there is a considerable number of people who are visually disabled, and therefore, can not relish such beauty. They are annoyed by slowing down of their machines due to Flash web sites; certainly this is something web designer can take a lesson or two.

In short, Flash generated hiccups together make user experience on the Internet time consuming and a little unwholesome for information retrieval.

Flash: An enabling web tool vs. designer’s obsession

Flash web sites are a matter of excessive use of a particular technology and technology per se cannot be blamed on any counts. Like other web related tools, Flash is definitely an enabling tool where it is used in the right context and in the right measure needed.

The instances where Flash has been used with impunity smell of designer’s obsession to prove his mettle in domain of design specifics. These web sites are really wonderful in design perspective but unfortunately Flash takes a heavy toll of usability and accessibility of such sites.

Probably those who designed such sites forgot to realize that the purpose of a web site is much, much beyond mere visual pleasure. Web sites have got informative and commercial values. Mindless use of Flash renders the system slow; and given the short attention and patience span of online users, users hardly bother to tolerate waiting period, which might be irritating or even frustrating to them.

How to use Flash to your optimal advantage

It has been often seen that people tend to use Flash with a view to conceal the lack of content on their web sites. This is some thing that is based on false premises because people come to web sites looking for content or information. What’s more, this is content which pursues users to come back again to the web sites.

That is probably the reason why there is a plethora of beautiful web sites which are not faring well in terms of user retention and business statistics. Remember this inference has nothing to do with such web sites where Flash happens to be content and it is a case more of a necessity than over use of it. Say for instance, web sites which thrive on online games, jokes, maps, graphs etc.

However, this does not necessarily mean that use of Flash is solely beneficial for sites heavily dealing with games, jokes, maps, graphs etc. Its use transcends over such sites and is really helpful provided it is used in moderation and in strategic consideration.

Let’s have an idea how Flash can be used in strategic consideration so as not to hamper usability and accessibility of your web site.

- Don’t be tempted to design your web site in Flash alone. Use a good mix of HTML and Flash in a user friendly way to tap maximum traffic.

- Keep it etched in your memory that Flash can never be a substitute for the content on your site. Use Flash only to enhance the value of your content, not at all to replace it.

- Information retrieval could be a disturbing experience for your users if you display content in Flash files. Do change such practice in favor of your users.

- Optimize your Flash files to an extent which helps you serve your users better rather than drive them away unpleasantly.

A lesson in Flash

Make sure on your part that you use Flash in proportionate amounts to enliven your web site and hence Flash does not take toll of meaningful information retrieval.

Deepak Sharma is a Web Designer at BlueApple, a Web Design and Development Company with a well connected development infrastructure in India having a strong portfolio offering superior web services and solutions at competitive costs.

Link popularity is an important part of any search engine optimization or traffic building campaign. Having relevant backlinks to your website from other authority websites in your chosen keyword space is essential to achieve good rankings with the search engines. In many cases you will find that webmaster’s require a link back to their website from your website before adding your URL to their links page.

If you currently update your links manually each time you have a link request or exchange to perform then you already know how much of a nightmare this can be. The use of an Automated Link Management system alleviates the pain of link building while providing a valuable resource to your website visitors.

Automating your Link Management

1. Purchase or find Link Management Software

• Free: http://www.phpjunkyard.com/php-link-manager.php
• Paid: http://www.reciprocalmanager.com

2. Download link management software to your local hard drive.
3. Read the documentation included with the software package.
4. Create an empty MySQL database and user on your webserver. If you are unfamiliar with MySQL databases and/or you do not have a control panel from which you can create MySQL databases consider downloading and installing PHPMyAdmin.
5. Edit any configuration files or scripts to include the database information from step 3 if required.
6. Upload package files and scripts to a folder on your webserver. Name this folder; directory, resources or partners.
7. Edit file permissions on any files or scripts that require it. See your documentation for a list of files. Normally you will need to make some of the scripts or directories in the package “writable”.
8. Run the installation script for your link management software and supply any required information. If you were not required to add your database information to one of the configuration files in step 5 you will need to enter it when prompted.
9. Log in to the “admin” panel for your new link management system and add 20-30 categories which are closely related to your website topic.
10. Edit the “look and feel” of your new directory to match the rest of your website.
11. Place a link to your directory on your home page and interior pages of your website.

You now have an automated link management system installed and linked to your homepage.

Mike Lawrence is the webmaster for a Directory of Website Promotion and Seo Resources. For professional SEO Services visit SEO Web Guide.