How To Avoid 4 Common Web Hosting Mistakes and Succeed.

If anyone ever learned the true meaning of what mistakes to avoid in order to succeed, it would be Thomas Edison. According to historical accounts, Thomas Edison made many mistakes before he finally produced a reliable, long lasting source of light in 1879. When Edison first set out to improve upon the 50-year-old idea that had attracted his attention, he had absolutely no idea of the magnitude of mistakes he would ultimately make before finally producing a commercially reliable and long lasting incandescent, electric light. But according to Edison, not any of his many experiments were mistakes; To him, each mistake (experiment) was a step closer to the realization of his goal.

If Edison had of known beforehand what experiments would work, he could have eliminated much trial and error. By avoiding the many mistakes or experiments that didn't work, Edison could have focused on the ones that did work and could have reached his coveted goal of producing a commercially reliable and long- lasting- incandescent electric light much sooner. Likewise, if you read this article, you will know beforehand how to succeed by avoiding the 4 most common web hosting mistakes that don't work.

Mistake #1: Irrelevant Information
Those who are new to the Internet understandably want to jump in and get going right away in their own money making website business. This is good because “Enthusiasm” is one of the personality traits that will help you hang in there for the long haul. The problem is that newbies in their zeal to get started, rush to create a website; Not knowing how to make it SEO compatible, they cram it full of irrelevant information consisting of an over abundance of images, photographs and all kinds of other stuff, as much as the page will hold.

Not only is “irrelevant information” frowned upon by the search engines, too much information on a single page can cause it to load too slowly. What little, if any traffic you get, is going to click away. The fact is potential customers are not going to hang around long waiting for an overstuffed page to load. They are going to click away without ever seeing your page. And those who do hang around are going to feel frustrated when the page finally loads, and even more frustrated when they try to muddle through all the irrelevant, disorganized information on your page. And if you think they'll be back, forget it. This can hurt because it usually takes several exposures to an offer before a potential customer will purchase, and the fact that they won't be back is not going to result in a purchase.

If the information displayed on your website is mostly irrelevant to the actual product or service you're trying to promote or sell, then the search engines can't classify your site's relevance to a particular search term. Since the search engines can't determine what your site is about, they are not going to pull your site up when a search is made for the “product or service you're trying to promote or sell”, so you are not going to get traffic from the search engines. No traffic means no sales which means no income. Unless corrective steps are taken, the trend of making no money will eventually force you out of business.

Mistake #2 Using the wrong criteria to choose a hosting company.
Most newbies to the Internet choose the cheapest hosting company in their haste to get stated. Now it's good to practice thrift, but the problem is that choosing a hosting company solely based on the cheapest price may not always be your best option. There are other factors to be considered that are crucial to the long term success of your business. For example, having adequate storage and bandwidth – especially important when your website business begins to grow in popularity and attracts more traffic (Click Here to see my article "Four Steps To Choose The Best Host Website Service" for what you need in a hosting company).

Mistake #3: Not having a clearly defined major purpose or premise.
Most newbies to the Internet fail to define a business purpose when starting their Internet Business. If you don't have any idea what the product, service, or idea is that you are trying to promote, how do you expect the search engines or visitors (potential customers) to know.

When you start a business you need to clearly define your product, service or idea, and don't you dare to keep it a secret. You say ridiculous, why would I want to keep it a secret. Of course you would not. The point here is that unless you clearly define your product, service or idea, it will appear to be a secret to the search engines and visitors (potential customers), if you ever get any.

When it comes to choosing and defining a product, service or idea to promote, remember this! If someone wants to buy an assortment of goods, they can always go to Wal Mart or a similar store, so don't try to sell or promote everything on one single website. If you do you are going to fail. Instead, you need to focus on one particular product, service or idea, and let the product, service or idea that you are promoting resound throughout the fabric of your website. If anything on your website obscures this, you should consider removing it or accept a loss of revenue.

Now I'm not saying that you can't include ads on your site -- there are pros and cons to these. And I'm not saying you can't include links to other sites -- there are pros and cons to these also. What I am saying is this: Your website should be about one major premise. For example, if you decided to visit a pet shop, chances are good that you would be going to buy a pet or pet supplies, or at least to look them over for comparative pricing in consideration of a future purchase. When you got to the pet shop, you would expect to find other items associated with pets that are for sell in addition to the pets, such as pet food and an assortment of pet supplies. Similarly, when visitors visit your website they expect to find what they are searching for along with other associative items. You need to design and maintain your website premise so that search engines and visitors (potential customers) know exactly what you are about. And if you do decide to display ads or have links to other websites, make sure the links and ads are relevant to the product, service or idea that you are promoting, and steer clear of all others.

Once you choose and define your product, service or idea for a particular website business, stick with it. Just as the pet shop example would not suddenly stop selling pets and supplies and start selling guns and ammo, you would not change the product, service or idea you are promoting. When you have once chosen your target product/market, you need to stick with it. If you eventually do want to branch out into other areas that is good and the way to make more money, but do it on another website.

Mistake #3: Ineffective Advertising
Once you have clearly defined your product, service or idea, you thus have identified and chosen your target market. Now this is important: Just as you wouldn't advertise automobiles for sale inside a McDonald or other Restaurant, you wouldn't advertise your particular product, service or idea just anywhere. Some people inside the McDonald Restaurant may be in the market and want to buy an automobile; However, the fact is that the advertiser would undoubtedly sell more automobiles by offering them in a place where people gathered that wanted to buy automobiles. Where they gather would be the advertisers target market. Similarly, when you advertise your product, service or idea, you need to advertise in places where your target market will see your advertisements. This will bring more visitors (potential customers) to your website, and since they are targeted, more will convert to customers who make purchases.

Mistake #4: Becoming an emulator
Any business that's making money is going to have competition, and this is good. Competition keeps you striving to be your best, and it drives you stay abreast of what your competition is doing. Staying alert to changes in the market trend by examining the actions of your competitors is exercising sound business practice. However, the old saying that too much of anything can lead to problems couldn't be truer than in the arena of competition. You see, if you allow yourself to become too
wrapped up in what your competitors are doing you will lose sight of your purpose and become nothing more than an emulator of one or more of your competitors. While this can bring success and increase earnings in some instances, when used in moderation, the ever-present danger is allowing yourself to give in to the temptation of becoming overly indulgence. Overindulgence in emulation is an insidious culprit that stifles your creativity and stunts your business growth.

The key word is moderation. Yes! By all means go ahead and stay abreast of what your competition is doing, but don't ever allow yourself to become nothing more than an imitator of one are more of your competitors. Encourage your on creativity and, I'm borrowing a phrase from Zig Ziglar, "I'll see you at the top".

To your online success,
Richard Driver
http://hostbuydomain.com

Introduction to FTP Hosting for Beginners

This article will describe how you can transfer information from your computer to your online hosting service. To transfer or upload files into your hosting provider's secured storage system, you will need an FTP (File Transfer Protocol) program. Files can then be accessed or downloaded from the storage system as necessary. If you don't understand what FTP is and/or how to use it, don't worry. I've included a link at the end of this article so you can access some free lessons entitled “Beginning FTP Tutorials”.

But to give you a basic understanding of FTP, consider this example: Lets suppose that a prospective purchaser decides to buy an ebook from an online seller. They most likely would enter into their favorite browser the type ebook they wanted to purchase. Within a short time the search engine would return numerous results for the prospective purchaser to look over. Upon picking one, the prospective purchaser would click on the supplied hyper-link and a sales page describing the ebook and its cost would appear.

The sales page was stored in a secure storage system inside the computer of the ebook sellers hosting provider and loaded into the prospective purchasers' browser for viewing via HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) when its link was clicked. Similarly, via of FTP (File Transfer Protocol, if the prospective purchaser decides to purchase the ebook, upon payment the ebook can be downloaded from the hosting providers secure storage system directly to the purchasers' computer. An FTP Hosting Service makes this possible. Click Here for the one I recommend.

In addition to including a link to FREE FTP lessons, I also included a link to download a FREE FTP program that you can use to upload files to your hosting provider when you've read over the tutorials and learned how.

Resources:

To gain an understanding of FTP I recommend that you visit http://www.pageresource.com/putweb/ftpmain.htm and read the “Beginning FTP Tutorials

You can download Smart FTP FREE
http://www.smartftp.com/download/


To your online Success
Richard Driver
http://hostbuydomain.com

How to Increase Web Traffic Using These Best Techniques: Best Technique #3

Best technique #3: Online Marketing Techniques for The Low Budget

To date we have looked at two best techniques to drive more targeted traffic to your website. In “Best technique #1” we covered how to drive more targeted traffic to your website by Optimizing your Webpage(s). In “Best technique #2”, we covered how to drive more targeted traffic to your website using Google Adwords. In “Best technique #3”, our final technique, we will look at how to drive more targeted traffic to your website using low cost online marketing techniques.

Words of Encouragement to those who start an online business with a low or non existent budget

If you have a low or non existent budget don't be dismayed. If you keep trying and keep going, and keep studying and keep taking advantage of every low cost and free resource, and adamantly refuse to give up, you will find a way to make money online. I'll guarantee it. It may take you a while to get there, but remember that a journey to any destination no matter how small or vast begins with the first step and your getting there is dependent on you continuing to take each succeeding step until you finally arrive at your destination. Just stay focused and be prepared for what you might expect to encounter in your journey.

When you first start out trying to make money online you'll find that it is sometimes difficult to do; that no matter how hard you try the money just doesn't always flow to you as quickly as you thought and hoped that it would. If you started with a large budget and adequate resources to fall back on this is really not a problem for you; but if your resources are low or non existent, then it can present what seems like a major impasse to you with no foreseeable way through. If you started with any money at all you'll find it quickly depleted and wonder if maybe you would do better getting yourself a regular job. Well these are all normal thoughts we all have when starting out; but I'll tell you this, the way you deal with our thoughts will ultimately determine whether we make our living off the net or off a regular job.

While it may be necessary to sometimes get or keep an existing job until your business starts providing adequate income is a decision that you will have to make based on your particular circumstances and preferences. There is nothing wrong with having a regular full time or part time job in addition to an online business, even when the online business is making adequate money to provide for yourself and family. Initially it is sometimes necessary to have and keep a regular job. However, eventually when your business starts making money enough to provide for your family and self, it becomes a matter of personal choice whether to give up your regular job or keep it.

If you are fortunate enough to have a large budget then there are other options available to drive targeted traffic to your website that are not covered in this article, and your large budget may enable you to escape the uncertainties that are sure to cloud over those who have and begin with a small or non existent budget.

Regardless of your budget size though you can still benefit from the advice in this article. The fact is that most beginning online businesses do not have a very large budget to begin and not having enough is what actually lures most of us to the Internet, where it's possible for any person from any walk of life to have their own online business. But whether you have a large budget or you are among the majority who do not, you owe it to yourself to look for ways to market your business as cheaply and effectively as possible. A dollar saved here and there is sure to push your income level ever upwards, provided of course that you are actually making money online which is my objective in writing these lessons.

Fist recommendation:

If you are among the majority stuck with a low beginning or non existence budget, I strongly recommend and encourage you to begin immediately leaning some basic HTML programming. Even if you have a large budget leaning html can still benefit you. If you're not familiar with HTML don't worry because it's EASY to learn. Just by spending from 15 to 30 minutes a day or whatever you can spare, you can learn it quickly. The reason you need to learn HTML is because when you get your own website you will sometimes need to add or delete certain items and unless you know the basics you will have to pay someone to do it for you. Moreover, unless you get a free website or pay someone to design one for you, you will have to design it yourself. You will have to know html to do this. Knowing HTML is crucial to your success, so start studying and implementing what you lean if you are serious about making money and a success of yourself on the Internet.


Second recommendation::

You need to begin building an opt-in list that you can market to over and over again by offering something of value in exchange for money as well as in exchange for an email address to build your opt-in email list. If you are just beginning you may not know exactly what an opt in list is. If this describes you, you can pick up two free tutorials in recommended resources at the end of this article. If these are not enough, just type in something similar to “free tutorial on opt in list” (without the quotes) into Google or another of your favorite browsers and you'll get access to plenty of material on the subject.

Study the material over and become thoroughly familiar with what an opt-in list is and how to acquire one. Especially be aware of the SPAM legislation and make sure that you comply with it at all times. You can find information on SPAM legislation at the end of this article in the Recommended Resources to Read. You can also read “The new spam: it's bigger and uglier”, an excellent article written by Wanda Sloan. You can also find a link to her article in the Recommended Resources at the end of this article.

I recommend that when you begin using email marketing that you sign up with an email provider who is familiar with the SPAM laws and can help you comply by providing a double opt-in auto responder service. Click Here to check out one that I personally recommend. They provide a free service as well as a paid service. If it is not in your budget to pay for the service then sign up for their free service, You can always upgrade later if you want when your budget permits without losing any of your subscribers.

Here are three ways you can start building your opt-in email list:

1. You can offer your subscribers a free gift for referring 5 friends to your website. However, a word of caution here: Because of the SPAM laws, I do not recommend letting anyone email their friends from your website. The reason is that it could lead to a violation of SPAM.

The best way is to provide a double opt-in sign up form on your website and provide the URL so others can refer friends for double opt in sign up. Note: If you sign up for a free auto responder account Click Here, they will provide the html code for your sign up form that you would copy and paste on your appropriate webpage.

2. Generate targeted traffic to your website by starting an affiliate program where you pay affiliates a commission whenever they refer someone to your site that makes a purchase.

3. Obtain and post testimonials from satisfied customers on your site to generate more targeted traffic through referrals. Do be sure, however, that you get a customers permission before posting their testimonial on your site.

Although I have listed only three techniques you can use to start building your opt-in list there are many other techniques that I've used over the past several years to generate targeted traffic to my websites. You can do a search on Google or another of your favorite search engines to find more traffic generating techniques. Also, there is an excellent report that will help you better understand and apply marketing techniques to generate a steady monthly income. To check it out Click Here

To Your Online Success,
Richard Driver
http://hostbuydomain.com

Recommended Resources to Read:

How to build an opt-in list: two free tutorials
http://www.internetbasemoms.com/ezine-publishing.

SPAM
http://www.spamlaws.com/state/index.shtml

“The new spam: it's bigger and uglier”, an excellent article written by Wanda Sloan.
http://www.bangkokpost.com/100107_Database/10Jan2007_data001.php

How to Increase Web Traffic Using These Best Techniques

In “Best technique #1”, I stated that “(g)etting more targeted traffic to your website can mean more sales”, and explained how to do this by Optimizing your Webpage(s). In “Best technique #2”, I will discuss how to get targeted traffic to your website using Google Adwords.

Best Technique #2: Google Adwords

Google Adwords is one of the most targeted forms of marking on the Internet, and it is one of the fastest ways to increase targeted traffic to your website, but it is not free. It requires that you have a credit card to set up an account with Google. The activation fee is $5.00, which you pay when you set up the account. It only takes you a few minutes to set up an account using specific keywords or phases. Your ad can start displaying across the Internet almost immediately and start bringing fresh targeted traffic to your website.

You have a choice to display your ads on other websites that display relative content or restrict them to display on search engine pages when someone does a search on your particular phase or keyword. If you have a large advertising budget, you may elect to display your ads both ways; but I recommend when starting out, especially if your budget is small, to display your ads only on the search engine pages, at least until you've acquired some experience using Google Ad words.

Although the traffic that will visit your website is targeted, depending on the right choice of keywords and phases, each visit will not always result in a sale; but each click on your ad will cost you regardless. This can get expensive, so you need to get some training before using Google Adwords. There are several excellent courses on the market that you can purchase, but I recommend the FREE tutorial at http://www.google.com/adwords/learningcenter/

Richard Driver
http://www.hostbuydomain.com

How to Increase Web Traffic Using These Best Techniques

Getting more targeted traffic to your website can mean more sales. But how do you get more targeted traffic? There are numerous ways, some better than others. In this article I will share some of the better ways and identify specific resources that I personally use to drive targeted traffic to my sites.

Best Technique #1: Optimizing your Webpage(s)

Optimizing(SEO) is a technique that can cost quite a bit if you hire someone to do it for you. If you do it yourself, it cost nothing other than an investment of time in studying the technique and implementing what you learn. There are whole volumes written on optimization, so there is no way I can cover it all in this brief space, but I can give you a nugget of information that is pure gold in terms of helping to drive more targeted traffic to your website, which will increase your online income. And! It is something you can implement right away.

Driving targeted traffic to your website is of such importance that any time investment spent in learning to optimize your webpage(s) is well worth the reward of increased income. The more time you spend studying, implementing and perfecting the technique, the more income you'll ultimately earn. But most of us neither have the money to hire a SEO expert nor the free time to spend in this type of study. What we need is a quick, do it yourself fix.

A Quick Do it Yourself Fix

The technique is to optimize your homepage by using selected keyword phrases in your meta tags as the title of your page. Always use font size h1 for the size of your title. Try to include your keyword phrase at least once in every paragraph. You especially need to include your keyword phase in the beginning and last paragraph. This technique alone is sure to improve search engine ranking and increase traffic.
One more thought on keyword phase.

Say for example one of your key word phases is host website. In addition to including it once in every paragraph and in the beginning and ending paragraphs, you need to include it in different combinations. Instead of host website every time, use the combinations hostwebsite, and host web site. However, and this is important, in your actual meta tags do not use the phase more than three times to avoid possibly being penalized for word spam. Our goal here is to entice the search engines to send us more targeted traffic.

Richard Driver
http://onlinebusiness2riches.com/

Resources:
If you don't know what meta tags are, there is an excellent online free reference tool available that will help explain them to you at http://tools.seobook.com/meta-medic/

Four Steps To Choose The Best Host Website Service

There are so many hosting providers on the Internet that it's not always easy to choose which one is the best for your particular need. Basically there are two types of host website providers: The free and the paid. Many times we are tempted to choose free hosting when starting out, but this is not always the best option. The primary reason you need to avoid free hosting is that you usually don't get enough bandwidth and storage to satisfy your hosting needs. Resultantly, you most always have to upgrade and end up paying anyways. For this reason it's best to choose a paid hostwebsite provider at the beginning that offers the most bandwidth and storage at the best price.

A free host website provider, however, is something to consider if you only want to post a personal page, or maybe it's your first website and you just want to get the feel of what's involved. It's especially something to consider if you don't have a credit card to buy the hosting and domain name. Ultimately, whether you choose to pay a hostwebsite provider or get a free host website provider, these four steps will help you choose the best host website service.

Step One: Storage
Regardless of the host website provider you choose, you need to choose one that offers adequate storage. Storage is especially important if you want to store a lot of images and large files on your website. Most free hosting providers will only give you the first 10mb and then want you to upgrade so they can start billing you. Always choose a host provider to host your website that will give you the most storage and bandwidth. While you can't expect much from a provider that will host your website free, you should try to get a minimum of 50mb of storage so you don't risk running out. But keep in mind that even that amount is really not that much if you plan to store a lot of images and/or large files, such as a reseller of software, for example, would need.

Step Two: Bandwidth
As with storage, bandwidth is an equally important consideration. The problem with most free host website providers, as well as some paid host website providers, is that they do not provide enough bandwidth. They offer small inadequate amounts of bandwidth, and when you approach and/or exceed it you run the risk of having your account suspended unless you pay to upgrade. This can result in website downtime, which is not a big problem if your are using the host website provider to host your website for personal use, but if you are trying to run a business too much downtime could result in loss of potential customers and revenue.

Step Three: Ads
Another consideration when choosing a free host website provider is the reality that nothing is actually free. Like any other business, a free host website provider has to turn a profit to stay in business. To do this they place ads (advertisements) on your free website. Some free host website providers go overboard with Popups, banner ads and more.... When this occurs, it distracts from your site and doesn't present a professional image to potential customers. It's best to go with a paid hostwebsite provider; especially if you are running a business; however, if circumstances force you to go with a free host website provider, try to find one that has the least amount of advertising and preferably no Popups. An overly crowded website distracts your potentials customers and makes them want to click away fast.

Step Four: Uptime and Functionality
Since it takes an investment of time to upload your web pages and/or get them looking exactly the way you want them to look, you probably will want to stay with your host website provider and not have to move to another host website provider where you will have to repeat the process of uploading and editing. Sometimes though, poor customer service, high downtime, and a delay in answering your concerns may necessitate that you move to another host website provider. To lessen the chance of this occurring, you need to shop around before deciding on a host website provider. Choose one that has an uptime of over 99% -- the more the better; but realistically, there is no such thing as 100% uptime. Even the best host web site providers will occasionally have some downtime.

Before choosing a host website provider, look over their website to see if they offer prompt customer service. It's best to choose one that has a telephone number displayed that you can call to voice a concern or report a problem. If a number is not displayed, choose one that has live customer support and/or promises to respond in a certain time period. There really is no hard and fast rule here because there are many fine host website providers that don't display a telephone number or offer live support, so they can keep their overhead low and pass the savings on to their customers. It's your choice though, and you need to choose based on your particular needs and circumstances.

Whether it's a free host website provider or a paid host website provider, you need to choose the one that offers the most storage and bandwidth and the best customer service and highest uptime. If you choose a free host website provider, make sure it is one that doesn't overly crowd your web pages with too much advertising. It distracts from your sites' appearance and professional image; a crucially important consideration if your free host website provider is hosting your business.

Following these four easy steps can considerably lessen your learning curve and give you a more pleasurable experience with your free or paid host website provider. Why not try http://www.hostbuydomain.com. They offer lots of storage, Massive Bandwidth, great security and 24/7 customer service, and 99.9% uptime ! I hope this article is helpful and enables you to make a more informed choice when choosing a host website provider.
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