 |
 |
If you are looking for free and useful plug-ins or resources for your web site, look no further - this is a list of ready to use free resources.
A list of 25 Cool things to put on your website
If you see something you like we'd be happy to add it for you. |
|
 |
 |
|
Copywriting for your Website
- Make a list of keywords. Don't try and use them all, just write the list and keep them in mind.
- Just put it on paper. Don't try and be perfect, don't try and use every keyword, just get it down.
- Clean it up...now make the sentences make sense. Get it in some kind of logical order. If a keyword fits, use it but don't overdo it.
- Imagine you're the intended audience reading your document for the first time. The big questions you want to answer here are:
- Does it make sense? Would the reader understand what you're trying to say?
- Does it hold your interest from start to finish?
- Does it include all the information you need (e.g., important numbers, URL, event location)?
- PHAT or FAT?
Get it lean and mean...thin it out and cut out the fat. Trim long sentences: If any are longer than 25 words or so, consider turning them into two sentences or removing any unnecessary words.
- Slim down the words: Replace long words and phrases with short ones. In other words, why say"ascertain the location of" when you can just say"find"?
- Remember that black flatters figures, but white flatters writing: Nothing is more daunting to a reader than a dense block of text. Add some breathing room with white space between paragraphs, bold subheads and (where appropriate) bullet points. Use lots of bullet points....
- Listen to your high school English teacher - except when it's best to tune her out.
Marketing writing is not the same as writing for your old English teacher. For example, you can in fact start a sentence with "and" or "but." But only if it adds clarity and impact. That said, she was right about a lot of things. Here are a few major points we can all agree on:
- Good writing is error-free. This means perfect spelling and no typos.
- Check for the correct use of homonyms like to/too/two, their/they're/there, etc. Spell check doesn't always make those distinctions.
- Confirm you've spelled all names correctly. This mistake can be particularly embarrassing.
- Good writing avoids the energy-draining passive voice. Write Bob threw the ball. Not The ball was thrown by Bob.
- Good writing is formatted correctly. Check your margins, use of spacing and consistency in style of headings, font, bold or not bold, capitalization, etc.
- Now clean it up and read it again. Out loud.
After you've made your revisions, print your document (don't edit onscreen!) and read it again. If you're in a crowded office, whisper instead, but don't skip this step. You'll be amazed at how much you'll catch.
- Yay, I'm done! It's perfect...
Don't feel bad, but probably not. Editing is a real skill that can take years to perfect. But if you follow these recommendations, you'll greatly improve whatever you write. If you don't want to tackle it yourself, we'd be happy to help with our copywriting services.
|
|
|
 |
|
Alex Scott(1996-2004)
In 2000, a 4 year old cancer patient named Alexandra "Alex" Scott announced a seemingly simple idea -she was holding a lemonade stand to raise money to help find a cure for kids with cancer. The idea  was put into action by Alex and her older brother, Patrick, when they set up the first "Alex's Lemonade Stand for Childhood Cancer" on their front lawn in July of 2000.
For the next four years, despite her deteriorating health, Alex held an annual lemonade stand to raise money for childhood cancer research. Following her inspirational example, thousands of lemonade stands and other fundraising events have been held across the country by children, schools, businesses, and organizations, all to benefit Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation for childhood cancer. On August 1st, 2004, Alex died peacefully at the age of 8—she had raised over $1 million for childhood cancer research in her short lifetime.
Alex's spirited determination to raise awareness and money for all childhood cancer while she bravely fought her own deadly battle with cancer has inspired thousands of people, from all walks of life to raise money and give to her cause. Alex's family and supporters are committed to continuing her inspiring legacy through Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation, a registered 501c3 charity. As of January 2007, Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation has raised over $10 million for childhood cancer research. The result—Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation has given millions of dollars for childhood cancer research across the country!
http://www.alexslemonade.org
If you have a 501c3 non-profit and need a website, we'll give you a 20% discount off our standard hourly rates. |
|
|
 |
 |
We are a small web design company based in Howell, Michigan for over 10 years.
We provide advanced web design services for small businesses and non-profits worldwide. Our rates remain reasonable because we use open source software in tandem with a choice of reliable, economical hosting providers.
Whether you need a simple blog, or a complex community based ecommerce site, our custom designed websites are standards compliant and use modern design methods to give you the best search engine advantage.
We offer online worksheets and information to help you make the best possible decisions, and provide many software demos to help you choose based on your specific needs. We offer FREE phone consultations and would love to speak with you about your anticipated web project. We work with businesses worldwide through email, fax and phone to build you a website that's JUST RIGHT ---Cindy |
|
|
|
 |
|
Monetize Your WordPress Blog
Everyone wants to know how to make money with websites. People especially want to know how to make money using online advertising. This is because, it's often assumed that putting a few ads on a website requires less work than other means of earning a living.
The first thing to note is that just throwing Google adsense or any other advertising on your blog isn't going to make you much money by itself. Just like you won't sell products if you don't have a customer base, you won't earn money from advertising if you don't have customers coming to your site. Having a few hundred people visit your WordPress blog each week won't cut it.
The first way to earn income from ads on your WordPress blog actually has nothing to do with advertising, but everything to do with content. If you're not offering something fresh and new, then users won't continually come to your web site. You have to offer fresh content or products to first get people on your site. This may be posting several blog posts a day, selling products or running contests. Write about something you LOVE or you'll never stick with it. Find a niche, and work on building a presence on that niche before even thinking about putting advertising on your website.
Once you've got a following, start researching about possible advertising tools out there. Many people do Google Adsense, but it is difficult for it to pay off without tons of traffic. There are many other methods of advertising on your WordPress blog including:
- Affiliate Ads. These are often the best advertising method because you can choose affiliates that are geared toward your targeted audience.
- Brokered Ads. This type of advertising only works if you have a high volume of visitors. Advertisers go through a broker to have their ads display on your site. This cuts down on the work you have to do such as billing, ad size and technical issues.
- Text Link Ads. Text link advertising is important if you have a high page rank and your blog is properly optimized. Once again, you can use a broker or sell the ads yourselves.
- Contextual Advertising. These are your basic adsense-type ads that display ads based on keywords on a page or your blog's category.
We do affiliate advertising including Google Adsense. Give us a call. |
|
|
 |
|
Finding & Installing New "Drivers"
You've been told either by your computer or your local geek you need to download and update your "Drivers"...Yikes, what isTHAT you say? Well, it's not that hard (Drivers make things like printers, video players, and other things in your computer RUN)...Here are some step by step instructions for downloading and installing new drivers for just about anything:
- Know that if you are not using Microsoft Windows, seek instructions other than the following ones - these are only for Windows
- Find the brand and model number of your piece of hardware. There are several ways of doing this, the easiest is to see if it came in a box and that will give all the information you need. Sometimes the hardware has the brand and maybe even the model number if you can find it.
- Go to the manufacturer's website. Go to a search website such as google.com, and type in the manufacturer's name and usually the first result is the website you want to go to.
- Find information and drivers for your hardware. Once you are at the website, find the support section, this is typically at the top of the screen, and click. Type in the product model number and select your product from the search results. Once you are at the product home page, find the section for the list of drivers.
- Choose which drivers that are best for your computer. There are probably many driver downloads available, so you have to be careful about which ones you are going to download and install. First, find all the drivers that have your operating system listed. To narrow it down more, choose which driver is the higher version number for your operating system. Sometimes it shows 32 bit and 64 bit on the drivers, determine if your computer is 32 or 64 bit and choose from there. Older computers are always 32 bit, however newer computers use both 32 and 64 bit - it will be in your computer documentation.
- Download the drivers. Once you have found the driver for your system, click the download button right next to the driver. Sometimes you will have to go through a series of download links to download it. If a security box questions the download, allow it. In a few seconds, depending on your computer, a box will show up asking if you want to save the file you are downloading or run it, choose save and find a location you can easily find on your hard rive.
- Go to your download location and double click the file you downloaded and it will start the installation. It should tell you when installation is complete.
- Restart windows so it can detect and acknowledge the new drivers you installed.
|
|
|
|
