'Nough said...
Good morning, fellow coffee drinkers, and welcome to the Traffic Generation Cafe!
A few months ago, I got myself one of those very nifty Nespresso single-serving coffee makers that brews a perfectly fresh and delicious caffeinated goodness one cup at a time.
I was hooked!
If you think I am too harsh sometimes, especially when it comes down to my Blog Audit Fridays, it’s most likely because I have coffee pumping through my heart.
That explains the “Cafe” part…
Anyway, I am happy to share my Sunday morning cup of coffee with you; some of you requested substitutions and that’s fine with me – however let’s stay away from vodka in coffee (you know who you are 
).
Here are the answers to some of the questions I got last week.
Sunday Coffee Questions
#1. Guest posting
Question from Lisa Dubec:
Happy 2011!! I wanted to ask you a question in regards to guest posting. I have received a few invites to guest post on some blogs…yay! My question is, do you have standards set for yourself as to which invites you accept or should I guest post wherever I am invited?
I actually had to face that decision just this past week myself, when I needed to choose between 2 seemingly great blogs.
Since guest posting is becoming quite a trend, I decided this topic deserves a post of its own. The post will be published this week; see the schedule below.
#2. Email signature
Question from my numerous email subscribers:
How do you add your signature in Gmail?
In case, you’ve never seen it, here’s a screen shot:
As you can see, not only does it have my signature per se and a picture, it also includes by social media buttons and my latest RSS update – quite handy!
What I use to create that is a free Firefox addon called WiseStamp. Feel free to Google it to down-load if interested.
Quick tip: even though you can use WiseStamp for all your email needs, I still do use at least a form of it in my Aweber emails, for instance. All you do is copy and paste the HTML code of the signature.
3. Gravatar
Question from my numerous “faceless” commentators:
How do you add your picture to a comment?
That picture is called “avatar” and it’s an absolute must for personal branding. Plus it’s one of the reasons your comment might not be accepted by the author of the blog – it looks a bit spammy when you don’t have an avatar, since spammers never do.
Read more on how to avoid being labeled as a spammer:
Back to the question: the best way to do this is to use Gravatar.com. It’s a free service that let’s you upload a profile image and “attach” it to your email you use for commenting purposes.
So every time you comment and use that email, your picture will automatically show up.
#4. In-post Notes
How do you add that coffee cup image to your headings within the post?
Those headings are called “in-post notes” and are a great way to keep your readers reading by providing them with a great way to break up the content into smaller chunks.
Here’s how you code that in Thesis theme, which is what I use in this blog:
.custom #content h3 {background: #fff url(images/note.png) center no-repeat; border: 0px solid #66CCCC; background-position: 5px 50%; text-align: left; padding: 10px 10px 10px 60px;font-style:bold;font-size:20px; }
Of course, you need to change the images/note.png to your own image.
And to implement the same in other themes just add:
.h3 {background: #fff url(images/note.png) center no-repeat; border: 0px solid #66CCCC; background-position: 5px 50%; text-align: left; padding: 10px 10px 10px 60px;font-style:bold;font-size:20px; }
Since all themes work differently, I can’t guarantee it will work on yours, but certainly worth the try.
This code snippet should go into your custom.css file.
The code was provided by Devesh of Technshare – thanks, Dev!
#5. Link Building
I have a brand new site. Any suggestions as to how to approach link building to start working on my keyword search engine rankings?
This question assume that you’ve already done your thorough keyword research and pertains to ANY website: old or new, with zero links or a whole slew of them.
The absolutely EASIEST and the BEST thing to do is to check up on your competition that’s already ranking in the first 3 spots for your keyword.
Hey, they already have the rankings, so they’ve done something right with their link building; why not “borrow” their success and follow it to hopefully outdo them?
I am going to show you 3 ways to do this: 2 paid and 1 free.
When I work on my own link building, I use both paid methods and never bother with the free one: too much work. But hey, with a little leg work it’ll still do the trick.
I will list the methods in the order I prefer to use them starting with my top choice first.
Market Samurai
In case you haven’t noticed, this is my favorite software to use for just about everything: keyword research, ranking tracking, competition research, and much more.
Market Samurai makes the task of checking out your competition EXTREMELY easy and quick: with the click of a button, it tells me everything there’s to know about the first 10 sites ranked for your keyword: how many links they have, where those links are coming from, their PR and anchor text, and general domain info.
It looks something like this:
SEO SpyGlass
What I love about it (it’s a part of SEO Power Suite software I use and love) is the fact that among other things, it provides me with link value estimation for each incoming link, letting me make wiser choices as to what links I should really go for first.
It takes a while longer to collect that information than Market Samurai does, since it goes a bit more in depth, but I still use it almost on a daily basis.
Here’s a screen shot of the SEO SpyGlass at work:
As yo can see from the image, PageRank (PR) is not the sole indicator of link value – by far. SEO SpyGlass definitely has my back covered in that area since there’s no way I can do this kind of calculation by hand.
Yahoo Site Explore
This is the free version of doing your competition spying.
You can find this tool at https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/search.
One thing I highly recommend you do when using this method is to install a free Firefox addon called SEO Quake first. Since Yahoo! Site Explore won’t give you any information about the links, just the number and the URL, SEO Quake will provide the missing pieces.
#6. Blogger Hacks
If you are running your blog on Blogger platform, here’s a list of some of the best Blogger hacks out there.
Traffic Generation Cafe Posting Calendar
Here’s what I have in store for you this coming week on TGC:
Monday: Keep Your Money, Honey: Which Internet Marketing Products Are Not Worth Their Salt
Tuesday: Guest Posting: How To Successfully Borrow A-list Bloggers Traffic
Wednesday: What You Don’t Know About Your Target Market Is a Lot
Friday: My Blog Audit Friday
Saturday: Always a day off here at TGC. If you want to take up the spot with your guest post (a bloody good one though! ) – be my guest.
Sunday: yeah…. you know what happens on Sundays now.
A Word About My Blog Audit Fridays
There’s a new criterion to qualify for a free one: BE ACTIVE ON TGC!
Get involved, comment, help other readers, guest post – show me you are a part of the community, in other words.
Starting in February, I will have to cut down to 2 blog audits per month, but that’s OK – all the more to look forward to.
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