Ok, let's say you want to build a site or blog about
some off the wall topic, such as The World of Warcraft. There
are a lot of tools, scripts, and stuff out there than can be added
to you site, or used with your site, to enhance it in any number of
ways, including getting traffic.
So here's a bunch of stuff the we find to be pretty useful on a pretty
regular basis.
Yes, almost every link on this page is an affiliate link so we get
paid if you buy the product.
And yes, we do, in fact, use everything listed on this page.
If something isn't listed here it's because we don't use it and that
says nothing about that product or service, one way or the other. For
example, we use Aweber for email services, but there are several other
good services out there.
Contents
Build a site:
There are a ton of options here. We have free blogs on Wordpress and
Blogger, lenses on squidoo (see below,) and our own domains with blogs
and sites like this one.
If you want to build a site then I highly recommend XsitePro. Gotwarcraft
was built with Dreamweaver, but if we had to do it over it would be
with XSP. Anyone can make a decent looking site that is consistent
from page to page. Comes with lots of templates and tools. If you know
what you're doing (graphically) then you can make somethign that looks
pretty hot. It's maybe not as versitile as DW, you won't make the next
Amazon.com with XSP, but it's more than good enough for most uses.
- Dreamweaver
on Amazon - If you like to do all the code yourself. Limited pretty much just by
your skills. Lots of templates are available on the web.
- XsitePro - If you'd rather use a much easier system and aren't making
the next Ebay.
The Email Stuff:
- Aweber - A very slick system that allows to to set up an email list
and mail to it. You can build opt-in forms (such as the one to the
right) either send out news alerts or do an automated series of emails
(such as an email course) or both. It's also well designed to keep
spammers out.
So why don't we have a list (even though we have the forms?) Sigh...
Laziness. Aweber gives you the tools, but you actually have to write
the emails and enter them into the system. :)
Here are the lastest postings from the Aweber blog if you want to give
them a look:
Or, just give Aweber a test drive and see how their automation works.
Yeah, we'll get around to making our list soon.
- Contact
Form - A nifty javascript form which allows you visitors to
contact you, but which blocks spammers from grabbing your email address.
Cheap at twice the $7 price.
- See below for some free email tools.
How To...
- Blog Success -
Yeah, I know, this isn't a blog, but we actually have several. These
guys have a lot of good info on how to get started and eventually make
a killer blog. Of course, you'll have to actually work at it... They
also have some great stuff on figuring out what you want
to blog about and how to keep it up.
- Wealthy
Affiliate - Want to make money from your site selling other
people's products? Which, you may have noticed, we do on this site?
WA covers everything you could possibly want to know, and a lot more,
and offers lots training and a crazy number of useful tools. Also
check out the
WA blog, lots of good stuff there.
Getting Links
There are a bazillion services on the web that have to do with getting
links and traffic to your site. BlogSuccess and WealthyAffiliate (above)
will show you how to get tons of links and traffic. In addition to those
two here are a couple of other things we use:
- SEO LinkVine - One of several services which does the following:
Allows you to add your blog to the system to get free content (this
part is free.) Articles link back to the owner's site(s) and may or
may not be well written. There is an option to approve articles before
posting. The paid part of the system allows you to
add your own articles and send them out to their blog network, getting
links back to your site. There are a few other nice tweaks to the system,
as well.
An extra cost option is a full blown video course on Search Engine
Optimization, but a guy who knows his stuff.
- Article Underground -
You get a nice forum on Internet Marketing, focusing on linking and article
marketing, 400 PLR articles a month, and a set of blogs that you can
post to with your own stuff to get links
back to your sites. That one feature can be awesome. Well worth the
price of admission if you are going to use it.
Useful Free Stuff
- Never post your real email address on a website
or a forum. Use either a script to hide it, an non-clickable image
that displays it, or a contact form. Spammers search sites for email
addresses, so unless you want a ton of extra email offering, **ahem**,
certain products, just say NO to posting your email.
- Here's
a free email hiding script. This gives you a clickable
link that most email snoooping programs won't be able to see.
- This one turns
your email into a graphic. Users will then have
to type in your email to send you wanything. With a little tweaking
(look up "how to javascript") you could probably combine
the two to make a clickable image link. The form also works with
any text you care to enter.
- We use a javascript contact form on our contact page. This is a
paid product, but it's only $7. Get
it here.
- Start your own blog for free - There are
lots of stes where you can post your own stuff, free of any charge. Rant,
compare A to B, discuss your favorite thing, whatever. There are lots
of others besides these three.
- Wordpress.com -
Sign up and in about 10 minutes you can have you own blog, and it'll
look pretty cool! Lots of templates and tools. Think you can get a
lot of
traffic to your stuff? Go for it, WP can handle it.
- Blogger -
Owned by Google and works much the same as Wordpress, also has lots
of templates and tools. Same as WP for traffic. You'll need a Google
account to join.
- Squidoo.com - Make a page (lens) and post your own stuff, free. You
can plug in any number of modules that let you do things like sell
Amazon or Ebay stuff (and get a cut,) start arguments (duels,) and
all kinds of stuff. Here's one of ours: The WoW
Cooking Guide
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