10 Ways To Improve Your Site Speed For SEO

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Whilst no SEO specialist can know 100% every aspect of Google’s algorithm for ranking websites, there is enough research, data, and information to know what factors help a website to rank, and what do not. Some of these are more important than others, and one which you will find on numerous articles about best SEO practices is page load speed.

Page load speed is the time it takes each page to open in the browser of the person who clicked through to that page. Given Google’s focus on user experience, it follows that the quicker your website page opens, the better the experience is for the visitor, and what follows should be better rankings. Any SEO campaign should speed up the time it takes a website’s pages to open and here are ten ways this can be achieved.

Switch To The Optimal Hosting Solution: One basic way to improve your website’s speed is to switch to a hosting solution that can provide the page load speeds you desire. Specifically, moving to a dedicated server rather than using a shared server should manifest a faster page load speed.

Use a Content Distribution Network (CDN): Rather than all your content being stored on and loaded from your hosting server, you should store content on a third-party CDN. This then uses the closest data centre to the visitor to serve up that content on your website, meaning the website loads faster for them.

Reduce URL Redirects: If you use a lot of internal URL redirects within your website, it slows down the page laud speed as there are additional server requests to process the redirect. Carry out an audit on your websites’ redirects and remove those that are no longer necessary.

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How Websites Get Hacked

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When any individual or business has had their website hacked, apart from the considerable stress, inconvenience, and in some cases, financial loss, that they suffer, there tends to be a question that they all ask. That question is “How did they do it?”. It gets asked with a sense of disbelief as the person asking was under the misconception that their website was 100% secure.

The sad fact is that of the 2 billion websites that exist in the world a large number will not be completely secure from a hacking attack. Worse than that, the lack of security some of them have will be akin to leaving the front door of their home wide open with a sign above it that says, ‘Come on in and take what you like’.

Thankfully, many websites owners have taken the correct approach and have the necessary security in place that will repel most hacking attempts. Hackers will tend to follow the path of least resistance so if they soon find that your website is behind several layers of security then they will move on to a website whose owner has not to be so vigilant.

Website Hacking Methods

When that website does get hacked it will be done by exploiting or overcoming a website’s security in one of three ways. These are 1) Software vulnerability, 2) Access control and 3) Using a third-party integration. Now, it does not matter whether a website is owned by an individual who sells arts and crafts locally, or a global multi-billion dollar company, if their website is hacked, it will be based on one or more of these methods so let us look at each of them in more detail.

Software Vulnerability

When websites are created and published there will be several individual pieces of software and coding that are required to keep the website live. These could perform functions on the website, be responsible for the structure of it, play a part in creating the visual elements, generate some of the interactive elements and so on.

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SEO Reports – What They Are And Why They Are Important?

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If you employ an SEO agency to plan and implement an SEO campaign with the objective of your website securing improved rankings on Google, there must be a feedback mechanism in place so that you can be kept informed of that SEO campaign’s progress. The most effective tool for this feedback is an SEO report.

SEO reports provide you with insights into many aspects of your SEO agency’s work and allow you to see how it is progressing. Each agency might use a different template for its SEO reports, but in general, they will include data and the metrics relating to how your website’s ranking is performing before and after the work the SEO agency has undertaken.

Types Of SEO Report

In most cases, there are two types of SEO reports produced. These are the “Initial SEO Report” and the “Ongoing SEO Reports”.

Initial SEO Report: As you might expect, the initial  SEO report is not used to measure how your SEO agency is performing, but rather how any previously SEO has worked or not. It will outline your current rankings and can be used as the starting point against which any future SEO can be measured.

Ongoing SEO Reports: An obvious title, and as it suggests these are the reports which outline the data and metrics of your SEO campaign as it proceeds. The usual timeframe for these to be produced is monthly, although that can be adjusted in agreement with your SEO agency.

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10 Web Design Mistakes That Diminish Your Website

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How Non-Disclosure Agreements Apply To Business Website Designs

If you get web design correct, it can ensure that your website performs to its maximum and in doing so allows your business to thrive. Get web design wrong, and not only will your website fail to produce anything positive, but your business may also be harmed. The solution? There are several, with the first, and most important being you entrust the creation of your new website to a professional web design agency.

Beyond that, if you choose not to use professionals for your web design, you must avoid making some common web design mistakes. These mistakes harm your website and its performance. If you want to know what the ten most common web design mistakes are, continue reading.

Poor Layout: Although the term “web design” covers many aspects of your website, one of its primary goals is to produce a layout that is visually pleasing and gives visitors landing on your website a great first impression.

Low-Quality Content: Great content within your website is essential. If you skip on this or try to save money by hiring cheap content writers you will do more harm than good. Invest in quality content, and the return on that investment will be significant.

Slow Page Load Speeds: Today’s internet users expect instant gratification, and this is why slow page load speeds are a huge problem as visitors will simply click away. In addition, if they click away immediately it is recognised by Google, which becomes a double-whammy as they penalise your rankings.

Zero Or Poor Navigation: Visitors to your website should feel in control and that is achieved by providing them with a simple menu so that they can navigate through your website pages. Omitting this is a huge web design error and another reason why vistos leave your website quickly.

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The Best Free Web Design and Development Software for Webmasters

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HTML Editors
HTML editors come in many shapes and form. Some of simple and have only a few features, while others are complex and have many advanced features. All web designers and developers need a good HTML editor to help them create and update Web pages. Here are some of the top free HTML editors for web designers and developers.

Komodo Edit – A free open-source code editor for Windows, Mac, and Linux operating systems. You can use it for PHP, Python, Ruby, JavaScript, Perl, Tcl, XML, HTML, and CSS. Features include: syntax coloring, IME support, background syntax checking, code formatting, and smart auto-indenting.

CoffeeCup Free HTML Editor – A full-featured HTML editor with real-time preview and wizards for tables, frames, fonts, forms, lists, and more. Features include: HTML tag highlighting, spell checker and thesaurus, unlimited Undo, built-in FTP client, image and link insertion tools, split-screen preview, and free Web graphics.

Aptana Studio – The world’s leading IDE (integrated development environment) for building Web apps. This can be used as a standalone tool or as a plugin for Eclipse tools. Features include: Code Assist for HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, JavaScript debugging, JavaScript libraries, DOM outline view, file transfer and synchronization (FTP, SFTP, FTPS), and live preview.

HTML-Kit – A full-featured HTML editor with modern comforts and hundreds of plugins for customization. You can even edit a file in HTML-Kit and automatically preview it on your iPad. Features include: color themes, preview as you type, Windows 7 jump lists, quick upload, file versioning, translations, image picker, HTML list wizard, and profiles.

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Top Free Font Sources for Creating Unique Designs

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Fontfabric
Fontfabric is an independent type foundry based in Sofia, Bulgaria. Here you will find high-quality unique fonts and new fonts are unveiled each week; some are free and others are available for a small fee. Fontfabric also does custom orders for logos and corporate fonts. So if you’re looking for something creative that will help you stand out from other brands, give them a try.

exljbris Font Foundry
At exljbris Font Foundry you’ll find many free fonts, all created by full-time designer Jos Buivenga. Take your pick from this growing collection. All typefaces come with several different kinds of fonts such as small caps, italics, and bold. Most fonts only have the regular type for free and the others for a small fee, but even the regular versions of each font are unique enough to help you stand out.

Impallari
Created by a small group of type lovers, Impallari showcases script fonts, serious fonts, and playful fonts. All fonts come with several styles or weights and some even have alternative letters that you can use instead of the defaults. This gives you more freedom over your letters and overall typography.

Behance Network
Behance is a professional network for creative individuals like artists, designers, photographers, and even bloggers. You can view projects and work based on creative fields, and one of those fields is typography. Here you’ll be able to find the best of the best when it comes to typography and many include downloads links or a link to the original source where you can download that specific font.

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Is the cheapest consultant to help you evaluate a business for sale the best?

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So many buyers are looking to spend their life savings in a business and then complain that they have to pay a consultant, accountant, lawyer fees to help them with the business they are going to purchase. Many buyers who spend $100,000, $300,000 or even $1 million don’t want to pay very much in fees. Yes, it is prudent to watch what you spend but is the cheapest consultant the best?

There is a saying, if you want to get something done, give it to a busy person and you know that it will be looked after. Busy people have a successful business. If their business is successful, they probably charge more than another consultant. That is the supply and demand concept, the busier you are, the more you can raise your prices and the customers can then decide if they want to use your service or not.

Whenever you hear that a famous person has had a run in with the law, who do they use, the most expensive lawyer that they can find.

Why – they believe that they hired the very best and they do not want to take any chances.

Same goes for a business, you are going to spend your life savings on a business for sale and many investors want to pay the least amount of money for someone to help them buy a business. If things go right and there is no problem, then you were lucky and got away with having to spend a lot of money. The issue is never when things go right, the purpose of a consultant is to avoid when there is a potential for something to go wrong.

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WMT Button Gallery – HTML5 Joomla Component

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The HTML5 WMT Button Gallery – Joomla Component can be used as a gallery or even as a banner rotator. Each image can have animated description window, this window can be animated from different directions, the transition duration, transition delay and final position can be set for each of then plus they have full css support.
WMT Button Gallery – Preview

WMT Button Gallery – Usage
1. Create New Gallery:
Navigate to Components –> WMT Button Gallery –> Galleries

Click on New button to create new gallery

Enter gallery name and click on Save&Close

2. Upload Image
Navigate to Components –> WMT Button Gallery –> Upload

On Upload tab click browse to select image tha you would like to upload and click on Upload icon

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How fast will the value of your business return to the levels prior to the recession?

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The last 6 to 12 months have been difficult for many businesses. Some have gone out of business, others who were large enough were able to reduce the quantity of people working for them significantly so that they were either break even or marginally profitable. The majority of companies have witnessed had significant erosion of their profits. Typically, when a buyer looks for a business, they like to see a three year history to see if earnings are sustainable and they were not the result of a one time contract. If there was one bad year, sometimes you could explain that to the buyer and he would look to the current year and the year prior to the bad year. This recession has changed a lot of things and I believe that business is now conducted differently than it was two years ago.

Will you be able to explain away one bad year or will the buyer now look at your current revenue. Clients two years ago may have closed down, reduced their business, is that a good indication of the business in the future, I do not believe so. As a result, buyers are going to want to look at revenue and expenses based on the new model – from the year 2009 and forward. If the profitability is weak for 2009 or it increased in the last 3 months of the year, it may not make a large difference on the entire year because of 9 poor months.

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Is it a good time to start a new business?

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At the moment, there are a lot of stores that are closing but I think over the next few months, there will be a void in the market and many small stores will open to offer the products and services which were once offered by some of the large stores going under.

A lot of people are getting laid off from companies and if they have worked in that company for a long time, they might get a reasonable size severance package. If there are no jobs out there, some of those unemployed people may look at the downturn as an opportunity to open a store.

I think that this will take place when a former employee believes that we are at or near the bottom of the recession. Based on predictions in the paper, this could be in 6 to 9 months’ time. I believe that people will start opening stores when they believe the economy will not get any worse. They may be able to get a bargain on the rent since there will be a lot of vacancies. Their costs will be lower than if they opened a new store today.

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