Archive for October, 2008

How to Start a Blog: Part 3

// October 6th, 2008 // 1 Comment » // How To

So you have decided on a niche and you have a domain name and hosting plan. Now you need a blog! I am going to go through step by step how to download, install and configure WordPress. The format of this guide will be a little different to the others – more of a step by step rather than an explanation.

Download WordPress

  1. Go to http://wordpress.org/download/
  2. Click on “Download Wordpress” on the right hand corner
  3. Save the zip file to a safe and memorable location on your PC
  4. Extract the zip file to your PC

Create a Database and User

You will need to create a MySQL database and user in order for WordPress to function. The setup of the database will vary depending on your hosting provider. I am going to show you how to setup your database using cPanel, however you might want to check with your hosting provider before you start this step.

The below steps are taken directly from the WordPress website.

  1. Log in to your cPanel.
  2. Click MySQL Databases.
  3. If a user relating to WordPress does not already exist under the Users section, create one:
    1. Chose a username for WordPress (‘wordpress‘ is good) and enter it in the UserName field.
    2. Choose a difficult-to-guess password (ideally containing a combination of upper- and lower-case letters, numbers, and symbols), and enter it in the Password field.
    3. Write down the username and password you chose.
    4. Click Add User.
  4. If a database relating to WordPress does not already exist under the Databases section, create one:
    1. Choose a name for your WordPress database (‘wordpress‘ or ‘blog‘ are good), enter it in the Db field, and click Add Db.
  5. Under Databases, select your WordPress username from the User dropdown, then select your WordPress database from the Db dropdown. Make sure All is checked under Privileges, then click Add User to Db.
  6. When you return to the main MySQL Account Maintenance screen, cPanel will list information about the database you just created. You should see the username you just added to the database (with ALL PRIVILEGES), as well as a few sample Connection Strings for you to use in Perl or PHP scripts to connect to the database. The PHP code will have the following format:

$dbh = mysql_connect(“hostname“, “username“, “<PASSWORD HERE>”) or die (“message“); mysql_select_db(“databasename“);

Write down the values of hostname, username, databasename, and the password you chose. (Note that hostname will usually be localhost.)

Edit wp-config.php

  1. Browse to the location where you extracted the WordPress zip
  2. Rename the file wp-config-sample.php to wp-config.php
  3. Open the new wp-config.php in notepad or another text editor
  4. Edit the following fields
    DB_NAME
    The name of the database you created for WordPress
    DB_USER
    The username you created for WordPress
    DB_PASSWORD
    The password you chose for the WordPress username
    DB_HOST
    The hostname you determined (usually localhost, but not always)
    DB_CHARSET
    The database character set, normally should not be changed.
    DB_COLLATE
    5. The database collation should normally be left blank
  5. Save the file

Upload Wordpress

In order to upload WordPress to your server, you will need the FTP details you received when you signed created your hosting account and an FTP client (such as CuteFTP or WS_FTP.

Configure the FTP client with your FTP address, username and password and connect. Once you log into your FTP account, browse to the root directory. If you are unsure you should confirm with your hosting provider as the location varies between hosting providers.

Once you have selected the folder you wish to upload WordPress to, browse to the WordPress folder on your local PC and send the files to the server. This should take about 10 minutes or so.

Install WordPress

  1. Open your Internet browser
  2. Browse to http://example.com/wp-admin/install.php
  3. Follow the on-screen prompts

The on-screen prompts will ask you for the title of your blog and e-mail address. You will also be asked if you would like your blog to be visible to search engines such as Google. I suggest you leave the box un-checked so your new blog can be indexed in the search engines. You will be able to change all of these options in the administrator panel within WordPress.

Once you complete the installation of WordPress you will be ready to log in and start posting! I will explain in my next guide some tips and tricks to WordPress.

Many 70-640 and 70-236 professionals insist that IT professionals should blog so that new students of 220-602 and 350-030 can utilize from there.

Blog Sells for $15Million!

// October 6th, 2008 // No Comments » // General

No not this one!

I have read on numerous sites this morning at blog called Bankaholic has been sold to a financial based website for US$15 million!

The blog is run by one person – John Wu – who will remain at the blog assisting in the transition and remain for an “unspecified period of time.”

The blog is ranked below 50,000 in Alexa and has had steady growth over the past year.

Stories like this inspire me to keep on going! It is amazing was one simple idea might be able to turn into. There might be hope for all of us!

Explore With Me

// October 4th, 2008 // No Comments » // Projects

I mentioned a few days ago that I was about to embark on a new project – a travel blog which documents all our travels around the world in the hope to educate want to be travellers and maybe teach them a thing or two.

Ruth and I have been trying to come up with a few names to represent the blog as we don’t really want something like “danielandruthstravelblog.com” and so on.

We decided on a name yesterday and I registered the domain name just in case it is the one we choose. Before we decide whether to use this name we thought we would sit on it for a while and see how we feel about it in a week. Sometimes what sounds good one day doesn’t seem to the next. It has been a few days and I seem to like this one.

At the moment our blog will be called “Explore With Me” – www.explorewithme.com. This is what we are going to call the blog unless we find another name that we like better – however I want to get it up and running by the end of this month so we will have to make a decision soon.

What do you think?

After doing 70-620 and 220-601, many professionals state that going for 70-649 before the advanced SY0-101 is a smarter move.

Why Most MMO Blogs Don’t Succeed

// October 2nd, 2008 // 1 Comment » // Making Money

There are so many make money online blogs on the Internet that never succeed – in fact I would say 99% of them don’t. It makes you wonder why people bother starting one when there is already so many on the Internet. I think people see it as an easy way to make money – however it is probably the hardest niche to break into.

Most of the MMO blogs that are created only last a few months. After the blogger realises the challenge in attracting traffic and more importantly, revenue, they just give up and stop posting – their blog goes to the place where websites go to die.

I started this blog as a project to see if I was able to create something from nothing and make money online – it is essentially a make money online blog. I am making money, however all the work I put into it, blogging everyday, researching make money methods, barely makes worth while the $35 I have made in the past 4 months.

I think most MMO bloggers will tell you not to start one when there are so many other niches you can blog about and make more money. Most of the biggest blogs on the Internet have nothing to do with telling others how to make money online yet they are easily able to live off the income they make.

I read an interesting comment on another MMO blog the other day that discussed this same topic. One of the comments said that the reason why most MMO blogs don’t succeed is because other bloggers are the ones who are reading the content.

I have to agree. Other bloggers are the ones visiting MMO blogs so they can monetise their own blog. Why would I click someones affiliate link when I can just click my own affiliate link to buy the same product?

This blog is a challenge to maintain, and it does take up a lot of my time. I said initially that I would give “Project Blogger” 12 months and then evaluate the blog and decide if I would continue. I am going to keep my word and finish the project.

I am starting to look at other niches now and I think I have some other opportunities to make money online without having to depend on this blog. I have plenty of other interests and hobbies that I am sure I can write about!

Up, Up and Away

// October 1st, 2008 // 2 Comments » // Project Blogger

It is that time of the month again! Another month has just ended and after a poor August, September bounced back with a bang! September was the best month danielfelice.com has ever had in its short 5 month history.

Traffic

September was a massive 252% increase on August and 62% better than my best month so far, July. After a bad August I hoped this month would improve, however I didn’t expect it to be this good.

Having the contest really helped me this month I think, and also the first two parts of “How to Start a Blog” have shown some keen interest being the most viewed pages of the month.

I seem to be receiving traffic from a number of sources this month which is good to see. I have been making more of an effort to join forums, post comments on other blogs and submit my posts to social communities such as StumbleUpon and Digg. The top three traffic referrers for the month were DNTrade, StumbleUpon and TylerCruz.com.

Search engine traffic was big factor in Septembers success. A good 25% of all traffic was from search engines this month with terms such as “freebies4webmasters”, “daniel felice”, “promote blog for free” and “create a blog” being the best performing search terms.

Revenue

Revenue this month was also up on last month and also beat July’s record! I made a total of US$22.35 this month which is about $5 more than July. It has to be said though without the £10 from freebies4webmasters I would have only made about $5 this month – so thanks to them!

For those of you who don’t know freebies4webmasters give you £5 per month for just showing 3 banners anywhere on your site and an additional £5 when you sign up.

My affiliate ads still aren’t performing as well as I would like – actually I am yet to make a single cent from them. I will have to look at this again and see what I am doing wrong here.

So it was a great month and hopefully things will keep on flying away in October! Thanks for all your support over the past few months.

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