Web Dev Notes

Remember back in April when I became the new writer for Web Dev Notes? I started off by introducing Joomla, PHP-Nuke, phpBB and PHP. I even recommended some cool software like the ALT-Tab Replacer, Virtual Desktop Manager and the Firebug plugin for Firefox. After a slow start, I finally got my big break when my article Formatting Text in Wordpress started to bring in steady traffic!

In my early Web Dev Notes days I stuck to covering more technical topics such as how to insert CSS on your website or how to create your first PHP page. However, after testing out the use of humor in posts like the Top Ten Stupidest Joomla! Administrator Tricks and When will GoogleBot index my Brain I discovered that this unique approach was actually quite well received! I also realized website marketing and SEO was a very popular aspect of web development so I decided to venture into this area with posts like The Battle for Traffic - SEO vs Content, No Contacts, No Money and Validate Your Website for Better SEO!

Of course, even though I would later discover that marketing and SEO would be a very popular topic on my blog, at the time I had no idea yet! Looking at my stats, the posts about PHP were the most trafficked so I decided to cover this area more extensively! In May I introduced some great web development resources and then discussed the relationship between PHP and a Web Server/Browser in order to build a solid foundation before diving right into PHP for the rest of the month. I then covered how to comment PHP code, the debate over using Print or Echo, how to use variables, how to use concatenation with variables and variable naming conventions. Using this introductory material, I was then able to go even deeper and cover topics like using arrays, if/else programming logic, nested IF/ELSE conditional statements, and PHP Loops. Since the topic of loops is already an extensively covered subject, I decided to make my articles sound unique by naming them, “The magic of WHILE Loops“, “The incredible FOR Loop Multi-Tasker“, and “The FOREACH Loop Love Affair with Mr. Array“.

In order to stay informed, I subscribed to many RSS feeds relating to my topic. In so doing I noticed that Digg and Google were two very popular topics. I decided to explore these subjects a bit with articles like, “List of Google Hoaxes“, “Who’s Digging You?“, “Google’s PageRank Explained by Phil Craven“, “Declare Warr on Digg Doondles!“, “I Hacked Google and Stole Their Robot lolol“, and “Are Your Archives Burying You Worse Than Digg“. These articles continue to bring in traffic to this day!

During the month of June I was taking a course on Interface Design so decided to cover similar topics on Web Dev Notes. I began by discussing the advantages of using personas during development and then decided to list nine causes of software error before discussing software quality and the three general principles of quality assurance. I introduced the subject of human/computer interaction and demonstrated how good design can help us better interact with computers. In fact, making the interaction between humans and computers as easy as possible is an important goal of improved user interface design. I also mentioned that building the right product is even more important than building a product right.

It was around mid-June when I also began to notice how well my SEO, blogging and marketing tips posts were doing! I therefore decided to write about the guaranteed way to generate incoming links and conquering the crowded niche! I also wrote about some issues I was having with trying to follow my own advice when I noticed my trackbacks were being kidnapped and asked if it were possible if my bullets were killing them! Not wanting to stray too far from the very roots of web development, I also introduced the Pixel Groovy website, discussed how to created animated favicons and threw in 21 CSS tutorials answering frequently asked questions.

During the month of July I continued to cover a lot of marketing topics. I created a new Top 11 Posts section and asked if people thought linking to other sites increases incoming traffic. I also started to learn a great deal about blogging and realized that my very own archives contained in itself the power to help WebDevNotes succeed. I therefore stopped considering old posts like dirty socks thrown into a laundry bin, and instead began viewing them as cornerstone content that should be linked back to frequently so that new visitors could access my best content easily.

Upon making this realization, I began offering my visitors some blogging advice with the help of Lolcats to make the posts more fun and easy to read. For example:

Don’t let Chihuahua’s hold back your website! Start working with the purrrrfect partners and plot your plan for success. Make sure you plant the seeds for success early and listen to feedback so you can feed your readers a happy meal. Make good use of article directories and other marketing techniques and never forget the secrets to writing a successful blog!

In conclusion, to those who say linking to old content is difficult, I beg to differ! Don’t let those archives go to waste

I’ve seen this question discussed and debated several times now so I thought I would share my opinion on the matter! Should bloggers use humor in their posts? I think bloggers should be themselves and should not be afraid to use humor whenever they feel like it. Of course, if you think insulting people or being offensive is funny, I’d suggest you not go down that route!

Still, at the end of the day, if you can make someone visiting your blog laugh or smile, chances are you’ll see them again tomorrow!

Should bloggers use humor in their posts? What do you think? I’d love to hear some other opinions!

How about this for a Sunday morning brain twister upper! Does linking to other websites increase traffic to your website? What do you think? Share your articles with us on the subject and I will feature them in all their glory next week! In fact, when I feature them, I will link to them which will definitely increase traffic to your website! The question is, how will my linking to your articles affect traffic back to Web Dev Notes?!

Of course I could share all my theories with you, but how would that help get you thinking! One of the Huge Advantages of Weekend Blogging, is that the weekend is a great time to socialize and discuss subjects! So please, let me know what you think about posting links to other websites from your own. Are you afraid that by linking you will be sending your visitors away from your website and that they will never return? Usually you want your links to be relevant, so are you worried that linking to a competing website might cause you to lose all your visitors to them? Or do you think linking to other websites shows how confident you are in your own and how you are willing to make sure your readers get access to the best material they can, even if its not written by you?

While we all enjoy the theories, by now you may have realized that I am a fan of the evidence and experiments! So, join me next week as I spend the entire week linking and featuring great articles written by others. Once the week is done, I’ll post my website traffic stats and we can analyze what the results of linking were…

What do you think? Will I see a spike in traffic next week or will I see a huge drop and lose all of my loyal loving visitors and fans? Another interesting question to ask would be, do I even have any loyal loving visitors and fans? LOL! I know GoogleBot is a huge fan because he visits pretty often!

Are you Interested in investing in domains? There is definitely some risk involved, but given the right name, the opportunity to make a nice profit is definitely there.

Meet Andy. Andy is a noob in the domain investment business but is thankfully a blogger eager to share his story with us so that we can learn from his mistakes! Check out One Noobs Experience Part 1 and One Noobs Experience Part 2. These articles are a well documented first experience by Andy trying to get started in the business of domain investments. There is even a follow up post giving another update on how the domain investments are working out for him.

Have you ever considered investing in domain names? If so, have your experiences been positive or negative? Let us know of any big sales you have made!

Should you approach weekend blogging the same as weekday blogging? When writing on Saturday morning last week, I did not feel like researching material to write about because generally I like to relax and socialize on the weekend. I figured most of my readers would feel the same way so instead of giving you all a lecture, I decided to ask the question, “What is your Favorite Marketing Strategy?”

Are questions the best type of post for the weekend? What type of posts do you find work best for your blog on the weekend? Please let us know!

We encourage you to share your opinions in the comments and post any links you have that are related to this question. All links will be featured in an article next week! This site currently has a page rank of 4, so any links we give you will be quality ones!

Ah, it’s Saturday morning and all your minds are nice and well rested! Rather than giving you something to read about, I think the weekend is the perfect time to give you something to talk about!

What is your Favorite Marketing Strategy? Is it sending emails, writing guest posts, leaving comments, buying ads, etc..! We want to know what works best for you!

If you’ve already written on the topic, please post your link in the comments below so I can link to your website in a follow-up to this post!

The more blogs I read, the more I see these darn technorati tags stuck within or at the bottom of posts. While I’ve always known being listed in Technorati was a good thing, I never really saw the point of using their tags until now thanks to Patric Herber from BloggingPointers.com. Patric explains How to Drive Traffic with Technorati Tags in an article which explains how the technorati tags work and how to use them to your advantage.

As Patric explains, Technorati is in fact one of the largest social search engines on the web which sends millions of people to the blogs listed in their database each month. Therefore, TEO (Technorati Engine Optimization) could be a great way to boost your traffic.

I’m still a bit old-fashioned myself and prefer relying on good SEO (Search Engine Optimization) rather than investing in a social media website that requires some control of my content. I’m always worried that should Technorati disapear and all my posts are set-up to work with their service, I’ll suddenly have hundreds of pages which will need to be edited… ! (By this I mean, I’ll have to go ahead and remove all those broken-linked tags; my posts themselves will still be fine!)

That doesn’t mean I don’t want to list my blog in Technorati or that its a bad idea to use their tags. Those who take advantage take the risk of investing their blog in something which could either increase their traffic or just give them a big headache. However, if you don’t take some risks, you won’t be successful! Technorati is also not a very big risk as the site is growing incredibly fast and looks to have a bright future!

Patric does mention there are Wordpess plugins out there for Technorati tags. If uninstalling these plugins will remove all tags from your posts, then I’d highly recommend using that! The only thing you want hard-coded into your posts is the text containing your content! For those running sites where such plugins are not available, you’re setting yourself up for a possible headache if you write in technorati tags as part of the content, because that’s when you risk having hundreds of pages to edit one at a time in the future!