Wednesday, September 28, 2011

How to Create a Shopping Cart with PayPal

Paypal makes it very easy to create a shopping cart on your website. I will show you two ways to do it, first the easy way and then the more secure (but really not that hard either) way. Paypal makes money by charging a small percentage of the purchase price. They deduct that automatically from the payment, so that's easy as well. The only caveat is that if your monthly sales are more than $3000 US you have to apply for a merchant account. After your merchant account is approved, the rates drop the more you sell.

But first, there is some information you need to know in order to set up your Paypal store:

Paypal Shopping Cart Requirements

  • A Paypal account
    If you don't have a Paypal account, go to Paypal and sign up for one. Use an email address you want associated with your shopping cart. The best is to use an address that is on the domain of your website, but it's not required.
  • Something to sell
    You'll need to know the item's name, price, and optionally shipping costs and tax rate.
  • A website
    This can be any website at all, from a personal page to a specialized domain
  • An HTML editor
    So that you can add your shopping cart to the page

The Easy Way to Set Up a PayPal Shopping Cart

The easiest way to set up a Paypal shopping cart is to copy the HTML following code where you want the "Buy Now" button.
<form action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post">
 <input type="hidden" name="cmd" value="_xclick">
 <input type="hidden" name="business" value="PAYPAL EMAIL ADDRESS">
 <input type="hidden" name="lc" value="US">
 <input type="hidden" name="item_name" value="ITEM FOR SALE">
 <input type="hidden" name="amount" value="PRICE">
 <input type="hidden" name="currency_code" value="USD">
 <input type="hidden" name="button_subtype" value="products">
 <input type="hidden" name="bn" value="PP-BuyNowBF:btn_buynowCC_LG.gif:NonHosted">
 <input type="image" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/btn_buynowCC_LG.gif"
 border="0" name="submit" alt="PayPal - The safer, easier way to pay online!">
 <img alt="" border="0" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/scr/pixel.gif" width="1" height="1">
 </form>
Change the three bold items to your values, specifically:
  • PAYPAL EMAIL ADDRESS - the address you receive paypal funds from
  • ITEM FOR SALE - a short description or title of the item for sale
  • PRICE - Do not include the dollar-sign, and do include the pennies, even if it's an even number (ie. 800.00 - not $800) The price will be in US dollars.
You can put that form on every page that you want to sell something, just change the price and description

The Better Way to Set Up a Paypal Shopping Cart

While it's very easy to put the above code anywhere you want to sell something, there are some problems with doing it that way:
  • Your Paypal email address is written in clear text in your HTML - wide open for spammers to harvest
  • It is just one button, "Buy Now", there are no other options
  • You don't have any options for price and options on what you're selling
  • And lots of other options
To solve this, you should go to Paypay directly. They have a button designer you can use to
For security reasons, I don't recommend clicking on any link directly into Paypal, even if you trust the source. Instead, you should type in http://www.paypal.com into your browser window, and navigate to the button designer directly:
  1. Go to http://www.paypal.com/
  2. Mouse over the "Get Paid" option in the menu and then click on "Accept Credit Cards"
  3. Click on the "Setting Up" tab
  4. Click on "set up your button"
Once you're in the button builder you can customize lots of options on your form, including:
  • Change it to an "add to cart" button so that customers can shop for multiple items
  • Accept donations, set up subscriptions, or sell gift certificates
  • Use item IDs to have Paypal help you with your inventory (with a Paypal business account)
  • Change currencies or set up multiple prices (for different sizes or options)
  • Add in shipping fees and taxes
  • Most importantly have Paypal use a Merchant ID for your transactions, so your email address is secure.
  • Customize checkout pages (with a Paypal business account)
  • And lots of other options
Once you're done choosing your options, click on the "Save Changes" button. Then just paste the code that is generated into your HTML editor where you want the button.

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Web Marketing/Web Analytics

Web Analytics is the analysis of your website to determine how many page views you're getting, where those readers are going, and what they are clicking on. Web analytics covers log analysis, referrals, page views, and clicks or hits. The articles and links in this section will help you track your Web pages.

How to Use Web Metrics

Most Web designers and website owners have some type of analytics package that they can use to evaluate how their website is doing. But most people use it only in the most minimal way. While you can get a lot of information just by watching the pageviews on your home page, there is a lot more information in your analytics than that. Learn how to use your analytics package effectively.

What Web Metrics to Track

There are lots of metrics you can track on a website. You can start with pageviews and delve into visitors, time spent on site, entry and exit pages, social media links, inbound links, outbound traffic, and so much more. So how do you decide what to track and what's important information and what's fluff.

What analytics do you use - What Web analytics do you track

What Web analytics do you track on your website? Find out what other About.com readers track on their sites and why they find those analytics important.

What Web Analytics Can be Tracked

There are lots of different metrics that can be tracked on a website. These Web analytics are all metrics that can be tracked and there are various reasons why you might want to follow them on your site.

Use Your Search Statistics to Improve Your Site

Many Web developers use their website statistics to evaluate how their pages are doing and improve their sites. But one statistic that is often overlooked is the search results. The statistics your search engine provides can be a valuable tool for improving your website.

Web Analytics Basics - Web Metrics - Web Measurement

Web analytics - learn to talk the talk when setting up web measurement so that you can get the most out of your Web metrics

Web Analytics: How to Use Web Analytics Effectively

Web analytics can be very confusing, as there are many ways you can evaluate your Web site. But it's important to be systematic when reviewing your Web analytics so that you can get the most out of them. The best thing that Web analytics can do for you is to help you improve your Web site.

Tracking Web Page Views

Almost from the day that the Web was invented, people wanted to track information about the pages delivered and the computers requesting that information. This is stored on Web servers as log files - usually in Common Log Format (CLF) or Combined Log Format.

Referrer - What is a Referrer - How to HTTP Referrers Work?

Referrers or HTTP Referers are anything online that drives visits and visitors to your Web site.
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Elements of Web Designing

The elements of design are the building blocks of design. These elements are what make up every page you build and understanding the basic elements you'll be able to put together more powerful Web pages.
There are five basic elements of every design:

Lines and Linework

Lines include borders and rules. They can be horizontal or vertical and help delineate the spaces around elements on Web pages. Linework increases the readability of the design.

Shape

Shapes make up any enclosed contour in the design. Shapes on most Web pages are square or rectangular. But they don't have to be. You can use images to generate other shapes within your designs.

Texture

Texture gives a design a feeling of surface. Texture on Web pages is all visual, but you can use natural textures or artificial to get the effect in your designs.

Color

Color is the one design element that most Web designers are acutely aware of. But remember that color is not a required element of any design. In fact, a good plan in design is to create the design without color first, then add as little color as you can to enhance the design.

Direction

Direction gives your Web designs motion. In most designs there is a sense of movement in a direction across the design. Good designs lead the eye through the design in a deliberate fashion so that the viewer sees what the designer wants.
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Web Design Basics-Elements of Good Design

Good Web design is the same as good design. If you understand the elements that make up good design, you'll have a Web page that works well. These elements of good design apply whether you are writing a Web page, a business card, or a t-shirt and once you understand them you'll have the skills to be a great designer.

Fonts and Typography

ABCFonts are the way your text looks on a Web page. And most Web pages have large amounts of text. When you're thinking of design, you need to think about how the text looks on a micro-level (the font glyphs, what font family, etc.) as well as the macro-level (positioning blocks of text and adjusting the size and shape of the text). These resources explain how to work with fonts on Web pages.

How to Use Color

colored pinwheelColor is everywhere. It's how we dress up our world and how we see things. Color has meaning beyond just "red" or "blue" and color is an important design element. These color resources teach how to use color effectively in Web design.

Graphics and Images

Graphics are the fun part of most Web pages. As the saying goes "a picture is worth 1,000 words" and that's also true in Web design. Learn how to get the most out of your Web images with the following links.

Web Layout Basics

When people think of Web design often what they mean is the layout. Layout is the organization of elements on a Web page. First you need to start with basic design principles. Once you understand them, you can move through how to place elements on your Web page. These links and resources will take you through the steps to learn good Web layout design.

Tackling Web Navigation

IndexNavigation is how your customers get around from one page to another on a Web site. Navigation provides movement and gives your customers the chance to find other elements of your site. You need to make sure that the structure of your Web site (the information architecture) makes sense so that your customers aren't forced to simply use search.

Accessibility and Usability

AccessibleAccessibility and usability are often seen as a detriment to Web design, but a good designer focuses on making their site useful to as many people as possible. The links below take you through the basics of making an accessible site without compromising the design.

Web Design Software

Most Web designers prefer to work in WYSIWYG or "What You See Is What You Get" editors because they provide a visual interface to the design. But finding the best Web design software is more than just WYSIWYG or not. Plus there are other tools you will need to build Web pages beyond just the Web editor.
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SEO Tips and Tricks for Powerful Search Engine Optimization

Previous SEO Tips and Tricks

Create a sitemap (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Search engines love sitemaps - not necessarily for ranking, but for finding links on your site. It's not critical that you create an XML sitemap or Google sitemap, plain HTML sitemaps work just as well.

Create an XML sitemap or Google sitemap (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Search engines love sitemaps - not necessarily for ranking, but for finding links on your site. It's not critical that you create an XML sitemap or Google sitemap, plain HTML sitemaps work just as well.

Use 301 redirects for permanent redirects (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

When you redirect your pages, you should always use a 301 http server redirect. This tells the search engines that the redirect is permanent and that they should change their index to use the new URL. Spammers use other types of redirects (HTTP 302 redirects and meta refresh), so they are not a good idea to use.

Use 302 redirects only for long or ugly URLs (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

HTTP 302 redirects are for temporary redirects. The only time you should use them is for redirecting ugly URLs to more user-friendly ones. This tells the search engine that the ugly URL should not be removed from the index, because the user-friendly URL is just to make the URL palatable. Keep in mind that many spammers use 302 redirects to fool search engines. So be judicious in your use of them.

Get as many inbound links as you can (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Links are important, especially from sites other than your own. These are called inbound links. And if you get a lot of inbound links, that will help your page ranking. Remember that 1-2 links from high-reputation sites are better than 10 links from link farms.

Put your keyword phrase in the first paragraph (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Repetition of your keyword phrase is important in your content. But it's especially important in the first one or two paragraphs of text. And if you can repeat it once in the first paragraph that will help up it's priority.

Put your keyword phrase at the top of the HTML (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

More than just the first paragraph, you should try to move your content towards the top of the HTML document. And that includes your keyword phrase.

Put your keyword phrase in alternative text (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Images are a great place to put your keyword phrase - in the alternate text. This is a way to add your keyword phrase into your document without being repetitive to your readers. But be

Increase the font size of your keyword phrase (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Search engines understand that fonts that are larger than the standard font size on the page indicate text that is more important. Use CSS or the font tag. Apply font size changes to headline tags as well.

Format your keyword phrases to stand out (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Use <strong> and <em> where appropriate to make your keyword phrases stand out. Search engines can read those tags, and will recognize that text that is emphasized is often more important than the surrounding text.

Write a descriptive meta description (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Search engines use the description meta tag as the description in their index. So it's important to describe your pages accurately. This helps customers find your pages, and search engines to index them.

Link to your page from within your site (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Links are important, and linking from one page to another on your own site is a very easy way to get links. They aren't as important in search engine ranking as links from external sites, but they do help. If nothing else, they help the search engine spider find all the pages on your site.

Put up links that flow within the text (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Links that make sense within the context of the document (whether from external or your own site) will rank higher than lists of links or other forms of artificial links. This is because search engines value content and links that make sense within the context of the content are more definitely related to that content than links that are inside lists.

Keep asking for inbound links (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

The older the links are the better. If you get 100 links added all at once, it appears to the search engines that you are buying link placement, and that can be construed as spamming.

Get linked in DMOZ and Yahoo! (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

DMOZ and Yahoo! and other directories show that your page is related to the contentin that section of the directory.

Periodically check your outbound links for pagerank (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Whenever you add an external link on your site, you run the risk that it changes from the site you linked to into a link farm or "bad neighborhood". By periodically checking the PageRank of the external sites you link to, you can remove links that have gotten bad. This will help you make sure that your page's credibility is not reduced by who you are linking to.

Link all major images (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

It's important to always link images because people click on images. And search engines value content that has been linked. The key is to always include alternative text, so that the search engine has text to rank. Any image that your customer can see on the page should be linked.

Keep your pages up-to-date (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Pages that are regularly updated are given priority over pages that are older and ignored. But you should do more than simply fix typos or make small changes, regular, extensive updates are more effective than minor updates.

If you must use frames, always use the noframes tag (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Frames and search engines don't mix well. But if you must use frames, then you should always include an extensive noframes version of your site. And by extensive, the best way to get your site indexed in search engines is to completely rewrite it in your noframes version.

If you must use Flash, always include alternative text (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Flash and search engines don't mix well, but if you must use flash you should include alternate text that describes exactly what the Flash element includes. And if you use Flash for your entire site, you should always do an alternate version of the complete site in HTML so that search engines and non-Flash browsers can view it as well.

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Monday, September 26, 2011

SEO Tips and Tricks for Powerful SEO

 SEO tips and tricks you should and should not be doing on your Web pages to make them rank higher in search engines. This list looks at more than just meta tags and the basics of SEO, so even if you've got some of the factors, you may not have everything. Scroll to the end of the list to look at the things you should never be doing, as well as the things you should always do at the beginning.
  • High Priority
  • Medium Priority
  • Low Priority
  • Avoid
  • Avoid or Get Banned

Write great content (HIGH PRIORITY)

Great content is where it all starts. You can have all the keywords in the world, but if your content is no good, people won't stick around on your site and search engines won't find your site valuable

Write unique content (HIGH PRIORITY)
Unique content is important too. You need to provide content that has different information than what is on other sites and other Web pages.

Add new content all the time (HIGH PRIORITY)

Sites that have new content added on a regular basis are seen as more reliable than sites that rarely do. This also helps you to increase the amount of relevant content on your site, which also improves your rankings.

Create a great keyword phrase (HIGH PRIORITY)

The first thing you should do when working on search engine optimization is find a great keyword phrase for that page. You shouldn't try to optimize your entire site to one keyword phrase - instead focus on writing pages for specific keywords and phrases.

Choose a phrase that is popular, but not too popular (HIGH PRIORITY)

When trying to decide on a keyword phrase, you want to find one that is popular but not extremely popular. This may seem counter-intuitive, but the reality is that extremely popular keywords are very desirable and so very competitive. It's better to try to optimize for keywords that you can rank higher. You'll get more pageviews from a less popular keyword when you're on the first or second page of the search engines, than from a super popular keyword that you only make it to page 50 of search engines.

Write an accessible site (HIGH PRIORITY)

Accessible HTML is accessible to both search engine spiders and screen readers. The more accessible you make your pages, the easier it will be for search engines to read and rank your pages.

Use the keyword phrase in your title tag (HIGH PRIORITY)

The title tag is one of the most important tags on your Web page. And placing your keyword phrase in the title tag, preferably at the beginning, is very important to get that phrase into the search engines. Plus, that puts your keyword phrase as the link in the search engine index.

Get a domain with your keyword phrase (HIGH PRIORITY)

Putting your keyword phrase in your domain name is a great way to optimize for that phrase.

Use the keyword phrase in your URL (HIGH PRIORITY)

Even if you can't get your keywords into your domain name, you can put them into your URLs. Search engines read the URLs and assign value to the text they find there.

Use your keyword phrase a lot, but not too much (HIGH PRIORITY)

The ratio of your keywords to the rest of the text on your page is called the keyword density. It's important to repeat your keywords in your document, but not too much. Keyword density should be between 3 and 7% for your primary keyword phrase and 1-2% for any secondary keywords or keyword phrases.
Previous

Use your keyword phrase in headlines (HIGH PRIORITY)

Headline tags (h1, h2, h3, etc.) are a great place to use your keyword phrase and secondary keywords. Search engines recognize that headlines are more important than the surrounding text, and so assign greater value to keywords found there.

Use your keyword phrase in anchor text of links (HIGH PRIORITY)

Link text is another great place to put your keyword phrase. Links stand out on most Web pages, and so are given higher priority than surrounding text.

Ask other people for links to your page (HIGH PRIORITY)

A great way to get inbound links is to simply ask for them. But remember that excessive cross-linking can be viewed as spammy, so be careful about trading links or otherwise buying links on external sites.

Try to get your keyword phrase inside incoming links (HIGH PRIORITY)

Inbound links are a great way to improve your page rank. But you can't really control how people link to your pages. Chances are they won't use a phrase that has anything even remotely close to your keyword phrase. Remember that they are doing you a favor by linking to you. If it makes sense, you can ask them to change the text of the link, but be careful, as people can be very touchy, and you might just get your link removed.
Another way to get your keyword phrase in inbound links is to provide your customers with the link text ready-made. For example:
Please link to this page: <a href="http://webdesign.about.com/od/seo/tp/seo_tips_and_tricks.htm">SEO Tips and Tricks</a>

Try to get links from reputable sites (HIGH PRIORITY)

Reputable sites that link to you will increase your reputation. After all, if a reputable site feels that your site is valuable enough to link to, that means that your page has more value. You can tell if a site is considered reputable both by how high it appears in search engines and it's Google PageRank. Also, .edu sites have a higher reputation because they represent schools and universities.

Try to get links from similar sites (HIGH PRIORITY)

Inbound links from sites similar to your own are important as well. This indicates that your site does have content related to that topic. Plus, it indicates that your competition finds your site valuable, and that gives your site more credibility.

Try to get links from .edu, and .gov sites (HIGH PRIORITY)

Sites that are on .edu and .gov top-level domains have a large amount of credibility because they are very difficult to get. So if you can get the designers of those sites to link to you, that gives your site more credibility as well.

Create as much content as you can (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Content is king. The more content you have on your site, the more there is to be indexed and appear in search engines.

Keep your site content inside one theme (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

The theme or topic of your entire site is important as well. If you have a lot of pages all around one basic theme, that will lend more credibility to each page that follows that same theme.

Keep your site live as long as possible (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Older pages (at the same domain) will rank higher than newer ones.
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Reasons to Adopt B2B Marketing

In recent weeks I met with a B2B company to discuss marketing options. The topic of community and social media came up and I was reminded of how difficult it has been for the B2B segment of businesses to grasp a hold of the power in social media when one business is marketing to another. The value has still not been understood. They still view this type of marketing as not relating to them, when in actuality social marketing is becoming one of the most effective ways to market online.
In today's economy B2B companies are decreasing their marketing dollars and spending more online. A recent survey by B2B Magazine revealed that over 48% of those surveyed were increasing their online marketing spend.

Why is there such an effectiveness in social media?

Truth is, so many people are tired of "marketing speak." Social media allows companies to relate to one another and bypass the fluff.

Let's take a look at what the online definition of social media, I've chosen to use the definition from wikipedia since it is user generated.

Social media describes the online technologies and practices that people use to share opinions, insights, experiences, and perspectives with each other. Social media can take many different forms, including text, images, audio, and video. Popular social mediums include blogs, message boards, podcasts, wikis, and vlogs.
The definition alone should reveal to you how important it is that B2B companies explore social media marketing channels.

In a recent study done by KnowledgeStorm of B2B technology decision makers the following statistics were revealed:

  • 90% Participate in Video
  • 80% Participate in Blogs
  • 80% Participate in Wikis
  • 69% Participate in Social Networks
  • 53% Participate in Podcasts
In the same study it was shared that of 69% of B2B buyers use social networks "primarily for business networking and development."
At a minimum B2B businesses should at least be involved in communities and social network where there customers already are. Explore the opportunity to reach out to key influencers in your target market and optimize your content and social media applications for syndication.
I know that stepping out into social media can feel somewhat daunting for more traditional marketing team, but it doesn't have to be difficult to be successful. Chose a few initiatives that will work well for your company and gain you incremental success until you are more comfortable in really delving into the social media and applications.
Social media enables you to :

  • Share your expertise and knowledge
  • Tap into the wisdom of your consumers
  • Enables customers helping customers
  • Engages prospects through customer evangelism
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