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Sunday, December 25, 2011

Why people start businesses


You’re flipping through a magazine and come across a test that assesses whether you have the right personality to start a business. You take the test and learn that you’re best suited for a traditional career. Your heart sinks, because you’ve been giving business ownership some thought. But you figure that the people who designed the test know what they’re doing. Right? Wrong!
There’s no scientific evidence that shows that people with certain personalities are more likely to start a business or will be a more successful business owner than anyone else. In fact, the somewhat surprising collection of research results illustrate that there are no meaningful differences between business owners and non business owners on the most basic human characteristics, behaviors, and desires.1 Most people, for example, want to make more money and crave independence, not just business owners. People who start their own businesses are just as diverse as people in regular jobs. You don’t have to have a certain personality, behave in a particular way, or have a certain set of desires to be a successful business owner.


What, then, motivates people to start their own business? In most instances, it’s riskier and harder to start and run a business than it is to traverse a traditional career. Although there are many reasons that motivate people to start their own business, two reasons are paramount: the presence of aspiration gaps in people’s lives, and passion for a business idea.

Aspiration gaps
All of us have aspirations, which are made up of our most important goals, objectives, ambitions, and longings. Our aspirations vary because they’re influenced by our values, abilities, experiences, families, and individual circumstances. When one or more of our aspirations are unmet, we have aspiration gaps in our lives. Collectively, our aspirations form what researchers call our aspiration 1 vectors. Sometimes our aspirations vectors get complex, like when we’re simultaneously trying to build a career, raise kids, love
our spouse, save money, and so on.
For people who have strong aspirations and are insistent that certain aspirations are met, their aspirations become the driving force in their lives. For example, a young mother might have the following three aspirations: a job that pays at least $35,000 per year, the ability to be home by 3:00 p.m. on weekdays to meet the school bus, and Sundays free to participate in church and volunteer-related activities. Similarly, the assistant manager for a large retail chain, like Home Depot or Target, might be driven by the single aspiration to have his own store by the time he is 30.
People can become discouraged or distressed when they look at their job or alternative jobs in the traditional labor market and conclude that none of the choices will allow their most important aspirations to be met. In these instances, an alternative is to start a business. Although starting a business isn’t easier than a traditional job, business owners usually have more discretion and control over their schedule and career trajectory. This discretion and control helps people better juggle both professional and family-related goals and aspirations and accomplish the things they want the most.

Passion for a business idea
A second factor that motivates people to start their own businesses is passion for a business idea. What frequently happens is that a person gets an idea for a new product or service, and there is no practical way
to bring the idea to market other than starting a new business. In these instances, a person’s passion for the idea is determined by how desirable and feasible the idea seems to be.
 Many prospective business owners become very passionate about their ideas, particularly if they believe that the resulting business will improve their own circumstances and positively influence other people’s lives. An important result of passion is that it often elicits extraordinary effort on the part of business owners to get their businesses off the ground and to run them successfully. Small business owners often work long hours and make sacrifices to make their businesses work, but they say it’s worth it because they’re passionate about the businesses they’re running.



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Saturday, December 24, 2011

What are Relevant Backlinks ?


Relevant Backlinks
I‟ll start off with relevant backlinks first. Let‟s say you have a website in the health and fitness niche. The most relevant backlinks you can get would come from other websites in the health and fitness niche as well. When you have other websites in your niche linking back to your website via anchored text for the keywords you want to rank for, the search engines will see that your website is important for those keywords and rank it well. Look at it as a type of voting system. The more websites that vote for your website, the better it will rank and it‟s even better when those website are in the same category as yours.

Getting these types of backlinks can be very hard. Truth is, majority of the websites that you would want to get these links from would be your competition and unless you are going to give them a good incentive to link to your website then they are not going to do it.

(Point to note: It’s not wise to buy links from other websites. The search engines frown upon this as they see it as a way to game their system. Therefore, if you do buy link on other websites and get caught, you not only will your website drop in rankings but you risk being taken out of the entire search index. Be Warned!)
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Nofollow VS Dofollow : What is better


Nofollow VS Dofollow
A Backlink can be categorized in two main forms:

  • Dofollow backlinks and
  • Nofollow backlink
A „dofollow backlink‟ is a type of link that tells the search engines to pass on credibility or influence to an outbound link. In internet marketing we refer to this as „Link Juice‟.
A „nofollow backlink‟ on the other hand is a type of link that tells the search engines not to pass on the link juice.
When conducting your backlinking campaigns, it is very important to get a mixture of both types of links. Search engine optimization should be a natural process which means that all types of websites should naturally link to your website overtime. Thus if you aim to get only dofollow backlinks, it will seem unnatural to the search engines and can do more harm than good to your search rankings.
In order to rank well, you need to get lots of HIGH QUALITY backlinks. The more high quality backlinks you get, the easier it will be to outrank your competition. It is also important to get lots of relevant backlinks as well. The more relevant backlinks you get, the less amount of backlinks you‟ll need overall to rank well. For example, another website can have thousand of irrelevant backlinks while you only have a few relevant backlinks and you‟ll still outrank them!
Now What Do I Mean By High Quality Backlinks?
And What Do I Mean By Relevant Backlinks?

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What is Off Page Search Engine Optimization


Off page seo as the name suggest refers to factors outside of your website that contributes to your rankings. How this works is that when other websites link to your website via text links for specific keywords, your website will rank higher for those keywords. The term BACKLINK is used to describe the process by which another website link to yours.

Note: An anchored text is a visible clickable link. Normally these links are blue and most times underlined. So a keyword anchored text would be keyword in the form of a link.
Example: if you have a careers website and your keyword is hot jobs then the anchored text link would be: Hot Jobs.
There are several ways in which another website can link back to yours.
1. They can link to your website via anchored text links (eg. Your keywords) or
2. They can simply link to your website via your URL link. (eg. http://theugandajobs.com
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What are the Important Factors for Proper on Page SEO

1. Adding descriptive titles (including your keywords) to each page of your website.
Each page on your website should have a title that accurately describes what the page is about. The search engine normally shows the first 60 characters (including spaces) of your title in their search results which users will see when they type specific search terms. What‟s also very important is that the search engines will BOLD the keyword in your title when users search for those specific terms.
Thus it is vital that you have your keywords in your title and it is also very important to have a very captivating title so that searchers will click through to see your website. The main objective of your title is to have searchers clicking through to see the content on your website. That‟s it! The image below is a sweet example.



2. Adding a unique description (including your keywords) to each page on your website.
The description is a short summary of what your webpage is about. You have a 160 character limit and you should also include your keywords in the description. Just as with your title, the search engines will show your description in the search results and they will also bold the keywords in your description.
The aim of the description is to support your title to have searchers clicking through to see your website.










3. Adding Meta keywords to each page on your website.
Meta tags do not carry a lot of weight towards your search engine rankings. However, high search engine rankings come from a cumulative effort so it‟s important to include Meta tags with your keywords on each page. It will help to tell the search engines exactly what each page on your website is about.


4. Formatting your URLs correctly to include your keywords.
Having your keywords in your URL is a very important factor when it comes to ranking highly in the serps (search engine results page). When you have your keywords in your domain, it will be much easier to get the top search engine positions for your targeted. Even if your main domain doesn‟t have your keywords, the specific page should have the keywords in the URL that is representative of the content on that page.


5. Adding proper sitemaps on your website (one for search engines and one for humans).
A sitemap for search engines allows the search engines bots to spider your website and discover all the content on your website and know what each page is about. A sitemap for humans on the other hand, allows readers to easily navigate your website and find what they are looking for. You‟ll use an XML sitemap for search engines and .html or .htm sitemap for humans.


6. Offer quality content on your website. (Content MUST be unique to your website).
When it comes to SEO, quality content is one of the most important factors to ranking in top positions. You need to add great articles that your readers will love and appreciate. It‟s important to note that even though you are focusing on specific keywords, you should make sure that your content is optimized for your readers.
I also found that the longer your articles, the better results you‟ll get. You should aim to have your articles at minimum 700 words and longer. Another point to note is that you should vary the length of your articles on the different pages of your website. Some can be 700 words, some 800 words, 1,000 words etc.


7. The content on each page must target a specific keyword. (Keep the keyword density to about 1-3%. Don NOT keyword stuff)
Let‟s say you have a website that is focused on dog training. The best thing to do would be to have several pages that target the specific breed of dogs. (Just an example) Therefore, each page should target a specific keyword. For example, one page could target German shepherd and another could target a Great Dane etc.
The keyword density that I find to work the best is anywhere between 1-3%.
You don‟t want to go over that because you may do more harm to your rankings as a result of keyword stuffing. Having too much of a high keyword density can raise red flags in the search engines and may result on your website being penalized to lower rankings. The best thing to do is to ensure that you have the keyword in your first sentence and last sentence and then randomly distributed throughout the body of the article. This should flow naturally and if you can‟t get it in the first and last sentences, at least try to get them in the first and last paragraph.

8. Include videos and images in the content on your pages when possible and use Alt tags on your images to include your keywords.
Bounce rate is a very important factor when it comes to search rankings especially after the „Panda Update‟. Bounce rate simple means how long your visitors are staying on your website before they leave. So if you have a bounce rate of 100% that is very bad for you because it means that people are not finding what they are looking for and click the back button the moment they land on your website.
Adding videos and images helps to keep people focused on your website for longer periods of time which eventually decrease your bounce rate. You see, the aim of the search engines is to offer relevant content to their users. So if someone searched for a specific keyword and then clicked to your website from the search results and then back the moment they get on your site that is telling the search engines that your website isn‟t relevant to the search query. As a result, they will lower your rankings for that specific keyword.


9. Interlink your pages on your website via keyword anchor text.
Interlinking is very important to boost your rankings. You should always interlink pages with the appropriate keyword anchored text. Interlinking also help your readers to easily navigate your website, keeps them longer on your website and as a result boost your overall seo strategy.

10. Each page should have H1, H2 and H3 tags that include your keywords. You can also add more H tags all the way down to H6.
The H1 tag is the main heading for your webpage. When the search engines crawl your webpages, they read the H1 tags first and it tells them exactly what your page is a bout. Each page should have its own H1 tag. If you are using Wordpress, the title is normally in H1 tag by default and all you would need to do is to add the H2 and H3 tags in the body of the content on the page. You can use the H2 and H3 tags as subheadings in the body of your content.


11. Use LSI (Latent Semantic Indexing) keywords in the content on your pages.
Another important factor that the search engines take into consideration is the use of other related keywords to your main keywords. That means you should also use other related keyword to your main keywords in the content but it MUST appear naturally. A great way to get ideas is to use Google. Simply search for your main keywords and then scroll to the bottom of the results and Google will suggest some other keywords. Use can use some of these as your LSI keywords. Using the term „how to train a dog‟ Google returned the following results:

All off the above keywords could be LSI keywords if I had a page targeting the term „how to train a dog‟.


12. Adding Social Buttons to your websites
There‟s no direct evidence as to how this works but I have found that by adding social buttons like twitter, facebook and Google+ and other buttons helps in my rankings. My hypothesis is that the search engines like to see when people are interacting on your websites. To them, it means that you have good content that people love to share and thus they will rank your website highly as a result.

13. Using the Bold, Italic and Underline functions on your keywords.
When you add content on your websites, you should also ensure that you use a mixture of the bold, italics and underline functions to place emphasis on your keywords at least once throughout the body of the content.
14. Limit the amount of outgoing links on each page.
When you have too much outgoing links on a page on your website, it reduces the amount of authority that page has since most of its link juice would have been passed on to the other sites that it links to. I‟d say keep your OBL (out bound links) to a maximum of 30 and no more for each page.
15. Be careful of the websites you link to.
Don‟t link to spammy websites, or other sites that offers no value to users. Also, do NOT link to adult websites or any gambling related websites as doing so can devalue your website and result in loss of rankings.
16. Avoid Having Duplicate Content On Your Website
The search engines are very strict these days when it comes to duplicate content. No two pages on your website should have the same content. This is especially very important since Google‟s latest Panda updates. If you have two pages on your website with similar content then you should add a „no index‟ tag on one of those pages so that the search engines doesn‟t crawl it. Your website also should have content that can be found elsewhere on the net word for word.Even if your website is the original source, it can still have a negative effect on your rankings. Unfortunately there‟s not much we can do at times about this because there are a lot of unscrupulous people out there that will just rip content from your sites. However, when you can do something about it, do it to protect yourself!
17. Add The „Nofollow‟ attribute to your affiliate links or when linking out to other websites.
The „nofollow‟ attribute tells the search engines not that you don‟t want to pass on any link juice to the website you are linking to.

The 17 points above covers EVERYTHING you NEED to know about on page SEO. By applying everything above, you are one step above your competitors because only a minority percentage of them will ever apply all the steps above. Now we are going to move onto off page SEO which accounts for more than 80% of your rankings.











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What is On Page Search Engine Optimization


On page seo refers to anything that you control and can do on your website to make it search engine friendly. These days, on page seo is not as effective as it use to be a few years ago. Nevertheless, it should NOT be ignored. Lots of webmasters are ignoring this aspect of seo and thus you should take advantage of this when it comes to beating out your competition.

The main concept of on page SEO revolves around building a website that contains pages that focuses on specific topics. This means that your websites should target specific keywords. In the next article I am going to give you everything you need to know about on page seo. You can start implementing these strategies to boost your rankings in the search engines.
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Introduction To Search Engine Optimization


Search engine optimization is the process by which you‟ll make your websites search engine friendly. This simply means building your websites in such a way that the search engines will love them and rank them highly for your targeted keywords. There are two main aspects to search engine optimization.
On page optimization and
Off page optimization
Both are important when it comes to ranking a website but the latter contributes more weight than the former. Based on my testing, I‟d say that on page optimization contributes about 10% while off page optimization contributes 85% and the other 5% comes from social interactions on your website.
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Why Is A First Page Ranking Important?


If you have been into internet marketing for some time or even if you are just getting started then you already know that in order to MAKE REAL MONEY ONLINE, you need lots of targeted traffic. It doesn‟t matter if you have the best looking and best converting website in the world, if you have no traffic it simply means no one is seeing your website and thus you‟ll make no money.
There are many ways to get targeted traffic but one of the best ways is to rank your websites high in the search engines for buying keywords. As a result people will find your website when they are searching for solutions to their problems. However, ranking high in the search engines is not a walk in the park. Well not yet at least! But after you are through with this report, it will be a whole new playing field.
In this report, I am going to reveal my secrets and techniques that I use to rank my websites high in the search engines.
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Monday, December 5, 2011

Tips And Tricks on how to write the best articles in journalism

So what do you do when you’re pressed for time, swamped under works and you still need to get some stuff written, and written well? Your nerves are tightened up so well that you can’t sleep, but you can’t squeeze even a sentence out of your mind. I know the feeling so well, but what I did then was, just start writing fast without even thinking, then a professional article was born with the time shorter than usual. Heck, it might be even more professional than my previous articles!


The phenomena has nothing to do with the God I worship, or any supernatural phenomenon, it’s just how brain works: we write fast and professionally if we can just limit something, abandon certain habits, and put up some beneficial habits. That’s all, it’s really easy, and I’m going to explain them clearly in this article, so master them all and write like a ninja from today!

1. Freestyle Writing

To be honest, I hate this method. I’m one of those annoying writers who edits as I write. It just works better for me. I’m able to form better sentences, find my flow and generally write better if I take my time with it. Unfortunately, it doesn’t make for fast writing, and just because I hate free style writing, it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t work.If you’re pressed for time and really want get some writing done, open up a fresh Microsoft Word document, and start typing. Don’t worry about how it will sound, whether your sentences are grammatically correct or even if they make any sense. Don’t look at the clock. Get it all written.
Editing and cleaning up copy in 10 minutes is more than enough for you to produce a quality article. So you see, there’s really no magic here, you just let your brain has more freedom, and it rewards you a completed work. Fast and practical.

2. Set A Timer

I know a lot of people who don’t like setting a timer and writing till it goes off. However, I don’t know anyone for whom this hasn’t worked. So go ahead and try it. Set a timer for 10, 20 or 30 minutes, then sit in front of your computer and start writing. It’s okay if you can’t think of anything to write and you might be just staring at a blank screen. It’s totally fine.Chances are that as your timer starts to run out, your brain will jump-start and your fingers will start flying on their own. Like what I wrote earlier, it doesn’t have to be pretty and it doesn’t have to make sense. It just needs to be written! You can pretty it up later.
Once you timer is off, step away from your computer – even if you’re on a roll. Leave your brain wanting for more. If the timer proved ineffective in jump-starting your writing then take a break and come back to it later.
Your timer doesn’t have to be a clock. You can write after you’ve put a few cookies to bake in the oven and use that as your timer. Stop when the oven dings and treat yourself a cookie. After all, you deserve it! My personal favorite timer is the train. I write every time I use the metro and have no choice but to stop and take a break when the train arrived at the station. And let me tell you, my fingers fly as the train is about to reach the station. Suddenly I have so much to say!

3. Turning Off Spell Checker

One thing that really bugs me is seeing a red-underlined error while writing in Microsoft Word. I mean can’t it tell that this is my first draft? That it doesn’t need to be perfect right now? That right now, at this very moment, it just needs to be written?Well, apparently it can’t. So if you’re one of those writers who get bugged by the spell checker, you need to turn it off. For Microsoft Word 2010, you can simply click on the dark blue tab on the top left side of the software, then click on the Option > Proofing, and uncheck “Check spelling as you type“.
You can also uncheck any other option that will interrupt your writing process, such as “Mark grammar errors as you type”. You can check all these errors later by click on the Review > Spelling & Grammar Check, which the options are existed on the top bar of the software. By doing this, you will find that your idea will flow more naturally and writing will be more comfortable.

4. Turning Off Backspace

Ever had one of those sentences which you typed, then you feel it’s bad, then you pressed Backspace about a hundred times, just to delete it? Yeah, I had the similar experience. What’s worse is that after I’ve pressed theBackspace key a hundred times, I realize that my original sentence was fine.To avoid pressing the Backspace key for unnecessary changes, you need to make a determination to not touch the backspace key and stick to it. If you make a mistake, whether it’s a spelling mistake or a grammatical mistake, just move on.
If you manage to not hit the Backspace key while writing, chances are you’re going to end up with someword combinations which have the potential to be composed into epic phrases that you might use after all.

5. Do Research Before Writing

One of the fastest ways to write is to stop the urge to check on your facts or refer to information for accuracy. Before you sit down to write, make sure you’ve done all your research and are well versed in it. This way all you have to do is write without stopping
Everything is already there in your head – you just need to put it down in writing to make sense of it all.Research before writing will also stop unnecessary actions like reading off-topic articles while you are writing. You might be even tempted to see certain Youtube video for “research” purpose and boom… another day well spent with nothing but procrastination completed. Surely we need inspiration from different kind of sources, but not for the time when you need to write fast.

6. Write Outline

This is absolutely my favorite tip for writing fast. Think about what you want to write, then outline it. If it’s an article, jot down the subheadings. If it’s a web copy, write down the points you want to cover. The process is pretty much the same for any writing you need to get done.
If you prefer, you can also write more detailed outline for easier writing later. Give some keywords to every topic or even paragraph in the article. Surprisingly this action will possibly spawn more ideas for you in the writing stage later. Most importantly, once you have the outline, writing will be a breeze and doesn’t take much time. Before you know it, the work is done!

7. Get A Writing Buddy

If nothing seems to be working, then teaming up with a writing buddy/partner is your best bet. A writing buddy holds you accountable, watches the clock for you and even writes with you. If you have a lot of writing to do or have a big project that needs to get done, partnering up with a writing buddy is going to keep you motivated and on track with your deadline.
Your writing buddy doesn’t necessarily need to be your friend. They just need to check in with you to see if you’re doing what you have decided to do. Set a few ground rules before starting. What time will you check in with each other? How will you compare notes? Will you exchange each other’s work and provide feedback?
For me, the best writing buddy is one who has to do some writing of his/her own. This way, it’s a two-way thing and I’m not just getting help but I’m helping someone too.

What About Writing Professionally?

Your writing can’t be professional if it’s not written at first. Concentrate on getting it written first, then spend a few minutes revising, editing and generally prettying it up. You’ll notice that there are really not much differences between the speed writing and the common writing, as you’ve done the research, wrote the outline, and edited the article to make it professional. You just took another approach which costs you less time.
So get it written first, then make it professional. Use these tips and tricks regularly and you’ll find yourself doing lesser editing with time, while enjoying more on writing great articles! Also do let us know your personal favorite tricks for writing fast and professionally!





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