The 404 error page. What is it and how can you maximize it as an opportunity to promote your business?

A 404 error (”Page Not Found”) occurs when a page no longer exists on your website … or never existed. This could be a result of restructuring your website, renaming or deleting pages without a 301 redirect (naughty) or it could be due to a searcher’s typo. Basically, you are trying to retrieve something from the server that does not exist. When this happens, if a custom page is not created, the following default page shows up:

Default 404 Error Page

(more…)

Bingo…I mean Bing is the latest edition claimed to be the newest, greatest…next best search engine to rival the undeniable king, Google. Bing.com is on scheduled to replace Live.

Have you checked this new search engine out yet? Do you like it? Let us know what you think of this latest search platform. I was pleasantly surprised, actually, and plan on investigating it further. Bing offers us searchers categorized listings and if you hover over certain links, you will see ‘more info’. Streamlined and quite nice! (more…)

Do you use images from the Web for your projects? Be careful you don’t violate someone’s copyright in the process! You may want to pay particular attention to this post if you are designing your own website or promotional materials.

Recently I came across an image that was being used for a Facebook group, which I instantly recognized as a copyrighted image (details below). At first, I was astonished at the nerve of this guy. Was he seriously trying to defend his right to use the image without permission? Didn’t he understand the severity of copyright infringement? Was he nuts to sit there and argue with me when he was in the wrong?

Then I thought… maybe this isn’t so rare after all. I bet this happens all the time and people don’t even realize they are doing anything wrong! Below is the conversation that ensued through Facebook messages after I discovered the image… (more…)

Email SPAM drives me crazy. How about you? How many times have you missed an important message because it was hidden among all kinds of SPAM messages? How many minutes do you spend each morning sifting through the good, the bad and the ugly? The answer: too many!

Well, I wish I could offer a way to completely block out all SPAM and only SPAM from your inbox forever… but nothing is ever that easy, is it? What I CAN offer, though, are a few great tips for helping to reduce the amount of SPAM you do receive.

First and foremost, never put your email on your site for all to see without encoding it! Many people mistakingly think that if they put something like “Email us here” and simply link mailto:address@domain.com, then they are safe. But not so, my friends! This is actually begging for SPAM! It takes a couple of seconds to wrap your email address in some javascript to prevent unwanted SPAM spiders from snatching it up for their own evil devices. It just makes sense. Best of all, it will still show up perfectly normal for all your site viewers – no one would know the difference! (more…)

With the beginning of a new year, we all tend to feel a sense of renewal. There’s something about being given a chance to do better, to accomplish something more, or to just put a rough period of time behind us. New Year’s Resolutions are the perfect example of how Americans view a new year as a new opportunity.

I think this is a great time to take inventory of your website and what you would like to accomplish in the coming year. (more…)