About Nile

Nile is a 32 year old female from Southern Illinois. Nile is a mother of 1 son. She is also a web designer and developer, a graphic designer, and a public speaker, who exclusively designs using WordPress. She is currently a student working for a Bachelors in Business. She also blogs at FamousBloggers.net

Why You Should Have A Twitter Account For Your Business

May 21, 2013 by Nile 9 Comments

You should have a Twitter account for your business. There are so many places online and so many ways to connect with potential buyers or even current customers. As a business, it is not always about selling, but also connecting with people interested in what you do. Hopefully, you are a business owner that is passionate about your product or service.

Why You Should Have A Twitter Account For Your Business

Just to give you a little background on where I live – I live in Centralia, Illinois, which is in southern Illinois, barely within the St. Louis metro east. Centralia is a very small place. It is a city that has a annual Balloon fest that attracts a lot of people from over the region, and a large yearly Halloween parade, much larger than some of the city parades I have seen growing up.

I have the privilege to talk to a lot of small business owners. Centralia is a place where people are still a bit hesitant about the Internet, but those in business are contemplating if they need a website. The problem is, a lot of them do not have that much money to fork out for a shiny website made by a big kahuna web design company. I offer my services. I often talk to them about Twitter as I believe any business should plug into the social network.

This is helpful on several levels. If you use Twitter to connect with others, and they find you trustworthy, you build a reputation that is easily searchable. You help your business virtually get on the map, and furthermore, you get your town/city on the map. A lot of smaller cities do have a website, and for places like Centralia, it is great to see business coming in from anywhere. The brilliant part about Twitter is – IT IS FREE!

There are many tools to find people in your general area or even in your niche. You do not necessarily have to have an e-commerce site, but if you have products you like to feature that are unique to your business versus others in your niche, Twitter would be one of the great places to share that information. You never know, you might either make a good transaction over the phone, or actually set up an e-commerce site.

Another thing is that you can use Twitter to provide Live Support too. There are several places already that do, like Best Buy’s Twelp Force. Even though they are a larger business, small business can use that as an example to help others.

Going further, Twitter is great for freelancers. Freelancers are small business owners in their own right too. Using Twitter allows them to connect with others in their niche. The number of projects I have paired up with other freelancers who needed my skills are more than I can count, and a lot of them came from connecting with them on Twitter.

There are more reasons, but I thought I would allow some room for conversation. If you are a small business owner, what are your reasons? How have you used Twitter so far for your business?

Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: business, small business, twitter

#SharingSundays Recap 2013 Volume 11

May 20, 2013 by Nile 1 Comment

The #SharingSundays weekly recap posts is here! For those who are new visitors here at Blondish.net, and have no clue what #SharingSundays is, well, it is a weekly event for bloggers to share their most recent article. In return I hope they get more exposure to blog post. This event is held every Sunday on my professional Facebook fan page.

The bonus to participating is that the event is recapped in posts like this one.

#SharingSundays Recap 2013 Volume 11

Larry James shared Where Your Visitors Will Look When They Come To Your Website (Probably)

Devesh Sharma shared The Ultimate Guide for Choosing A WordPress Theme

Karen Woodham shared T’Pau 25 Live at Rhyl Pavilion 17th May 2013

Jim Landers shared How to Change Font Size and Font Family in WordPress Posts and Pages

Amrik Virdi shared How I Get 500 Page Views Everyday by Blog Commenting

A big shout out of thanks goes to those who participated this past Sunday for #SharingSundays. Even though it takes less than a minute to drop a link, it still is great and I hope it has helped a lot.

I hope to see you at the next #SharingSundays event. Please go read, share, connect, and enjoy the articles shares this week.

Have you participated in #SharingSundays? Did you need a reminder for the event?

Filed Under: News Tagged With: #sharingsundays

#FanPageFriday Recap 2013 Volume 8

May 19, 2013 by Nile Leave a Comment

#FanPageFriday is a event held every Friday on Facebook for anyone who owns their own Facebook fan page. This is a simple event to shamelessly promote pages you like and your own.

To participate in #FanPageFriday, you have to go to my professional Facebook fan page and do two things:

Share a fan page of someone you recommend
Share your fan page.

It is very simple and only takes moments to do. The bonus to this event is that I put together a post like this one to recap what was shared.

#FanPageFriday Recap 2013 Volume 8

Kimberly Castleberry

justaskkim-fbfanpage-image

Social Media Technology Specialist

Jupiter Jim’s Marketing Team

jupiterjim-fbfanpage-image

Over 80 FREE VIDEO TUTORIALS on WordPress and Thesis! I also create WordPress Blogs and Websites for small business and home-based business owners.

Limitless Laura

limitlesslaura-fbfanpage-image

The Universal plan is LIMITLESS for you. You deserve unlimited miracles in your life simply because you breathe.

Empower Yourself To Financial Freedom

Hi, my name is Falanya and I am on a journey to Empower myself to financial freedom after the past 6 years feeling powerless to care for myself due to chronic illness…but not anymore!

The Android Family

theandroidfamily-fbfanpage-image

Do you own an Android? Do you want to know how to use your device to its full potential for you and your family? Then follow the Android Family adventures and learn more!

Portenzo

portenzo-fbfanpage-image

The original made-to-order case company for your iPad, iPad mini, iPhone, Nexus, and Kindle.

Pathtofreedom247

pathtofreedom247-fbfanpage-image

We show you a trusted, honest way of solving your financial struggles, once and for all.

be Creator

An Institute which struggle for creating excellence in your studies.

Food Engineering

UNIVERSITY OF AGRICULTURE, FAISALABAD

This past week had a wide variety from different genres. That is awesome!

Thank you to everyone who participated and shared the event. Hope to see you next Friday for #FanPageFriday!

Have you ever participated in a #FanPageFriday event?

Filed Under: News Tagged With: #fanpagefriday

The Responsibility Of The Blogger Who Tweets

May 17, 2013 by Nile 15 Comments

I have been blogging for many years. I believe this year will conclude as my 7th year blogging on Blondish.net. Believe me, it has changed quite a bit. More tools have changed to be more community oriented as the content pulls in people who want to continue on the topics through whatever comment system has been integrated. Bloggers went from hard coding plain HTML or simple php sites without comments, to using simple outside comment resources like Haloscan (haloscan), and then finally to blog platforms like WordPress (wordpress), and many others. Bloggers now use social network sites like Twitter and other sites to push their content to the masses. However, I have been finding that there are people pushing their content in a manner that may detract from their own site.

Examples:

The blogger who tweets and retweets their posts constantly without engaging their followers.
The blogger who shares articles with followers and asks loyal followers to spam their links on other blogger’s sites that may not be relevant to the article they wish to be shared.
The blogger who creates a separate ID to push the same content that they are already tweeting in another.
The blogger who tweets, visits other sites and pushes their link at sites that are not on topic through the comment system – comment spam.

Sharing your material with others is great. In fact, that is the beauty of social media. However, here is the problem. Sharing your material in a way that is off topic and does not belong is spam. Whether within a social network, or other’s blogs, it is the responsibility of the site owner to make sure that they only promote within areas that will help attract people to your blog or where you want them to go. This extends to those who help push your content as well. Your loyal visitors may not be as internet savvy and could plug your content in places that may do more harm rather than help.

The reason for this is that you could be reported for spamming. Regardless if it is at another’s blog, or on the social network streams, you run that risk. You could face the following (not all or possibly all depending on how extreme the offense is):

- loss of your social network account
- blacklisting in search engines
- loss of your webhosting through your provider
- loss of your Internet connection with your Internet Service Provider

Spam has been a big issue, so when you push your content to the masses, be cautious and knowledgeable.

How do you manage promoting your content online?

Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: blogging, social media, twitter

Make Your Tweets Powerful Enough To Reach Your Followers

May 15, 2013 by Nile 13 Comments

When I mean “powerful”, I mean how many people do you actually reach? How many of them would welcome a direct message from you that asks them to retweet your post and they actually do it without hesitation? Are you effectively influencing these bloggers? – Are they actually referencing you as a source of knowledge in your niche?

You can have a lot of followers, but even a large percentage will probably have one eye on their stream, and that depends on when they are online. So how can you make your tweets reach and influence enough followers?

Before you tweet…

…you need something to say. In the case you are wanting to actually sell something, you have to do the leg work. It may take gathering details information and making sure everything is in order. This is kind of a summary that is similar to many business models, but really, it is kind of like a trying to raise a kid properly. You would never send your kid out and let them be uncouth, disheveled in their dressing, and just flat out looking like he or she has been neglected, right?

As you tweet….

This is where you have to take that step back and let that kid you have been raising out into the cruel world. However, in the same breath, be ready to accept your kid back and improve before re-releasing. You will need to make sure your kid has a nice name (a good title) that will bring people to see what you are trying to get them to either buy or just read. Do no be afraid of negative feed back. Use it to your advantage. Twitter can be the quickest way to get the feedback you need to make vital changes to your blog or even a product you might be selling.

As your tweet is seen…

Your tweet may not be seen by whom you want it to be seen. You may need to re-tweet it on occasion. Do this tastefully and without making it so obvious. People do understand that you are trying to reach others with your product that may be interested. However, you do not want to make it seem like spam.

And in between…

If you have to put some of your tweeting on an auto program, do so. This will allow you to go out and engage with people. It does not take long and you can even pace yourself. Tweeting for 5 minutes here and then 5 minutes later might be great, and you can get around things better. Some of you might have more time and that is cool, but please remember that some of your followers are going to see just about everything you tweet, so try not to be overwhelming.

You will be able to see the improvement through your own stats on your site. You might even see more quality followers too!

How are you going about reaching your followers?

Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: influence, tweet, twitter

#SharingSundays Recap 2013 Volume 10

May 14, 2013 by Nile 2 Comments

#SharingSundays are always fun as you never know what articles will be shared. Bloggers share articles from various genre. Even bloggers in the same niche share different topics. It is interesting to observe each blogger’s development while providing an opportunity for promoting.

Just as a usual recap, #SharingSundays is an event held every Sunday on my Facebook fan page at http://facebook.com/NileFlores. This event allows bloggers to share their not recently written blog posts so they can get some exposure. I hope that this events encourages people to not just share their posts, but also comment on each others articles.

This even is just for fun, but was created that bloggers who take advantage of this opportunity will eventually learn how important both engagement and syndication can be for their website.

#SharingSundays Recap 2013 Volume 10

Tony Greene shared How To Give Your GMail inBox a Good Flush

Marquita Herald shared Grit: The Ultimate Key to Success?

Suresh Khanal shared Is your hosting effecting adversely to your SEO efforts?

Jim Landers shared How to Create a new user in WordPress

Mohammad Salman Baig shared Nokia Asha 501, the Smarter and low cost Asha Series Handset

Devesh Sharma shared 6 Simple Tips For Learning CSS For WordPress

Karen Woodham shared Star Trek Into Darkness Kirk and Crew are Back – Movie Review

Shalu Sharma shared Have your earwax removed while on holiday in India

Gurwinder Singh shared Giveaway #2 – Commun.it Review and Giveaway

A big ‘thank you’ to everyone who ventured by my fan page and participated. I hope to see you next Sunday.

Have you participated in #SharingSundays?

Filed Under: News Tagged With: #sharingsundays

Signs That Your Website Has Been Hacked

May 13, 2013 by Nile 13 Comments

Every day someone is getting hacked. Why? Who knows. It could be for malicious intentions or for someone’s personal fun. The world of hacking contains a whole community of its own that it is hard to figure out a reason why such things happen. However, for the regular website owner, how do you know when you have been hacked. In this article, I will cover signs that your website has been hacked.

Signs That Your Website Has Been Hacked

PWNED

Being pwned is a way for hackers to tagged or vandalize your site with a message saying who hacked you, and that they successfully did so. Often it is a simple page they have put in place of your usual index.html or index.php file so your visitors will see only their message.

DDOS

A DDoS is a distribute denial of service attack. This is where the hacker targets a server and sends as much data to overload the system. This is temporary, but a nuisance as often sites slow down to a trickle until they are completely down.

Brute Force Login Attack

This is where the hacker tries to use as many combinations as possible in a short period to gain access to a website. If the user has a password that is simple, then the hacker can get in and choose to leave their own mark on the website. In some minor cases, the hacker just changes the password.

Code Injection

A code injection is usually something that happens with out of date programs or unsecured programs. It allows the hacker to install malware on a website that could possibly be detrimental to website visitors if they click on the link or malware. Often these are links or even links from pop-ups.

The issue with this is that a lot of times the link or pop-up at a first glance seems to be from a trusted source. The best thing to do is to exit the site and try to inform the website owner on one of their social networks. Some of the code injections are simple and only require updating a plugin, a theme, a specific script, or the overall program that the site operates with. Others may require going into the database and removing the infected tables or possibly even having the server scanned. Please do note that some cases of code injections do not turn up positive for an infected website, so it is necessary to carefully look into all files for suspicious code.

Visible signs

Sometimes your Internet Provider may produce messages like the following if your site is unsafe to surf.

Sometimes your listing might look strange on the search engines with a title that is different from your site and a different description.

The best methods to combat against hacking is to keep your server, and website’s software and programs up to date. It would also not hurt to use extra methods of hardening security.

Has your site ever been hacked? What did you do to prevent your site being hacked again?

Filed Under: Web Design Tagged With: hacked website, hacking

Why Is Local SEO Important?

May 10, 2013 by Nile 30 Comments

Local SEO is important for any business. It does not matter if the business has a physical location or if it is online. It makes the difference between someone purchasing from you or purchasing from a competitor in another city, state, or even in another country.

So… why is Local SEO important?

Why Is Local SEO Important?

You want people to visit your store or your website, and you want them to purchase a product or service, right? Well, you have to have tell people where you are and what you offer.

Sure, just putting up a store and a website will be great, but you need to let the world or your surrounding community know. Of course, there are newspaper advertisements, billboards, radio ads, and phone book listings that you could invest in. You could invest in premium web listings or even premium ads with search engines. However, you still need to build your foundation with your website to be organically listed in keywords that people will locally search.

General keywords are hard to get top rank, and really are not ideal for local business. For example, how often would someone from Nigeria come to your store in Texas for some barbecue rub. The answer: That might seem like less than “once in a blue moon.”

Instead, think logically about optimizing your site. For example, if your store that sells barbecue rub is in San Antonio, Texas, then you might want to optimize your website around keywords like:

San Antonio barbecue rub
barbecue rub store in San Antonio
San Antonio barbecue rub store
San Antonio Texas barbecue rub
Texas barbecue rub

You could also go further and optimize using keywords for different flavored rubs.

You could optimize for the general keywords ‘barbecue rub’, but you will be competing with other places around the world that do sell a similar product, even if the flavors offered are different than your business. I am not discouraging you from doing this, especially since you might actually sell from your website. However, you need to think about your local store and endearing your surrounding community to your product.

In cities like San Antonio, which according to a United States Census Bureau survey in 2011 that was listed in Wikipedia, it is the 7th largest city in the U.S. This means there could be dozens of stores that sell products that are similar to your business. You need to somehow be the business that people see first. These are your immediate potential customers. They are not just going to aimlessly drive around the city to find you. They might not have the patience to go through the phone book, or even care to buy a newspaper. They might not even listen to the radio stations you might use for your advertising.

The Internet has become a fast means of obtaining any type of information. If your store is listed and there is a map, you might have a chance of being seen. However, and I emphasize this… if you are not listed on that front page of that keyword that the consumer is searching for, then you just gave business to your competition.

Are you a local business? Take a look at your site right now and ask yourself if you are properly optimizing your site for Local SEO.

Filed Under: SEO Tagged With: local business, local seo

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