If your blog is disabled, it will be listed on your Dashboard, but you will not be able to click on it to access it. If this is the case, there will be a grace period during which you can request that it be reviewed and recovered. The disabling is a result of our automated classification system marking it as spam. Because this system is automated there will necessarily be some false positives, though we're continually working on improving our algorithms to avoid these. If your blog is not a spam blog, then it was one of the false positives, and we apologize.
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Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Regarding Images from the Web
Blogger's image upload feature allows you to upload and display images in your posts. This is great when you want to add a photograph you shot or an image you created. However, there are a few details to note when it comes to images that are legally protected or hosted at someone else's expense.
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Adding Images 'from The Web'
If you choose to 'Add an Image from the Web' using the image upload feature in Blogger, you shouldn't use an image location that is hosted at someone else's expense without their permission. Sometimes this is referred to as 'stealing bandwidth' because every time your blog loads, the image is loaded from their server, and this person likely incurs an expense.
Copyrighted Materials
Before you put an image in your blog, keep in mind that some images are protected as intellectual property through copyright. This means that the creator has sole legal rights to their works and may not want you copying and displaying them. If you're unsure whether or not an image is copyrighted, it's best not to risk it. However, there are places that make it easier for you to find images you're allowed to useI've deleted my blog but its still online
Try clearing your Web browser's cache and then refreshing the page. If you have recently deleted your blog, you may have to wait a day before it completely disappears. Additionally, some search engines keep cached copies of pages in their search results for up to a week so you may have to wait a a few days before your blog is removed from all search engines.
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Monday, November 24, 2008
How can I make my blog load faster?
The speed at which your blog loads is critical to attracting more readers to your blog. If your blog takes a long time to load, many readers may leave your blog before they have the chance to read it. Here are a few tips and tricks that will help your blog load faster and attract more users:
Posts
Your blog's load time can be affected by the number of posts you display on your main page. You can easily edit the number of posts displayed of the main page from the Settings | Formatting tab. You can then select the number of posts you want to display on the main page. We recommend displaying 10 or fewer posts on the main page.
Third Party JavaScript and Links
For optimal blog load speed, we recommend using Google/Blogger widgets, JavaScipt and links. However, if you need to use third party JavaScipt and links, your blog will load much faster if you put all JavaScript at the bottom of your blog. If you have third party JavaScript and links in your sidebar, put them in at the bottom of the sidebar.
Images and Media
The more images, videos and other multi-media you have on your blog the longer it will take to load. However, images and other multimedia are important to attracting users to your blog, so it is important to optimize the load speed of your images and media. Here are a few tips to increase the load speed of your media:
* Decrease the size of your images or use thumbnails that link to the full-size image.
* If you use third party images, consider uploading them to Picasa Web Albums via the Blogger post editor.
* If you have a large number of images to display, you can upload all your images (from a vacation or event) to a Picasa Web Album and link to the album in your post or sidebar.
Other suggestions
* If you've added any custom CSS to your blog, make sure you put it at the top of the page.
* The most important content of your blog that catches readers attention should load the quickest. To help you identify which items are taking the longest to load you can use Stopwatch. To use Stopwatch, enter your blog's URL into the text box and click "Start StopWatch". Stopwatch will then open your blog in a frame and will record the time it takes for everything on your blog to load, including images, videos, widgets, etc. Take note of the items that take the longest to load and modify them appropriately using our suggestions.
Read More...
Posts
Your blog's load time can be affected by the number of posts you display on your main page. You can easily edit the number of posts displayed of the main page from the Settings | Formatting tab. You can then select the number of posts you want to display on the main page. We recommend displaying 10 or fewer posts on the main page.
Third Party JavaScript and Links
For optimal blog load speed, we recommend using Google/Blogger widgets, JavaScipt and links. However, if you need to use third party JavaScipt and links, your blog will load much faster if you put all JavaScript at the bottom of your blog. If you have third party JavaScript and links in your sidebar, put them in at the bottom of the sidebar.
Images and Media
The more images, videos and other multi-media you have on your blog the longer it will take to load. However, images and other multimedia are important to attracting users to your blog, so it is important to optimize the load speed of your images and media. Here are a few tips to increase the load speed of your media:
* Decrease the size of your images or use thumbnails that link to the full-size image.
* If you use third party images, consider uploading them to Picasa Web Albums via the Blogger post editor.
* If you have a large number of images to display, you can upload all your images (from a vacation or event) to a Picasa Web Album and link to the album in your post or sidebar.
Other suggestions
* If you've added any custom CSS to your blog, make sure you put it at the top of the page.
* The most important content of your blog that catches readers attention should load the quickest. To help you identify which items are taking the longest to load you can use Stopwatch. To use Stopwatch, enter your blog's URL into the text box and click "Start StopWatch". Stopwatch will then open your blog in a frame and will record the time it takes for everything on your blog to load, including images, videos, widgets, etc. Take note of the items that take the longest to load and modify them appropriately using our suggestions.
Friday, November 14, 2008
Build traffic tip - set Send Pings to "Yes"
One of the ways to help build traffic to your blog is to ping blog update notification services to inform them that your blog has been updated so that they will crawl and update you blog. With the old classic Blogger, you can set weblogs.com, and only weblogs.com to be automatically pinged whenever you publish a new post.
What I normally do is to set "Send Ping" to "No", and whenever I publish a new post, I will go to pingoat.com to ping all the ping blog update notification services (including weblogs.com). That is easy to do because all you have to do is to enter your blog URL (which can easily be done by right-clicking on "View Blog" in the Dashboard, then pasting it into the URL box, type in the title of the blog (this can also be very easy because if you have done it before, the moment you enter the first or second letter of the title, a list of titles of blogs you have pinged before will drop down for you to select), click the "Categories" and this will cause all the blog update notification services to be ticked, then click "Go Pingoat!".
"Send Ping" is normally set to "No" by default, but today, I decided to go to SETTINGS > PUBLISHING to check and found this:The wordings is a bit small in the screenshot. You can click on the screenshot to enlarge it or for your convenience, I will put the wordings below:
"Pings blog update notification services that many individuals and services use to track blog changes."
Please note that it says "Pings blog update notification services" and not just "Ping weblogs.com". This means New Blogger has changed this to ping more services without alerting us to the change. So I will probably change my habit and set my blog to ping automatically instead of laboriously pinging myself.
However, I will try to get more information as to which blog update notification services are being pinged and if I get some information, I will update this post.
Read More...
What I normally do is to set "Send Ping" to "No", and whenever I publish a new post, I will go to pingoat.com to ping all the ping blog update notification services (including weblogs.com). That is easy to do because all you have to do is to enter your blog URL (which can easily be done by right-clicking on "View Blog" in the Dashboard, then pasting it into the URL box, type in the title of the blog (this can also be very easy because if you have done it before, the moment you enter the first or second letter of the title, a list of titles of blogs you have pinged before will drop down for you to select), click the "Categories" and this will cause all the blog update notification services to be ticked, then click "Go Pingoat!".
"Send Ping" is normally set to "No" by default, but today, I decided to go to SETTINGS > PUBLISHING to check and found this:The wordings is a bit small in the screenshot. You can click on the screenshot to enlarge it or for your convenience, I will put the wordings below:
"Pings blog update notification services that many individuals and services use to track blog changes."
Please note that it says "Pings blog update notification services" and not just "Ping weblogs.com". This means New Blogger has changed this to ping more services without alerting us to the change. So I will probably change my habit and set my blog to ping automatically instead of laboriously pinging myself.
However, I will try to get more information as to which blog update notification services are being pinged and if I get some information, I will update this post.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Increase traffic: Add Interests, Favorite movies, music, books to Profile
In the old classic Blogger, your Interests, Favorite Movies, Music and Books that you added to your profile was clickable. This means that other surfers/bloggers can use that to find blogs sharing the same interests. However, when Blogger Beta (now New Blogger) was introduced, these became unclickable words, thus useless.
Now according to Blogger Buzz Browse Profiles! Find new blogs to read!, as of 7 August 2007, these interests that you list in your profile are now active links, that means if you have put "blogging" as one of your interests, anyone viewing your profile can click on "blogging" and find other blogs whose interests are also blogging. This apply not only to your profile, but also other bloggers' profiles as well. This implies the more interests, favorite movies, music, books, that you add to your profile, the higher the chances that some other surfers/bloggers will find your blog. So put as many of them as you can into your profile. That is a very good way to try to bring more traffic to your blog.
If you do not know how to do that, sign into Blogger at blogger.com and you will end up in the Dashboard containing a list of blogs you have created. At the top right corner, click EDIT PROFILE and you will get the page where you can add all the interests, favorite movies, music and books you want.
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Now according to Blogger Buzz Browse Profiles! Find new blogs to read!, as of 7 August 2007, these interests that you list in your profile are now active links, that means if you have put "blogging" as one of your interests, anyone viewing your profile can click on "blogging" and find other blogs whose interests are also blogging. This apply not only to your profile, but also other bloggers' profiles as well. This implies the more interests, favorite movies, music, books, that you add to your profile, the higher the chances that some other surfers/bloggers will find your blog. So put as many of them as you can into your profile. That is a very good way to try to bring more traffic to your blog.
If you do not know how to do that, sign into Blogger at blogger.com and you will end up in the Dashboard containing a list of blogs you have created. At the top right corner, click EDIT PROFILE and you will get the page where you can add all the interests, favorite movies, music and books you want.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Social bookmark buttons bottom post
If you are desirous of getting more traffic to your blog, one way is to add social bookmarking buttons at the bottom of your posts so visitors can easily bookmark the pages they are interested in and easily return to them as demonstrated at Good Health Information. There are many ways to do that. One of the easiest is to use go to Add This and register an account. After signing in, click GET YOUR BUTTON. In the next page, from drop-down menus, select the type of button (Sharing/Bookmarking button), tick the radio button from among 1 of 6 buttons, where you want the bookmarking button (On a blog) and your blogging platform (Blogger). When done, click GET YOUR FREE BUTTON >> and you will get your code for the bookmarking button in the next page.
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Sunday, November 9, 2008
Adding a MP3 Player to your Blog
With Google Gadget, you can easily add a MP3 Player to your blog. I have added one at the bottom of the right sidebar in this blog Recreation and Sport. All I have to do is to go to Google Gadget, choose "MP3 Player", click "Add to your webpage" and will be taken to the page Add this gadget to your webpage. You can set, title, the height and width of the MP3 Player. A default URL of a song is already added for you. If you have your own song hosted somewhere, all you have to do is to replace the URL of the default song with the URL of your own song.
In the case of the above blog, a check of the template revealed this:
.sidebar {
float:left;
border-top: solid 1px #fff;
padding: 4px 0 0 7px;
background: #fff;
width: 260px;
That is, the width of the sidebar is 260 pixels. I thus set the width of the MP3 Player to 255I then click "Get the Code", copy the code generated, go to the template Layout, click "Add a Page Element" in the right sidebar section, choose HTML/Javascrip in the pop-up, pasted the code into the window and saved, then drag the new Page Element to the bottom of the right sidebar section.
To play the music, all one has to do is to click on the pink button.
Read More...
In the case of the above blog, a check of the template revealed this:
.sidebar {
float:left;
border-top: solid 1px #fff;
padding: 4px 0 0 7px;
background: #fff;
width: 260px;
That is, the width of the sidebar is 260 pixels. I thus set the width of the MP3 Player to 255I then click "Get the Code", copy the code generated, go to the template Layout, click "Add a Page Element" in the right sidebar section, choose HTML/Javascrip in the pop-up, pasted the code into the window and saved, then drag the new Page Element to the bottom of the right sidebar section.
To play the music, all one has to do is to click on the pink button.
Saturday, November 8, 2008
Adding music to your blog
There are many ways to add music to your blog. The most common way is to embed it into your post, or in New Blogger (formerly Blogger beta), add it as a HTML/Javascript widget via the "Add a Page Element" in the Layout.
You will first have to find a music file that is already hosted on the web, or if you have your own music file stored in your computer, upload it into a file host and then get the URL of the file. If you don't have any music file saved in your computer to upload, you can find files already hosted at freemp3mail.com, select the artist, click "Free Download" and you will be taken to the file hosted on the web. You can copy the URL from the address bar of that page. For example, this is a file already hosted on the web: Josh Aran (Blossom).
In the HTML/Javascript widget window or the post editor window, paste this code:
width="150" height="40" autostart="false" loop="false">
UPDATE 15 November 2007: A blogger commented he/she got error message "The tag isn't closed". No time to test this, but with XHTML (and HTML), opening tags without closing tags are supposed to end with a backslash /. Further, I believe with XHTML, there have to be a space as well. If you have problem, try
width="150" height="40" autostart="false" loop="false" />
and see if it helps. Please give feedback as I have no time to test.
You will have to substitute "URL of music file" with the actual URL of the music file in the script. In the script, there four attributes - width="X", height="Y", autostart="false/true" and loop="false/true". You will have to make sure that the value of width attribute X is consistent with the width of the container in which you intend to add the player into. For example, the width of the sidebar is 160 for this template, so I have to add a value less than 160 if I want to put it in the sidebar. For the autostart attribute, if you put it as true, the music will start automatically the moment your blog is loaded. Many have the opinion that this is a bad choice as the visitor may be visiting your site in the middle of the night when others are sleeping, and may be forced to quickly exit your page to stop the music. If you put the autostart attribute as false, the visitor will have to click the start button to start the music. For example, I have used the "Add a Page Element" to embed an MP3 player at the bottom of this blog Good Hobby Ideas. Try clicking on the start button to listen to the music. For this player, I have put the attribute loop="false" so that the music will stop when it is finished. If you want the music to loop continuously, you will have to put loop="true".
There are other ways of adding music to your blog. For example, you can use this site
Sonific to generate a script for putting into your post (the player will only appear in that post) or the Page Element (the player will then appear in all pages of your blog). You register for an account, verify your email address, sign in, select a songspot, and you will be taken to this page to fill in the field for the blog platform you are using and the URL of the blog you want to put the songspot inAs you can see from the screenshot, you have various option like orientating the player horizontally or vertically, select the size, whether to start the music automatically or manually, etc. You will also have to select your blog platform (which in our case will be Blogger) and type in the URL of the blog you intend to embed the player into. When you are finished the configuration, click "Activate" and the next page will display the script for you to paste into your post or the Layout. If you paste it into your post, when you try to publish it, you will get an error message "Your HTML cannot be accepted.......". Ignore it, tick "Stop showing errors for this post" and publish.
You can see an example of the player embedded into a post at Testing Sonific. The player will only appear in this particular post. You can also see the player embedded in the footer of this blog. In this case, the player will be displayed in all the pages of the blog.
You can also use Google Gadget to add an MP3 Music Player on your blog. See post Adding a MP3 Player to your blog (click "BACK" button to return to this page).
Read More...
You will first have to find a music file that is already hosted on the web, or if you have your own music file stored in your computer, upload it into a file host and then get the URL of the file. If you don't have any music file saved in your computer to upload, you can find files already hosted at freemp3mail.com, select the artist, click "Free Download" and you will be taken to the file hosted on the web. You can copy the URL from the address bar of that page. For example, this is a file already hosted on the web: Josh Aran (Blossom).
In the HTML/Javascript widget window or the post editor window, paste this code:
width="150" height="40" autostart="false" loop="false">
UPDATE 15 November 2007: A blogger commented he/she got error message "The tag isn't closed". No time to test this, but with XHTML (and HTML), opening tags without closing tags are supposed to end with a backslash /. Further, I believe with XHTML, there have to be a space as well. If you have problem, try
width="150" height="40" autostart="false" loop="false" />
and see if it helps. Please give feedback as I have no time to test.
You will have to substitute "URL of music file" with the actual URL of the music file in the script. In the script, there four attributes - width="X", height="Y", autostart="false/true" and loop="false/true". You will have to make sure that the value of width attribute X is consistent with the width of the container in which you intend to add the player into. For example, the width of the sidebar is 160 for this template, so I have to add a value less than 160 if I want to put it in the sidebar. For the autostart attribute, if you put it as true, the music will start automatically the moment your blog is loaded. Many have the opinion that this is a bad choice as the visitor may be visiting your site in the middle of the night when others are sleeping, and may be forced to quickly exit your page to stop the music. If you put the autostart attribute as false, the visitor will have to click the start button to start the music. For example, I have used the "Add a Page Element" to embed an MP3 player at the bottom of this blog Good Hobby Ideas. Try clicking on the start button to listen to the music. For this player, I have put the attribute loop="false" so that the music will stop when it is finished. If you want the music to loop continuously, you will have to put loop="true".
There are other ways of adding music to your blog. For example, you can use this site
Sonific to generate a script for putting into your post (the player will only appear in that post) or the Page Element (the player will then appear in all pages of your blog). You register for an account, verify your email address, sign in, select a songspot, and you will be taken to this page to fill in the field for the blog platform you are using and the URL of the blog you want to put the songspot inAs you can see from the screenshot, you have various option like orientating the player horizontally or vertically, select the size, whether to start the music automatically or manually, etc. You will also have to select your blog platform (which in our case will be Blogger) and type in the URL of the blog you intend to embed the player into. When you are finished the configuration, click "Activate" and the next page will display the script for you to paste into your post or the Layout. If you paste it into your post, when you try to publish it, you will get an error message "Your HTML cannot be accepted.......". Ignore it, tick "Stop showing errors for this post" and publish.
You can see an example of the player embedded into a post at Testing Sonific. The player will only appear in this particular post. You can also see the player embedded in the footer of this blog. In this case, the player will be displayed in all the pages of the blog.
You can also use Google Gadget to add an MP3 Music Player on your blog. See post Adding a MP3 Player to your blog (click "BACK" button to return to this page).
Friday, November 7, 2008
Backing up your blog Part II
I have written about backing up your blog and have mentioned about using BlogCollector, unfortunately, I have tested BlogCollector on a blog using the New Blogger template, and it didn't work. So what is left now is:
1. to set your blog to send an email to a specially created email address to collect posts (unfortunately, this will not include the HTML that would display images, etc and also if it is an old blog, and you want the old post to be backed up, you will have to do it manually one by one)
2. Manual method. Open each post in the EDIT HTML mode, copy and paste the content into Notepad and save it somewhere safe and easily accessible.
3. Use HTTrack. I have tested using HTTrack and as I expected, it works for both blogs using old classic templates and New Blogger templates. I expected it to work because it mirrors Webpages which does not depend on how the Webpage was created. If you use HTTrack to backup your blog, you can even burn the mirrored site onto a CD and send it to other to view, etc.
Read More...
1. to set your blog to send an email to a specially created email address to collect posts (unfortunately, this will not include the HTML that would display images, etc and also if it is an old blog, and you want the old post to be backed up, you will have to do it manually one by one)
2. Manual method. Open each post in the EDIT HTML mode, copy and paste the content into Notepad and save it somewhere safe and easily accessible.
3. Use HTTrack. I have tested using HTTrack and as I expected, it works for both blogs using old classic templates and New Blogger templates. I expected it to work because it mirrors Webpages which does not depend on how the Webpage was created. If you use HTTrack to backup your blog, you can even burn the mirrored site onto a CD and send it to other to view, etc.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Backing up your blog Part
I have previously published a post How to backup your blog in which BlogCollector and HTTrack was mentioned as one of many methods to backup your blog. Recently, someone asked a question about BlogCollector, saying he couldn't get BlogCollector to work. Since I haven't used BlogCollector after New Blogger templates was introduced, I decided to make some tests.
I used BlogCollector to try to backup Testing Blogger Beta which is a blog using a New Blogger template in a New Blogger account. BlogCollector failed to backup this blog.
I tried BlogCollector on Blogger for Dummies which is also in a New Blogger account, but still using the old classic template. The backup was successful, backing up all the 60 posts in the blog.
So the conclusion is that you can use BlogCollector for blogs using the old classic Blogger template, but not for the New Blogger template. For that, you will have to use HTTrack or other methods.
Update 9 August 2007: This update should have been updated earlier, but BlogCollector has already been updated to backup New Blogger blogs. However, I haven't really have time to test it but I think it still can backup photos. The best way to backup blogs is to do the tedious manual method by editing each post in the EDIT HTML mode, save the content of the post in a Notepad file and save them one by one, but it is a lot of work.
Read More...
I used BlogCollector to try to backup Testing Blogger Beta which is a blog using a New Blogger template in a New Blogger account. BlogCollector failed to backup this blog.
I tried BlogCollector on Blogger for Dummies which is also in a New Blogger account, but still using the old classic template. The backup was successful, backing up all the 60 posts in the blog.
So the conclusion is that you can use BlogCollector for blogs using the old classic Blogger template, but not for the New Blogger template. For that, you will have to use HTTrack or other methods.
Update 9 August 2007: This update should have been updated earlier, but BlogCollector has already been updated to backup New Blogger blogs. However, I haven't really have time to test it but I think it still can backup photos. The best way to backup blogs is to do the tedious manual method by editing each post in the EDIT HTML mode, save the content of the post in a Notepad file and save them one by one, but it is a lot of work.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
How to change the color of the blog background, text in the content, etc.
Someone asked in a comment how to change the color of fonts, etc. With the New Blogger, this is really very easy. Just get into the Dashboard of the blog, click, "Template" tab, then the "Fonts and Colors" sub-tab and you will get this page.
First, choose what your want to change in the left side of the page, then preferably select a color from the blocks of color to the left. You should preferably select colors that matches your blog or colors from your blog. Be careful if you are choosing color for the font, not to choose a color that matches the background, or choosing a corlor for the background not to choose a color that matches the font. That will make the text invisible, making your blog unreadable. Worst, it can get your blog black listed by the search engine as that is considered black hat SEO (Search Engine Optimization). If those colors mentioned doesn't satisfy you, that are other color further to the right. You can also input the exact HTML code for the color you want. For this task, getting the very useful ColorPic will be very helpful.
If you are trying to get the HTML color code for the link on your site, it is best to make a screenshot (press "Printscreen" key, then paste it into the Paint program available in Windows in the Accessories, or use my favourite - the free Irfanview). You have to use an image of your page because most links change in color the moment you place your mouse over it, but with a screenshot, that doesn't happen.
Read More...
First, choose what your want to change in the left side of the page, then preferably select a color from the blocks of color to the left. You should preferably select colors that matches your blog or colors from your blog. Be careful if you are choosing color for the font, not to choose a color that matches the background, or choosing a corlor for the background not to choose a color that matches the font. That will make the text invisible, making your blog unreadable. Worst, it can get your blog black listed by the search engine as that is considered black hat SEO (Search Engine Optimization). If those colors mentioned doesn't satisfy you, that are other color further to the right. You can also input the exact HTML code for the color you want. For this task, getting the very useful ColorPic will be very helpful.
If you are trying to get the HTML color code for the link on your site, it is best to make a screenshot (press "Printscreen" key, then paste it into the Paint program available in Windows in the Accessories, or use my favourite - the free Irfanview). You have to use an image of your page because most links change in color the moment you place your mouse over it, but with a screenshot, that doesn't happen.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
How to Add Shopping Cart to Your Blog
The easiest way to add a shopping cart is to use Paypal Merchant Tools. Of course in order to make use of this service, you will need a Paypal account if you don't already have one. Signing up is free and easy. Plus by making use of Paypal Merchant Tools, you can accept credit card payments.
Perhaps the easiest way to describe how to add a shopping cart to your blog is to describe how I set up this demonstration "online shop" at Demonstration shopping cart.
First, you will have to prepare your post. Add photographs, description, prices, etc.
Then, sign into your Paypal account. Then click on the Merchant Tooltab. Then at the right sidebar, click on "Paypal Shopping Cart", then enter the details like Item Name/Service, Item ID/Number (optional), Price of Item/Service you want to sell, Currency, etc. Then either tick the Paypal "Add to Card"button or if you have your own button hosted on the web, enter its URL. Click the "Create button now"button at the bottom of the page and 2 HTML script will be generated - one for the "Add to Shopping Cart" button and another for the "View Cart" button. Copy the HTML scripts and paste them in the appropriate places in your Post Editor Window. Add further buttons if required and when finished, publish the post.
Many have said it is possible for non-residents of eTrade to open a US bank account (one even guaranteed it, but unless I am desperate, I will take that guarantee with a pinch of salt). I have corresponded with eTrade and they have told me that only US residents and/or those who have a Social Security number can do that. If any reader knows of ways for people like us to withdraw from Paypal account, I hope you will leave a comment in this post. It will be very much appreciated.
Read More...
Perhaps the easiest way to describe how to add a shopping cart to your blog is to describe how I set up this demonstration "online shop" at Demonstration shopping cart.
First, you will have to prepare your post. Add photographs, description, prices, etc.
Then, sign into your Paypal account. Then click on the Merchant Tooltab. Then at the right sidebar, click on "Paypal Shopping Cart", then enter the details like Item Name/Service, Item ID/Number (optional), Price of Item/Service you want to sell, Currency, etc. Then either tick the Paypal "Add to Card"button or if you have your own button hosted on the web, enter its URL. Click the "Create button now"button at the bottom of the page and 2 HTML script will be generated - one for the "Add to Shopping Cart" button and another for the "View Cart" button. Copy the HTML scripts and paste them in the appropriate places in your Post Editor Window. Add further buttons if required and when finished, publish the post.
How you can withdraw funds from your Paypal account
Note that there are two ways to withdraw money from a Paypal account - by check or transfer to your bank account. For withdrawal by check, only residents of U.S., Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, Ecuador, India, Jamaica, and Uruguay can do that. Regarding transfer to bank account, I have requested information on which countries can do that and will update this post when I get a response. In the meantime, what I have done is emailed my niece in US to ask if she could help me by opening a Paypal account if she don't already have one and I send what I have in my Paypal account to her and she help me transfer that to me. Waiting for a response.Many have said it is possible for non-residents of eTrade to open a US bank account (one even guaranteed it, but unless I am desperate, I will take that guarantee with a pinch of salt). I have corresponded with eTrade and they have told me that only US residents and/or those who have a Social Security number can do that. If any reader knows of ways for people like us to withdraw from Paypal account, I hope you will leave a comment in this post. It will be very much appreciated.
Monday, November 3, 2008
Promoting Your Blog
This is in no way a science or guarantee; it's simply a few suggestions with which many bloggers have found success.
Set your blog to Send Pings. When this setting is activated, your blog will be included in various "recently updated" lists on the web as well as other blog-related services.
Activate Your Navbar. Do this and you might start to see the effects right away! One of the features on the Blogger Navbar is a button called NextBlog - click it to visit the next Navbar-enabled blog.
Install Email This Post. If you use Email This Post on your blog, people will be able to forward your posts to friends. This may not have an immediate impact on your site stats but it enables others to publicize your blog for you.
Turn on Post Pages. By publishing every post as its very own web page with Post Pages, you ensure that your entries are way more link-able and more attractive to search engines.
Turn on your site feed. When people subscribe to your site feed in their newsreaders, they're very likely going to read your post.
Add your blog to Blogger's listings. When you add your blog to our listings it shows up in Nextblog, Recently Updated, and other places. It's like opting-in to traffic.
Write quality content and do it well. If your "style" is bad writing, worse grammar, no punctuation, and an ugly design, that might be okay for a niche crowd. But the idea here is to achieve mass appeal, so fix yourself up a bit.
Publish regular updates. Simple: the more you blog, the more traffic you'll get.
Think of your audience. A good way to build an audience is to speak to one in particular. When you keep your audience in mind, your writing gains focus. Focus goes a long way toward repeat visitors.
Keep search engines in mind. There are a few things you can do to make your blog more search engine friendly. Use post titles and post page archiving. This will automatically give each of your post pages an intelligent name based on the title of your post. Also, try to be descriptive when you blog. A well crafted post about something very specific can end up very near the top results of a search.
Keep your posts and paragraphs short. Strive for succinct posts that pump pertinent new information into the blogosphere and move on. Keep it short and sweet so visitors can pop in, read up, and click on.
Put your blog URL in your email signature. Think of how many forwarded emails you've seen in your day, and just imagine the possibilities.
Sumbit your address to blog search sites and directories. People look for blog content at Technorati every day, are you on their list? You should be. Submit your blog's url to Technorati, Daypop, Blogdex, Popdex, and any other site of that ilk you come across.
Link to other blogs. Links are the currency of the blogosphere and it takes money to make money so start linking.
Install a blogroll. It's a very simple yet effective social networking scheme and it has the same result as a simple link if not stronger: traffic! So if you don't have one yet, sign up for a blogroll and get that link-list going.
Be an active commenter. This is in the same vein as linking. Most comment systems also provide a way for you to leave a link back to your blog which begs a visit at the very least. So if you feel inspired, leave a comment or two in your blog travels. It behooves you.
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Layouts Guide
Blogger's Layout feature is an easy-to-use template editing feature that allows you to edit and customize your Blogger template without any knowledge of HTML or CSS. You can easily edit and customize the colors, fonts, header and sidebar of your blog with a few clicks of the mouse. To customize your blog's layout, go to the Layout | Page Elements tab in Blogger.
If you're using a classic template and would like to use the Layout feature, you can read instructions on how to switch.
Read More...
If you're using a classic template and would like to use the Layout feature, you can read instructions on how to switch.
Moving elements in your template
How to arrange elements in your template
You can arrange the elements in your template the way you want them displayed. Simply click on the element you'd like to move and drag and drop it where you want it to be. You can move your page elements to the bottom of the page, anywhere in your sidebar, or below or above your blog posts. (Note: you can move all elements except your navbar, blog posts and header in some templates.)Editing elements in your template
Here's an overview of what you can configure when you click Edit for each of these elements:
- Navbar: Select the color you'd like your Navbar to be.
- Header: Add or edit the header of your blog, which includes your blog title and blog description.
- Blog posts: Choose the number of posts to display on your main page. You can choose either the number of days with posts to display or the total number of posts on the main page. You also have the option to show email post links that let your visitors easily email posts from your blog to their friends.
- Profile: Edit/add your profile title, 'About Me' description, and location.
- Blog archive: Edit/add your blog archive title, select your display style (hierarchy, flat list or dropdown menu), choose to display post titles, display oldest posts first, choose your archive frequency (monthly, weekly or daily) and date format.
How to add a page element
You can add several page elements to your blog page or sidebar by clicking Add a Page Element. This will open a pop-up window. Click Add to Blog in the proper element section to add it:
- List: Add a list with the ability to add a title, select the number of items to display, sort your list alphabetically and add links to your list elements.
- Link List: Add a link list to your blog with the ability to add a link list title, select the number of items to display and sort your link list alphabetically.
- Labels: Add a list of all the labels you've used on your posts. Click each link to see a page showing all the posts with that label. You can change the title of the list, and sort it alphabetically or by frequency of use.
- Picture: Add a picture from your computer or the web. You can also add a title and caption to your picture and shrink the picture to fit into your blog perfectly.
- Text: Add text to your blog (such as a welcome message or footnote) with our rich text editor.
- HTML/JavaScript: Add third-party functionality or other HTML/JavaScript code to your blog.
- Feed: Add content from a site feed. Enter the feed URL, then click Continue. You'll then be able to add a title, select the number of items to show (up to five) and display the item dates and/or authors by selecting the appropriate check boxes.
- Logo: Add one of our stylish Blogger logos to your blog.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
What is the dashboard ?
Originally a board used to stop mud from being dashed inside a vehicle, the word dashboard has evolved to mean a user interface that organizes and presents information in a way that is easy to read. Your Blogger Dashboard is your control panel, your main editing interface to Blogger.
Once you have signed in to Blogger you will arrive at the Dashboard page from which you will have editorial access to all your blogs and your profile as well as Blogger News, Recently Updated Blogs, and Blogs of Note.
Note: Whenever you're navigating around Blogger and you are not already on the Dashboard page, you will see a blue button in the top right side corner of the page that says "Back to Dashboard."