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The long lasting businesses here in Muskegon, Michigan for example, have a strong belief in our community. They buy local, because that’s what makes the community go-round. When they pay their employees, and the employees drop their money in local businesses as well, it makes a stronger community. However, when business is outsourced, then everyone suffers; even the business that outsources.

When a business outsources to save a few bucks, the benefit for the company is only temporary. I will agree though, that in some cases it is necessary. Like when talent and skill can’t be found local. But eventually, less dollars in the community will weaken the system, and in turn come full circle to even affect the business that outsourced. Essentially, the business accepts money from the community, then disperses it away through outsourcing, and unfortunately, it’s the younger generation of savvy business owners that do this.

If an area of people truly believe in their community, then it’s important to do business locally whenever possible. Area Web Solutions is a web design and SEO firm that believes this. We are actually very good at what we do, and have a strong belief in other local businesses.

The fact of the matter is, that print advertising has had its days, and the only real alternative left, is for a business to get on the web and promote their business. Did you notice that I did not claim that getting on the web is promoting a business alone? Simply getting a website, is not going to attract millions of new potential clients. In fact, an unpromoted website is only going to bring an average of 20-50 new visits per month. This is where SEO comes in.

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and is basically a method that educated and mostly experienced individuals use to promote a website through many different variables. Some of the ways that an SEO company with these expert individuals promote a website is through ensuring that the html code of the website is clean and without errors. Another way that SEO works is by getting quality inbound links to your website. In addition, SEO companies should utilize blogs and understand how to do so properly. Not all blogs are created equal. And then there’s the other goodies as well like social networks such as twitter.com, facebook.com and myspace.com.

So is that all there is to SEO? As I chuckle and answer that question, I’m going to have to say no, not even close. We here at Area Web Solutions will actually go over 140 checkpoints for all of our SEO programs. These are things that we have learned over the last 10 years and what’s important today. By the way, meta keywords no longer work with Google, Yahoo, and Bing (formerly Live.com; formerly msn.com search), and have not for a few years now.

If you’re a business in the Muskegon area, then we would love to help your business. That’s what we are here for so call us today at (231) 457-4894 or see our Search Engine Optimization Muskegon plans.

Looking for a web design agency in Muskegon Michigan? The good news is that Area Web Solutions is located in Muskegon, MI right here in West Michigan. We have been in business since 2005 and have done work for various business types including Fruitport Township.

Just because we are located in West Michigan, this does not limit who we can work for. We have clients all over the US right now. Whether you are located in California, Boston or anywhere in between, we will work with you closely every step of the way as though you are local business, in order to get the results that you expect from a premium web design agency like ours.

We have prepackaged and custom design plans to fit your needs. Our rates are affordable and the work is unmatched. Many of our clients have come to us to have their website done right after bad experiences with other designers. Yes, there are people out there that will build a website for nickles, but the term, “you get what you pay for”, really rings true with web design. If you want it done right the first time, call us. If you want to pay twice, call the other guy, then we’ll be hearing from you soon anyways.

Contact us or call 231-747-9531 today!

The first disadvantage of using craigslist.org to make money is reach. Although millions of people visit this website, all of those visitors are distributed among 450 locations. This is where craigslist.org is lacking. You are not supposed to post your ad in more than one location at a time. If you are selling widgets, and you want to sell a lot of widgets to everyone, everywhere, then craigslist.org will be very limiting to you.

Another disadvantage of using craigslist.org to make money is that there is no protection for the seller. Many auction sites have procedures in place to make sure that both the buyer and seller are protected from unscrupulous individuals. Craigslist.org has no such protections. You make contact with a potential buyer or seller and hope that they will not rip you off. You do not know if they are legitimate or not and you have no idea if they are a dangerous criminal or not. Online auction sites remove the person interaction by means of shipping the item to a location. On craigslist.org you usually have to either have a buyer come to your home, go to a seller’s location or meet in a public place somewhere. Meeting someone is fine if the item is small. However if you are selling a projection TV, it may be more difficult to get it to the local diner.

Craigslist.org does post a notice explaining how to keep safe from fraud. Their intentions are well meant and in this case you get what you pay for. Craigslist.org is free. Most auction sites have fees. In this case it seems that you are paying for an additional level of safety and security. On an auction website there is recourse if someone passes you a bad check or if someone offers to pay you via PayPal and then reverses the payment. With cragislist.org there is recourse only through law enforcement for a bad check or through PayPal. Your chances of recovering payment is not good. You will be out the money and the product.

Another problem with craigslist.org is if you are trying to promote your business. There are many businesses that will keep reporting your ad as being in violation of craigslists.org’s rules and regulations or that it is spam or even that it infringes on some else’s copyright. In certain categories it can be nearly impossible for a new business to post an ad. For example, posting an ad for carpet cleaning services in the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill area can be next to impossible. I know of one particular company that finally had to contact Craig Newmark directly in order to get a problem resolved.

Now that you know all about the disadvantages of using craigslist.org to make money you can decide for yourself if it is worth it. Although the ad is free it takes a lot of time to write, post and constantly delete and repost your ad so that it stays on the front page. Is it worth it? Only you can decide for yourself.

The answer is very simple, it is free and easy to do. That’s all good and fine, but we really should elaborate. First of all, anyone who has a valid email address can post an ad. This makes joining very easy. All you have to do is upload a picture if necessary and write a good ad. You can post just about anything on craigslist.org. From services and items for sale, to real estate and cars, and even job postings (although there is a charge for this in 10 cities), you can find anything and sell just about anything that is legal for sale.

Selling items and services on craigslist.org is a great way to add extra income. It does not take a lot of effort and you can bring n a decent amount of money selling off your old and unwanted items. Some people also run their own business off of craigslist.org. Are you creative? Can you fix cars? Cars are bought, fixed up, and sold for a profit. Creative people sell quilts, crafts, and other items they have made. Yard sale junkies sell this weeks finds. It is all free, fun and profitable. This is the main advantage of using craigslist.org to make money.

Another advantage is that it sure beats having a yard sale. With a yard sale you are stuck there all day, the weather may or may not cooperate, and you might have undesirables shopping around in your front yard. With craigslist.org, you can be contacted via email. You choose who you wish to deal with. Your personal email address can be hidden and there is an option to have all inquiries go through a craigslist.org email address that gets forwarded to you. Protecting your privacy is important and selling through craigslist.org is more private than holding a yard sale.

Safety is another consideration, especially for single women, single moms, or women whose husbands may be out of town for extended lengths of time. Holding a yard sale can put you at risk if there are no other adults around. You do not want to broadcast the fact that you are there alone or alone with kids. Craigslist.org removes that situation. Only people that you invite come to your home. You can even agree to meet them at a local McDonalds or some other public place, thus keeping your actual residence private. This is a huge benefit over a yard sale. Personal safety should always be a primary concern. Safe and almost anonymous versus having droves of people come to your home. That is one of the many advantages of using craigslist.org to make money instead of a yard sale or classified ad.

Craigslist.org is free to use for buying and selling items and services. Online auctions sites cost you money. So does posting an ad in the local newspaper. Anytime you can promote a business or sale for free it is a good thing.

Now that you know about the advantages of using craigslist.org to make money, why not give it a try. Pad that bank account and start saving for a better car or perhaps just keep it for a rainy day. Whatever you use it for, you should consider giving craigslist.org a try.

Is this because of luck? That is even more remote. It takes good business sense and a lot of help and team effort. Most importantly, it is the eagerness to succeed and the persistence to learn and the willingness to put in a lot of hard work and some money.

However, before shelling out your hard-earned money on advertising, here are three (3) smart reasons why you should consider paying for your traffic including common-sense methods of showing you how to prepare your website.

1. The quickest method for getting customers to your website is to pay for your traffic.

Like Neo, traffic is ‘The One’ . Without traffic, all your efforts would just go to waste. Every business needs customers, without them you wouldn’t have anyone to sell your products to. In the Internet world traffic is the walk in customer. The more traffic you possess the more people you’d be able to sell your products to.

But similar to any business that’s in every corner building or in the mall, not everyone that goes in will buy. But for those who do come in to browse your merchandise, most of them will buy your products. It is a clear and known fact.

But, how do you get traffic, traffic great enough that could make a small portion of resulting buyers enough to make a fair profit. Many big companies generate traffic of tens of thousands a day and a measly ten to fifteen percent actually buys, but that small percentage is enough to supply them with adequate business.

Many of these success stories get their traffic from paying others. Yes that’s right; you have to spend money to make money. Advertising is the key. The more people who know that your site exists the more people would of course go to your site, that’s common sense.

While there are numerous ways to get free advertising for your business, free advertising doesn’t generate the same high volume of traffic as paid traffic does. Paid advertisements include such advertising schemes as those offered by Google and Yahoo.

2. In order to take full advantage of the search engines, make sure that your site is properly optimized to rank high before paying for your traffic.

Search engines are the fastest and easiest way for finding what you need on the internet . Search engines are extremely popular because they provide an indispensable service to many people. They are free and easy to use. Because of their popularity, search engines receive many visitors as well as click throughs . With these benefits in mind, it is easy to see why so many companies would pay to advertise with search engines.

Search engines provide information to the millions of users they receive each day. They provide relevant links to many sites that a user may be looking for. If your site’s link pops up as one of the top ranked sites on the search results page, you stand a great chance that the user will click your link and go to your site. While search engine optimization is a cheaper and low cost way to get your site a high rank, paying for advertisements will ensure that you will be on the top ranks.

When you pay for your advertisements, it is like paying for guaranteed traffic to your site. This may not seem like a good idea at first, but the benefits of doing so far outweigh the cost in the long run. When you pay for your traffic, you are guaranteed a consistent flow of traffic to your site. You will at no time go without making a sale on any given day.

3. Find and use tools that will aid you in researching relevant keywords for your chosen niche so that you don’t waste money on advertising.

Normally, you will be charged with the number of hits a link gets when your ad is clicked, this is known as pay per click. For some search engines, you will be charged with the number of times your ad shows up when a certain keyword or keyword phrase is searched. It is imperative that you have good keyword content in your ad. There are many tools on the Internet which can aid you in using the right keywords at the right moment in time.

All the money you spend in paying for your traffic will not be for nothing. You will get an impressive boost in traffic which will also result in a great boost in your sales figures.

Keith Gloster has stumbled upon a proven system that solves four major problems 99.99% of marketers face everyday which are traffic generation, prospecting, lead generation and follow-up. For the exciting details, visit: http://www.free-mlm-leads-generator.com

First things first. I have to make it clear that I am going to discuss how to set up wordpress software properly while hosted on your own server with a fresh copy of WordPress 2.7.1 from wordpress.org. I will not be discussing anything that has to do with wordpress.com social network blogging. Same software, different solutions.

I am going to assume that you already know how to install the software too. So I won’t be discussing how to install it either. However, if you are looking for hosting with wordpress for free, and one click installs, then see our hosting plans. All of our hosting plans include simple one click Installs and Upgrades.

So let’s get started on that checklist.

Go to “Settings >> General” and name your website under “Blog Title”, then put in a blurb about your site under “Tagline”. Keep it short and simple. Save and move on.

Go to “Settings >> Privacy” and make sure that the radio button that says “I would like my blog to be visible to everyone, including search engines (like Google, Sphere, Technorati) and archivers is checked. This is the number one most common mistake people make when setting up WordPress. They forget to check this and if “I would like to block search engines, but allow normal visitors is checked, then you are telling all the search engines to stay away. And believe me, they will.

Go to “Settings >> Permalinks” and select “Custom Structure” the enter this in the box /%postname%.html
You will have to either be able to copy the .htaccess code provided that will look like this

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]
If your .htaccess file has the right permissions set, the wordpress will create it for you. Never give full 777 permissions to your htaccess file. This is asking for trouble with hackers. 666 usually does the trick, and when complete, change the permissions back to 644. Save your changes and go to the next step.

Go to “Settings >> Writing” and put all the following ping addresses in your “Update Services” pinglist box.

http://rpc.pingomatic.com/
http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
http://search.yahooapis.com/SiteExplorerService/V1/ping
http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2
http://1470.net/api/ping
http://api.feedster.com/ping
http://api.moreover.com/RPC2
http://api.moreover.com/ping
http://api.my.yahoo.com/RPC2
http://api.my.yahoo.com/rss/ping
http://bblog.com/ping.php
http://bitacoras.net/ping
http://blog.goo.ne.jp/XMLRPC
http://blogdb.jp/xmlrpc
http://blogmatcher.com/u.php
http://bulkfeeds.net/rpc
http://coreblog.org/ping/
http://mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatt
http://www.lasermemory.com/lsrpc/
http://ping.amagle.com/
http://ping.bitacoras.com
http://ping.blo.gs/
http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/
http://ping.cocolog-nifty.com/xmlrpc
http://ping.blogmura.jp/rpc/
http://ping.exblog.jp/xmlrpc
http://ping.feedburner.com
http://ping.myblog.jp
http://ping.rootblog.com/rpc.php
http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php
http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php
http://ping.weblogs.se/
http://pingoat.com/goat/RPC2
http://rcs.datashed.net/RPC2/
http://rpc.blogbuzzmachine.com/RPC2
http://rpc.blogrolling.com/pinger/
http://rpc.icerocket.com:10080/
http://rpc.newsgator.com/
http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2
http://topicexchange.com/RPC2
http://trackback.bakeinu.jp/bakeping.php
http://www.a2b.cc/setloc/bp.a2b
http://www.bitacoles.net/ping.php
http://www.blogdigger.com/RPC2
http://www.blogoole.com/ping/
http://www.blogoon.net/ping/
http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates
http://www.blogroots.com/tb_populi.blog?id=1
http://www.blogshares.com/rpc.php
http://www.blogsnow.com/ping
http://www.blogstreet.com/xrbin/xmlrpc.cgi
http://www.mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatter/ping.php
http://www.newsisfree.com/RPCCloud
http://www.newsisfree.com/xmlrpctest.php
http://www.popdex.com/addsite.php
http://www.snipsnap.org/RPC2
http://www.weblogues.com/RPC/
http://xmlrpc.blogg.de
http://xping.pubsub.com/ping/


This pinging function automatically notifies all on your list upon a new article post. Once pinged, the bots–like Google– come to your website looking for the new page to crawl and index it. Within 10 minutes, your new page should be searchable in Google and all around the web, once you have been writing regularly and gained trust. What did I just say? I said this service is not going to be fantastic right from the start as the places you ping may sniff you out for a few weeks and several articles before you can gain their trust to put you in their serps faster than you can order a number 1 at McDonalds. Once I post this very article about this WordPress SEO checklist, it will no doubt be in the Google search results in 10 minutes and people will find it right away. It won’t be number one, but it will be there and as time goes by, it will slowly climb up with other efforts to get it there.
Don’t forget to save your changes before you move on.

Now on to the plugins. Download and install the plugin “All in one SEO Pack“. After successful install, now go to “Settings >> All In One SEO” and set your “Home Titel”, Home Description”, and “Home Keywords”. The title should be 70 characters or less. The Description should be no more than 150 characters in length and don’t use more than 10 keywords in the keywords box. The rest of the defaults should be fine unless you know what you are doing. Press the ‘Update Options” button and go to the nest step.

Now download the Worpress Plugin, “Google XML Sitemaps” and install. Don’t be fooled by the name. It’s actually a sitemap for most compatible search engines that conform to the xml sitemap technology. After installation, go to “Settings >> XML Sitemap” and leave most of the settings as-is. However, you will need an api code from yahoo to notify yahoo. They are free and take a little time to setup at Yahoo Site Explorer Once there, make sure that you add your sitemap to their list within Site Explorer. Your sitemap will be at youraddress.com/sitemap.xml
Another important third party communication that you will want to setup is at Google Webmaster Tools. You don’t need an API with Google, but you do need to add your site to your account with them and also add your sitemap.xml file with them.

After setting up Yahoo Site Explorer and Google Webmaster Tools, in the same “Settings >> XML Sitemap” area of your site, make sure you check the box to “Notify YAHOO about updates of your Blog” and insert your api code along with all the other search engines being checked. Make sure that the box “Modify or create robots.txt file in blog root which contains the sitemap location.” is also checked and scroll down to “Sitemap Content” and check the following at a minimum:

Sitemap Content

Include homepage
Include posts
Include following pages of multi-page posts (

Posted in Web Solutions ]]> http://areawebsolutions.wordpress.com/2009/02/19/wordpress-blog-seo-checklist/feed/ 0 lavinco WordPress Checklist Checkmark Checkmark Checkmark Checkmark Checkmark Checkmark http://areawebsolutions.wordpress.com/2009/02/17/why-you-should-register-at-youtube/ http://areawebsolutions.wordpress.com/2009/02/17/why-you-should-register-at-youtube/#comments Tue, 17 Feb 2009 04:04:44 +0000 lavinco http://areawebsolutions.wordpress.com/2009/02/17/why-you-should-register-at-youtube/ ]]> (My Original Blog Post: Why You Should Register At YouTube)
Do you enjoy watching videos on YouTube? Even if you have never visited YouTube before, we urge you to do so, as you will likely find it fun, exciting, and very entertaining. YouTube is a video sharing website which allows internet users, just like you, to upload and share videos that they have made and socialize with each other. Perhaps, the greatest thing about YouTube is that it is free. Plus currently, it ranks as the number 2 most popular website out of the 20 million that Alexa keeps track of-behind only Google themselves. Oh, did we also mention that YouTube is owned by Google, which may have something to do with their success?

While at YouTube watching some of the greatest video clips on earth, and some of the most retarded, you will find that you can browse around for free. However, there are a few benefits to having an account at YouTube–besides it being free–such as the following.

Besides being an easy process to do, signing up for a free YouTube membership account can be done in just a few minutes. You’ll only be asked the simple questions like, name, age, gender, how much you weigh–just kidding about that last one, lol–, and your location along with your desired username and password. Some of this information is to feed you video suggestions and sponsored ads based on your criteria. Additionally, if you end up uploading your own videos for free after you sign up, YouTube will show you detailed statistics for what type of people watched your video. Neat huh?

Right after signing up for the free YouTube account for yourself, you can immediately begin to enjoy the many other benefits of having a YouTube membership. One of those benefits is the ability to rate videos that you watch, as well as leave comments. As it was previously mentioned, you can watch videos on YouTube without having a YouTube account, but you cannot rate videos or leave comments for the video owner. This is ideal if a video is of interest or offensive to you. Rating YouTube videos also gives other YouTube members an idea as to which videos are high in demand, and in turn, can lead to more of your favorite videos being found on the YouTube site. That is just one of the many reasons why you should not only sign up for a free YouTube account, but also rate YouTube videos that you watch or leave comments.

Another great feature along with commenting and rating other videos on YouYube, is that you will have the ability to also share your own with others. Non-registered YouTube users are unable to upload and share any videos that they would like to. If you have never shared videos online, you may want to think about doing so, if you have the desire to be famous for a moment to the rest of the world. Many of the videos currently found on YouTube are comedy related shorts, video blogs aka vlogs, and prank videos. All you really need to have is a video recording device, such as a cell phone, webcam, or camcorder, and a movie editing software program if you with to fancy it up, which now comes standard on most computers, and you will be online showing off your skills in no time.

If you are looking for ways to promote yourself, your music, your business or orginization, then you better believe that YouTube is a marketing tool that you need in your toolbox. YouTube has perhaps more people visit the site in just a few days, than we have in America voting for our Presidents. Crazy, but true! So why not get your message out in front of this large audience? Simply point a video camera at yourself, press record, and don’t forget to take the lens cap off to begin capturing your commercial in a video. A little tip though, don’t be uptight and boring. YouTube members are there to be entertained, so be entertaining and have a little fun.

Perhaps the most rewarding benefit to owning a YouTube account, is the money you could be making. What? Did I just say you can make money at this free service? Yep, I certainly did. You have to have a few other ingredients to make this work though. First you should own or have access to a website that you have rights to so that you can put videos on the site. And secondly, you need an AdSense account. I won’t explain what an AdSense account is in this article, but click on the link in the previous sentence to learn more. You can monetize your website by not only have basic AdSense ads on your site, but with YouTube and AdSense, you can also provide fancy video ads of your own or ones that other people have dedicated to the ads. You can access the YouTube ads through your AdSense account.

So there you have it. Creating a membership account with YouTube is free and it should only take a few minutes of your valuable time. If you enjoy using the Internet as a source of entertainment or marketing, you will not only want to visit YouTube, but you will also want to take the few minutes needed to register for a free account. In the end, you will likely be pleased with your decision to do so as millions of other people have been.

For custom Internet Marketing Web Solutions, contact us for free information.

Posted in Web Solutions ]]> http://areawebsolutions.wordpress.com/2009/02/17/why-you-should-register-at-youtube/feed/ 0 lavinco