Communication, Communication, Communication

On May 1st I launched a new product, WPSimulator.com

It was the most problematic launch I’ve ever had, including the server being down for several hours, and yet after 48 hours we’d still had only 1 refund.

So what happened?

One of the most important things with a launch is not just being properly prepared before hand, but paying attention to what’s happening and being ready to respond to any problems.

Within an hour of going live I spotted that there were no new members registered in the membership database, this was after 100 sales.

So I then went to the support desk to check for the support tickets that I was expecting and discovered there weren’t any.

Then the server went down for the first time.

At this point it would be easy to panic, but that doesn’t solve problems.

So what did we do?

First we got the webshost to get the server back up and work out why the server had gone down.  Read more... (546 words, 2 images, estimated 2:11 mins reading time)

Popular WordPress Developer Tool

aka: How to break a high capacity cloud server…

sometimes you come up with something that you know straight away isn’t the usual ‘run of the mill’ offer…

yesterday this proved to be even more the case than expected for my new WordPress product.

In the first few hours of the new launch my brand new, “high capacity” cloud server got so much traffic it broke…

I’ve had to upgrade the server to quadruple the capacity to deal with the surge of interest in this new offer!

Check out what all the fuss is about here: WPSimulator

If you’re a ‘newbie’ at WordPress then you can be up and running on the same development system that the pro web designers use to create their sites in just minutes…

If you already know how to use WordPress then you really need to be using this to make your life easier and stress free for developing sites…  Read more... (275 words, 2 images, estimated 1:06 mins reading time)

4 New Blog Posts & Global Botnet attack…

another long, but productive week, rewarded with a couple of beers with my sister and some friends last night, so I’m probably going to have a less productive Friday…

got a few things for you this week, including several blog posts!

#1: Global DDOS Attack on WordPress Sites

if you’ve not heard about the massive botnet attack on worpdress sites that’s been going on for the last couple of weeks, then you can read more about it, as well as some simple advice to help secure your sites in the new blog post here:
http://seouk.com/global-ddos-attack-on-wordpress-sites/

#2: BlogDefender going up in price on 25th April…
if you haven’t secured your WordPress blog from hackers then you may already have been hacked!

learn how to secure your site before the price goes up here:
http://BlogDefender.com

#3: Search Engine optimization techniques don’t exactly stand still, Google does seem to enjoy keeping us all on our toes!  Read more... (344 words, 2 images, estimated 1:23 mins reading time)

Weekly News 12th Apr 2013

I hope your week has been productive!

I’ve been spending a lot of time preparing my new product “WPSimulator” for launch, so plenty busy…

#1: I also had a webinar on Passive Niche Profits earlier in the week with Adam Short, which went down very well with everyone who made it along.

if you missed the webinar don’t worry, I’ve got the link for the replay for you!

here it is: -
http://www.nicheprofitclassroom.com/webinars/mg/replay.html

grab yourself a cup of tea/coffee, or whatever your preference, and and make sure you’re got a notepad open, as you’re bound to want to take some notes, Adam shares a whole bunch of useful info!

and feel free to hit reply if you’ve got any questions…

#2: I also came a cross a sweet little WP Plugin that allows you to search through over 50,000 copyright free, stock images, grab the one you want, resize it, and pop it straight in to your blog posts…  Read more... (361 words, 2 images, estimated 1:27 mins reading time)

Finding a decent webhost company with good support just ain’t easy…

Warning: this may be a bit of a rant, as I blow some steam from the last few weeks of webhost problems…

With 13 years of building websites and over 510 live (hosted, not parked) sites in my portfolio you can imagine I’ve been through a few hosting companies.

In fact I just had a look in my email archives under the hosts section and it looks like I’ve used 40+ hosting companies over the last 12 years.

I’m now down to 2 dedicated servers, 1 VPS, and just 5 reseller accounts, having closed 1 VPS & 5 reseller accounts in hte last couple of weeks.

Over the last month or so I’ve been having some ‘fun’, moving over 200 sites to a brand new server.

It all started because one of my old reseller hosts [Xilo.net] started having problems with one of my sites, they got in touch to tell me they had suspended the sites “due to excessive resource usage”. I ended up spending over a week going back and forward with them trying to work out what was causing the problem, without any joy.  Read more... (1203 words, 2 images, estimated 4:49 mins reading time)

Weekly News Summary 31st March 2013

wow, what a week!

I’ve been mad busy migrating 200+ sites from 5 reseller hosting accounts to a new cloud VPS, not an easy task…

and on top of that I’ve been digging out and listing a whole bunch of my premium domains for sale on another blog…

yup, definetly a busy week, but all good so far, perhaps time for a beer tonight as a reward!

I’ll be doing some blog posts on both subjects for you next week, along with some tutorial videos on setting up backup for WHM hosts, backing up individual sites in cpanel, and migrating/cloneing/moving blogs, so keep your eyes peeled for the Friday update!

in the meantime…

#1: If you’re blog is more than a few months old you’ll probably have noticed that your old content tends to get less and less traffic over time.

this new plugin fixes that, along with a few other things to bring in more traffic: -

http://alink.co/pingfresh  Read more... (326 words, 2 images, estimated 1:18 mins reading time)

Weekly News Summary 22nd Feb 2013

wow, what a week, I think I’ve managed to get more work done in just the last 2 days than I usually do in a whole week, it’s amazing what you can get done when you get focused and stick to your ‘To Do’ list!

I hope you’ve had a productive a week as well..?

I’ve got 2 new blog posts for you this week: -

#1: is the very best, ‘must have’ “Social Marketing Optimization” (the social equivalent of SEO)  plugin I’ve seen.

This is probably going to be the most important plugin you can get your hands on this year as far as ‘SMO’ (& possibly SEO) goes, as it deals with all the new stuff that Google wants to see to rank your site…

And I’m including spanking new, bang up to date, bleeding edge stuff like “Facebook open graph”!

With this running on your blogs you’ll be ahead of the curve (and your competition) for a change…  Read more... (354 words, 2 images, estimated 1:25 mins reading time)

Blog Post Graphics – free software

I thought I’d cover the topic of graphics in blog posts this week, as it also gives me the opportunity to sneak in a reminder of some recent/new blog posts…

If you’re like me, when you’re doing a blog post the last thing on your mind is a cool/funky/interesting graphic to go with it, right?

The problem is we really do need to add them, they capture peoples attention and Google prefer your posts that have extra elements on them (e.g. pics, videos etc.), and they’re more likely to catch attention (and potentially go viral) on social media sites like facebook…

so really we should be adding a pic to every post we do, but that can be such a pain in the ‘neck’!

there are some obvious options to make life easy: -

1. Use the product pic if there is one – example post:

My mum’s blog got hacked
http://blogtactics.com/my-mums-blog-got-hacked/  Read more... (421 words, 2 images, estimated 1:41 mins reading time)

Essential Free Online Tools

Happy New Year!!!

I hope you’re not nursing a ‘self inflicted’ party illness like I am…

Here’s a whole bunch of free online tools and resources that you should already be aware of/using to check out, just in case you missed any…

1. Free “open source” office suite, including wordprocessor and spreadsheet program, as well as a pdf creator:
http://openoffice.org/

2. Drop Box Cloud File Storage
http://alink.co/dropboxfree

3. Cool Timer
http://www.harmonyhollow.net/cool_timer.shtml

4. Audacity Audio Recorder
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/

5. CamStudio Video Recorder
http://camstudio.org/

6. Gimp Graphics
http://www.gimp.org/

there’s a set of 27 tutorial videos on how to use Gimp at the top of this page, although they’re not free, they are cheap: -
http://www.mat4.com/ebooks/

7. Video Viewing Software
http://www.videolan.org/

8. SafeHouse virtual encryped drive
http://www.safehousesoftware.com/SafeHouseExplorer.aspx

9. FeedNotifier
http://www.feednotifier.com/download/

How to use FeedNotifier Tutorial video: -
http://blogtactics.com/rss-authority-backlinks/

10. Blog hacking protection tutorials
http://blogdefender.com

and as one extra, grab a free copy of Tony Shepherd’s Private Monthly Mentoring Newsletter:  Read more... (182 words, 1 image, estimated 44 secs reading time)

Membership Site Software

I wish this had been available a few months ago, before I spent an arm & a leg on the membership software I use, that isn’t as easy to use, & doesn’t do as much…

Quicklink ~> MembershipRocket

What makes this so good..?

check this out: -

~ After users are done with the payment, they register straight away (and there’s no bypassing the payment page)
~ No hassles getting the product
~ Integrates with ProductPay, PayPal, ClickBank, W+, JVZoo and Digiresult
~ Simple process for buyers – pay, register, login, get the goods – that’s it, no hassle
~ Protects ALL videos and pdf downloads with SECURE Amazon encryption (no more passing around the Azon URL)
~ Can limit plugin installs – from single to whatever number
~ Built in support desk
~ Amazon SES mailer
~ Simple easy fill-in-the-blanks setup
~ Just make a WordPress page and then protect it – simple as that!
~ Silk smooth buyer and seller experience
~ Sellers get easy setup and don’t have to worry about their URLs getting passed around
~ Integrates with Aweber (other autoresponders coming)
~ Launch on ALL networks at the same time – more exposure to affiliates!
~ If you can put in a WordPress site – you can protect it with Member Rocket
~ If someone refunds your plugins sold, Member Rocket will deactivate them for you
~ and more!  Read more... (297 words, 1 image, estimated 1:11 mins reading time)