Weekly Roundup – Guy R Cook 20130727

50 Homepage Website Layouts using Featured Details & Icon Lists by Jake Rocheleau

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Explaining Markdown The trend of icon detail lists has be rising very quickly but silently. I have not seen many other designers writing about this topic, and my hope is to shed light onto the trend with some beautiful examples. Generally startups and smaller Internet-based websites utilize these icon details for pitching their product to customers.
Homepage layouts are also the typical place to find these details because it will capture visitors landing right on the website. Some icons are very large, others are tiny and stacked in rows of 6 or 8 features. Other icons are colorful or flat or shiny and many other various styles. The point is to give recognition for these icon-centric interface features which really to present a beautiful product to interested consumers.
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Shared this for the excellent keep it simple calls to action this model presents!  And if these 50 ideas don’t work, let me know what you came up with instead ok?

Guy R Cook - President vDomainHosting, Inc

Freemium
and the links to go with that word.

5 ways developers fail at freemium games

Freemium Games Explained!  – Dual currencies and more.

Freemium Is Irresistable, Even For Successful Game Companies

Advanced Link Tracking Code from Google

It’s listening really well, that enables you to hear the sound of one hand clapping.

7 Benefits of App Authorization for Sweepstakes

To make sweepstakes perform better, here are 7 benefits explained.

by Frederick Vallaeys

The Evolution Of Quality Score

Even if you don’t care much for a history lesson, it may help paint a picture of why QS exists in the first place, and the evolution of factors may give you some insight into what Google cares about.When I started working at Google in 2002, Quality Score didn’t exist. But what set Google apart from the other PPC ad systems at the time was how they determined if ads were relevant enough to warrant an impression. In addition to having a team of humans reviewing all ads, the system was also monitoring the click-through rate (CTR) of every keyword — if a keyword’s CTR fell below 0.5%, it would become disabled for poor relevance. Google was using the wisdom of the crowds to let its users determine which ads should show and which shouldn’t.The problem with disabling keywords at an arbitrary CTR level was that advertisers were unhappy to see some of their keywords disabled forever (unless, of course, they knew of the workaround to resubmit the same keyword with different capitalization). So, we started to evolve the system. Instead of disabling keywords, we came up with new statuses like “slowed,” “in trial” and “on hold.”

Know Thy Fans – Be Relevant In Your Fan Acquisition Efforts

Before you pull the trigger on a sweepstakes to win a new iPad, diamond earrings, or luxury vacation, ask yourself if the people who enter your contest are doing it because they are potential customers and want to engage with your brand, or if they’re just using you for a chance to win that shiny new gadget/sparkly/getaway.
— another great post from the WooBox website @ http://blog.woobox.com 

5 Landing Page Headline Formulas Tested

By Michael Aagaard

While there is no shortage of articles that list different headline formulas that you can use on your landing pages, there really isn’t much research available on how these formulas actually perform in real life on real landing pages.

How to Deactivate All Plugins
When Not Able to Access WP-Admin

Often times during troubleshooting, hosted WordPress, many sites will recommend deactivate all plugins and activate them one by one. What’s worst is sometimes you get locked out of your WordPress admin panel, so you can’t even deactivate the plugins in an easy way. If you have ever faced the white screen of death, then you know exactly what we are talking about. In this article, you will be shown how to deactivate all WordPress plugins when not able to access wp-admin area.

JoomlaShine Power Admin

Very often JoomlaShine sees reports from users about how difficult it is to do simple tasks in Joomla such as changing module positions, hiding an article’s title or relocating menu items. Thus, we decided to take a good look at how people use Joomla and created an ultimate solution to make such processes much easier and joyful.  Have a look.

Weekly Roundup – Guy R Cook 20130720

Guy R Cook - President vDomainHosting, Inc
https://www.facebook.com/help/332626706817162/

Managing facebook Ads With Power Editor

You can’t currently create Custom Audiences within the self-serve ad tool, although you can select ones that have already been created. You’ll need to use Power Editor to create them. Power Editor is a bulk ad editing tool created by Facebook. It’s a browser plugin that currently works with most browsers. Simply go to Facebook Power Editor to get started.

Tech and Coffee mug arrived today.

Tech and Coffee #publichangouts is run by a bunch of tech savvy people. Below are a few examples of the topics we may discuss;

  • G+ Features
  • Linux / Windows / Mac / UNIX
  • General Computing
  • Mobile Devices
  • Code / Hacking
  • Videography & Photography
  • Coffee
  • Sleeping
  • News and Current Events

Tech and Coffee Mug

When Device Recognition and Programmatic Buying Intersect – A Mobile World Where Everyone Wins

So how can publishers take advantage of this opportunity? How are OpenX and AdTruth using technology such as universal device recognition to deliver more effective mobile ad inventory with high quality mobile audiences? And how does Real Time Bidding (RTB) work for publishers on mobile devices? – See more at: http://blog.openx.org/07/todays-webinar-when-device-recognition-and-programmatic-buying-intersect-a-mobile-world-where-everyone-wins/#sthash.UMhOAS8U.dpuf

Jaana Nyström

Works at Social Media entrepreneur. Google+ Discuss TC.
Lives in Jyväskylä, Finland
468,415 have her in circles

Screen Sizes for mobile phones

Doing research for Mobile Phone screen sizes, got this link
http://screensiz.es/phone

There are quite a few great, thorough keyword research guides on the internet (see herehere, and here). In general, they tell you to follow this process:

  1. Create a seed list of starting terms
  2. Expand your list using keyword research tools
  3. Refine your list with competitive research

The KISSmetrics Guide To Keyword Research – Part I: Keyword Discovery http://blog.kissmetrics.com/keyword-research-part-1/ 

Keyword Research for Web Writers and Content Producers http://www.copyblogger.com/keyword-research/ 

How to do Keyword research – The beginners guide to SEO http://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo/keyword-research

Google XML sitemap validator tool

http://www.xml-sitemaps.com/seo-tools.html

A tool which will validate your xml sitemap and optionally ping Google to inform them of their location.

Our xml sitemap validator will inform you straight away if there are any problems with your sitemaps allowing you to make changes prior to submitting it to Google.
You can also optionally ping Search Engines with the whereabouts of your sitemap. Supported search engines are:

  • Google
  • Bing
  • Yahoo
  • Ask.com

Please note that we would recommend you inform Google of your sitemaps via the Google Webmaster Tools.

Longitude / Latitude

 http://itouchmap.com/latlong.html   To find the latitude and longitude of a point Click on the map, Drag the marker, or enter the…Address:

PSAMA Pulse Awards

The PSAMA Pulse Awards highlight the region’s best marketing strategies, creativity, and results. This award recognizes marketers who best understood the pulse of their audience, and really embraced the marketplace and its objectives. This is the only marketing awards competition of its kind in Washington State. Awards Category finalists are chosen by a professional panel of judges, but the ultimate winners are chosen by you.
http://pulseawards.org/

Shopcade

Shopcade is your personal shopping app. Discover new products, create lists of the things you want, and get exclusive deals. ~ Twitter: @Shopcade; Instagram: @Shopcade; FB: Facebook.com/Shopcade     Found on Pinterest @ http://pinterest.com/shopcade/

Chocolate Festival links

Build has begun for space for the Chocolate Festival here are some links I came across in researching for this event.

 Orange County Chocolate Festival! http://www.occhocolatefestival.com/
21st Annual Oakdale Chocolate Festival  http://www.oakdalechamber.com/chocolate-festival-rootmenu-41
Lewisburg, West Virginia Chocolate Festival http://www.lewisburgchocolatefestival.com/
Cincinnati Chocolate Festival 2012 — A Bigger Box of Chocolates! http://cincinnatichocolatefestival.com/ 
Ramsbottom Chocolate Festival | the UK’s Original, Award Winning, Biggest & Best Family Friendly Chocolate Festival http://www.ramsbottomchocolatefestival.com/ 
Colorado Chocolate Festival http://www.chocolate-festival.org/
The Chocolate Festival – Welcome to the Chocolate Festival  http://www.festivalchocolate.co.uk/

How to Find Great Content to Share on Twitter

What content are you sharing on Twitter?
Do you struggle to find interesting, relevant things to tweet about every day?