As you might be able to tell, doing the actual podcasts for the Web Hosting Show have taken a back burner to more important aspects of my life both personally and professionally.  So, with that said I am officially retiring the Web Hosting Show as a podcast.  We had a good run – from 2005 to the present and over 200 shows.  That is almost as many episodes as they did of the TV show Friends – sure I didn’t get nominated for 63 Primetime Emmy Awards but I did get some of your admiration and respect, which I appreciate a heck of a lot more.

So what does the future hold for this website?  Well, I am going to keep posting articles here and turn it into more of a web hosting and web development blog.  So, you will still be getting all the same great content, just not in audio form.  If you really miss the sound of my voice – and want to see another multimedia project of mine – check out my YouTube “Let’s Play” series, Mitchcraft.

Thank you again for letting me fill your MP3 players for a number of years and stay tuned, because more (text based) web hosting and web development tutorials will continue to stock pile here on webhostingshow.com for your enjoyment.

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!

 

When you have a web site of any size or shape, you come to realize that statistics, in various forms, are important to watch.  They let you know how well you are doing, and what type of content seems to be the most popular.  With all the different types of statistics to watch, I thought I would go through the top five that you should keep you eye on the most.

Here are the top five web site statistics to keep your eye on:

1. Visitors – This might be the most important ‘bit of information you get on your web site.  You always want to know how many visitors your web site is getting, plain and simple.
2. Most Popular Pages and Posts – Which web pages on your web site are getting the most hits, and which are not doing so well?  Look at popular pages and their traffic sources to figure out what your doing right and how to best repeat your success.
3. Who Links to You? – Which web sites out there on the Web are sending you the most traffic?  Is it Google? Digg? Delicious? If you notice it is another like-minded web site, you might even try to partner up with them for more link exchanges in the future.
4. Keyword Based Traffic – Looking over your search engine traffic, what keywords seem to be coming up most often?  Are they the keywords you are targeting or something different?  This will give you a good idea of the type of keywords you should be targeting too.
5. Bounce Rate – The bounce rate of a web site tells you the percentage of initial visitors who move on to a new web site, leaving yours.  In a perfect world, you want that number to be as low as possible.  The reason for this is that the lower your bounce rate is, the longer people are staying on your web site and not going elsewhere.

I hope this help to both explain these statistics a little better, and helps you know what type of analytical data you need to monitor on a daily or weekly basis. Know of any other data that it is important to keep an eye on?  Leave your thoughts on the comments.

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!

 

When you have a web site of any size or shape, you come to realize that statistics, in various forms, are important to watch.  They let you know how well you are doing, and what type of content seems to be the most popular.  With all the different types of statistics to watch, I thought I would go through the top five that you should keep you eye on the most.

Here are the top five web site statistics to keep your eye on:

1. Visitors – This might be the most important ‘bit of information you get on your web site.  You always want to know how many visitors your web site is getting, plain and simple.
2. Most Popular Pages and Posts – Which web pages on your web site are getting the most hits, and which are not doing so well?  Look at popular pages and their traffic sources to figure out what your doing right and how to best repeat your success.
3. Who Links to You? – Which web sites out there on the Web are sending you the most traffic?  Is it Google? Digg? Delicious? If you notice it is another like-minded web site, you might even try to partner up with them for more link exchanges in the future.
4. Keyword Based Traffic – Looking over your search engine traffic, what keywords seem to be coming up most often?  Are they the keywords you are targeting or something different?  This will give you a good idea of the type of keywords you should be targeting too.
5. Bounce Rate – The bounce rate of a web site tells you the percentage of initial visitors who move on to a new web site, leaving yours.  In a perfect world, you want that number to be as low as possible.  The reason for this is that the lower your bounce rate is, the longer people are staying on your web site and not going elsewhere.

I hope this help to both explain these statistics a little better, and helps you know what type of analytical data you need to monitor on a daily or weekly basis. Know of any other data that it is important to keep an eye on?  Leave your thoughts on the comments.

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!

 

See what you can do with a little imagination and some unique server side tools?  The Scroll Clock keeps perfect time, and also shows off what you can do with MooTools (a compact JavaScript framework).  Seen any other neat sites like this?  Leave them in the comments!

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!

 

People often say it is a good idea to register domain name typos.  Why?  Well, when somebody accidently types in the wrong domain name, you want to make sure they still get to your web site at large.  For example, did you know Google has Gooogle.com registered?

To help you find some of the domain names to register we have ErrorNow.  To use this domain name error search tool, all you need to do is type in your domain name, hit the TAB key and then hit the button labeled, “Make Error” when it is available.  Once you do, you’ll get a number of different options like this: 

There are just some of the results I got when I searched for my own domain name, mitchkeeler.com. 

For now only 2 types of errors are caught:

• Errors made by forgot to type a character
• Errors made by press a nearby character

Want to give it a shot yourself? Head on over to errornow.com.

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!

 

When in any business, even web hosting, you want to keep an eye on your competitor’s website. You need to be able to analyze and understand the keywords they are popular for and find out the reasons why.  One tool that helps you track down statistical information on keywords and domains is WebStatsDomain. 

The great thing that makes this website service really work is they collect detailed information about keywords and how they effect search engine results.  It also notes the  keywords and plenty of other statistics from your potential rivals and similar sites so you can see where you are going right or wrong and enables you to react. 

To use it, simply type in a keyword you have in mind – and click search.  To get a pretty good profile of a website (your own or somebody else’s) simply type in the domain name and click search.  Some of the information is off (This website is worth well over $3,000) but for the most part they do a good job at giving you organic keywords, similar sites, summary statistics, and other public information about a website in one simple location.

Want to give it a shot? Head on over to webstatsdomain.com to get started. 

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!

 

Being able to chat with your website visitors in real-time can be a really good way to keep them engaged and on your website longer.  One free chat provider that you should check out is ChatWing.  This excellent service allows you to give your visitors a real-time communication tool and lets you generate revenue from the box too.

Here is a little more about how to get started from the ChatWing developers:

To get started, enter your domain name on www.chatwing.com in the purple box that says: ‘Add ChatWing to your website’ and click ‘GO’. Once you have created your ChatWing account, you will be able to customize your chatbox. Once you have done this, you will be given html code that you must embed on your website. For specifics, visit our ‘Embed Instructions’ page.

So how does this generate revenue for you? They pay on a CPC (cost per click) basis.  You will get 75% of all revenue generated by the chat on your website. When you have reached the minimum threshold of revenue earned for payment, $25, a request payment button will appear on you analytics page.

Want to get started with your own chat box on your website? Just head on over to ChatWing.com.

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!

 

Image hosting is a dime a dozen out there – however there are some really great services that should not be turned away because of this fact.  One image host that outshines the rest is Imgbox.  If you are looking for a free photo or image host that gives you unlimited storage space and a full range of tools to integrate it into your website – Imgbox is the way to go.

You can choose to register or not register – that much is up to you.  Of course, if you do register for the service – it is a little easier to keep track of what images you have uploaded.  Once your image or images have been uploaded you can share them each individually or share the entire gallery of images you have put up for the world to see.

Want to try it out for yourself? Get started with your own free image hosting over at Imgbox.com.

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!

 

If you are in search for a website that is much like the one you are on (or any other website out there) then you really should give WebsitesLike.org a shot.  This fantastic website search engine will allow you to view websites that are related to the ones you put in to it.

To use the service, all you need to do is input a website or keyword into the search box on their front page:

On the results page, you will see a list of website categories (for example, webhostingshow.com fits under hosting, news, podcast, web and webhosting).  Under the website profile, you see websites like the one you are on.

From that point, you can explore and check out all the suggestions they have to give you.  If anything else, this website serves as a great way to find more like-minded websites that you could potentially contact and try to network with (if you are a webmaster yourself, like I am). 

WebsitesLike.org boasts having alternatives for over 1 million websites.  Go give it a shot and see if you can find any good alternatives to your favorite websites at WebsitesLike.org.

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!

 

In just a few more days Facebook is going to roll out the new timeline layout for all the Facebook fan pages, which means both hosting companies with these types of pages will need to find a banner they can use to stand out from the rest of the hosting community.  If your in a creative slump, you might try Pic Scatter. 

The Pic Scatter website is a Facebook timeline banner creator.  The customization options they offer are pretty nice too.  You can generate a great looking photo collage based on your Facebook friends, likes or albums.  Here is a quick example of one I made in just a few seconds:

Want to create your own Facebook timeline banner? Head on over to Picscatter.com.

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© Mitch Keeler 2012 | Check out my firefox help site and my tech blog too!