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By The Squirrel, on November 7th, 2010%
  Prevent hacking of your blog. Like all of our posts this one, on preventing your blog from being hacked, was generated from our circle of friends and clients.
Several of our bloggy friends have had their blogs hacked at some time in the not-too-distant past.
Realizing we probably didn’t know enough about preventing it, we decided this was a great opportunity to not only educate ourselves on avoiding the horrors of a hacked blog, but to also educate our reader(s). <— our attempt at humor. We really hope there is more than one of you out there.
Here are a few very simple tips we picked up in our research:
1. Spammers can insert code via comments. Along with the wonderful spam catcher Askimet, install Conditional CAPTCHA. This adds a CAPTCHA window only for those comments Askimet labels spam. The potential spammer must then enter the CAPTCHA code to have their comment go forward to the Askimet spam queue. Best of all, your regular, non-spammy commenters won’t even see the CAPTCHA screen. We’ve only had it in place for a couple days on all of our blogs and it is fantastic! No more having to dump hundreds of spam comments!
2. Hide your WP version. Hackers often need to know which WP version you’re using in order to hack it. This used to be visible in the footer. We’ve just checked and either the latest version of WP, or the themes we’ve chosen, are aware of this security flaw and have removed this information from the footer. It may also be in your blog’s header.php template tag. Remove the meta tag named “generator”, which states which version you’re using. Continue reading Seven Ways to Prevent Those Bloggin Hackers
By The Squirrel, on September 20th, 2010%
 What’s a “Pretty URL”? It’s when you take a URL, put a nice dress and some make-up on it, curl it’s hair… Oh, sorry. Wrong blog. . . . → Read More: Pretty URLs Just Need A Little Makeup
By The Squirrel, on August 7th, 2010%
  Blogging all the time. Blogging really is an art form. You need the ability to hold the attention of your reader, maybe even entertain then a bit, engage them, all while getting your point across. But don’t be discouraged and run out to get that journalism degree – some of the best bloggers never went to journalism school.
Here are some quick tips on the general tone to use when blogging…
Talk to your audience like you would a friend – but without the cuss words and off-color comments. (Unless of course, that is your “shtick”.) Be friendly. If they feel they know you a little maybe have a smidgen of a rapport with you, they are more likely to use your service or buy your product.
Avoid the newspaper article tone. Too many sites are dry and humorless. Consumers just aren’t drawn to it. If they wanted to read the newspaper, they’d be on that website reading emotionless articles instead of your blog.
Don’t write posts that are too long, or too short. The general consensus is 250-750 words per post. Got more to say? Break it into a series. Those do well, and keep the reader coming back. Continue reading Blogging For Your Audience
By The Squirrel, on June 8th, 2010%
 What is this 'blog' and why should I have one? You already have a website, why should you have a blog? That’s what you’re asking yourself, right?
Let me tell you why I now have one on each of my websites…
About a year and a half ago I started one website (without a blog), six months ago I started a second (without a blog), and three months ago I started a third (with a blog). On the second site, I had a little help from a SEO (search engine optimization) guru. On the third, three-month old site I, knowing next to nothing about it, did my own SEO with a little help from GoDaddy.
On the 1.5 years old site, and six months old site which had a little SEO help, I got no traffic.
Zero. Zip. Nada. Continue reading Why Should I Have A Blog?
By The Squirrel, on June 4th, 2010%
 Blogging about Blogging This is the first post in a series for Beginning Bloggers.
New to blogging?
First, “What “is” a blog? A blog is a type of interactive software you can add to an existing website, or it can operate as a stand alone website. This allows you to have a dynamic and constantly changing website. Dynamic websites get better ranking in Google and Google tends to send more traffic to them.
Welcome to what’s likely to be your newest addiction hobby!
When I started blogging professionally a few months ago, I had no idea how addictive it would be! I knew nothing about blogging. Nothing at all. All I knew was I had stories in me that needed writing. I now have three blog sites of my own, and guest blog for others. Before you get scared and run off because of my use of the word ‘addiction’, just know if you already have an interest in blogging, it may just be too late.  Seriously, it’s a lot of harmless fun and even has the potential to make money for you. It’s also a marvelous way to express yourself and build internet friendships. Continue reading Resources for Beginning Bloggers
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