Pedro B

I have been using the BANS (Build a Niche Store) system for about three months now and, as I’ve said before, it’s an exciting affiliate marketing tool.

One of my BANS sites is a niche that involves Lego sets and has the word ‘’LEGO” in the domain name.  I have been purchasing domain names for two years now and own a few that include registered trademarks in the name.  An example would be NFLAnalyst.com.  Obviously, NFL is a trademark of the National Football League and, if the NFL cared to, they could take it from me.  I have to admit that I have known for quite awhile now that the owner of a registered trademark can claim trademark infringement.  There are tons of webmasters that use trademarked names as a part of a domain name.  But I honestly never thought companies cared that much.  I feel pretty dumb now.

This morning I received an email from a representative of “The LEGO Group” advising me that I have to release one of my domain names to them or face legal action.  This representative tells me the following:

The effect of your use of the LEGO mark as part of your domain name, create the false and misleading impression that you are authorized, licensed or approved to provide information about, or goods or services with respect to, the LEGO Group’s products or the LEGO Group itself.

At first when I read the email i was pretty pissed.  The domain name mentioned in the email is one of the first I used to setup a BANS system.  I have put in a lot of effort with it as it involves a niche that I am pretty interested in.  In the last month or so i have been reading a blog about the Build a Niche Store system by a guy named Dave.  Dave has a lot of good advice for new BANS users and posts daily tips for his readers.  Using his advice, I have included lots of pages of unique content, incorporated a WordPress blog into the site and did what I could to get backlinks for my site.  Since I set the site up in November as a freshly registered domain name it has received a PageRank 3!  This is an accomplishment for me as it is not easy to be ranked that quickly for me normally.

So naturally for LEGO to just send me a letter telling me it will no longer be mine, I was mad.  Unlike a few other sites I have had to transfer, I will not be able to use 301 redirects and enjoy the PageRank juice from the old domain.  LEGO will take the domain name and let it resolve to nothing probably.  But I understand right now that this is my fault.  I should not have registered a domain name with a registered trademark.  Developing the domain into a website was an even bigger mistake as that makes the domain more valuable.  I will certainly not do this again.

I’m trying to look on the bright side of things with this.  For one, I incorporated a blog in a sub domain for this BANS install.  I always wanted to make the domain name resolve to a WordPress blog and use the BANS system in a sub directory, as Dave recommends.  I’ve been meaning to do that but I hate changing URL’s and setting up redirects.  Also I have decided to make the site even better with more unique content and landing pages.  So now I can do all these things with a brand new domain name that does not include any registered trademarks.

Moral of the story would be to avoid developing a website that includes a registered trademark, unless you own that trademark of course.

Apple has announced that it will now sell DRM (Digital Rights Management) free music soon.  This is the main reason why I would refuse to pay for music from iTunes as it would mean that I could not play the music on anything other than Apple’s hardware, namely my ipod.  The death of DRM was officially announced today at the Macworld conference.

DRM pretty much died everywhere else in the last year except for iTunes and not because Apple wanted to keep it.  Apple has been trying to lose DRM for a few years now but didn’t convince the industry until they agreed to use varied pricing.  This means that not every song will be .99 cents anymore.  Prices are going to range from .79 cents to $1.29.

The real kicker about this deal is that if you want to free music that you have already purchased from Apple of DRM lunacy you have to pay .30 cents a song.  Booya!!  Right to the nads.  This is why DRM music is so lame and why in the years I’ve owned an ipod I purchased 1 song from Apple.  Amazon has had DRM free music for a year now.

One of my favorite MMA clips of all time.  I wanted to share this today because I couldn’t think of a well thought out post and the dude that kisses Heath Herring recently fought at against Antonio Silva at Sengoku “Rebellion 2009.”

This is a pretty old highlight but it’s definately a classic.  Before the bout even began, Yoshihiro Nakao and Heath Herring do the typical MMA staredown thing.  They get close enough to kiss and lo and behold, Yoshihiro actually kisses Herring.  And the rest is history folks.  Check out the video to see Heath Herring’s reaction.

I have gone into the WordPress Content Management System before, but now I am going to elaborate a bit with tips for your first WordPress Blog installation. WordPress is very easy to setup and begin to use. Here I will offer some suggestions and recommendations for getting the most out of your first WordPress blog.

Here is a list of what I will be covering in this post. This may be a bit more comprehensive than what you need so feel free to jump forward to the place where you are at in your first WordPress blog.

WordPress Setup

Domain Name
Hosting
Installation

WordPress Settings

Discussion Settings
Permalinks
Changing Permalink Settings

WordPress Theme

Picking a theme

WordPress Plugins

Using WordPress Plugins
Installing WordPress Plugins
Must-Have WordPress Plugins

Your First WordPress Post

Categories
Tags
Meta

WordPress Setup

Picking a Domain Name

I go a bit deeper into picking your first domain name in a different post, but I will recap – Make sure you will love it forever and try to go with dot com!

Web hosting Service

I also touched on picking a web hosting service but this is much easier than picking your domain name. There are thousands of web hosting service out there so due some searching and make sure you know what you want out of your new web hosting service.

WordPress Installation

For your first WordPress install there are a few different ways to get setup. If you have chosen Hostgator as your web hosting service then setting up WordPress is just a few clicks away!

To install WordPress with Hostgator:

First login to your cpanel using the login information provided from Hostgator to your email address. Navigate to the bottom of your screen and look for the Fantastico Icon:

Your cpanel may look different but the Fantastico Icon should be the same. Click on it and you will be taken to Fantastico’s Navigation page where you can select different scripts to install:

Click on “WordPress” and you will see a new screen where you are given a brief description about WordPress and where you will see the option for a New Installation:

 

Clik on “New Installation” and you will be taken to a screen to enter basic settings for your new WordPress installation.

Fill in the basic settings for your first WordPress blog here. By default, the “Install In Domain” option will have your domain name in that field.

The next option is “Install In Directory.” Here you can decide if you would like to install in the root of your domain or if you would like to install in a sub directory. For example, if you want to have your blog show up in Http://www.yourdomain.com/blog instead of http://www.yourdomain.com than you would type “blog” in the “Install in Directory” field.

The other options are pretty self-explanatory. Fill in the login information you want to use to login to your blog and your user nickname and email. The “Base Configuration” options are not super important as you can change them later when you login to your blog.

Manual WordPress Installation

You can also setup WordPress manually. First Download the latest version of WordPress. Then follow the installation instructions included with the WordPress download. WordPress has one of the easiest installation processes available but if you are still having problems, visit the WordPress Website Troubleshooting guide.

WordPress Settings

WordPress makes this very easy but there are a few things out-of-the-box that you should change for your first WordPress Blog.

Permalinks

One of the first things to change will be your Permalink settings. Go to “Settings > Permalinks” and change to either “Day and Name” or “Month and Name.” It is very important to change your Permalink settings from the default for a few reasons. The first is that search engines will be able to read and understand what your posts are about. The other is that users will be able to tell what your post is about by glancing at the URL.

The other default Settings for WordPress depend on you. Check the Discussion settings to change any comment settings for your blog and then the General settings to personalize a bit.

WordPress Themes

The ability to easily extend the WordPress system is what separates WordPress from other Content Management Systems. The community of WordPress developers have created, and continue to create, thousands of WordPress themes that are easy to download and install. A theme allows for personalization of your first WordPress Blog and helps you stand out from the crowd. Download WordPress themes for free and try them out on your WordPress installation.

There are also many sites online that offer further customization for a fee. This is something to consider once your WordPress blog is more popular or making a steady income.

WordPress Plugins

Using WordPress Plugins

WordPress Plugins add to your blog and help you add almost anything you can think of. Extra sidebar widgets and many back-end plugins help you personalize your blog even more.

Installing WordPress Plugins

Downloading and installing WordPress plugins is very easy to do. Log into to your WordPress blog, navigate to your “Plugins > Add New” page and there you can search for plugins that are right for your Blog. WordPress even lets you install plugins right from your plugins panel! No downloading to your computer necessary.

Must-Have WordPress Plugins

Here I will list a few must-have WordPress plugins. Some, in my opinion, are essential to getting the most out of your blog, regardless of whether you are using it to make money. Others are only necessary if you are monetizing your blog.

Akismet – Akismet is a must for every WordPress installation. Akismet blocks “Spam” comments used by bots to automatically comment on hundreds of different WordPress blogs at the same time. I have spoken to a few new WordPress users who did not have the Akismet plugin turned on and were bombarded by comment spam. It is very discouraging to see porn and gambling links being posted in your comments section and may turn a first time blogger off from WordPress. It does require getting a WordPress account but it’s free and does not take much time.

All in One SEO Pack – I love this plugin. All in one SEO Pack gives you the ability to generate Titles, Descriptions and Keywords for each of your posts and let’s you block the search engines from crawling through potentially duplicate content. What I just described might be confusing to a new WordPress user but that’s what makes All in One SEO Pack so important. You don’t really have to understand those things to use it. It is ready out-of-the-box and is very easy to use.

Google XML Sitemaps – Another must-have WordPress plugin, Google XML Sitemaps generates a XML compliant Sitemap of your WordPress blog. It is very easy to install and setup and is another tool that helps you forget about the search engines and focus on writing unique content.

Here are a few more plugins for more advanced WordPress bloggers.

Share This

Wordtwit

cforms

WP Super Cache

There are many more plugins available that may help you personalize your blog even more but remember that the more plugins you have the slower your blog pages will load!

First WordPress Post

Your first WordPress post can be about anything you want it to be but here I will list a few tips for your first post and subsequent posts.

WordPress features an awesome WYSISYG (What You See is What You Get) editor that let’s you write great posts without knowing HTML. Play around with the icons in the editor and you can be writing posts with links, pictures and different types of text in no time!

The title of your first post should be a quick description of what your post is about. You should have your title in your post more than one time and you should write it in different ways in your post. So going by those rules you should probably decide on your title after you write your post. It is good to write your title in before hand, just go back to it and be sure it describes what your post is about.

Use the “Category” option that WordPress provides. Your WordPress blog will only have the “Uncategorized” category at first. You can add new ones to the right of your “Add New Post” panel. Categories should be pretty generalized. If your writing about George Bush, your category might be “Politics” or “News.”

Tags are another feature that you should use when writing your first WordPress post. The “Tag” is also to the right of your “Add New Post” panel, just above “Categories.” Tags should be much more specific to the topic you’re writing about. In the example above, if you were writing about George Bush your tags might be “George Bush” or “President.”

The most important thing to remember when starting your first WordPress blog is to have fun with it. Write about things you are interested in and that will keep you interested in your blog.

You should consider picking your domain name one of the more important decisions for your first blog. It is not difficult to change content from a blog over to a new domain name, especially if you are using WordPress, but it is certainly not convenient and should be avoided if possible.  So let’s focus a bit on choosing a domain name for your first blog that you will love for a long time.

First of all I will discuss domain extensions, or TLD (Top-level domain.) There are quite a few domain extensions available and it’s very important to remember that dot com is, and will be for quit a while, king. If you acquire myfirstblog.info, you can expect your returning visitors to type in myfirstblog.com in their web browsers with the expectation of finding you. It is a simple yet undeniable fact that dot com is directly associated by average internet users as the default domain extension. Average users don’t always understand the logistics of domain extensions and why typing in myfirstblog.com doesn’t take them to the same page as myfirstblog.info and often times they will just move on if they don’t find you right away. With that said I highly recommend registering a dot com as your domain extension for your first blog. Also, avoid dashes in your new domain name. When is the last time you typed a dash in your web browser?

As far as what your first blog’s domain name should be, it really depends on you more than anything. My recommendation to someone registering a domain name for the first time is to make sure your domain name is something that you will love, even five years from now. Try not to register a domain name that is related to a passing fad or something that isn’t going to be around to long.

Your own name is a great example of something that you will love forever. Registering your name as a domain name assures that your domain will not “Get Old” or “tired.” A nickname a few friends call you may not always last. A good example is how excited Mark Wahlberg gets when he hears the term “Marky Mark.”

Availability of Your Domain Name

Your own name may not be available as a dot com or as any other major domain extension. In that case, you may want to consider variations of your name. For instance, if your name is John Smith and johnsmith.com has already been registered, than you could try jsmith.com or johns.com. Be patient with looking for the domain name of your first blog and understand that since dot com is king, it is also the least likely of available domain extensions to be available.

If you would like to support us, use Nameram as your registrar for you first domain name.

There are quite literally thousands of choices for Web Hosting available on the web. There are many great ones, many decent ones, and many that are unreliable crap that are just interested in receiving your monthly payment.

When choosing a Webhosting service the most important thing to consider is what exactly you are going to be using the Webhosting service for. What type of website are you going to have? How big will your audience be? How often will your pages be accessed?

My first Webhosting service was with Yahoo. I didn’t have any previous experience to go by so I really wasn’t missing anything as far as I knew but after I switched to to my new Hosting service I realized how bad Yahoo was. Yahoo’s ten dollar a month plan does not offer unlimited Email addresses, ulimited subdomains, unlimited databases or unlimited add-on domains. Five Email addresses. Five subdomains. Five databases. Zero add-on domains. That is what Yahoo offers besides a User Interface that is very confusing and not very “usable” at all.

Hostgator Webhosting Service

For my second website I did some research and decided to go with Hostgator Webhosting service. Hostgator offers all the things I just mentioned above and at the cost of ten bucks a month! And Hostgator’s service is top notch. Try calling Yahoo on a Sunday because you messed up a database. They will not answer! Hostgator does, and they will help you identify your problem and get you back up and running in no time.

The best experiences I have had with Hostgator is when I have had to upgrade. Sometimes you have to upgrade your service with your Webhosting service because you are getting much more traffice than you anticipated. Upgrading with Hostgator Webhosting service is easy. I just gave Hostgator a call, explained what I wanted and their rep walked me through upgrading on their website. When I need a dedicated server upgrade, Hostgator transferred all my websites for me! Databases, htaccess settings, files, all of it. No hassle on my end.

I have been using Hostgator for over a year now and I can’t say I have ever considered changing Webhosting services. I would recommend Hostgator as a hosting service to anyone.

I was only mildly hung over this morning.  Woke up at a friends house after staying up all night playing Con Quien, drinking Corona’s and eating ceviche.  All around a good time but next time I’m going to sleep before 5am.  I planned on getting a bunch of stuff done today, including setting up a BANS site that I’ve had an idea for, but I ended up doing squat.  I did help my youngest sister setup her own blog so the morning wasn’t a complete waste.

The year 2009 is here and it’s time to get things in gear again, so I’m going to make a list of things-to-do this year that I can reference and look back on at the end of the year.  This is going to be a rather broad list, easily attainable and should go towards producing long term residual income.

1. Master WordPress – Over the last year I’ve come to rely more on WordPress.  I’ve played around with other content management systems but I keep going back to it as it is best suited for what I’m trying to do and it’s just to easy and powerful to ignore.
2. Spend more time with Social Networking – I really need to get that aspect more involved in what I do.  Social Networking has exploded in the last two years and just dabbling in sites like Reddit and Stumbleupon make me think that Social Networking is going to be at least as important as SEO in the next year.  These sites bring traffic.  Period.
3. Block out distractions – I’ve learned I can’t watch Monday night Football and grow my income at the same time.  And, the same task takes about four times as long to boot.  I can do what I need to get done quickly, then watch Football, listen to music, eat or whatever it is that is causing me to take a long time.
4. Focus more on Content – This one is easy.  Just create content and the rest should fall into place.  Google keeps teaching me that thin affiliate sites with zero unique content will not be rewarded in the long run.  Time to roll out Plan B.
5. Break Down Tasks – I will make my tasks shorter and easier to accomplish this year.  Sometimes I can be a bit to ambitious with what I want to do.  Then when I figure out how long something will take, I tend to move on.  I think this blog is a good example of breaking down tasks.  One article a day, properly SEO’d, content driven without a ton of emphasis on immediate monetization and in a year I should have close to 400 quality articles.  Maybe Google will love me then?

That’s a broad plan for starters.  I think the key one is breaking this all down in to short tasks.  Make it easy.  Keep it simple.

I have been collecting domain names for about a year and a half now.  It’s still just a hobby for me as I don’t generally spend a lot of money on any particular domain names but I do enjoy it and I love when I pickup a good expired domain name.

There are a ton of different systems available for picking up expiring domain names.

Pool.com

One place I’ve used to pickup expired domains is Pool.com.  Pool is, by far, the most reliable system I have used to pickup an expiring domain.  Pool uses a system that is much more likely to acquire a domain of your choosing but it’s also one of the more expensive systems available.  Pool charges a minimum of $60 if it captures your domain.  The money is taken from your credit card once Pool has verified that it caught the domain for you but there is a catch.

Unlike other systems that pickup expiring domains, Pool allows multiple users to backorder the same domain name.  This means that just because Pool acquires a domain you backordered, that doesn’t necessarily mean you will own it.  If a domain that Pool acquires has been backordered by more than one of its users it automatically goes into auction.  These Pool auctions can get out of hand sometimes because if you don’t know how many other Pool users have backordered your domain name and, obviously, you don’t know what the current max bid is of other users.  An auction goes on for three days once a domain is secured by Pool.  Pool will email you every time you are outbid and to prevent a user outbidding in the final seconds, Pool will not allow an auction to end if there is a bid in the last five minutes.  The auction just keeps goind until there has not been a bid in the last five minutes.

Snapnames

Snapnames is similar to Pool in that it costs $60 to aqcuire an expired domain name through their system.  The difference is the auction process.  It is much easier to know what your competing against and guess what the ultimate auction price will be.  Snapnames is owned by Oversee.net.  Snapnames has had a deal with Network Solutions for years now and has some sort of affiliation with Moniker.

Snapnames is not as reliable as Pool is but if a domain you are looking to backorder is registered with Network Solutions then there is a good shot that Snapnames will have first crack at backordering it.

Enom

I have never used Enom to be honest so I can’t give a good account of their service, reliability or success rate.  I am very annoyed by Enom and only have a few domains registered with them.  Enom just seems so backward.

GoDaddy

GoDaddy uses a pretty basic backorder system that only allows one user at a time to backorder a domain name.  They are the cheapest system to use but the least successful.  Godaddy charges $18.95 per backorder and that must be paid upfront, however, if the GoDaddy system is unable to capture the domain name, you receive a credit towards a future backorder.

One service I will be discussing in further detail in an upcoming post is Recommission.  I peruse Recommission’s daily list of expiring dictionary domain names often and will show you how to get the most out of it.

dadsbday.3GP on 12seconds.tv

I’m enjoying 12Seconds.Tv.  I’ve been uploading video today and one of them was of my dad who’s birthday it is today.  Every year on December 29th the old man turns 39 years old.

So a big happy birthday to my dad.  I went and got him a case of Michelob.  I told the liquor store lady that it was my dad’s birthday and she broke out a big shiny bow and put it on the case for him.  The old man was impressed.