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10 Good Reasons to Cloak Affiliate Links

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cloak affiliate links
Yes, you should cloak your affiliate links!

Affiliate links are completely obvious. For example, here is my affiliate link for StudioPress:

https://shareasale.com/r.cfm?b=346200&u=84626&m=28169&urllink=&afftrack=

When I cloak that link on this site, it ends up looking like:

https://rosalindgardner.com/blog/studiopress

Both links go to the same URL and both will generate an affiliate commission when a sale is made, but the latter link is SO much better in many ways – 10 ways to be precise. Here are the reasons you too should cloak your affiliate links.

[Read more…]

Watch this Copyright Infringing Site Disappear

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James Reinhold is a thief. He's a copyright infringer. Don't make the same mistake as he did…

copyright-thief

Since registering his domain in mid-February, James Reinhold has put a lot of effort into building and marketing his new blog.

He has already signed up 1390 subscribers to his newsletter by offering a copy of his new e-book.

In the last week alone, James has created a new header graphic, replaced the theme's standard favicon and added links to his social media sites. He also installed the MaxBlogPress Subscriber magnet plugin and placed new banner advertising in his sidebar and below the author's box on his posts. What is MOST impressive however, is that he posted 19 full length articles and book reviews over just two days!

James Reinhold (most likely NOT his real name) is a copyright infringer, i.e. a low-life thieving cheat and all 'round scumbag.

How to Find a Copyright Infringer

I first discovered “Award winning Blogger, Internet Marketing and Affiliate Marketing Coach and Author” James Reinhold when I saw several pings from his blog  show up in the comment moderation section of this blog.

copyright-infringement-1

Hmm… “Must-Read Articles for Beginners” is the exact title of one on my posts, so I paid his site a visit and sure enough, not only was he copying my articles, he had stolen the graphic that I bought at iStock as well and Getty Images doesn't take kindly to thieves.

Here's a screenshot of what I found on his site…

copyright-infringement--article-list

When I first saw this post a few days ago, each of the articles was linked back to my site. Now the linked articles have been copied and posted to his blog and I suppose he has plans to copy and paste the rest of those from the links were removed.

Smart kid! Like I always say —  don't place unpaid links on your site! 🙂

So, after finding my articles, I did a little more snooping around his blog and discovered that his new e-book “How to Brand Yourself in An Insanely Competitive Marketplace” being offered to newsletter subscribers was in fact written by Andrew Spence.

Learning that he'd also stolen that content was easy. I just entered the book's title into Google and found Andrew on Twitter, which then lead me to Andrew's site right away.

Locating a Copyright Thief

When I visited Andrew's site, it was obvious from where James had pulled his WordPress theme. Andrew uses the premium Get Noticed theme for WordPress by Michael Hyatt, which costs between $197 and $397 US to purchase.

I'm guessing that someone who steals content, probably didn't spend the big bucks to buy a premium theme.

Then, for good measure, James also stole Andrew's newsletter sign-up copy.

This is Andrew's email subscriber form…

Andrew Spence Email Sign Up

And this is the copyright thief's email signup form …

copyright-infringement-email-signup

Gee, I'm surprised that James didn't bother to change Andrew's name to his own on the book graphic — if he had, he might have more than 1390 subscribers by now. (No, I don't really believe he has that many subscribers.)

Just for fun, I visited the thief's social media sites and found links to other sites, some of which were dead, including ELITEIMHUB.COM and ELITEINCOME.NET.

Perhaps it's just my imagination running wild, but with domain names like that, maybe the content on those sites was similar to what he is posting now? And maybe, just maybe, those sites were taken down for copyright infringement issues and the thief didn't learn his lesson?

Well, let's hope he learns the lesson better this time.

Taking the Copyright Thief Down

My first step was to file a ticket with his web hosting service provider, Webcedi, which I found by doing a Whois search on his URL. Note, you want to look at the the Nameservers to determine the hosting provider, not the Registrar.

Domain Name: JREINHOLD.COM
Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 48
Whois Server: whois.enom.com
Referral URL: http://www.enom.com
Name Server: NS1.WEBCEDI.COM
Name Server: NS2.WEBCEDI.COM
Status: clientTransferProhibited http://www.icann.org/epp#clientTransferProhibited
Updated Date: 12-feb-2015
Creation Date: 12-feb-2015
Expiration Date: 12-feb-2016

In the ticket I included a list of links that match my articles with the content that he stole and placed on his site.

Next, I filed a “DMCA COMPLAINT – TAKEDOWN NOTICE” with Clickbank to let them know that they have an affiliate who is promoting their vendors' products (including my own Affiliate Blogger PRO) by using stolen content to market those products.

To find his Clickbank ID, I clicked the affiliate link on his site to Affiliate Blogger PRO, hit the ‘Order' button and at the very bottom of the payment page, the affiliate is revealed.

copyright-infringement-clickbank-id

I sent a notice through Amazon Associates support (basically a DMCA complaint notice).

I would have filed a DMCA notice with HostGator but unlike almost all the other companies, they require that notices be filed by postal mail or fax. (I'll get back to that).

I will also notify each of the folks from whom he has stolen content, i.e. Andrew Spence, Michael Hyatt and others with the hope that they too will file DMCA notices.

The Real Downside to Stealing

In reviewing Mr. Reinhold's social media sites, I've discovered that he has links to various associations and people that may be interested in his nefarious ways.

I just might have to send those associations and people some proof of his nefarious ways if he who calls himself (poses as) James Reinhold and pretends to live in Renton, Washington, USA  (aka MrJRSnr on Twitter and De Governor on Facebook) doesn't own up to his misdeeds.

james-reinhold-twitter

Those associations might include a rural school in Accra, Ghana (where he really lives), the Study Access Consult (of which he is supposedly Director) as well as his Facebook friends and Twitter followers.

james-reinhold-facebook

James wasted a LOT of my time as I've followed his tracks… and will continue to do so until his site is taken down for good.

What's really sad is that he (or the person he has working for him) has obvious skills with WordPress design and social media marketing. Instead of putting those skills to good use to earn a living, he's chosen to be a criminal — which almost always ends badly.

UPDATES

I'll post changes here as they are made.

  • April 23rd, 2015 – Based on my contact with the ISP, almost all my articles were removed from the site today.

    copyright-infringement--success

    He also removed the title of Andrew Spence's book from his email signup form, but still claims to have a book to offer. I signed up for his list and got confirmation, but never received a link to a download… which is a good thing!

Summary

If you find your content being used without your permission you should notify the infringer as well as the hosting Internet search provider (ISP), who may remove offending content from a site or sites. Most big companies, have easy complaint mechanisms for copyright infringement“take-downs.”

You can also set up Google Alerts with keyword phrases specific to your content that will notify you anytime that exact phrase matching your work is placed online.

Comments, questions or suggestions? Please leave a comment below!

Cheers,

sig-ros

Spring Cleaning for Your Blog

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Spring Cleaning for Your Blog

The birds are singing, the posies are popping and spring rains are making everything look shiny and new. Here are 10 tips to dust off your blog and give it a fresh spring feel.

  1. Update Your About Page

    Have you gained experience or earned new credentials since you set up your blog? Has the objective for your blog changed?

    Have YOU changed? One of the most frequent complaints that online daters have is that “in person, they looked nothing like their picture” — meaning that the picture showed a younger (and probably skinnier) version.

    Edit your About page as necessary to reflect those changes and add a new picture, so people will recognize you when they see you at the next conference you attend.

  2. Check for Broken Links and Images

    Are all your links and images working correctly? Activate the Broken Link Checker plugin to find out quickly.

    broken-link-checker

    Note that I said to “activate” the Broken Link Checker plugin. if it is allowed to run continuously, you can suffer some serious ramifications.

  3. Test Subscriber Forms

    Sign up for your own email newsletter in each of the forms you use (e.g. Aweber, Popup Domination, Sumome) to make sure they all work. You should also use Aweber's test function each time you plan to send an email out to your subscribers to make sure that the formatting renders correctly.

  4. Check Social Share Buttons

    Make sure each of your social share buttons works correctly and that you've added your Twitter account name.

    twitter-settings

    Consider adding the Pinterest Pin It Button On Image Hover And Post plugin which allows readers to pin your blog posts, pages and images.

    pinterest-hover-plugin

    Be sure to remove social share buttons which are no longer applicable.

  5. Update Your Header

    Updating your header graphic can be fun, such as what I did here for St. Patrick's Day.

    update-header

    If you don't know how to work with a graphics editor, consider having a professional header graphic created for your blog at Fiverr or 99Designs.

    If you'd like to learn how to design your own graphics, check out the design courses available on Udemy.

  6. Change Up Your Sidebars

    Have you been running the same banners on your sidebar for as long as you can remember?

    Confirm the efficacy of each of those banners to make sure they are earning their keep. If not, replace them with tried and true merchant links (banners) or something completely new.

  7. Review Your Navigation

    Less tends to be more when it comes to navigation bars.

    Limit reader options by placing only your most valuable (best-converting) categories and pages in your primary navigation menu. Readers will drill-down through your content from primary pages.

    Contact and other administrative links belong in a secondary navigation bar or in a widget in your blog's footer.

  8. Tend to Tags

    I doubt anyone is still searching for “WordPress 2.9.1”, yet that tag, along with numerous other old versions of WordPress, was still in my tag collection.

    You can edit tags or delete them outright. In the WordPress 2.9.1 case, I changed that to “WordPress”.

    To check for and delete unused tags, try the ‘Mass delete unused tags' plugin.

    Delete Unused Tags

  9. Remove Unused Plugins

    I have a tendency to test multiple plugins before settling on the one that best suits my needs.

    After all that testing, I'm eager to get to work using that new plugin and often forget to delete the rejects.

    Keeping only plugins that you use is a good security measure and also helps speed up page loads.

  10. Review Your Content

    Last, but certainly not least, review your blog posts for content that is no longer relevant.

    Start with those posts that Google Analytics reports as being most visited. Updating information in those articles might reduce your bounce rate and increase the time visitors spend on those pages and your site in general.

I hope you've found these tips helpful. If you have comments, questions or suggestions, please share your thoughts below!

In the meantime, I'll be working on those broken links. 🙂

Cheers,

Ros

Pinterest Banned Affiliate Links

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Update: After Pinterest banned affiliate links, they had a change of heart. Learn about Affiliate Links on Pinterest – Know the Rules.

Thousands of bloggers, perhaps tens of thousands, are raving mad because a major source of affiliate revenue, Pinterest, banned affiliate links on their platform.

pinterest banned affiliate links

In an email to its ‘Power Pinners' late last week, Pinterest stated all affiliate links, as well as all redirects and trackers, would be removed from the site.

Particularly hard hit are affiliates with links from two popular affiliate networks, RewardStyle and Hello Society, which are being specifically targeted.

In a statement to the Wall Street Journal on Friday, a Pinterest spokesperson stated, “We observed affiliate links and redirects causing irrelevant Pins in feeds, broken links and other spammy behavior.” The spokesperson also said, “We have noticed their Pinner behavior going downhill,” and “this has caused slower delivery of Pins and less relevant Pins in people’s home feeds.”

According to Pinterest, no pins will be deleted. The past Pins will still show up and be clickable, but the tracking links will be stripped.

So, those who were using tracking links from bitly.com just for tracking will have their links stripped.

Why am I NOT surprised Pinterest banned affiliate links?

Ask yourself WHY as a Super affiliate marketer of 17+ years (15 years full-time) experience – did I NOT devote time working Pinterest, or add a section to my coaching programs about ‘how to monetize Pinterest‘?

Because the writing was always on the wall.

I've only come across one blogger who was smart enough to mention the ‘additional step' affiliate bloggers need to do now in light of this turn of events at Pinterest — that they'll have to link back to their own sites — and they actually lamented that fact.

Ah, pity, they (affiliate bloggers) are SO HARD done by. However, that's exactly what they should have been doing to make a secure full-time income as affiliate marketers – basic online business stuff that I've been teaching since 2003.

For those of you who remember what happened to affiliate marketers who played the “Google Cash” game – direct linking to merchants from Google Adwords (and Google was PAID for those links) – Pinterest was bound to follow suit sooner or later.

Pinterest has disallowed Amazon affiliate links for years, yet some affiliate blogger / marketers put their heart, soul, and all of their effort into monetizing Pinterest through direct linking to their merchants, despite the obvious sign of impending doom.

Do I feel for them?

Sure.

I'm sorry that they were fooled into buying into some shyster's ‘How to Make Money on Pinterest‘ B.S. program and wasted all that time and effort, rather than learning basic affiliate marketing business principles which, at very least, include:

    Build your own blog / brand
  • Provide added value
  • Link back to your site from third-party venues
  • Build a list
  • Create a relationship with those on your list
  • Care about your readers
  • Market to those people as if they were your friends and family

The message is and always will be – work to build a business (emphasis on WORK).

Did you find this post informative and useful? If so, please share it with others! If you have a comment, question, or suggestion, please leave a comment below!

Cheers,
sig-ros

21 Types of Blog Posts

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blog-keysNow that you know how to come up with endless ideas for blog post content, let's look at a number of different ways that your content can be shaped into information your readers will find both useful and entertaining.

  1. How-To Tutorials

    Teach your readers how to do something or reach a goal, either by writing an article or creating a video. The majority of posts on this blog are how-to tutorials and they are also the most popular.

  2. Product Reviews

    As an affiliate marketer, product reviews are ‘bread and butter' posts that link directly to your merchants' sites and products. You can review a single product or do a comparison of two more products. These posts can be referred to from almost any other type of post on your blog. Tag those posts with either ‘product review‘ or ‘review', so they can be found easily within your tag cloud.

  3. Lists

    Everyone loves list posts — readers and writers alike. THIS post is a list. They tend to be easier to write, read and understand, as the list points are brief but comprehensive.

  4. Solve a Problem

    Every so often I stumble across an issue with my blog or business that needs to be resolved. Knowing that my readers may face the same or a similar situation, I often write a blog post about both the problem and the resolution. Here is an example – Plugin and Broken Links Could Kill Your Affiliate Business.

  5. Rebuttals

    Has someone ticked you off or taken you to task about something you've said on your blog? Write a rebuttal. These posts can be highly cathartic and attract a lot of reader response. To Link or Not to Link: The Grocery Store Analogy is by far my favorite rebuttal post on this blog. 🙂

  6. Warnings

    I have a category devoted specifically to warn affiliate and internet marketers about scams and other troubles associated with doing business online. While ‘problems' with your niche may not be your favorite topic, your readers will applaud your efforts to keep them advised of trouble they may face. They'll also appreciate your honesty which helps to build trust in a big way.

  7. Question and Answer Post

    A simple post that offers answers to readers' questions about everything and anything, without having to be related to a specific blog post topic, is always much appreciated.

  8. Pose a Challenge

    Set yourself and/or your readers a challenge, i.e. post to your blog every day for a month. At the end of the month you can write another post about your experience and ask your readers' to share theirs.

  9. Profiles and Interviews

    Is there someone in your niche whose work deserves high praise? Profile their achievements in a written post, or better yet, interview them. I suggest that interviews be recorded and then transcribed, using Freelancer. That way you get 2 types of media and save your interviewee the hassle of having to answer your questions in writing. (Note: Requests for interviews are often rejected if the person being interviewed is expected to communicate in writing.)

  10. Inspirational and Motivational Posts

    Everyone can use regular injections of inspiration and motivation to keep working at their pursuits. You can write about your own experience, relate someone else's motivational methods or create a list of helpful books.

  11. Personal Portrait

    Jasper BlogsShow your readers who you really are. Tell them about a day in your life, your perspective on a particular event or how your dog helps with your blogging. Yes, that is my blogging dog, Jasper. He has his own Facebook page too!

  12. News

    Has something exciting just happened within your industry? Quickly post a brief news article with your readers and link to the article where you first learned of the news.

  13. Events

    There are dozens of blogging, affiliate marketing and Internet marketing conferences throughout the year. I maintain a current post of those events, linked to from my sidebar. What types of events are held within your niche?

  14. Sale, Coupon and Free Stuff Posts

    Help your audience save money on the products and services you promote by letting them know when your affiliated merchants have a sale or a new coupon available. Offering free stuff can be even better than sales and coupons when your merchants know how to convert those customers. For example, Chemistry.com frequently offers ‘free communication weekends' which I post on my dating site. Those free trials often end up in sales.

  15. Hold a Contest

    Contests are an excellent way to engage your current readers and increase your subscriber numbers at the same time. For example, I held the Lightbulb Joke Contest: Win a Copy of “Insider Secrets To Marketing Your Business On The Internet”. By asking readers to respond with a comment on the post, you also enjoy the benefit of additional content which you didn't need to create! When the contest closes, be sure to revise your post accordingly.

  16. Surveys and Polls

    Surveying and polling your readers is both fun and informative. After you've accumulated a respectable amount of data, you can then blog about the results.

  17. Glossary

    A glossary of terms related to your niche is super simple to create. Make sure to include a link to your glossary alongside your FAQ and other essential posts on your blog. This blog has a glossary of Internet Marketing Terms.

  18. Checklist

    Checklists are composed of tasks necessary to reach a goal. On this blog, you'll find the “148-Point Affiliate Marketer / Blogger Checklist“.

  19. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

    If you've been working / blogging in a particular industry for any amount of time, you will know what questions your readers ask most often. Create a list of those questions and answers (a FAQ), add to it when necessary and make sure that a link to that post is included somewhere in your sidebar or footer. I use the (now out-dated) FAQ-Tastic plugin to create the FAQ on this blog, but your FAQ can be a simple Q and A list.

  20. Holiday Greetings and Gratitude

    Holidays are a wonderful time to send greetings and a wonderful opportunity to express how enormously grateful you are to your readers.

  21. Video / Audio

    Almost anything you write about can also be turned into video or audio that can be posted to your blog. Posting videos to YouTube may help drive traffic back to your blog when you include your URL within the video description.

So, what type of blog post will you write next?

Comments, questions or suggestions? Please leave a comment below!

Cheers,

Ros

14 Reasons to Fire Your Webmaster

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Does your website REALLY represent your small business and help you succeed by engaging your existing clientele and attracting new customers?

Here are 14 problems that I see all too frequently on small business websites. If yours suffers from any or all of them, it may be time to fire your webmaster.

  1. You don't own your own domain name

    Did your webmaster do you a ‘favor' and register a domain name for you?

    SOME favor!

    If you have a falling out with your webmaster, your website could disappear overnight when you stop paying them for their services and they stop paying the yearly registration costs on your behalf.

    If your webmaster registered and pays for your domain name, insist that it be transferred immediately.

    Most domain registrars (GoDaddy) and hosting services have information posted to help you with this process.

  2. Your website is ugly

    We've all seen them — business sites with floral wallpaper backgrounds and ragged-looking logos that look like they were designed by kids in kindergarten.

    ugly-website

    Paying a ‘webmaster' for such ugliness is just plain wrong.

    With thousands of website template designs available for almost any type of business, there is absolutely no excuse for anyone to have an ugly website.

    Pre-made template designs exists for all types of business. For example, StudioPress has themes for real estate agents, photographers, food bloggers, charitable organizations and more.

    More importantly, when you buy a website theme from a professional designer or agency, you know that the template is secure, i.e. access is made difficult for hackers. Good design companies keep their templates current and inform customers when updates are available through the WordPress interface. One click of a button and your theme will be automatically updated. Note: It is also important that your webmaster update your WordPress platform when required to make sure that it also remains secure.

    Professional themes are designed to be responsive to those visitors who prefer to access your site on their mobile devices.

    All professional website themes can be further customized to suit your individual requirements, using either services recommended by the template designers or at Freelancer.

    Furthermore, website or WordPress themes are moderately priced – usually less than $100 – so you don't need to pay through the nose for a ‘propietary' website design when all you'll need is a little customization.

  3. Your business site doesn't show up in the Google search results

    I have good friends in town who build campers (campervans) that they export to New Zealand, simply because their campers can be built less expensively in Canada, shipped to New Zealand and Kiwis still save money when they buy my friends' product.

    Does their site show up in the Google search results for:

    • campers New Zealand
    • campervans new zealand
    • campervans new zealand for sale
    • buy campers New Zealand
    • new zealand campervans for sale

    Nope… not a blessed one.

    They have a nice looking site, but their website hasn't been optimized in the least to appear in the Google search results.

  4. Your website has pages marked as ‘Under Construction' or ‘Coming Soon'

    under-constructionAn Under Construction sign suggests to potential clients that:

    • you are dis-organized, and;
    • that you don't care if you waste a visitor's time by making them click useless links

    I'm sure that's NOT the first impression you want to give potential clients.

    If your webmaster doesn't know how to create and build new pages in the background without having to utilize the infamous ‘under-construction' notice, fire them immediately!

  5. You have no access to your site's control or administration panels

    If your webmaster disallows you direct access to your website's hosting control panel (i.e. cPanel) or your site's administration panel (i.e. WordPress admin), you should request the usernames and passwords as soon as possible.

    It's your website – YOU must be able to access the backend to make small changes to your site when required.

    If you have a real web development company working for you, this won't be an issue – BUT, you'll also be paying them top dollar to make sure you are always happy with your website.

  6. You don't know how to make simple changes to your website

    If you or your staff can't make simple changes to your website, then you are always at the mercy of your webmaster's schedule.

    See next item…

  7. Your webmaster is slow to respond to change requests

    You've just increased the price of an item on your restaurant's menu and need that posted on your website ASAP, but you haven't been able to get in touch with your webmaster for the past week.

    Consider how frustrating that is for customers who check your website for specials and are then disappointed find out that the price has increased.

    Who loses?

    YOU do! Because if you do the right thing – as I know you will – you will honor the price listed on your website.

    Who pays for that mistake?

    YOU will… because your webmaster won't accept responsibility for changes that aren't made simply because they're on vacation.

  8. Your webmaster insists on using a website platform other than WordPress

    With 70+ million websites, WordPress is the most popular open-source website platform and is used by companies such as the New York Times, CNN.com, Forbes, Reuters, McLean's, eBay, Sony, BestBuy and more.

    For small business owners who need to be able to make changes to their own websites, WordPress has the most user-friendly interface, and as an open-source product, it is constantly being improved by developers the world over.

    Too, there are NO limitations nowadays on incorporating business plugins into WordPress that help you sell your goods online.

    The fact of the matter is that staff you hire in future are much more likely to be familiar with the WordPress platform than any other and their knowledge will save you money and time.

    If YOUR webmaster insists on using Dupral, Joomla or some other content management system for your website, you should request a conversion to WordPress ASAP.

  9. Your business site doesn't show up on Google+ and Google Maps

    If you own a hair salon in a resort town like the one in which I live — Penticton, British Columbia, Canada — then you know that a good percentage of your business in summer months comes from vacationers who search the web for a highly recommended stylist located close to their hotel or other accommodations.

    Your business NEEDS to show up on Google+ and Google Maps. If your webmaster hasn't spent the half an hour needed to do this for your business, then you really need to fire them now.

  10. Your site doesn't have a sign-up form for news and special offers

    A real webmaster knows how to install a simple autoresponder signup form from companies like Aweber and Constant Contact on any website.

    They will also understand and explain the importance and necessity of having an autoresponder service for your business website — in order to generate leads and keep your potential and existing clients returning for more news and special offers.

    It is not good enough for your site to display a link to ‘newsletter'.

    The email capture form MUST be located on your homepage and every other page of your website.

    If it is not, then fire your webmaster now!

  11. Your business has no presence on social media sites

    In addition to showing up in Google's search results and business listings, your business must also have a presence on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest and the other top social media sites.

    That's easier than you may think.

    Setting up a Twitter account takes only minutes. Facebook profile and page

    Most of the new articles you post to your blog can be automatically posted to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+.

    Your webmaster should know how to set those auto-postings up – if not, fire them now!

  12. The current year isn't reflected in your copyright notice

    Your website looks really out-dated when your copyright notice shows the year in which your website was constructed, but doesn't include the current year, i.e. Copyright 2010, instead of Copyright 2010 – 2014 (or current year).

    Adding the snippet of code that always shows the current year is super-simple.

    If your webmaster hasn't installed that code or doesn't know how to install that code — imagine how much else they don't know about basic website development!

  13. Your website links to your webmaster's business site

    This bugs me to no end.

    YOU paid your webmaster to develop your website and THEY get free advertising?

    That is just so wrong! They should pay YOU to advertise their site.

    Seriously, if someone finds your site because it fulfills all the requirements of a great business site and then wants to know who designed it — YOU, the website owner, should earn a referral fee based on your recommendation.

    Webmasters who place links to their own business sites on the bottom of their clients' websites are simply self-serving… and need to be fired.

  14. You hang on to a bad website due to loyalty to a friend or family member

    Your business website is a representation of your BUSINESS and the point of your business should be to support existing clients and attract new clients to generate income… NOT to make your webmaster feel good about themselves.

    If you've been conned into believing that a friend or family member who builds websites for friends and family members is actually a ‘webmaster' then you get what you deserve when they don't or can't turn your website into a real BUSINESS website.

    After all — your website is not personal – it's business.

If your small business website suffers from some of the aforementioned issues, what you need is a REAL webmaster or preferably a ‘web developer' — someone who knows what it takes to make your website visible and functional for existing and potential clients.

If you can't afford a webmaster or web developer who knows how to design a website for business, then take responsibility for your online marketing and learn how to make simple changes on your own after your web ‘designer' has set you up with a pretty WordPress site.

There's no shortage of WordPress tutorials, some of which will teach you how to broaden your reach and earn revenue from your website beyond the local level (including my Affiliate Blogger Pro). 🙂

Comments, questions or suggestions? Please leave a comment below!

Cheers,

Ros

12 WordPress Security Tips

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A reader asked for tips on how to secure his WordPress blog against hackers. After thinking about and listing all the things I do to keep my blogs secure, I did some online research to see where my actions fell short.

Turned out that my blogs were well-protected, but I did adopt some additional security measures that I learned from other Wordpress bloggers.

Now I pass all those tips on to you…

    1. Do NOT use ‘admin' as your username

      In April 2013, thousands of WordPress sites with ‘admin' as the administrator username were compromised via large-scale brute force attacks. The hosting service HostGator, reported that they had “seen over 90,000 IP addresses involved in this attack”. In response, WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg urged all those with ‘admin' as their usernames to change them immediately.

      Since then, WordPress no longer suggests / pre-populates the username form blank with ‘admin' as the default username for administrators.

      However, if you started your blog prior to WordPress 3.0, and still have ‘admin' as your username… it is time to change it!

      How to change your username

      1. Login to your administrative user account.
      2. Navigate to Users > Add New and fill in all the details for a new user account. Choose a username and set the privileges to Administrator.
      3. Now log out of your ‘admin' user account and log back in using your new user account.
      4. Go to Users and delete the old “admin” account. WordPress will prompt you to reassign all the posts associated with ‘admin' to another account. Choose your new account from the drop down list… and you're set!

    2. Hide your username

      WordPress displays your username in the URL of your author archive page. So, once you've changed your username, make sure it can't be found by changing your nickname in your user profile.

      wp-nickname

    3. Use a strong password

      Did you know that the second most common password is ‘password'?

      UGH!

      WordPress comes with a built-in password strength indicator. Make sure your password indicates ‘STRONG' and that you follow the hint included alongside the password change area:

      “Hint: The password should be at least seven characters long. To make it stronger, use upper and lower case letters, numbers, and symbols like ! ” ? $ % ^ & ).”

      wp-password

    4. Use the latest version of WordPress

      WordPress is frequently updated to fix security issues such as unintentional information disclosure and brute attacks.

      Many hosting service providers will update blogs on their servers to the latest version of WordPress automatically.

      If yours does not, or you happen to notice that a new version is available, simply update to the latest version yourself.

    5. Keep plugins up-to-date

      In mid-July 2014, Sucuri reporting about a security hole in WPTouch stated “During a routine audit for our WAF, we discovered a very dangerous vulnerability that could potentially allow a user with no administrative privileges, who was logged in (like a subscriber or an author), to upload PHP files to the target server. Someone with bad intentions could upload PHP backdoors or other malicious malware and basically take over the site.”.

      Just like the WordPress platform itself, plugins are regularly updated by their developers to improve functionality and to plug security holes. Take action whenever you see that a plugin update is available.

      wp-update-plugins

    6. Delete unused themes and plugins

      Security (see above) is the primary reason to delete unused plugins and themes.

      In addition, removing unused plugins and themes reduces the size of your backups and may even slightly enhance your blog's performance.

      wp-delete-plugins

    7. Limit login attempts

      Hackers frequently use a malicious script to repeatedly guess passwords in an attempt to discover the correct one.

      Apple has reported that this was the reason many celebrities nude photos were stolen from their iCloud accounts and then leaked publicly…”After more than 40 hours of investigation, we have discovered that certain celebrity accounts were compromised by a very targeted attack on user names, passwords and security questions, a practice that has become all too common on the Internet.”

      Nude photos or not, you don't want anyone to guess your password and hack into your administrative account on WordPress.

      One way to thwart hackers is to limit the number of times users can try to login. After the limit is reached, the user is locked out for a specified period of time.

      Moreover, you can block IP addresses of those who repeatedly try to login without success.

    8. Limit registration of members

      Remember the dangers associated with subscribers mentioned in #5 above, i.e. “allow a user with no administrative privileges, who was logged in (like a subscriber or an author)?

      Unless you are running a membership site or a forum, you really don't need to allow member registration of any sort on your WordPress site.

      I personally add users who are guest bloggers and give them the role of Contributor.

      Otherwise, no one is allowed to register as a member on this blog.

    9. Use a security plugin

      I use Wordfence which is free.

      Wordfence starts by checking if your site is already infected.

      Here is a graphic of problems it found with my blog when I originally installed the plugin…

      • Post contains a suspected malware URL: [title removed]
      • Comment with author [name removed] contains a suspected malware URL.
      • Comment with author [name removed] contains a suspected malware URL.
      • User “[name removed]” with “contributor” access has an easy password.
      • User “[name removed]” with “contributor” access has an easy password.

      What problems might it find with yours?

    10. Use a professional theme for WordPress

      The folks who develop blog themes and templates for a living do NOT want to kill their businesses by leaving holes for hackers.

      The same cannot be said of those who create free themes… they're hobbyists who either don't know or don't care if what they create leaves security holes in your blog.

      That's why I always recommend using professional themes for WordPress. My preference is Studiopress.

    11. Use a high-end secure hosting provider

      Do NOT cheap out on your hosting provider. Bad web hosting services don't care whether or not your blog is protected from hackers. Do your homework to find a secure service.

      The majority of my sites are now hosted with WebSiteManagers.net and I've never had better service.

      Here is a list of my recommended hosting providers.

    12. Use a blog backup utility

      Last but not least, make sure you keep your blog backed up at all times, just in case you run into problems with hacker idiots.

For more information check out the Hardening WordPress article.

Stay safe, folks!!

Comments, questions or suggestions? Please leave a comment below!

Cheers,

Ros

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