You should allow your readers various ways to interact with your blog be it bookmarking, sharing, saving, or emailing. Given the chance they could be your greatest promoters.
Below are my top 9 social media WordPress plugins:
1. Add To Any – Compatible 2.0 – 2.7.1
Allows readers to share, save, bookmark, and email your posts using 122 different social sites. Very easy to use and compact, also allows you to customize the look.
2. WP Digg This – Compatible 2.2 – 2.7
Adds the Digg button to your posts with the added option of choosing which posts you want to add it too.
3. Social Bookmarks – Compatible 2.5.1 – 2.7
Adds the social media buttons to the end of your posts. You can also select which media site to show and use.
4. HB Social Bookmarks – Compatible 2.3.3 – 2.7
If you’d like to add the feature to a sidebar this plugin will do just that. You can choose which site to show and use.
5. Share This – Compatible 1.5 – 2.7?
This is possibly the most popular social media plugin. It’s very simple, compact, and clean looking.
6. Sociable – Compatible 2.2 – 2.7
You can’t go wrong with a plugin by Joost de Valk aka Yoast. It adds the social sites to the end of your posts and again you can choose which to use.
7. Twitter For WordPress – Compatible 2.1 – 2.7
This will display your Tweets on your sidebar.
8. WP To Twitter – Compatible 2.5 – 2.7.1
This works in the opposite direction of the above. It send a Twitter Update when you post something new on your blog.
9. Meet Your Commenters – Compatible 2.5 – 2.7
This is a very unique and smart plugin. When someone leaves a comment it will show the profiles of the sites they are a member of in the dashboard so that you may add them.
Posted in Blogging + Open Source + Technology + WordPress | 
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Earlier today I was talking with a client about alternatives to Google Adsense for generating revenue from websites and blogs.
For those unfamiliar with it, Google Adsense is an advertisement application run by Google.
As a website owner, you can signup for this program to allow Google to place ads on your website according to your site’s content and audience.
Basically when your site visitors click on these ads, you receive a percentage of the ad revenue generated by Google.
While it is free to signup, easy to use and provides a supplemental income, there are also negatives associated with using Google Adsense.
Three examples are the lack of control over the ads shown on your website or blog, the small earnings for someone just starting out and the somewhat ambiguous rules.
Need alternatives? Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Affiliate Programs + Reference + Tips & Tricks | No Comments »
For those not in the know, a “404″ error is also known as a “page not found” error.
When a 404 page is encountered, many people will not make an effort to find the missing page.
While some people might hit the Back button and try again, some might just leave and move on to another website.
In other words, every 404 error is a potentially lost visitor and loss of opportunity.
But there is no reason to allow visitors to leave disappointed, so why not create a custom “404 page” that can help visitors find what they thought they’d find on your website and keep their stay on your website longer?
When creating a custom 404 page, here are some things to keep in mind: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in HTML + Technology + Tips & Tricks + Web Design | No Comments »
Someday the hard drive on your computer will crash, stranding thousands of songs on your Apple iPod. Here’s how to get them back onto your Windows or Mac based PC.
1. Reinstall iTunes. Launch the app and sign in to your itunes music Store account. Don’t plug in your iPod yet.
2. Install and launch a free trial of Music Rescue or PodUtil from KennettNet software. The app will sit there idling, displaying a Waiting-for-iPods message.
3. Plug in your iPod. Music Rescue will detect it and display a window that shows the files and playlists on your ipod. Click the “Choose” button at the bottom of Music Rescue and select your iTunes music folder.
Next, click the “Copy Settings” button. In the dialog box that appears, select both “Add Tracks to iTunes” and “Rebuild Playlists.” Click “OK.”
4. Read the Don’t-Steal-Music warning in the lower right corner of Music Rescue. Think carefully. Click the “Copy” button below it.
5. Watch as Music Rescue copies your songs, videos, playlists, and podcasts back to your computer and then loads them into iTunes. Reauthorize your iTunes music store tracks. Done!
6. Happy? Hit the “Register now” button and send the site 10 British Pounds (about $18 USD).
For another method, you can do this with a third party application called “iPod to PC transfer“.
When your computer crashed, just recover your iPod video music to your computer or itunes directly. It’s really easy to use!
With iPod to PC transfer, you can transfer iPod/iPhone music, videos to your Windows PC and iTunes. This option has made ipod and iphone deals more attractive than other bargains in the gadget market.
iPod to iTunes transfer can also transfer between iPod and iPhone, or among several iPods are also supported.
For Mac users there is also a similar one iPod to Mac Transfer which can helps you transfer iPod video, iPod music, podcast and TV shows from your iPod or iPhone to Mac.
Apart from that, it can add all these files from your iPod or iPhone to iTunes library. On the other hand, it is also Mac to iPod transfer, Mac to iPhone transfer software.
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Since the time Amazon made a tabbed interface popular, web designers have been talking about the design pattern. Are tabs good? Are they bad? How do you make them?
Amazon has since removed tabs from their site, but it’s still a useful metaphor when done right. So what’s right and wrong? The Usability Post shares 5 tips for tabbed navigation:
- Connect the active tab to the content
- Make other tabs a different color
- Change the font color on the active tab
- Have the link area span the whole size of the tab
- Make sure the landing page has its own active tab
Each step is illustrated with the right and wrong way, and explained. That’s helpful. Now you can include tabs on your website without the wrath of the entire design community (you’ll never avoid all the wrath, no matter what you do). Just don’t look like Amazon in 2000:
If you’d like to implement tabs and don’t know how to do them, you can’t miss with this classic A List Apart tutorial.
Originally posted on PlanetSean.com
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