by Jeremy Gislason
Posted on February 25, 2009
If you want a proven way to get high rankings on the search engines and ultimately succeed online, then you need to know how to apply one-way link building to your marketing ventures.
Why is one-way link building an effective marketing strategy?
Because it is the only way for the major search engines (Google, Yahoo and MSN) to recognize your webpages.
You need to get as many one-way backlinks to your website, so that search engines will rank your pages higher when browsers type in your targeted keywords.
You could exchange links with other sites, but one-way links are given more weight by the search engines than reciprocal links.
One-Way Link Building Through Article Marketing
Article marketing is an ideal way to get one-way links that are proven to get lots of free organic traffic.
One-way link building through article marketing could produce effective results. Not overnight of course; but in time, you can slowly (but surely) take advantage of one way link building and article marketing to make good money online – on autopilot! How do you do that?
Write informative articles and include an attention-grabbing resource box (also called author bio) in the article. The resource box is where you will put the anchored text of your link. The anchored text should contain your targeted keyword, so that your link gets a “vote” for that keyword, aside from getting a “vote” from the article directory site too.
This is not the only merit of article marketing. It could also elevate your reputation into an expert of your niche.
Thus, before you embark on submitting articles in article directories, you may first need to research your keywords and niche extensively. Look at what issues your audience face and find solution to those problems. Then, create keyword-optimized articles to help them solve that problem. As a result, people will regard you as a specialist in your field.
Article marketing is an effective promotional campaign to get your sites known and be an authority on your chosen niche.
Other Powerful Methods Of One-Way Link Building
1) Buying Links
Aside from writing and submitting articles, some internet marketer resort to buying links from other sites, preferably those with high page rank. However, if you do not have the money to buy those backlinks, don’t worry. There are free methods you can use (see below).
2) Forum Postings
A free and effective way to generate one way links, and also improve your chances of inducing trust and respect in your niche, is by posting at forums relevant to your niche.
Find the problems your target market faces and give them the solution to those problems. You may use the link to your website as a signature, but make sure they allow sig files and that you have made some valuable contributions. Give first, and the money will follow.
3) Blogging
Blogs can likewise help you in your one-way link building pursuits. If you’re passionate about your niche, you can easily write your own comments, opinions, or viewpoints on various topics related to it. Post updates in your blog regularly and include links to your business websites.
4) Content-Sharing Sites
You may also post your content (with your one-way backlinks) on social marketing or content-sharing sites. Some reliable ones include:
Squidoo.com
Hubpages.com
Wetpaint.com
Quizilla.com
Qassia.com
5) Social Bookmarking
Social bookmarking is a powerful tool in your one-way link building arsenal, but you have to be very careful. Many of them prohibit any marketing activities, so you need to be very subtle and “fly under the radar.” You could accomplish this by posting around 5 times more non-self-serving sites than your own sites.
You could also gain their trust by joining groups, writing comments on other people’s bookmarks, and be a helpful contributor to their community.
Some of the more famous bookmarking sites include:
Digg.com
Stumpleupon.com
Del.icio.us
Technorati.com
Reddit.com
Fark.com
Propeller.com
Kaboodle.com
Mixx.com
Furl.net
6) Video Sharing Sites
Video sharing sites can also provide valuable one-way backlinks. When you submit your videos to video sites such as youtube.com or dailymotion.com, you could put a hyperlink to your site in the video description.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
While one-way links help your sites rank higher on the search engines, you could also get top rankings by optimizing your webpages with your keywords.
You can do this by strategically putting your keywords in the title tag of your site, in the headings (H1, H2, etc.), in the alt tags of images, meta tags, and of course, in the content of your site (especially effective if you put the keywords in the beginning of your content). Selecting a domain containing the keywords would also help.
Keywords help web spiders to crawl into your webpages, and this will help you rank well in the search engines.
Aside from one-way link building and SEO, don’t forget that your main purpose is to help your target market solve their problems. So positioning yourself as an expert and having a truly quality product, combined with the right link building and marketing strategies, could skyrocket your profits to new heights.
Discover a breakthrough http://www.memberspeed.com/Link_Tracking_Management/Software.html]link tracking software to get immediate stats on how well your links are performing, and how responsive members and visitors are to your offers, at http://www.memberspeed.com/Link_Tracking_Management/Software.html. This software is part of the world's leading content and client driven e-commerce solution.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Monday, February 23, 2009
The way to buy product cheapness on Amazon
Hello All,
Thought i should post this as this might help someone trying to get some percent off on their purchase.
I am not the inventor of this method. I saw this on one forums sticky and was very popular just see if it works out for you.
Here it is i am pasting the method below
--------------------------------------
Since several have asked me how I get my Amazon gold box quick picks to look like the image I attached I decided to post the write up that I read which shows how to manipulate whats picked for your quick picks.
So here we go: Basically your Quick Picks are your personal Amazon Deals of the Day (DotD)
that have been catered to your past purchase history. This takes a day+ to work and is definitely hit or miss on what is offered.
To see your current "Quick Picks"
* Go to http://www.amazon.com (make sure you are signed in)
* Click on "Today's Deals" next to the gold box at the top
* Scroll down to see Your Name's Quick Picks Now onto the 'manipulation'
Step 1: Let's say you want an Xbox 360, what you need to do is 'fake' Amazon into thinking you own something related to it, say an Xbox 360 Controller. So search for a Controller, and then at the details page do a search for "Rate this item to improve your recommendations" and next to Rate this item click on "I own it". What this does is link it to your recommendations
Step 2:
* At the top of Amazon's page, click on "Recommendations"
* This will list everything that is recommend broken down by category.
* Remove everything not related to Xbox by clicking "Not interested" this may take quite a bit of time if you've purchased a few items from Amazon.
Another quick way to remove unwanted items is to click on "Fix This" on an item and then click on "Don't use for recommendations"
Step 3:
This should work for practically anything, be it a CD, a book, or whatever, just add something that is somewhat related to what you want and chances are it might show up the next day.
Resetting Your Gold Box Quick Picks (Thanks to baboymo) for those getting random crap in their Gold Box deals, here's a trick that will reset your picks to what you want.
1. Go to recommendations
2. Click link that says "These recommendations are based on items you own and more."
3. Click each product that you used to get items in your Gold Box.
4. Scroll down to "rate this item to improve your recommendations" and de-rate and de-own it (it will save automatically).
5. Search for a similar product and rate and own it. 6. Next day your Gold Box should be filled with what you want.
Note: It appears if you don't take advantage of the Gold Box deals, that's when you'll start to see random crap after several days.
Just reset it and voila!
Thought i should post this as this might help someone trying to get some percent off on their purchase.
I am not the inventor of this method. I saw this on one forums sticky and was very popular just see if it works out for you.
Here it is i am pasting the method below
--------------------------------------
Since several have asked me how I get my Amazon gold box quick picks to look like the image I attached I decided to post the write up that I read which shows how to manipulate whats picked for your quick picks.
So here we go: Basically your Quick Picks are your personal Amazon Deals of the Day (DotD)
that have been catered to your past purchase history. This takes a day+ to work and is definitely hit or miss on what is offered.
To see your current "Quick Picks"
* Go to http://www.amazon.com (make sure you are signed in)
* Click on "Today's Deals" next to the gold box at the top
* Scroll down to see Your Name's Quick Picks Now onto the 'manipulation'
Step 1: Let's say you want an Xbox 360, what you need to do is 'fake' Amazon into thinking you own something related to it, say an Xbox 360 Controller. So search for a Controller, and then at the details page do a search for "Rate this item to improve your recommendations" and next to Rate this item click on "I own it". What this does is link it to your recommendations
Step 2:
* At the top of Amazon's page, click on "Recommendations"
* This will list everything that is recommend broken down by category.
* Remove everything not related to Xbox by clicking "Not interested" this may take quite a bit of time if you've purchased a few items from Amazon.
Another quick way to remove unwanted items is to click on "Fix This" on an item and then click on "Don't use for recommendations"
Step 3:
Come back the next day and see what Amazon has put in your "Quick Picks"
Yesterday I did just this, I added that I owned an Xbox 360 Controller, cleaned up my non-related recommendations and then today I was offered a Quick Pick of 5% off the Xbox 360 Arcade bundle: $265.99 vs $279.99, a savings of $14
Yesterday I did just this, I added that I owned an Xbox 360 Controller, cleaned up my non-related recommendations and then today I was offered a Quick Pick of 5% off the Xbox 360 Arcade bundle: $265.99 vs $279.99, a savings of $14
This should work for practically anything, be it a CD, a book, or whatever, just add something that is somewhat related to what you want and chances are it might show up the next day.
Resetting Your Gold Box Quick Picks (Thanks to baboymo) for those getting random crap in their Gold Box deals, here's a trick that will reset your picks to what you want.
1. Go to recommendations
2. Click link that says "These recommendations are based on items you own and more."
3. Click each product that you used to get items in your Gold Box.
4. Scroll down to "rate this item to improve your recommendations" and de-rate and de-own it (it will save automatically).
5. Search for a similar product and rate and own it. 6. Next day your Gold Box should be filled with what you want.
Note: It appears if you don't take advantage of the Gold Box deals, that's when you'll start to see random crap after several days.
Just reset it and voila!
Membership Site Courses | Membership Millionaire
Click Here to Download Module #1 10 Inspirational Case Studies BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
This module takes a look at ten of the top membership sites that are currently in operation online. The sites discussed get their 'top' status in a number of ways. The sites discussed in this report use a variety of payment methods including monthly subscription, annual subscriptions, free membership with advertising revenue, and payment for individual products. For each membership site, we will have a look at its background to get an idea of its age and size. We will also look at the audience it is targeted at. Finally we will look at what customers receive with their membership, and how much it costs them, if anything.This is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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This module takes a look at ten of the top membership sites that are currently in operation online. The sites discussed get their 'top' status in a number of ways. The sites discussed in this report use a variety of payment methods including monthly subscription, annual subscriptions, free membership with advertising revenue, and payment for individual products. For each membership site, we will have a look at its background to get an idea of its age and size. We will also look at the audience it is targeted at. Finally we will look at what customers receive with their membership, and how much it costs them, if anything.This is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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Click Here to Download Module #2 Why People Need Membership Sites BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
Identifying a popular niche is a key step in building your membership site. It's important to know exactly who your target market is and how to promote your membership site to that market, but before doing that, we need to identify whether or not that market is actually profitable. And don't be fooled into thinking there's too much competition out there and there aren't any niches left to fill. The internet is filled with niches just waiting to be found. More and more people are joining online communities and paid membership sites specific to their hobbies and interests. The trick is to find this group of passionate enthusiasts and cater your site directly to their needs. This module covers:- Finding A Niche- Preliminary Market Research- About Sub Niches (detailed examples)- In Depth Market Research- Forming A USP- Promotion TechniquesAnd moreThis is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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Click Here to Download Module #3 Maximising Membership Site Income BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
Membership sites are ideal for trying out multiple income streams because you already have a very responsive customer base. Your members have joined your site because they have an interest in what you have to offer; which means they are like your products, trust you and are open to future offers from you. Before you begin to build your membership site, it's important to think about how you're going to maximize the revenues from your membership site - in other words how you can make more money.This module will look initially at some of those potential income streams, including affiliate programs, advertising, selling downloadable products, and selling private label rights material. Secondly this module will outline some of the possible subscription models you can use. And in addition to the traditional regular subscription model we will look at upgraded subscriptions, one-off joining fees and free memberships and how to profit from each membership model. Topics covered in this module:- Introducing Affiliate Programs- Paid Advertising Strategies- Selling Additional Products- Selling Serialized Content- Power Selling Strategies- Selling Private Label Material- Subscription Models- Pricing Your Membership SiteThis is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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Click Here to Download Module #4 Building Your Brand BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
Building a brand and increasing the exposure of your membership site. The number one ingredient in a successful membership site is the membership base. No matter how great your content is or how many fantastic downloads you offer, you will not make any money without members. This module will look at four crucial areas of membership site marketing which are:- Building your brand- Attracting affiliates - Finding the right JV partners- Getting exposure through word of mouthThis is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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Click Here to Download Module #5 Traffic Generation Strategies BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
Putting together a strategy for getting traffic to your membership site is a crucial element of your business plan. You can build a great site, with really useful content, but if nobody can find you how are you going to get any members? There are a wide variety of methods you can use to generate traffic to your membership site. Some are free, but take a lot of time and work, while others are quick and easy, but need to be paid for. Different methods work better for particular sites and niche subjects, so don't be afraid to experiment to see what works for you. You might want to start with methods that don't cost you anything such as search engine optimization, and then try paid advertising when you have some profit to reinvest. However, if you have some money in your budget for launching your membership site, you might start with paid advertising to get instant traffic to your site. This module will take a look at search engine optimization, press coverage, paid advertising and social networking as ways of getting traffic to your membership site. This module covers:- SEO Optimization- Content Tactics- Keyword Research & Usage- Linking- Navigation- Press Release Techniques- Paid Advertising- Co-Registration - The Power Of Social NetworksThis is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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Click Here to Download Module #6 Retaining Members BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
All too often, when we talk about building up an online business, we focus on getting new business and attracting customers to our websites. There tends to be very little written about looking after the customers we already have to ensure that they buy from us again and again. When you run a membership site, your existing customers are your regular source of income, and so it is important that you pay some attention to keeping them satisfied, or they may cancel their subscription. It is much easier to keep an existing member than to attract a new one, and as they have already bought from you once, there is a high probability that existing members will buy from you again and again. This module is designed to stop you overlooking your existing membership base in favour of new recruits. A few simple strategies such as providing members with new content, creating a sense of community on your site, paying attention to your customer support, and educating your members in the use of your site, will ensure that your members continue to enjoy your site and maintain that crucial monthly subscription. This module covers:- Alternative Content Delivery- Creating Community- Directly Involving Your Members- Customer Support- Educating Your Members- Handling CancellationsThis is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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Click Here to Download Module #7 Bringing Members Back BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
Continuing with the theme of looking after your existing customers, this module will start by focusing on keeping your site sticky and encouraging your members to return time and again. We will also look at putting together a successful recurring billing strategy, and discuss the importance of knowing your lifetime member value. In addition, this module will compare possible pricing models for your membership site, and look at how some current membership sites charge their members. Finally, we will explore possible payment methods your members could use for their subscriptions and buying any additional products. This module covers:- Increasing Site Stickiness- Effective Price Strategy & Price Model- Example Market Pricing - Understanding Lifetime Value- Recurring Billing Strategies- Increase Member LoyaltyThis is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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Click Here to Download Module #8 Keeping It Legal BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
You've decided on your membership site type, planned the strategies you will use to generate revenue, attract members, and keep them subscribing, and started working on your brand, but here is the serious part. What do you need to do to make sure your membership site complies with the wide range of legislation that has sprung up around websites in the last few years? This report looks firstly at the subject of copyright, both what you can do to copyright your site, and how you can avoid breaching copyright law. We will then discuss privacy and data protection, and how this applies to the information you will be storing about your members. The third section relates to spam, and includes information on the 2003 Can Spam Act and white listing strategies, as well as general tips on preventing your e-mail communications being viewed as spam. Finally we will take a look at your site's terms and conditions, why these are important, and what elements you should look to include. This module covers:- Understanding Copyrights- Protecting Your Content- Staying Legal- Privacy and Data Protection- Dealing With Spam- Getting Your Messages Trough- Creating Your Terms And ConditionsThis is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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Click Here to Download Module #9 Advanced Business Strategies BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
The chances are you're building your membership site for commercial gain, and unless you are one of the few who want to run a site for pure enjoyment, you may eventually be looking to sell your site for a good profit. This module looks at ways of building up your business to make it easy and profitable to sell. Firstly we will discuss automating the running of your site so that you have more time to work on other projects. We will also look at how you can use your first membership site to assist in launching further sites, and the commercial advantages of building up a network of sites. The second section will look at your exit plan; the way you should build your membership site with your exit strategy in mind, and the sort of elements that should be included in your exit plan. Next we will discuss various methods of valuing your site. There are standard ways to value your business, but we also need to look at factors that are specific to valuing a website. This section will give you an idea of the factors you should consider when you are designing your membership site, to be sure you get the highest possible price for it when you sell. Finally we will look at preparing for the sale of your site, ways to target potential buyers and which marketplaces are available for selling an online business. This module covers:- Automating Your Site- Networking Multiple Sites- Exit Strategies And Selling Your Site- Understanding Your Sites Value- Add To Your Sites Value- Finding A BuyerThis is a Silver & Platinum member download.
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Click Here to Download Module #10 Pulling It All Together BY:MembershipMillionaire.com Product Rights:Personal Use Only
This is the fast start guide that summarizes the various elements of running a membership site that we have covered in the previous nine modules. For each subject, more detailed information and explanation can be found in the corresponding module. This module goes over a recap of:- Choosing Your Niche Subject- Maximizing Your Revenue- Building Your Brand and Increasing Exposure to Your Site- Generating Traffic to Your Site- Keeping Your Members Happy- Maintaining and Retaining Numbers - Building Your Membership Site to Selland moreThis is a Silver & Platinum member download.
Sunday, February 8, 2009
10 Tips For Running A Profitable Web Site
1. Address your targeted audience on your business site. Example: "Welcome Internet Marketers". If you have more than one, address them all.
2. Make sure your content and graphics are relevant to your web site's theme. You wouldn't want to use a bird graphic on a business web site.
3. Alert visitors by email when you add new content to your web site. This will remind people to revisit your web site.
4. Offer a way for visitors to contact you on each web page. List your email address, fax number and phone number.
5. Give people the option of viewing your web site offline. Offer it by autoresponder or printer friendly version.
6. Make sure a least 50% of your content is original. The other option is to offer something else original other than content, like software or an online utility.
7. Offer your visitors incentives for revisiting your web site. You could give them new content, ebooks, software, ezine, etc.
8. Publish a FAQs for your business, product and web site. They could have questions about multiple parts of your business.
9. Make sure all links on the navigational bar are clickable. If people can't get to where they want to go, they will leave.
10. Organize you web site in logical and profitable sequence. You don't want to give a freebie before they learn about the product(s) you're selling.
For more information on how to make your own website for pleasure and/or profit visit: http://make-your-own-web-site-fast.com
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. Whenever this article is used, it must include the authors byline with an active link back to our web site.
. Courtesy copy of ezine or URL on web site is appreciated.
. Ask for changes you'd like made, if any.
The Problem with Paypal On Your Web Page
When I set up my website I felt paypal was a very simple and easy solution when people wished to purchase my products.
For 6 months I was getting 150-200 unique visitors a day, and yet only a few sales every week. And then I read somewhere that people are put off by Paypal?.
Paypal was seen by many customers as an amateur solution making your website seem tacky. Paypal is great on ebay but on a business web page people expect more.
So I decided to spend some money and purchased a different Merchant Account. As soon as the new merchant account was integrated with my website I was happy to say the sells flooded in, by a factor of ten times the rate of paypal.
At the time of using Paypal, you had no choice but to set up an account before you could make your first purchase, obviously this was the main reason people were put off.
Paypal has advanced since them, so that you do not need to register an account before your make a purchase, however the setting up an account option is clearly displayed in big letters on the purchase screen and understandably again it still puts people off.
So if you have a website using paypal and you are not making many sells have a look at getting a different merchant account provider, and see if it makes a difference, it did for me.
Charles Vald
Hypnotherapist at Hypnosis Health Care
For 6 months I was getting 150-200 unique visitors a day, and yet only a few sales every week. And then I read somewhere that people are put off by Paypal?.
Paypal was seen by many customers as an amateur solution making your website seem tacky. Paypal is great on ebay but on a business web page people expect more.
So I decided to spend some money and purchased a different Merchant Account. As soon as the new merchant account was integrated with my website I was happy to say the sells flooded in, by a factor of ten times the rate of paypal.
At the time of using Paypal, you had no choice but to set up an account before you could make your first purchase, obviously this was the main reason people were put off.
Paypal has advanced since them, so that you do not need to register an account before your make a purchase, however the setting up an account option is clearly displayed in big letters on the purchase screen and understandably again it still puts people off.
So if you have a website using paypal and you are not making many sells have a look at getting a different merchant account provider, and see if it makes a difference, it did for me.
Charles Vald
Hypnotherapist at Hypnosis Health Care
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
How to Prevent Data Loss
Introduction
The release of FireScope last week was a huge success, judging from the feedback on Twitter and the tens of thousands of downloads.
In last week's issue Kevin expressed our wish to contribute to the web industry. If you checked out FireScope and the SitePoint Reference redesign, we'd love to gain your feedback; if you can suggest any improvements with our reference content to make your job easier, we'd like to hear about that too. Email support@sitepoint.com with your thoughts.
It's quiz time again and we have a huge double prize up for grabs! All you have to do is read our recent article, Ajaxify Your Flex Application, and then take the quiz. You'll go into the draw to win a copy of Adobe CS4 Web Premium and Flex Builder 3 Pro.
In this issue Kevin talks about how every web service's worst nightmare has come true for a few sites recently. If your apps live in The Cloud, remember your parachute!
Summary
Introduction
Every Web Service's Worst Nightmare
How To Prevent Data Loss
New Technical Articles
Techy Forum Threads
More Techy Blog Entries
Every Web Service's Worst Nightmare
by Kevin Yank
"Earlier today social bookmarking site Ma.gnolia suffered what is undoubtedly the worst nightmare for any web startup: a massive, and possibly irreversible loss of data. The site is currently offline, and a note from company founder Larry Halff says that the problem will take days to evaluate."
That was the story reported by Josh Catone on the SitePoint News & Trends blog this past weekend. The note on the site remains unchanged today, and is far from encouraging:
"Early on the West-coast morning of Friday, January 30th, Ma.gnolia experienced every web service's worst nightmare: data corruption and loss. For Ma.gnolia, this means that the service is offline and members' bookmarks are unavailable, both through the website itself and the API. As I evaluate recovery options, I can't provide a certain timeline or prognosis as to when or to what degree Ma.gnolia or your bookmarks will return; only that this process will take days, not hours."
In his report, Josh spells it out: "It should be pretty clear to anyone that this is a very, very bad thing. Even if Ma.gnolia is to somehow recover all the user data it lost, there has very likely been irreparable damage done to their reputation and to the confidence that users have in their service. We expect that the cloud will go down from time to time, but we also expect that it will be back up quickly and with all of our data intact."
The team behind Ma.gnolia does seem to be focused on doing what is right. Their latest update on Twitter confirms this:
"Simultaneously working on tools to help members recover bookmarks from other sources on the web, if necessary."
From this we can infer that they're looking into pulling cached versions of users' Ma.gnolia public bookmarks pages from sources like the Google cache and the Web Archive. Prospects for a complete recovery in such a scenario are grim.
Unfortunately, other services have suffered a similar fate to Ma.gnolia. In Episode 6 of the SitePoint Podcast, we discussed blogging community Journalspace. It went off the air after six years, losing the painstakingly written content of its users overnight.
Servers go down from time to time, but it's every web service's responsibility to have a solid backup strategy in place. What happened to Ma.gnolia represents a failure (or an absence) of such a strategy.
Read on below for a few tips on how you can ensure your site's data is properly backed up.
How To Prevent Data Loss
by Kevin Yank
Following Josh's story about Ma.gnolia, a meaty comment thread discussing approaches to web server backups has sprung up.
First, if your site is hosted on a managed server, all but the cheapest of web hosts will provide automated backup services as part of the package. Dreamhost, for example, will back up both the files on your server and your databases on at least a daily basis.
Even Dreamhost, however, is quick to recommend that you also have a backup plan:
"We recommend you always keep your OWN copy of your entire web site at a remote location as well, but we'll do our best to make sure that's never needed."
Keeping your own copy of the code for your site is usually quite easy, since most development is done using such a copy. Code versioning systems like SVN and Git even provide a complete history of that code. The tricky part is keeping a copy of your site's dynamic data, usually in the form of database records.
If your site runs on MySQL, chances are your host provides a copy of phpMyAdmin (or you can set up your own). phpMyAdmin includes an easy-to-use database export feature. On the front page of your phpMyAdmin page, click Export.
Select which database(s) to export, and make sure they're set up to export the data in these database(s) as well as the structure:
Finally, make sure to check the Save as file checkbox and select a compression type, so that the backup is delivered as a file download.
For a small site, that will do the trick. Doing it every single day may be too tedious to be practical, however. That's when it's time to look into some of the automated solutions discussed in the comments thread.
Whichever solution you use, make sure to give some thought to where and how you choose to store your backups. Commenter Tom Rutter has some wise words which I've reproduced below:
"A lot of people's backup strategies take care of some problems, but not all. Ideally, a backup strategy for any data not worth losing needs to be able to cope with:
Your building burns to the ground
You find out all your data became corrupted/lost, and you have done backups since
"For the first, you need off-site backup. This ensures that if an entire building is burgled, burned down, flooded, etc then the data is recoverable.
"For the second, you need some sort of history of backups. Incremental backups are good because they allow history but save space, though of course you'll need to think about how easy it is to restore from backup.
"Common backup myth: "RAID is backup"RAID is not backup. It provides the ability to replace a failed drive without taking down the system, but that is "availability", not backup. For example, it is not intended to protect against either of the two above scenarios. If the building burns down, it's all lost. If data is corrupted, it's all lost (instantly). A faulty disk controller or power supply, or a power surge which your power supply can't cope with, can ruin the entire RAID set. RAID is good if you need high availability, but even if you have RAID you still need backup."
Do you have a slick backup strategy to share? Want to see what the experts are doing? Stop by the blog post and check out the comments:
News & Trends Blog: Industry news for web professionalsby Josh CatoneOpen Thread: How to Prevent Data Loss (13 comments)
See you next week for another issue of the Tech Times.
Andrew Tetlawtechtimes@sitepoint.comSitePoint Technical Editor
The release of FireScope last week was a huge success, judging from the feedback on Twitter and the tens of thousands of downloads.
In last week's issue Kevin expressed our wish to contribute to the web industry. If you checked out FireScope and the SitePoint Reference redesign, we'd love to gain your feedback; if you can suggest any improvements with our reference content to make your job easier, we'd like to hear about that too. Email support@sitepoint.com with your thoughts.
It's quiz time again and we have a huge double prize up for grabs! All you have to do is read our recent article, Ajaxify Your Flex Application, and then take the quiz. You'll go into the draw to win a copy of Adobe CS4 Web Premium and Flex Builder 3 Pro.
In this issue Kevin talks about how every web service's worst nightmare has come true for a few sites recently. If your apps live in The Cloud, remember your parachute!
Summary
Introduction
Every Web Service's Worst Nightmare
How To Prevent Data Loss
New Technical Articles
Techy Forum Threads
More Techy Blog Entries
Every Web Service's Worst Nightmare
by Kevin Yank
"Earlier today social bookmarking site Ma.gnolia suffered what is undoubtedly the worst nightmare for any web startup: a massive, and possibly irreversible loss of data. The site is currently offline, and a note from company founder Larry Halff says that the problem will take days to evaluate."
That was the story reported by Josh Catone on the SitePoint News & Trends blog this past weekend. The note on the site remains unchanged today, and is far from encouraging:
"Early on the West-coast morning of Friday, January 30th, Ma.gnolia experienced every web service's worst nightmare: data corruption and loss. For Ma.gnolia, this means that the service is offline and members' bookmarks are unavailable, both through the website itself and the API. As I evaluate recovery options, I can't provide a certain timeline or prognosis as to when or to what degree Ma.gnolia or your bookmarks will return; only that this process will take days, not hours."
In his report, Josh spells it out: "It should be pretty clear to anyone that this is a very, very bad thing. Even if Ma.gnolia is to somehow recover all the user data it lost, there has very likely been irreparable damage done to their reputation and to the confidence that users have in their service. We expect that the cloud will go down from time to time, but we also expect that it will be back up quickly and with all of our data intact."
The team behind Ma.gnolia does seem to be focused on doing what is right. Their latest update on Twitter confirms this:
"Simultaneously working on tools to help members recover bookmarks from other sources on the web, if necessary."
From this we can infer that they're looking into pulling cached versions of users' Ma.gnolia public bookmarks pages from sources like the Google cache and the Web Archive. Prospects for a complete recovery in such a scenario are grim.
Unfortunately, other services have suffered a similar fate to Ma.gnolia. In Episode 6 of the SitePoint Podcast, we discussed blogging community Journalspace. It went off the air after six years, losing the painstakingly written content of its users overnight.
Servers go down from time to time, but it's every web service's responsibility to have a solid backup strategy in place. What happened to Ma.gnolia represents a failure (or an absence) of such a strategy.
Read on below for a few tips on how you can ensure your site's data is properly backed up.
How To Prevent Data Loss
by Kevin Yank
Following Josh's story about Ma.gnolia, a meaty comment thread discussing approaches to web server backups has sprung up.
First, if your site is hosted on a managed server, all but the cheapest of web hosts will provide automated backup services as part of the package. Dreamhost, for example, will back up both the files on your server and your databases on at least a daily basis.
Even Dreamhost, however, is quick to recommend that you also have a backup plan:
"We recommend you always keep your OWN copy of your entire web site at a remote location as well, but we'll do our best to make sure that's never needed."
Keeping your own copy of the code for your site is usually quite easy, since most development is done using such a copy. Code versioning systems like SVN and Git even provide a complete history of that code. The tricky part is keeping a copy of your site's dynamic data, usually in the form of database records.
If your site runs on MySQL, chances are your host provides a copy of phpMyAdmin (or you can set up your own). phpMyAdmin includes an easy-to-use database export feature. On the front page of your phpMyAdmin page, click Export.
Select which database(s) to export, and make sure they're set up to export the data in these database(s) as well as the structure:
Finally, make sure to check the Save as file checkbox and select a compression type, so that the backup is delivered as a file download.
For a small site, that will do the trick. Doing it every single day may be too tedious to be practical, however. That's when it's time to look into some of the automated solutions discussed in the comments thread.
Whichever solution you use, make sure to give some thought to where and how you choose to store your backups. Commenter Tom Rutter has some wise words which I've reproduced below:
"A lot of people's backup strategies take care of some problems, but not all. Ideally, a backup strategy for any data not worth losing needs to be able to cope with:
Your building burns to the ground
You find out all your data became corrupted/lost, and you have done backups since
"For the first, you need off-site backup. This ensures that if an entire building is burgled, burned down, flooded, etc then the data is recoverable.
"For the second, you need some sort of history of backups. Incremental backups are good because they allow history but save space, though of course you'll need to think about how easy it is to restore from backup.
"Common backup myth: "RAID is backup"RAID is not backup. It provides the ability to replace a failed drive without taking down the system, but that is "availability", not backup. For example, it is not intended to protect against either of the two above scenarios. If the building burns down, it's all lost. If data is corrupted, it's all lost (instantly). A faulty disk controller or power supply, or a power surge which your power supply can't cope with, can ruin the entire RAID set. RAID is good if you need high availability, but even if you have RAID you still need backup."
Do you have a slick backup strategy to share? Want to see what the experts are doing? Stop by the blog post and check out the comments:
News & Trends Blog: Industry news for web professionalsby Josh CatoneOpen Thread: How to Prevent Data Loss (13 comments)
See you next week for another issue of the Tech Times.
Andrew Tetlawtechtimes@sitepoint.comSitePoint Technical Editor
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