Lighthouse Technologies Newsletter
June 2005, Volume 3 Issue 5
www.techlh.com
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In This Issue:
* A Note from Will
* More Thoughts Website First Impressions
* Our Sponsor - TownLink
* Five Fast Ways to Determine One Hosting Company from Another
* Whitepapers for Web Designers and Developers
* 3 Ways to Build Your Web Traffic Quickly
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A Note from Will

"Build it, and they will come" is a famous line from the great
baseball movie Field of Dreams.  In the movie,  a man builds a
baseball field in the middle of a corn field, in an attempt to get
great baseball players from the past to come play ball there.

Unfortunately the web isn't always like Hollywood.  Build a website,
and they still won't come.  They don't just come.  Someone needs to
tell them to come!

In this newsletter, I've provided a few articles on getting people
to your website. Both retail or informational websites, as well as
web developers should find this information helpful.

If you like what you see, let me know, or send it to a friend!
- Will
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More Thoughts on Website First Impressions

In last months newsletter we touched on some website first
impressions.  As a designer, I'm somewhat obsessed with nice
layouts, LOTS of information, and LOTS of links.

But LOTS isn't also right.  Designers, marketing folks, and sales
managers all look at the website from a slightly different point of
view - none of which are the right view - your customers!

While we focus on getting a lot of content on the home page, we
forget that our user, our customer, isn't interested in investing a
lot of time on your website.  They are there to learn, ingest some
information, and go on.  They scan for something that looks remotely
related to what they want, click it, and if they don't find it, back
to Google they go.

Taking some time to think about the key areas of your website, and
perhaps providing those links across the top or a sidebar is a great
way to help your potential customer
http://www.techlh.com/contactus.htm
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Five Fast Ways to Determine One Hosting Company from Another
by Will Hanke - Lighthouse Technologies (www.techlh.com)

These days, web hosting companies are popping up faster than
dandelions.  And just like those pesky weeds, they usually aren't
going to benefit your business at all.  So how do you pick out one
hosting company for another for that big Internet move?  Below I've
provided you some quick ways to sift out the sheep from the wolves.

1. Traceable Testimonies - Many web hosting companies provide a
testimony page.  Good web hosting companies will actually link to
the person who `said' what is posted.  If there is no link, it is
possible that the hosting company simply made up the testimony.  You
don't want to be involved with a company with questionable integrity.

2. Testing Quick Response Claims - Testing out the response of a web
hosting company is easy: email them.  They should provide an email
address or at least a feedback form.  Ask a simple question about
their service, and see how fast they respond.  Compare that with
what they have `advertised' as their response time.  See how they
measure up.

3. Online Help or Ticketing System - Some hosting companies may even
offer and online ticketing/helpdesk.  While you may have to be a
customer to actually use it, just the fact that it is available is a
good sign.

4. Sense of Community – Good web hosts still have problems.  Honest
web hosts will be open and (of course) quick to resolve them.  Many
hosting companies now offer online forums – a place for their
customers and potential customers to post questions, comments,
testimonies, and complaints online.  Really good hosting companies
will not only answer these questions, but they'll supply educational
posts that may answer similar future questions.

5. WHOIS – Taking a quick visit over to www.whois.sc will reveal a
lot of information about your web host.  Besides giving you some
technical information, you'll also find out just how many websites
are running on that server.  Remember, more websites doesn't always
equal better company.  You certainly want to make sure the server
isn't bogged down!

This is a good place to also make sure that the host isn't on any
blacklists.  Blacklists usually mean that there are documented
reports of spam coming FROM that server, and that's not good at all!

Whether you are a first-time hosting purchaser or a hosting refugee
(that's what I call those people who bought hosting from a fly-by-
night hosting company, and their website is now AWOL), I hope that
these tips will help you save some future headaches and maybe even a
little money, too.
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Whitepapers for Web Designers and Developers

The staff at Lighthouse Technologies have developed a few good
whitepapers on various aspects of owning and running a successful
web design and hosting company.  A few of these papers are available
to other web designers - with full reprint rights - for under $10.00!

http://techlh.com/webdesigners/whitepapers.htm
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3 Ways to Build Your Web Traffic Quickly
It's a common story. Someone builds a great site, populates it with
lots of fantastic content and beautiful graphics. They spend weeks
or month making sure everything is perfect before the big launch day
arrives. Then in the hours, days and weeks after the upload, a few
people trickle in but nothing really explosive. What happened? How
can such a great site not naturally take the internet community by
storm? Simple – the marketing of the site was not planned (and often
not even thought about!).

If this is happening to you then don't panic! There are a few ways
to kick-start your traffic and get some meaningful visitors. Done in
combination with a long term marketing strategy, they can help grow
your list of visitors and more importantly keep them. Here are a few
of the immediate steps that can be taken:

Buy Traffic – This is probably the easiest and a very cheap way to
go. The way it works is that companies purchase expired domain names
and redirect the traffic straight to your site. Other companies
operate pop-up or pop-under technology that displays the website you
want visited. Often you can start seeing results from this in 48
hours and many thousands of visitors can be had for only a few
dollars outlay. Beware! This can really send your stats through the
roof and is very easy, but there are pitfalls. Untargeted traffic is
quite low quality unless you have something truly great to show a
general audience. In most case you are far better off purchasing
targeted hits to your site's area of interest. It is only logical
that a travel site would want people looking for travel information!
It is worth spending a few extra dollars.

Post on POPULAR, ESTABLISHED Forums – Do some research and find out
what are the most popular forums in your area. I am talking about
forums with at least 1000 members and preferably many more. Beware
of forums that reward people for posting as they may indeed have
many members, but few of them post more than once or twice and even
fewer read other people's posts. (You want forums with many more
posts than members – this indicates that members actively return,
read and post at the forum). Most forum moderators have no problems
with users having a "signature" at the end of their posts. This is
where you can list your website URL. DO NOT SPAM people's boards
with commercial messages. Post helpful or interesting topics and
respond to other people's queries. Posting solely to advertise your
site will get you banned from most forums. This technique can be
worth many thousands of visitors to your site quite quickly if done
properly.

Yahoo! Listing – It's the most popular site on the internet and it's
where many companies go to get listed. It's also responsible for
about 50% of all internet searches. You can get your site reviewed
quickly for about $200 (though they do not guarantee to list
everything so make sure your page looks professional and has good
content. Even then it is still a gamble). It is expensive but your
site WILL get seen by a lot of people if you get a listing with
Yahoo! One good tip is to try to title your site with a letter
towards the beginning of the alphabet as the listings go in
alphabetical order. That way you will be in front of your
competitors.

These techniques can have a very fast effect on your website
traffic. The first two should send your stats up within a few days
and combined with the Yahoo listing, see them stay high. It's a lot
of work, and maybe a little cash, but these three techniques
combined can have your site getting thousands or even tens of
thousands of visitors per month.

Rob Wood
Lot's Of Clicks
Website Traffic Generation – Fast!
http://www.lotsofclicks.com
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That's it, folks. I hope you've learned something, and that you'll
pass this newsletter on to friends and business partners that it
would help.

Have a great day, and enjoy the warmer weather!

Will Hanke
Lighthouse Technologies
www.techlh.com