[Guide] How to Host a Website From Home

Hello,

Also mention that some ISP's dont allow the hosting of websites, just make sure you check there terms and you should be fine.

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Adam

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Quick and Dirty Guide to Using a Google Analytics Custom Dashboard

Now I’m taking a big leap of faith by assuming Google Analytics is your preferred arena for tracking your website data.

So let me explain the importance of having a Google Analytics custom dashboard to help you  make the right strategic decisions to succeed with your digital marketing efforts.

I’ll be honest, navigating your Google Analytics custom dashboard can become a tedious effort to acquire information needed to make an assessment of your online metrics. The worst part is, once you manage to find it, this same process will need to be repeated the next time around.

Most users would be accustomed to the standard reporting dashboard when they first log into Google Analytics. The standard dashboard has its advantages but sometimes it’s like finding a needle in a haystack, except you’re throwing that needle back in each time you log in – Onerous I know!

Dashboards have a number of purposes such as grabbing bits of data from different reports and assembling them into an easy to understand format. You can store up to 20 dashboards per profile and within each of these dashboards we can add a maximum of 12 widgets, with a widget representing a unique report/type of data you require.

Most of us understand the power of Google Analytics and how it makes analyzing your website traffic that much easier, but don’t you think the standard reporting is a little thin for savvy business owners?

This is where a Custom Dashboard can help!

By taking the custom route you can amalgamate data which otherwise would be difficult to procure under the Standard Reporting dashboard. I switched to using a Google Analytics Custom Dashboard to easily access the website data I require in a quick manner plus the ease of reproducing these reports is helpful.

Note from Ms. Ileane: I wanted to share a video with you with step-by-step instructions for creating the custom dashboard in Google Analytics. Damion Brown from Data Runs Deep was kind enough to record this video for us. Show him some LUV and visit his blog when you’re done watching.

Creating A Custom Dashboard in Google Analytics 

Before I explain the “how” element, I would strongly recommend determining the “what”.

A well structured analytics dashboard will answer a few imminent questions so you can determine your site’s performance. The Starter Dashboard is good for a quick website checkup as you’ll be presented with data such as Visits, Average Visit Duration, Duration by Country/Territory to name a few.

If you run a local business, mobile or international traffic (as an example) is probably of little value to you. Below are a few key questions to consider with your dashboard:

Am I receiving less, more or the same level of traffic? I will include page views so if my traffic is increasing but there isn’t an equivalent rise in page views, it’s worth investigating the pages per visit. Do my visitors hang around or scoot off? Key metrics: Average Visit Duration and Bounce Rate. If you run a mini site, sure one page is sufficient to present your good material but this might not be the case for a larger site.  Be sure to understand the context of the data for each individual website.Who Are my Visitors? Your primary traffic sources would include Visits by Traffic Type, Organic, Paid, Direct and Other.Are My Visitors Obeying Instructions? Obeying is a strong term to use but if you’re an online marketer, your website will have a purpose and this can be measured by the Goal Conversion Rate. My approach is to establish a unique dashboard for site goals. This makes it dead easy to identify the % of visitors who are doing what I want.

That’s basically it, but I will add the following caveats:

1. I have only touched on the concept of an actionable custom dashboard, but you can definitely have more than one. I would recommend limiting too many variables in your dashboard as you might become overwhelmed. If there are several key data points, try and separate them across different dashboards e.g. Site Overview, SEO Metrics and Goal Performance.

2. The other point regarding the Google custom dashboard is that they display the “what” and not the “why”. The “why” element can only be recognized once you dissect the data. The purpose of a custom Google Analytics dashboard is to quickly check information and then prioritize the elements which require attention. It’s important to know why things are happening before you show others to avoid the dreaded “So what’s happened here?”

This section would require a post on it’s own, however, it’s very easy to set up your custom Google Analytics Dashboard. If you require a step-by-step tutorial, please refer to Google’s quick tutorial here or for a visual tutorial watch the embedded video above, or head over to Sharon Hurley Hall’s tutorial over at The Daily Egg.

The conversion dashboard does exactly what you would expect – track conversions! This can range from Ms. Ileane determining her email list subscriptions to e-commerce purchases and having them all in one area is truly poetry in motion for analytics lovers.

If you are still insure on the need for a conversion based custom dashboard, then let me share a scenario with you. What if you wanted to know the exact sources of traffic which was providing the most goal completions – Wouldn’t it a whole lot easier to determine where to allocate your marketing budget?

If you are interested in running this type of dashboard, click here.

What does it really mean when your blog has a 85% bounce rate? Firstly, why is it this percentage and what action can you take? It’s time you dig deep to find out.

I will generally set up a custom dashboard which includes “Pages/Visit, “Average Visit Duration” and “Bounce Rate” to determine which pages are performing the best. You can also add Real Time data to your custom dashboard.

Click here to use a pre-configured dashboard which focuses on these metrics.

Now you have the answers at your finger tips in terms of which pages are gaining more traction and the sources of traffic which are providing these engaged visitors.

Would you like to see data on which countries your visitors are arriving from and the pages they are landing on?

You are in luck as the traffic custom dashboard is deal for this exercise and you can use the pre-configured dashboard here, however please add your own brand keywords.

There will be some effort required on your end with the “Visits – Organic Non-Brand” and “Visits – Organic Brand” widgets. Simply replace “yourbrandkeywordshere” with your keywords.

Once you’re done customising  you’ll have a good overview of the type of traffic on your website but feel free to test the widgets accordingly.

I hope you have a better handle of  your Google Analytics dashboard and importance of customizing to quickly gauge how well your site is doing and the actions needed to improve where necessary. It helps to review your Google Analytics custom dashboard setups regularly to ensure you are receiving the information you need and this might be a matter of adding or removing certain widgets. In no time will you have a solid understanding of your site’s health which you can swallow in small bits.

Check out these other cool custom dashboards shared by Google Analytics users throughout the community.

All the best with your tracking!

Please let me know what you think about Google Analytics Custom Dashboards and which one is your favorite in the comments below!

Tagged as: Analytics Dashboard, Custom Dashboard, Google Analytics, website traffic

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Menuism: The Super-Fresh Guide to Storing Chocolate

Restaurant reviews, menu aggregator, social network and educational food blog for diners and drinkers!

by Lauren Deitsch, Chocolate Expert for the Menuism Chocolate Blog

As someone who works with fine chocolate every day (hard life!), I often wonder why it doesn't come with care instructions attached, just like the tag on your cashmere sweater. Now, wouldn't that be handy?

After all, not everyone knows how best to take care of chocolate -- and without the equivalent of "hand wash, cold water, lay flat to dry," what's a chocolate lover to do?

Have no fear! Here, in a nutshell, is all you need to know to give that next artisanal chocolate bar or tasty box of bonbons the love and attention they deserve, so you can enjoy every last bite.

The fresher it is, the better it tastes. This might seem obvious, but it bears repeating: everything chocolate has a higher pinnacle of flavor and texture, the fresher it is. For this reason alone, you should buy chocolate in amounts you're likely to consume in a short period of time. (That might be a small amount, or it could be more . . . no judgments here!) Solid chocolate is best kept at a constant 65-68°F, and at low humidity. Stored this way, dark chocolate will keep for a year; milk and white chocolate should be consumed within six months.

As for bonbons, caramels, and the like, they're a different story. If you have a mass-production confection made by one of the bigger brands, it may well keep as long as solid chocolate (hello, preservatives!).

Then again, if you're enjoying handmade artisanal chocolates made with fresh dairy -- and I hope you are -- it's best to check directly with the chocolate maker or shop where they were made. Not only can they tell you exactly how long your chocolates will maintain their quality, but they'll be happy you cared enough to ask.

Chocolate doesn't play well with light and air, so remember to keep them separated. You don't need an expert to tell you chocolate melts in the sun. What's more, oxygen and light (both natural and artificial) cause chocolate to oxidize and develop undesirable flavors. White and milk chocolate are particularly susceptible because of added dairy ingredients and lower cacao content; dark chocolate is more resistant thanks to its high levels of antioxidants.

So unless you finish all your chocolate in one sitting (see "no judgments," above), be sure to tightly re-wrap and store it in an airtight container or bag, away from any light source.

Cocoa butter (the fat that comes from the cocoa bean) easily absorbs other scents. So it goes without saying: keep your chocolate away from strong odors! Otherwise, don't be surprised when chocolate stored near your baking extracts ends up tasting like an Altoid or a vanilla-scented candle. As a rule, storing chocolate in the fridge or freezer is not recommended, since this runs the risk of degrading its flavor and texture. But as with any rule, there are exceptions. Here are two:

#1: Summertime Exception!
Don't have access to a cool or low-humidity spot to store your bonbons and bars? Ok, go ahead and put them in the refrigerator (yes, I know I just said not to do that). Two important caveats: Before placing in the fridge, make sure the chocolate is tightly wrapped to prevent it from picking up odors or condensation. And when you remove it from the fridge, let it come back to room temperature before unwrapping. Stored this way in your fridge, they'll last for anywhere from three to six months.

#2: The Lucille Ball Exception (a.k.a. "Help, I can't eat them fast enough...!")
Let's say you neglected to follow my first tip above: buy only what you can consume in a short period of time. So now you find yourself with a huge batch of fresh chocolate truffles, and you don't know how you'll possibly manage to polish them off by the end of their recommended shelf life. There are worse problems to have! And this is an easy one to solve. To keep your bonbons and other ganache-filled chocolates from going bad, use the same Summertime Exception method outlined above to refrigerate them.

And should you need to store them even longer (say, six months to a year), here are two simple steps to ensure safe freezing of your chocolates:

Step 1: Again, make sure everything is tightly wrapped and moisture proof, then move your chocolate stash to the refrigerator.

Step 2: After a full 24 hours, move it to the freezer. Doing this in steps is crucial to preventing temperature shock, as well as preserving the texture of your chocolates. And the same holds true when removing from the freezer -- just follow those two steps in reverse. Put them in the fridge for a full 24 hours. And when you take them out, be sure to allow them to reach room temperature before unwrapping and enjoying.

Now that you're armed with the knowledge of how to care for your chocolate, go out and get some! Splurge on that enticing craft chocolate bar you've been eyeing at the market, or fill your online shopping cart with the latest trends in flavored bonbons. Explore, learn what you like, what you don't like, and above all, enjoy.

And if you happen to find yourself with a little more than you meant to buy? Again, no judgments here -- and this time, you'll know exactly what to do.

Related Links from the Menuism Chocolate Blog:
• How Chocolate Easter Eggs Were Hatched
• Chocolate and Terroir: Discovering a Taste of Place
• When Chocolate Meets Technology

The Super-Fresh Guide to Storing Chocolate originally published on the Menuism Chocolate Blog.

Lauren Deitsch is the Research & Development Specialist / Chocolatier at Lake Champlain Chocolates in Burlington, VT, where she works to develop new chocolate recipes every day. She's a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY. In addition to a love for all things chocolate, she enjoys connecting with friends, reading, traveling, hiking, running, and cooking.

Follow Menuism on Twitter: www.twitter.com/menuism

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Your Foolproof Guide To Blogs That Make Money

My name is Mitz and I am a serial full-time blogger. I started out with one website many years ago and it went so well, I sold my businesses and began living the internet dream. Since then I have been perfecting the system of blogging by building Wordpress websites that are set to earn money online. This is an ever changing business and I love the challenge. Please feel free to download one of my favorite FREE REPORTS if you are interested in improving your blogging business or starting one from scratch.

Mitz has written 20 awesome articles for us at Basic Blog Tips

Twitter: @buildwebsites1 | Facebook | Blog ? Lets Build Websites

by Mitz on January 11, 2013 · 17 comments

in Blogging Tutorials, Guest Posts

Blogs that make money all focus on the “Three Cs:” content, consistency, and customers. If you want your blog to make money, you can learn from these successful blogs and apply their formula to your site.

Blogs that make money almost all have one thing in common: they provide high-quality content.

The only exception are a few scam blogs that make money only temporarily until Google catches up with them.

High-quality content is informative and well written, although that doesn’t mean it’s extensive and grammatically perfect.

Extensive documentation belongs in a book, not on a blog, and striving to write perfectly is a great way to get nothing done.

Producing informative and well-written content is within the grasp of any competent adult. All you need to do is use plain English to tell your audience one useful thing they didn’t know before they started reading your blog. If you master writing useful information, you master the number one step towards creating blogs that make money.

I started providing quality content almost by accident on my first blog. You see I was obsessed with computers and how they worked and just wanted to share my knowledge in an easy to understand way. That is exactly what I did and have been rewarded ever since.

Blogs that make money are generally consistent. There are exceptions to this rule, but they are rare. Consistency applies mainly to three characteristics of the blog:

1.   A consistent posting schedule, usually daily or weekly

2.   Consistent high-quality posts

3.   Consistent post formulation

A consistent posting schedule is probably most important and most common among blogs that make money. But not any blogging schedule will do the trick—it needs to be a schedule people can easily predict, such as daily, weekdays, weekly, or bi-weekly.

Posting every three or five days will only confuse your audience as posts appear on a different day of each week. If you want to post more frequently than once a week but not every day, make sure you post on the same two or three days every week.

Also try to post at the same time everyday. This helps encourage your most loyal readers to visit at the appointed time so they can jump start the comments. But the main advantage is that your posts consistently appear on the same day each week to people in different time zones.

The final but perhaps most important consideration for blogs that make money is customers. That’s right: customers not visitors.

Many blogs take great pride in the amount of traffic they receive, but building your site with the intention of receiving throngs of traffic is pointless unless you can monetize that traffic.

You want customers, not traffic. But how do you count customers and how do you attract them instead of meaningless traffic?

Start by looking at your business model. Anyone who makes you money through your site is a customer, whether they click an advertisement or buy a product. Grab statistics and figure out what on your site best attracts your customers. Then try a simple experiment:

Try to create a blog post or static page on your site which attracts the best visitor-to-customer ratio, also called conversion rate. See if you can get 10% of your visitors to convert into customers; then try to get 20%; and keep trying to increase your conversion rate. By discovering how to convert your visitors into customers, you’ll learn much more about your customers and you’ll be able to figure out exactly how to write more blog posts that make money.

It is not easy learning how to monetize a website the right way and only experience will bring that knowledge. But you have to take action, fail and learn. New webmasters should never wait to learn this part of the business as they might realize too late that their blog is one that will never make money. There are bad website ideas out there and it is better to test the waters as soon as you start your blog.

Tagged as: Blogging Schedule, Blogs That Make Money, Customers

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A Month-To-Month Guide For Your Allergies

By Beth W. Orenstein

If you suffer from allergies for even part of the year, you may wonder when you'll get a reprieve. People with spring allergies, fall allergies, or winter allergies might feel relief during their off seasons, but for those who experience allergy symptoms year-round -- it's a constant battle with allergens in the air. Here's a look at which allergies plague people most -- and when.

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During the winter, there's less pollen (if any) floating around, but cranking up the heat indoors can kick up house dust, a winter allergy trigger. If you're allergic to dust, winter allergies can be just as bad as in the spring and fall. To reduce dust exposure, it helps to keep your home's humidity below 55 percent, use a vacuum with a HEPA filter regularly, and encase pillows and mattresses with dust-mite-proof covers.

Mold and dust can cause year-round allergy symptoms, but even if dust and mold don't bring on the sniffles for you, trees can cause your allergies to flare at this time of year, depending on where you live. "We can see tree pollen as early as February, even in the Northeast," says Marjorie L. Slankard, M.D., an associate attending physician and director of the Allergy Clinic at New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center. In the United States, trees that commonly cause allergies include catalpa, elm, hickory, olive, pecan, sycamore, and walnut. Tree pollen can cause the same symptoms as most spring allergies -- watery eyes, sneezing, and nasal congestion.

Tree pollen remains high on the list of allergens for March, which marks the beginning of spring. "If the trees, grasses, and pollens start coming out early, March can be rough going for people with spring allergies," Dr. Slankard says. Though nice spring weather beckons you outside, if you have spring allergies, keep your eye on the pollen count. The higher the count, the worse the allergies will be. A good place to check pollen counts is at the National Allergy Bureau of the American Academy of Allergy Asthma & Immunology.

April showers can bring … spring allergies. All that rain can make for blooming flowers, but as beautiful as they are, flowers and their pollen means discomfort for people with spring allergies. In some areas of the country, grass pollen emerges in April, too. Between the pollen from the flowers and the pollen from the grass, spring allergies may make you feel especially miserable.

Allergic to tree pollen? Although tree pollination can begin as early as February, it can last through May. That means you might need to slog through spring allergies for four long months. Grass pollen can also emerge this time of year in some parts of the country.

June is a key grass pollen month in many areas, and it's likely that grass pollen will start to trigger your spring allergies by this time of year if it hasn't already. As the days get longer and the temperature gets higher, you'll probably want to spend more time outdoors. If you suffer from spring allergies, you may have good days and bad days - the temperature, the rainfall amount, and even the time of day will affect grass pollen levels, and you'll need to adjust accordingly.

The good news is that by July, grass pollen should subside and you might feel like your spring allergies are finally becoming manageable again. The bad news is that July marks the start of fungus spores and seeds, so if you're allergic to molds and spores, too, you may feel like your allergies never end. Mold can grow on fallen leaves, compost piles, grasses, and grains.

August is a prime month for people with summer allergies to mold spores, which peak during hot, humid weather. You might want to stay inside on days when the mold spore count is particularly high. The best way to keep away from these allergens is to run the air conditioning with a HEPA filter - this cool comfort indoors should help you feel better during the dog days of August.

Late summer/early fall ragweed is the most common cause of fall allergies. Depending on where you live, ragweed-fueled fall allergies can start in August or September and continue through October and possibly November. Pollen grains are lightweight and spread easily, especially on windy days. The more wet and windy autumn is in your area, the more easily the pollen spreads, and the worse your symptoms will feel.

Chances that fall allergies will ease by October get better the farther north you go in the United States. But in warmer climates, fall allergies can linger well into this month. Seasonal rain and wind can also ramp up mold spores - if your fall allergies include mold or fungi spores, your symptoms may linger.

The ragweed pollen season usually ends by mid-November in most areas of the country. If you have fall allergies and react to fungi and molds, you probably face your worst symptoms in late summer and early fall. Although you might feel miserable from the end of March until November, making it seem like you have year-round allergies, you should get a break now. November may be one of the best months for people with outdoor allergies, which allows for enjoying the crisp weather. Then, just in time, indoor allergies to pet dander and indoor molds pick up.

As pretty as they are, real Christmas trees can make you wheeze and sneeze. It's likely not the tree itself that triggers allergies but the microscopic mold spores that can harbor in its branches. If you can't resist buying a live tree despite winter allergies, take it home a week before you plan to decorate it and leave it in a garage or an enclosed porch. Then give it a good shake to try to get rid of any spores.

"Your Month-By-Month Guide To Allergies" originally appeared on Everyday Health.

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