How much do you know about the people that frequent your website?  If the answer is "Not much", then perhaps it's time to conduct a few online surveys and get an idea of the kind of person that enjoys your content. Understanding your visitors can help you to focus your web development efforts, and is also useful for attracting advertisers. The more information you can provide about your demographics, the more targeted the advertisements on your site can be.  Better targeting translates into more conversions, and hopefully more money from those ads.

The logo of the blogging software WordPress. Deutsch: WordPress Logo 中文: WordPress Logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Seems like Wordpress is no stranger to the words 'top 100', as in April 2012 the popular blogging platform has found itself in familiar territory among the hosts that top bloggers favored most, for the second time in approximately four years.

If you’re a local business owner who has a website already created for your business, it’s important for the website to be laid out appropriately so it gets a person’s attention and makes them want to continue reading the content on the website. This includes making sure you have the relevant information on your main page that people are expecting to find when first visiting your local business website.

Does your homepage clearly provide information about who you are and what you do?

People expect to find exactly what it is they were searching for in the first place when they arrive on your homepage. They don’t want to find irrelevant info that wasn’t within their search request. Point being, people need to know exactly what your local business website is all about within only a few second upon arriving and reading. What’s even more important is each person visiting the site should know what services and products your business provides without having to dig for the information.

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The best deals on web hosting are not difficult to locate, but it is easy to fall for the hype. One of the things that a person looking for web hosting services and deals falls into is a bunch of affiliate marketing sites. Now, there is nothing wrong with that, per se, one must understand the motivation behind these reviews. The reviews are skewed to convince, not balanced to inform. But there is utility in them after all. Go through the blogs and look for the ones that provide the most number of alternatives. This smart marketer has gone the distance to get affiliate status with all the links and then gives an almost unbiased view of all.

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If you are planning to take your business to another level, you might want to reach a greater audience. As online businesses are now industry standards, making transactions and keeping up with your targeted market is essential to all businesses and doing them online makes everything easier, so here are some tools that can help you maximize your online business capabilities.

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In the digital age, a well designed company website simply is not enough. While a site may be visually pleasing and easy to navigate, those factors will not help you when it comes to search engine optimization. Website reliability and speed are very crucial aspects to a website from a usability perspective as well as search engine optimization. A company website can be used to reach out to potential customers as well as add revenue through ecommerce, offer focused interaction with customers and issues relating to customer service and can provide customers with up to the minute news about your business or product. All of these beneficial website functionalities will be lost if your page is not “search engine friendly”. “Search engine friendly” means the online site can be indexed by Search and listed on search engines easily. Search engines are a primary source of web traffic, and if your site is not listed, your business will miss out on thousands of would-be customers.

What's in the bag? Business of Software 2010 (Photo credit: betsyweber)

Regardless of what type of business you run, accounting will play a role in the process. You have to keep track of your business finances in some way and utilizing accounting software is a popular choice for most business owners. Accounting software can be a lifesaver and can make your job as a business owner a lot easier. However, if you're new to the business world, you may be unsure of which accounting software program to choose. There are, after all, a many choices to pick from. Before choosing accounting software program for your business, there are a few factors for you to consider.

With the widespread adoption of social media platforms, businesses are slowly forgetting the importance of company newsletters and the marketing potential they offer. Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are great social networking platforms that help businesses connect and communicate with potential and existing clients. However, company newsletters should be incorporated into the overall social media marketing strategy, as opposed to being nudged to the side, and can assist in the broadcasting of company and industry news. This article highlights the importance of newsletters and how they can be utilized to drive traffic to business websites, increase sale conversions and build great business to customer relationships.

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Magento is the revolutionary web development platform that has changed and enhanced ecommerce development. Magento provides a modular architecture and highly flexible platform that allows PHP developers to control the functionalities and features of the E-store. The solutions developed over Magento provide a very effective platform for online merchants. They can display and market their goods in a much effective manner now.

The Human Voice of Freedom: The Internet and Human Rights Panel (Photo credit: US Mission Geneva)

Although most people who come across your blog have no idea what you actually sound like it is important to make sure they are able to understand your writing voice.  The voice of your blog comes through in various ways and here are a few tips on how to make sure that yours is being heard and more importantly that the voice you are using will help you to increase sales and help with the branding of your online presence.