Resources – tools of the trade
This is the time saver page! What ever you want to do there will generally be many different options. It has taken me ages to figure out what works and what doesn’t. Here are the items that I have found have worked for me…
One of my problems when I started was evaluating everything. In general I have learnt that it is better to start with something than to get swamped by choices and not do anything, or take ages to make a choice. So I hope this helps you to make a decision and just get going….!
Please note: some links are affiliate links, meaning that I will earn a commission if you decide to make a purchase. This will be at no additional cost to you – in fact sometimes I can offer discounts. I have personal experience with all of these companies or products, and I recommend them because I found them helpful and useful, and I hope that you well too, not because of the small commissions I make if you decide to buy something. Please do not spend any money on these products unless you feel that they will help you achieve your goals.
Finding a Niche
- Market Samurai: This is just an amazingly powerful tool for positioning yourself within a market, for keyword research and for competition analysis. I would not recommend this tool unless you planned to get most of your traffic from Search Engine Optimization (SEO). However, if that is what you are planning to do – then this is one of the most powerful tools.
- Google Adwords Keyword Tool: Is a very basic equivalent… but performs the same basic function of returning popularity of searches for particular keywords. It is a great starting point, but if you are looking to optimize for keywords (i.e. SEO) you will quickly reach it’s limitations.
Domain name registration
- Namecheap: I have had great service and they offer a very competitive price. I highly recommend Hostgator and I would recommend the bab
Web-Hosting
- Hostgator: I have had great service and they offer a very competitive price. I highly recommend Hostgator and I would recommend the baby plan for unlimited domains – very cost effective. I host all my websites with this service. If you go for Hostgator, then
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Website Creation using WordPress
- Prose Theme – I spent a long time choosing a theme for this website… this was one of the best I found and was very compatible with all devices. The Prose Theme is run on a Genesis Framework in WordPress – that is just a fancy way of say it is very easy to edit all features without the need for specialist coding. Hence, why I chose it.
- WordPress – find lots of great info on the revolution that has brought us easy website design. If you go for a free theme – make sure you check out the support tickets. I have read many nightmare reports of difficulties with free themes.
Email Service Provider
This is pretty vital for any online business. There are typically two services that people consider initially (Aweber and GetResponse). I have accounts with both and I find that GetResponse has a better suite of features. But out of the suite of options, they are both excellent choices…and, I still use my Aweber account.
- GetResponse – has recently updated it features and is my auto-responder of choice.
- Aweber – also has a few updates, recently adding some new app interfaces. A great service provider and very popular.
Testing and Tracking
- Google Analytics: Google’s free website tracking and analytics tool. Really important for anyone with any type of website. I am a Google Analytics Fan. For even more powerful tracking use Google Link Tagging with Google Analytics.
Cool Free Tools
VIDEO
- Handbrake: One of the most efficient video compression software tools I have come across – it is simply awesome. I use this for all my videos and for all my webinars – it keeps the file sizes super small for good streaming and great delivery. It also makes zipping and downloading much easier and quicker. So all in all… if you “do” video… get it. Did I mention it’s free?
- Jing: Techsmith are a cool company and they produce cool paid products. Jing is a free snippet of this cool and it is very cool. You can screen grab stills or videos and either save them to your hard-drive or “cast” them over the web (here is an example screencast video recording [turn up your sound]). This has helped me no-end when dealing with support desks… just record the problem on screen with commentary and send the link via live chat. Super efficient! I use it every day.
- VLC: Very powerful video player software… get this and I bet you won’t find a video format it won’t play! I use this for pla
REMOTE ACCESS
- Teamviewer: If living in a cloud wasn’t enough. Now you are never away from your computer. This nifty software allows you remote access and control from one computer to another. It is possible to use your smart phone to wake up your sleeping laptop and to transfer data or to control your laptop from your phone. Now when I go camping I can still grab things from my laptop at home – how cool is that? (unless of course, you are going camping to get away from it all?).