Common Confusing Words In English [Infographic]

Everyone knows the problem with spell-check: your word might be spelled right, but it may be the wrong word. English is full of confusing words that sound alike but are spelled differently. It’s also full of words that share similar (but not identical) meanings that are easy to misuse. Below are some of the most commonly confused and misused words in English.

Let's face it, English can be confusing. A lot of words are similar but with different meanings, as a result it is almost impossible to avoid making mistakes in English, but if you can get your head around these explanations in the below infographic, you might be able to avoid making these ones or at least recognize them when you see them.

Source: www.grammarcheck.net

If Your Blog Were A Beer [Infographic]

It’s no secret the beer and blog markets are over-saturated these days, with every content and craft curator out there clamoring to generate enough hype to capture at least 30 seconds of their audiences’ (or customers’) dwindling attentions. But bear with us when we say this might actually be a good thing, since out of all the hundreds of millions of blogs and over 20,000 different kinds of beer out there, you can actually afford to be a little picky.

Labels may vary, but the taste is pretty much the same. Often found in red plastic cups. Some people live Miller Lite. They're brand loyal, just like some of your readers. But taste your last few posts. Do they read like a lot of other blogs? could they have been written by anyone? If your blog tastes like water, that's not a good thing. Your blog should sound like you. It should have a personality and style of its own.

Source : Visual.ly

SEO and PPC Practices In Online Market [Infographic]

SEO organic listings and sponsored/paid PPC listings both can place your site on the first page of Search engine result. Choosing PPC or SEO largely depends on your online marketing goals, the time slot in which you want to achieve them and also your budget. In other words, it can be said that if you need instant but not constant traffic, then go for PPC and If you need affordable and reliable traffic for long time, then go for SEO.

What’s SEO?

To put it simply, the process of acquiring top position in search engine result page in an organic manner is Search Engine Optimization. The best way to start SEO is to get your website created and content for the website added. Once you are done, you can start with your website optimization.

What’s PPC?

PPC ads are sold in an auction. Why? It is a paid form of internet advertising where advertisers pay for each click that directs the user to a dedicated website. You pay what you bid for a click on the ad. In other words, it can be said that popular Search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo allow business groups and individuals to buy listings in their organic search results by the way of specific targeted keywords.

Here is a self explanatory infographic recently published by infoshot, which we found to be useful as it explains the practices of SEO and PPC in online market.

Source : submitedge SEO

Recipe For A Perfect Blog Post - Google Effects [Infographic]

While throwing together the perfect blog post can feel intimidating, it’s as simple as memorizing a straightforward ingredient list, assembling it all with love, and giving it the time, space, and attention it needs to develop into something extraordinary.

Google has been dropping algorithm changes like hot potatoes, and it’s left many companies engaged in inbound marketing wondering just how they should move forward with their marketing strategies.

Congratulations! You’ve just assembled your perfect blog post! That wasn’t as hard as you thought, was it? Keep in mind that blog posts are very flexible, so you can repeat this recipe, trying out various lengths, topics, methods, and writing styles. Let's take another infographic and see how to make a perfect blog post with a different recipe.

Source : kunocreative & ExpressWriters

How To Increase Your Blog Traffic Using Online Tools

If you are blogging you should use some useful online tools.  These tools will help you to work on what to write about, how to write and how to rank on Google. Also it will help you promote your content over the web with a lot of useful suggestions. Using keywords play a big role in ranking a website. You should concentrate working on your SEO aspects which play a big role in attracting audience towards your blog. 

Here you go with your useful blogging tools for your blog. Click on the headings for each tools mentioned below to go to respective tool website.

1.  Google Keyword Planner :

You will need to have a Google AdWords account in order to use the Google Keyword Planner. If you don’t have one already, you can set one up here:

Google Keyword Planner provides a rough figure which shows number of monthly searches for particular keywords in particular countries or worldwide.  In fact this is not 100% accurate but it will give you a good amount of organic traffic for any keyword combinations.

This is the best tool in my opinion as there are a lot of keyword research tools and, although you may use more than one, you will generally end up still using Google Keyword Planner.

2. Seologies :

Google analyzes your article to understand what it is about.  Earlier you had options to include the keywords you wanted multiple times within your blog post and it was helping your content to rank higher in Google.  But now, Google analyzes all your content and it is also important to have related terms within your content, and it’s not just about over populating your content with keywords.

Seologies analyzes your content and gives you a percentage rating based on the keywords you should have to rank in search engines.  It will suggest some ‘expert vocabulary’ that can be included in your content that will help improve the relevance with the keywords you are using within it.

 3. Keywordtool.io:

One of the useful keyword research tools is keywordtool.io.  If you enter the keywords into this tool, it will show you hundreds of different, related, keyword combinations.  Even it will analyze and suggest you what Google thinks are related keywords by adding more keywords on to the existing keyword combination.

4. SEMRush :

SEMRush is another easy to use tool for keyword research. It crawls through Google search results and it pulls out the details where your competitors are ranking for keywords. It is also helpful in suggesting ideas for content. I prefer using this tool.

In case your competitor is ranking for particular keywords then you can also use those keywords in your content and try to get some of their traffic.

5.  HitTail :

HitTail analyzes your Google Webmaster Tools account and finds out the keywords that are driving traffic to your site. Later on it suggests some blog posts ideas you can write based on these.  Relevant keywords have the potential to drive good traffic to your site.

Suppose, Google sends you relevant traffic for some particular keywords but you don’t have a post based on those keywords. So in this case you will end up with less traffic. So obviously it makes sense that writing a blog post specifically based on those keywords will get you even more traffic.

6. Raven Tools :

It is a paid tool. If you want to go ahead and invest in an SEO tool then Raven Tools will be the best choice which is a compilation of SEO and social media tools all under a single platform.

Hope the above tools will help you find more audience for your blog. Use the tools properly so that the blog traffic will increase accordingly. 

How To Attract More Visitors To Your Blog Posts From Social Networks

Every blogger has the motive to attract more and more visitors to their blog or website. But how about the way getting from social media shares? How about the people share your posts over social media? Sounds great! Are you sure that the posts from your blog when shared on social media network do have proper description with an image so that people can click on the link easily?  Well, you need to always control the images that accompany your posts when they appear in status updates on Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+ because it is more likely that visitors will click on the shared link and re-share it.

How They Look On Each Social Platform :

It is very essential that you examine the social snippet looks while sharing on Facebook or Google+.

Facebook Social Snippet

The Facebook social snippet is a combination of the page title and image

Google+ Social Snippet

The Google+ social snippet also has a title, domain and image.

Here we have shown how it looks on different social media platforms :

How To Manage Social Snippets Looks :

This can be fixed easily by adding tags into the HTML code of your document. Try to add the appropriate tags so links to your content will show the right image in any status update. If you are comfortable using HTML codes, then follow the below steps :

1.  Adding Title and Meta Description Tags :

Include these two page elements into your blog as these two elements are used to show your post into Social Media:

<title>…</title>

<meta name=”description” content=”…” />

2.  Schema.org Micro formatting :

Schema.org has some common set of rules for most of the search engines and used for all the social media networks. You can control your social snippets, you’ll only need these tags:

<body itemscope itemtype=”http://schema.org/Product”>

<h1 itemprop=”name”>Interesting Headline</h1>

<img itemprop=”image” src=”{image-url}” />

<p itemprop=”description”>Thought provoking description</p>

</body>

3. Add Open Graph Protocol Tags :

Most of the social media sites use Open Graph standards for tagging content. So you can add tags to set the image in status updates:

<meta property=”og:image” content=”/image.jpg” />

Open Graph tags can also be used to set the title and description.

<meta property=”og:title” content=”…” />

<meta property=”og:description” content=”…” />

4. Add Use Image_SRC Meta Tags :

It is very useful if you can add image_src meta tag between the <head> and </head> tags to manage the images in social snippets.

<link rel=”image_src” href=”http://www.example.com/image.jpg” />

How Do You Manage These Tags ?

Here’s a quick guide showing how to put the tags into the right places :

If you are using WordPress then try the below plugins :

1. All in One Schema.org Rich Snippets Plugin:

It provides the control over tags for social snippets and also make your search listings look better when you rank in search engines.

2. WP Open Graph Plugin:

It also works like Schema.org plugin and the tool will add all of the Open Graph meta tags automatically.

3. Custom Image_Src Plugin:

For images appearing in social networks, this one is the best tool.  Create the image_src tag and this plugin will force Facebook to use image what you choose.

Note : You install the plugin and manage the tags from within WordPress. If you face any issue with Facebook sharing and you can also clear your Facebook cache using the Facebook URL Debugger.

Hope this effort will have an impact how your content appears in social media streams when it’s shared and we are very much sure that it will be able to receive a lot of clicks and shares gradually.

We would welcome your comment and suggestions if you have something to share.

Which Is The Best Blogging Platform

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How To Add "Thumbs Up" Rating Widget to Blogger

Star ratings are very common in use but recently we found JS kit that is having either using with a star rating look or setting it to "Thumbs Up!" Total number of thumbs up or thumbs down for each of your posts can be calculated and shown. We would recommend that you add it to your blogs to engage your readers more and increase your overall page views. Viewers for your blog would love to explore articles on your blog using this widget effectively.

Image Credit : Google

Follow the 7 steps to add Thumbs Up Rating Widget  to your blog:

1. Open particular Blog under Blogger 

2. Click on Edit HTML (Before that take a back up of your template)

3. Now search for

<data:post.body/>

4. Above the searched string, paste the code below:

<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == &quot;item&quot;'>
<div class='js-kit-rating' expr:path='data:post.url' expr:permalink='data:post.url' expr:title='data:post.title' view='score'>
</div>
</b:if>

In this way you can add Thumbs up widget just below your post titles. This widget will display only at post pages and not on homepage. If you wish to display it on homepage then simply delete the bolded lines. If you would instead like to add the Star ratings look/skin then simply delete view='score'.

5. Now search for

</body>

6. Above the searched string, paste the following code:

<script src="http://js-kit.com/ratings.js"></script>

7. Now save your template and all done!

Now users can visit any of your post and click the ratings to either Thumbs Up and Thumbs down the post.

How To Select Free Web Hosting For Your First Blog

Blogger or WordPress are basically the blogging platform where you launch and start blogging. But as you grow as a blogger on web and have published good amount of posts, it's time to move or opt for web hosting. The reason behind is that you will be now concentrating on earning from your blogs and mostly you need to pay attention to your blog readers. Here you need to switch to web hosting; it means you need to move your whole blog from Blogger or WordPress to some web hosting sites where you can manage your blogs and modify using coding which was not allowed in those blogging platform. Now you can choose a hosting domain from various hosting providers and that are offering a free service with premium features.

Most of the bloggers opt for a free hosting as they are not ready to invest for monthly fee or their blogs are not getting that much viewers. So overall you can get your blog on a platform where you can design and modify as you want.

Basic advantages of Free Web Hosting :

To host a blog free of cost is somehow saves money and somehow bloggers get the experience of web hosting. No monthly or annual fee is required for your domain to be hosted on web. If you want a domain name then you can go for a domain name with a small payment. 

We can line up some of the benefits of free web hosting:

1. No burden of paying the hosting company on monthly basis or yearly basis and no time frame is there.

2. Free web hosting companies do not limit your number of blogs to be hosted on their domains hence eliminating the option to think that you have a limitation. So you can create a second or third blog easily whenever you want.

3. Most of the free web hosting companies have similar features to that of premium web hosting with some useful features.

4. The basic features like cPanel, Website Builder, Email accounts are also available in free web hosting sites.

Well, now it's the time to move your blog to some free web hosting platforms mentioned below :
www.000webhost.com, www.free-webhosts.com, www.webs.com, www.x10hosting.com, www.freehostingeu.com, www.biz.nf, www.biz.ly
Please check the terms and conditions before you move to free hosting domains.

How To Increase Blog Visibility Using Google Plus

Google +1 Button is getting much popular like other named share buttons - F-like, Tweet etc. Nowadays, bloggers & publishers from different niche do prefer to use the +1 button on their websites. It is similar to Facebook's Like button. Like Facebook & Twitter it is also content sharing button for social networking users.

  Google's +1 button is helpful to get good search engine visibility because it can be found just below each and every URL in Google search results, where people can directly click on it and share on their social media.

It allows users to recommend content to their friends & acquaintances. +1 buttons on websites, are always in sync with the recommendations made for the same URL on Google search results. It makes Google search results even more socially shared by showing your recommendations to your friends and contacts.

Google +1 button is now very common and can be found on most of the websites. It allows a publisher to easily setup this new button along with the existing ones using simple code that can be generated from the Google +1 your website. Below is the screen shot explains how it looks. If you want the +1 code for your HTML file then please login to the site and get the code and paste it on your blog where you want it to appear.

Google with its leading publishers has put up the effort to give its +1 button a global exposure and publicity. The partners are Mashable ,The Huffington Post , Rotten Tomatoes, TechCrunch Reuters , The Washington Post , Best Buy , O’Reilly, Nordstro.

Google has always presented with its products a new format and there is no exception in +1 button too. It is a positive factor for search results even more helpful and relevant. And the reason why 1+ is leading among all the buttons is that it directly appears on the search result of Google without going to the particualr page we can use teh +1 feature benefits. It appears on top or the below of the posts with other social share buttons in blogs as shown in the below figure.

In this way, irrespective of niche different websites are using this button for its promotion and publicize throughout the web.

Hope you are also using the +1 button for your blog if not then please get it and share your post with the huge readers around the world. Let your readers share the your blogs with their networks.

How To Protect Your WordPress Blog

We very often hear that someone has hacked or stolen the Blog user information and get into it and made a lot of changes which result in providing the ownership to the hacker. But you can secure your blogs by following some security measures using WordPress security features.

Lets discuss on those 'Always' protection methods which will secure your WordPress blogs:

1. Always use latest WordPress version :

First and foremost thing you should is that update your WordPress to latest. If you are not using the the up-to-date version will cause a lot of trouble. Currently, the version is 2.3. So better to install the latest version and we need to keep track on the newest releases. Some releases were there recently for just security fixes like, SQL Injection. It may seem like doing a hectic job but in reality upgrading is really good for your blogs.

2. Always change your default password :

If you are using the same password provided via email to you at the time of installation to log into your wp-admin page then definitely we would suggest to change it now. Because the password provided is only 6 characters and it's alphanumeric. So there is a high possibility that your password may be hacked and you are in trouble. Better to avoid any kind of pain change the password to a complex string and keep more than 10 characters. DO NOT use words used in blog title, make it a nice mixture of letters, numbers, and special characters. One more thing you have to remember is that you should keep changing your password at the hosting site for your account login and the control panel logins, like cPanel. Make it a practice once in a month so your password will be secured. 

3. Always use SSH/Shell instead of FTP :

The most important and widely used option. We would say that this one is the best option among all as we all know that SSH is a secured method of accessing files. In any case, if someone gets your FTP login information (usually not encrypted and easy to get) then they can do modifications to your files and add spam to your site without your knowledge. So better disable FTP (recommended) and start using SSH. Yo uwill find everything is encrypted including the transfer of files,and of course the login. 

4. Always install LoginLock plugin :

Out of all available plugins, we would like to suggest you to use this plugin as this will automatically block the source IP address if somebody tries to log in your WordPress admin area after a certain number of attempts. LoginLock prevents spammers from continuously trying different combinations to crack your account password. It's the similar algorithm in which Windows works if you’re added in domain. LoginLock's locked out time is 1 hour default. 

5. Always create a blank index.html file in your /Plugins/ directory :

WordPress plugins folder is completely visible to anyone by going to http://www.domainname.com/wp-content/plugins. Go ahead and create a blank document in your favorite editor and save it as index.html and upload it to the plugins directory. Now when you try to access it, you only get a blank screen. This prevents hackers from finding out a security hole in one of your plugins. 

6. Always use .htaccess file to control access of wp-admin :
You can protect your WordPress admin folder by allowing access to it from a defined set of IP addresses. Everything else will bring up a Forbidden error message. In this case if you (only) access your blog from one or two places routinely, it’s worth implementing. Here you are supposed to create a new .htaccess file inside your wp-admin folder but do not replace the one at the root.

7. Always remove the version string from your header.php file :
It should be a normal practice to remove the version string so that in case you are running version 2.2 and the current release is 2.3, by default your blog always shows the used version i.e. 2.2 on every page and  here it will be very easy job for any hacker or spammer to crack into wp-admin.

8. Always block WP- folders from the search engines :
Needless to say this but sometimes we forget to do this. It is not required to have all of your Wordpress files to be indexed by Google. Therefore, the best thing would be blocking them in your robots.txt file. Add  Disallow: /wp-* to your list.

Hope the above steps will be useful to customize, maintain and protect your blogs. If you find some more additions to the above tips with more security measures which can be implemented for better protection of your blog, please share with us.

How To Manage Multiple Blogs Effectively

Well! If you are planning to start multiple blogs besides your one and only owned blog then–this post will help you in managing multiple blogs. May be as of now you are focusing on a single blog but if you start some new blog then that will gain some more interest for you introducing some new topics especially featuring exposure, credibility, recognition, and increased revenue.This is the usual thing for a blogger. 

In this post we will be discussing about managing multiple blogs without getting confused among them that which one to mange and when. Some of the mostly practiced tips are explained here to help you manage multiple blogs.

The following 10 tips and suggestions would be taken as normal practice for your blogging in reaching your goal.

1. Should be Realistic/Responsible in managing multiple blogs

Here  this decision will be solely taken by you as only you know when and how much time and effort you can give to your blogs with your day to day schedule.

We can line up some quick tips for you: a) amount of time you have for blogging,

b) writing style and speed,

c) regular update on each blog. 

What we always suggest that better go for a new first blog and on success of that start a second one. And gradually with the 2 blogs if time permits then continue adding another one. But only opening a new blog will not get a good response from web unless you concentrate, spend time and keep regular updates on it.

2. Blog niche - Selecting the right one 

This is the most important thing you should consider when opening a new blog. A lot of bloggers are mostly confused when they start a blog and consider a lot of things which include mainly the market demand. But we suggest you to go by your choice of interest and expertise on that. This will make your job easier because you have the capability as well as interest on that topic.

Here we must share some experience of building Poketors.com, we are basically concentrating on technology blogging  moreover the time we would like to gain tech news, updates, gadgets reviews, how-to guides & docs  and related events on internet. We started our blogs with multiple topics and tips and tricks in blogging, money making ideas and social media.

So once the bloggers started the blog they come to know about their interest and passion as time grows because time is the only thing which makes you realize the real fact. From multiple topics they choose their niche of blog. As a summary, if you write on the topics that you know well can also save time so that you can get engaged yourself in spending on research and attempting to know unfamiliar subjects that might become your niche of interest. 

3. List of  post topics for your multiple blogs 

This is actually on the basis of your blog's success on the area in which you have to keep ready with the new topics. Say, if your tech blog is getting much appreciation then you should research on that and you should get ready with the latest and unique posts which will be posted in future. Based on visitor's interest try new approaches to keep you blog fresh for both yourself and your readers. Moreover don't write a topic which will not be for any interest so whenever an idea strikes your mind note it down and write on it. 

4. Schedule your posting for each blog 

Know the frequency of your posting and based on that schedule it. Make a to-do list for each day in a week, which will keep you busy working on your blogs on regular basis rather than burdening on specific day, say: in weekend. It would be a great idea to create a writing schedule that will allow you to complete the desired posts with sufficient time to spare to keep you flexible in managing time.

5. Innovative and creative writing style

You should write on specific topics which will be unique, creative, and innovative. Moreover we can say that sometimes tech related topics become common but you should write it from your point of understanding. Never start writing apart from your niche and never force yourself to write on a topic just for the sake of posting an article. Write whenever you feel interested, inspired so your writing will be almost effortless and effective. Make the most of that interest by turning it to an opportunity to write an extra post or two everyday, which will boost up your interest for writing in your niche. Here you can get some extra posts at the end of each week, which will definitely motivate you writing some more.

6. Allow Guest Bloggers to post in your blog 

This practice is now widely followed and other bloggers will welcome the opportunity to write a post for your blog. We would suggest to do this free as in return of this,you will get some back-links to their own blogs, and also you can offer AdSense revenue sharing program to them, which will be some added interest for them too. Always take advantage of new guest bloggers.

7. Blog Editor's suggestions

You can hire some blog editor for your blog as they would love to work on reasonable rate. And once your blogs is established and your blog monetizes then you will be able to hire a Blog Editor from your income to manage your multiple blogs.

8. Form a network with co-Bloggers 

Try to explore the opportunity working with some regular co-bloggers who can share some of the responsibility for keeping your blogs updated on regular basis even if you are on vacation. You can offer a percentage of your Google AdSense ad revenues shares or in return write for the blogger's blog.

9. Have a single hosting account

Always have a single hosting account and host all your blogs in it. This will minimize your effort for opening multiple hosting accounts individually and managing each and every blog hosted on it.

10. Prioritize you blog

Make sure to prioritize your most important post get posted first. Because  that will be a milestone for your blogging and will boost up the numbers of readers.

Gradually you will be learning more and more on how to manager multiple blogs once you have multiple blogs and you have to maintain them as well.

Let's Start Blogging

Nowadays blogging has become one of the most preferred activity for the techies, IT professionals, doctors, film stars, film directors, politicians, school students and college-goers. The popularity and passion for blogging has influenced bloggers and has triggered a lot of budding bloggers and probloggers to boost up their interest in it and be a successful blogger. I can refer all of these bloggers as webmasters.

The hugely dominating field 'blogging' has its different platforms on which bloggers blog. Such as - Blogger, WordPress, Blog, TypePad, Tumblr, Live Journal and lot more. All the bloggers can see that a million of blogs being posted each day in different platforms. Maximum % of the bloggies community just blog as they have to write something or want to tell his/her friends, relatives that they also know blogging and what is the fun behind it. Couple of decades back also, people used to maintain diary and now also some people are still there who just want to be part of posting their life's snap shots and never care about who is reading it or not.

Bloggers must have the following prerequisites before they start blogging:

The Platform : Blogger has to choose the platform amongst a lot of available options in the web; like - Blogger, Wordpress, Blog, TypePad, Tumblr etc.

The Look And Feel : Blogger has to determine and fix a proper blog template from available various kind of sample template in the platforms. The look should be attractive and meaningful somewhat to your blogs. Using of different colors, styles make the blogs look professional and readable. If required you can change the template or style or you can also hire a designer who can design on behalf of you. So your readers can be more serious to your blogs.

The Content : The content should be fresh and the writing style should be unique. So that when the readers go through your blog they don't feel that the content is old one or copied from someone/some websites/blogs. Using simple words and simple presentation attract more readers. The writing style can make your blogs much more presentable and understandable. Not necessarily every blog should be liked by your readers and make them stay on your blogs. So, the more you post, the more chance you get to attract the eye of someone for related topics.

The Dedication : The most important thing for writing a good blog is dedication. You should be dedicated to your blog posts. You have to put in the time and effort to get very positive results. Dedication can hide the fact that you are a beginner and hence you need to put time and effort and update the posts regular basis. No matter how little experience you have, you can make your blogs successful with dedication.

I believe that the above four prerequisites are the basic needs for a blogger. Now its the time to start your own blog.