With so many web and graphic designers out there, getting the attention of potential clients and landing work can be a major challenge. The portfolio site is one of the most important assets for a designer, and an effective portfolio site will be an invaluable resource for keeping the business moving forward.

For many designers creating an attractive portfolio site is not the problem, getting people to see it is often much more of an issue. In order for the portfolio site to truly do it’s job it must be well-designed and it must attract the right types of visitors. In this post we’ll look at 15 things that you can do to increase the effectiveness of your portfolio site by getting more exposure for it.

1. Have a High-Quality Design for Your Portfolio Site

Not only is the quality of design of the items in your portfolio important, but the design of your portfolio site itself will also have a big impact on potential clients. Clients will expect a designer to have an attractive and usable site, otherwise they will question the work that the designer will be able to do for them.

When designing and coding your portfolio site be sure that it is getting all of the attention that it deserves. After all, it will be one of the most important aspects of your business, so it should not be rushed.

Impressive portfolio sites are great for encouraging visitors to contact you about their project, and they are also more likely to attract links and attention from other designers and bloggers.

2. Get Published in Web Design/CSS Galleries

There are hundreds, possibly even thousands, of gallery sites out there that exist for the purpose of showcasing beautiful websites. Having your site featured in a few of the more popular galleries will help it to attract attention from other galleries and design blogs, which can result in a flood of new visitors and a significant number of inbound links.

Getting your site featured in design galleries isn’t easy, but if you’ve done your best work with your portfolio site you’ll probably want to submit it to some galleries. Submitting to galleries can be rather time consuming, so you may want to consider a service like Gallery Rush that submits your site to a bunch of galleries for a relatively small fee of $17.

In addition to general design and CSS galleries, there are several that focus on showcasing the best portfolio sites, including:

• Folio Focus

• Pixel Perfect Portfolios

• Foliostars

3. Start a Blog

Possibly the best way to attract visitors to your portfolio site is to start a blog on the same domain. As you maintain the blog and publish new content your site will benefit from blog subscribers and repeat visitors, more content that can attract search engine traffic, increased ability to attract links, and a platform for showcasing your skills and expertise.

There are a number of different approaches that you can take with your blog. You may simply want to publish blog posts and content that will appeal to designers in attempt to increase your profile, build links, and establish the quality of your domain. You may want to publish case studies about your client work that will appeal to other designers who want to learn, as well as to potential clients who may be interested in knowing more about how you work. In this way you are able to use the blog to put a spotlight on your work, and hopefully the quality will lead to new clients. Or you could write posts that might answer questions that potential clients would have, or that would be optimized to be found in search results for queries of potential clients.

One of the most important benefits of blogging was mentioned briefly, and that is link building. If your portfolio site includes only a few pages of content (for example, a home page, portfolio page, about page, contact info page), it will be pretty difficult to attract any kind of significant search engine traffic. However, with a blog you will be drastically increasing the amount of content on the site, and that content will be much more likely to draw links from other blogs and from social media sites. Having a blog that attracts links will give your site/blog a chance to rank well for long tail search phrases, and in time your site should receive exponentially more search traffic than it would without the blog.

4. Pursue Freelance Blogging

In addition to publishing posts on your own blog, writing for other blogs also presents some great opportunities. Whether you are writing free guest posts or freelancing with larger design blogs that pay for contributions, you’ll usually receive an author bio at the end of the post that can include a link to your own site, and you’ll also be building up your name recognition.

Major design blogs like Smashing Magazine, Webdesigner Depot, and Six Revisions accept articles from designers and developers, and they pay for published articles. Aside from the larger blogs that pay contributors, writing free guest posts for smaller blogs can also be an excellent way to build links and gain exposure.

5. Build it to Be Search Engine Friendly

If you’re just starting your portfolio site it is unlikely that you’ll get more than a handful of search engine visitors for a while. But if you build the site to be friendly to search engines and if you work on publishing quality content on your blog and attracting links from other sites, you will be in a good position to see that search engine traffic rise over a period of time.

Having a search engine friendly website simply means that it is built to make it easy for search engine spiders to crawl the site and to determine what it is about, and to have a chance to rank well. It involves proper coding, use of page titles and headers, proper site structure, etc. (For a more detailed look at the subject see How to Create Search Engine Friendly Websites.)

6. Participate in Social Networking

Social media and social networking sites present opportunities to attract visitors to your portfolio site or blog, as well as to connect with other designers and build your professional network.

For getting visitors to your blog there are a number of niche-specific sites that are excellent alternatives to major social news sites like Digg. If you’re looking to reach a targeted audience of designers and developers try sites like:

• Design Bump

• Design Float

• DZone

• The Web Blend

• Design Related

• FAQ Pal

Aside from news/voting sites, there are excellent opportunities available to showcase work from your portfolio at networking sites like:

• Behance

• deviantART

• Flickr

• Carbonmade

7. Be Active on Twitter

Twitter is extremely popular with designers, so if you are looking for a place to connect with others you really should be active on Twitter (find us at @Vapvarun). In terms of getting visitors from Twitter, you can share tweets with links to your blog posts, or tweet links to recently completed projects, or even projects that are in process when you are looking for feedback. Like any other type of social networking, you must genuinely become a part of the community of users in order to have much impact for yourself. If it seems that you are only there for self promotion and not to interact, users will notice and the positive impacts will be minimal.

8. Distribute Freebies

Everyone love freebies. As a designer you can give away free templates, Photoshop brushes, PSD files, vectors, textures, icons, or just about any other type of resource that can be used for design. Giving items away can help to draw new visitors to your site, and maybe they’ll check out your portfolio while they are there. Freebies are also good for building links from other blogs and social media sites, and just as importantly, it gives you an opportunity to show your quality of work to the world. Just because you are giving it away for free doesn’t me that it can’t help to make you land clients or make money, so be sure that whatever you are giving away is up to your level of quality.

In addition to giving away freebies from your own site, you can also produce items to be given away at other sites and blogs, which may help to give some added exposure to your work. Many design blogs work with various designers to produce freebies to give to their readers. If you’re hoping to get your work noticed by a large audience, this may be a great opportunity.

9. Do Interviews

Designers are frequently asked to do interviews for blogs or for students. Although it will take some of your time to do the interview, they are great for getting exposure to new people and for allowing others to get to know more about you. Most people like to work with others that they know and like, so it can even sometimes lead to new clients. Even if it doesn’t lead to a new client, the interview is likely to include a link to your portfolio site and it may even include some screenshots of your work.

10. Join Flickr Groups for Showcasing Your Work

Flickr groups present an opportunity to showcase your work to others, and to receive feedback on your design. There are plenty of Flickr groups that focus on web and/or graphic design (this post is old but much of it is still relevant – 99 Flickr Groups for Design Inspiration). While these groups are unlikely to send a rush of traffic to your site, it is a supplementary way to showcase your work and draw a smaller number of visitors.

11. Design for a High-Profile Client

Some designers have been able to get valuable exposure by designing a site for a high-profile client. In situations where the designer is not yet established, the project will often need to be done for a discounted rate or even for free, but the resulting exposure may more than make up for it.

It’s not rare for clients to ask for a free website in exchange for the “exposure” that you’ll get from it, and in 99% of cases it’s not worth it. However, there may be situations, such as designing a custom theme for a very popular blog, where real exposure could justify a discounted or free service. If you agree to this be sure that you know specifically what type of exposure you will be getting. Are they simply giving you a link in the footer or are they publishing a review of your design services on the blog?

12. Run a Pay-Per-Click Ad Campaign

PPC ads are a great option because they can work with just about any budget, they can be highly targeted, and they can be turned on and off at will. When you’re looking for some new projects you can set up a PPC campaign, and you can even target only local clients if you’d like. You set the maximum amount that you are willing to spend on a daily or monthly basis, and you’ll start reaching some potential clients that are looking for what you have to offer. When things pick up and you are not looking for work you can easily pause the campaign and then restart it when you need more work.

13. Have a Memorable Business Card

Although most of the methods that we have covered in this post involve online marketing or promotional efforts, it is still possible to draw visitors to your site from offline methods. Most designers have business cards that they give out to people that they meet here and there, and hopefully they lead to some business. Having a memorable and attractive business card will help you to stand out and give you a better chance of being the designer that is contacted by the potential client.

14. Sell Templates/Themes

More and more designers are generating income by selling premium WordPress themes or HTML/CSS templates. Selling themes or templates doesn’t have to be your only source of income, they are also great for picking up work from customers who want to get some customizations done to the theme or template. Adding some quality themes or templates for sale from your portfolio site can help to generate interest in your services, in addition to making some money from the sales.

15. Leave Comments on Other Blogs

Another way to attract visitors to your site is by leaving comments on other blogs. Instead of leaving links to your site in the body of your comment, which can lead to your comment being marked as spam or deleted, leave a thoughtful, intelligent comment and provide your URL in the proper field when entering the comment (almost all blogs allow you to leave a URL). No one comment is likely to generate a huge amount of traffic to your site, but if you are leaving a lot of comments that provide useful information and are relevant to the posts/blogs where you are commenting, it can result in a decent number of targeted prospects entering your site.

What’s Your Experience?

If you have a portfolio site, what have you found to be especially effective for gaining exposure, visitors, and new clients?

Have you noticed how easy non-writers think writing is? When you’re a writer that can be frustrating.

There are three main things about writing that make it lack the social proof people expect of professional activities.

• It’s intangible – Many people don’t seem to consider writing a proper job, maybe because often writers type away for days with apparently little to show for it. Yes, there may be the occasional article in a newspaper, possibly even a published book you can actually show people. But even then that small book, an object you can hold in one hand, isn’t a good indication of the many hours, months or possibly years of work that went in to actually writing it.
• It’s unpaid – This is true even of successful, established and published writers, people like Zen Habits and Write to Done founder Leo Babauta who still regularly give away his writing on his own blogs and elsewhere. Many writers have blogs they write unpaid and if you’re not paid for something then other people tend to see it as a hobby and an unnecessary indulgence when for most writers creating a blog is a carefully planned career move.
• It’s intellectual – People see hard work as being physical like laboring, or stressful like being a fighter pilot. They don’t realize the kind of mental determination that writing calls for, the inner motivation that’s required to get you writing and keep you going until you actually finish the work.

No wonder writers often struggle with motivation.

Writing is a common dream for people. Yet most people who dream about writing don’t actually do it. Some of them hardly even read. Meanwhile writers who do actually earn a living from their work still struggle to stay motivated and keep writing.

Faced with all this opposition, both external and internal, how can we motivate ourselves to get writing and keep at it?

Here are six ideas that work :

1. Get motivated
   Accept responsibility for you own actions. Acknowledge that you’re the only person who can do this. That if you don’t glue your backside to the chair and first start, then finish writing your article or book, no one else is going to do it for you.
2. Create tight imaginary deadlines for yourself to spur you on.
   Try pretending you only have one hour to write today and that can be a good incentive to get on with it. Or ask yourself what you’d start or finish writing if you only had a month to live.I motivated myself to write a 70,000 word manuscript by telling myself that if I didn’t write it that year I never would. These scare tactics do work and best of all no one has to die in the process.
3. Commit to your writing.
   Work out how much time you can give to your writing and when. Schedule it in your diary it. Make it a part of your routine and keep at it until it becomes a true habit.Now stay focused. If it’s a book you need to be able to maintain your focus for months. For a shorter piece like a blog post or an article you need to focus for one or two hours.
4. Remove all distractions.
   You know what they are. Unplug the phone, turn off your router, find a place where you can write away oblivious to the household duties which are being neglected.Try using a kitchen timer to keep you seated and writing. Set the timer for an hour and write away. When the time’s up have a five minute break then repeat until the piece is finished.
5. Use motivational tools.
   Don’t dismiss Twitter as a waste of time waster or, at best, a simple networking tool. I’ve found it a powerful way to motivate myself and other people. It surprised me too but here’s how it happened.I followed a well known novelist and journalist called John Birmingham @johnbirmingham on Twitter.I noticed that he constantly tweeted how many words he’d written on a project and how many he was about to write. He’s prolific and his word count put me to shame so I decided to try his tactic and see if it helped me.First thing in the morning, I’d tweet:”Three jobs: edit chap two of fiction manuscript, finish short story for the competition, write blog post for Get In the Hot Spot.”Then I made updates on my progress via Twitter, as the day went on, such as:”Chapter two edited and looking good. About to update my blog now. Hope you’ve had a productive morning too.”

   I know this sounds ridiculously simple and unnecessary too, but if it works as a motivational tool, that has to be a good thing.

6. Try co-motivation
   Sometimes on Twitter I’ve challenge other writers or bloggers to a word race if I know they’re in the same boat as me. As we both write more than we would have otherwise, we both end up winning. I’ve found that innocent bystanders who’ve seen my word count tweets are motivated and inspired by that just as I was by John Birmingham.This type of motivation even has a proper name. Appropriately enough for writers it’s called “bookmarking”.

   Basically, you tell someone your goal and then update them regularly on your progress. It may be a friend, but it can be anyone, and it can also be done on the phone, with a text message, face to face, or on Twitter where you don’t even need anyone specific to report too.One brilliant side-effect of this is that as well as John Birmingham motivating himself and me, my progress reports have motivated other people too.

   One man told me that my tweets about writing and my word count have inspired him to start writing again. Another Australian writer Peter Moore @travdude who’s published six travel books, emailed me saying”I’m impressed that you’re knocking out those kind of numbers in a family environment.”

Final word on motivation

Who cares if writing’s intangible, unpaid and misunderstood? We mark our progress in words written and don’t worry that most of them will be removed in the end. We pay ourselves a favor each time we put pen to paper and practice our craft. We wage a war against lassitude and writer’s block on a daily basis and we win.

We just sit down to write no matter how hard it is, because no one else can write it like us.

How do you start writing and stick to it even though it’s easier not to? Please share your tips in the comments.

On the Internet it’s just the same as in real life ~ if you spend time with positive, inspiring people, you’ll be motivated to improve yourself and work harder.

Brrng, Brrng! Got to go now, the timer’s ringing. Have a super duper and highly productive day everyone.

Annabel Candy writes about self improvement at Get In the Hot Spot. She runs a web design company with her husband and manages to stay mostly focused on her writing despite the general mayhem created by their three children. To have as word count race or boast about how much you’ve written, tweet her @inthehotspot

The Power of Linking is often Overlooked

Although these concepts mentioned in the first paragraph are important there are actually many more incredibly important SEO factors involved that most bloggers and webmasters are overlooking. In fact, the vast majority of bloggers fail to realize the powerful impact that links have on the strength of their articles in the search engines results pages.

Links are powerful. Links from other websites, links from other articles on your site, and even outbound links from your site can massively impact Google’s view of your online authority. With this in mind, move forward and develop a strategy that makes use of this information and watch what can happen when you focus on building stronger SEO.

A Powerful Linking Strategy for Stronger SEO

Below you’ll find the linking strategy that I’ve adopted for Site Sketch 101 and I’ve been seeing explosive results. I’m not an expert on SEO and I won’t pretend to be, but I can boldly proclaim that I’m enjoying awesome success and tons of traffic from search engines and I believe whole-heartedly that you can also.

1. Improve the quality of outbound links

Google’s director of spam control, Matt Cutts, has made it very clear that outbound links are in fact used to determine the quality and relevancy of a page. Links that point to warez, piracy, pornography, cash advance and other shady sites do degrade the authority of the linking website.

If you’re caught linking to a site that defies Google’s terms of service then you can actually find yourself feeling the negative impact of the decisions that another webmaster made at their site.

This is, in fact, the number one reason that people employ the Nofollow tag in their comments sections. They don’t do it to deprive those who comment of precious Page Rank link juice. They do it to protect themselves from the painful consequences of linking to a low quality or spammy websites.

2. Massively increase high quality internal links

Take a moment to dig through any article on Wikipedia. For that matter, simply browse through this article and notice the large number of internal links throughout the content that use anchor text that is relevant to the article being linked.

Wikipedia is able to show off internal pages with average Page Ranks of 6 and 7 and they’re able to be listed at the top of search engine listings for thousands of search terms. Part of the reason that they’re able to accomplish that is simply due to the large number of internal links that point to each article.

Matt Cutts has made it very clear that Google prefers links that are in the content and that they value them very highly. Filling your content with relevant links to other great articles is a great way to pump the value of the pages on your site.

3. Increase high quality inbound links

Everyone agrees that building an army of inbound links is one of the most effective ways to demonstrate to Google, Yahoo, and Bing that your site is an authority in its niche. Yet too often bloggers forget that not all links are created equally. Here’s a few concepts to keep in mind when determining how important a particular inbound link is for your site.

• Quality: Is the site that’s linking to you an authority or is it an obscure website hiding in the corner of the internet with little or no influence?
• Relevancy: Is the site that’s linking to you providing relevant information to your content or is it random and likely confusing to readers and search engines?
• Anchor Text: Is the site that’s linking to you using your keyword as the anchor text for the link or does it use generic links like click here.
• Quantity: Are you building up more high quality inbound links than other sites who are trying to rank on similar keywords?

More and more people these days are looking for new and innovative ways to drive traffic to their websites. If you too are looking to do the same, try forum participation to lure people into visiting your site.

To begin with, you will need to find out some relevant forums that promote or talk about products or services that you deal with. It always pays to have a focus on the type of traffic that you want to attract. Since many web surfers surf casually, attracting them won’t serve your purpose as such people are likely to leave the site in a hurry. What’s more, since these casual surfers are usually not performing an intentional search to look for a product or solve a problem, they are unlikely to dig deeper into your site even after they have landed there. So, it pays to take time and make a list of potential forums that can give you targeted traffic.

While short listing forums, consider the membership size and the level of active member participation. Though people often tend to go for bigger forums, there are some smaller forums that are more intimate and tight knit. So, decide for yourself if you want to be a no one in a big group or a big fish in a little pond. Another point to note is how active other members are in responding to the queries or posts by members of the community. If you find many forum posts with high viewer ship but few responses, this may be the sign of a closed clickish forum. However, it could also mean that more active members are required, a need that you can fill.

Once you have got your list, create accounts in these forums and start posting interesting posts or comments on the existing threads. Most forums need you to have a minimum number of posts or activity before you can start your own thread. So, be patient and work carefully in the initial phases as spamming or commenting without adding anything meaningful to the discussion may get you into trouble. This initial phase is important to build your credibility and get noticed by the other forum participants. If you can do this right, you will soon have a following on such forums who will take note overtime you write or post comments. What’s more, these people are likely to use the website link in your signature to check out your site and may even become your clients.

By getting backlinks from quality and relevant forums, you can increase your link credibility, which in turn will help you to have high search engine rankings. Some forums even have experts as participants where you can get your queries, if any, answered and know about some time-tested tips and ticks.

In brief, forum participation can not only give you some useful insight into your own niche but even help you get traffic and a better search engine ranking for your website. So, join the league and start using this tool to take your business to newer heights.

Following are all the blog search engines, directories, and web-based RSS aggregators I could find, along with brief instructions on getting your site listed. I’m sure I missed something so use the ‘comments’ for any updates.

New: Big List of International Blog Search Engines

In alphabetic order:

Name: 2RSS
URL: http://www.2rss.com/
Description:RSS Feed Directory
Add your blog here: On front page
Note: Requires RSS Feed

Name: Bligz
URL: http://www.blizg.com/
Description:Focus on "Metadata"
Add your blog here: On front page
Note: Two step-process where you have to "Ping" site once listed

Name: Blogarama
URL: http://www.blogarama.com/
Description:Small search engine
Add your blog here: http://www.blogarama.com/index.php?show=add

Name: Blogdex
URL: http://www.blogdex.net/
Description: Hot topics listing and search engine
Add your blog here: http://blogdex.net/add.asp
Note: Requires email confirmation

Name: Blogdigger
URL: http://www.blogdigger.com/
Description: Small search engine
Add your blog here: http://www.blogdigger.com/addFeedForm.jsp
Note: Need RSS feed

Name: Bloghop
URL: http://www.bloghop.com/search.htm
Description: Small search engine
Add your blog here: http://www.bloghop.com/addblog.htm

Name: Bloglines
URL: http://www.bloglines.com/
Description: Search and aggregate RSS feeds
Add your blog here: No submission process, users add feeds they wish to track

Name: Blogmatrix
URL: http://www.blogmatrix.com/
Description: Blog tool provider, offers search as well
Add your blog here: http://www.blogmatrix.com/join

Name: Blogrunner
URL: http://www.blogrunner.com/
Description: Hot topics listing and search engine
Add your blog here: http://www.blogrunner.com/docs/partners-register.html
Note: Some sore of revenue share program going on

Name: Blogsearchengine
URL: http://www.blogsearchengine.com/
Description: Blog search engine
Add your blog here: http://www.blogsearchengine.com/add_link.html

Name: Blogstreet
URL: http://www.blogstreet.com/search.html
Description: Metasearch
Add your blog here: http://www.blogstreet.com/bin/add.cgi

Name: Blogtastic
URL: http://www.blogstreet.com/search.html
Description: Metasearch
Add your blog here: http://www.blogstreet.com/bin/add.cgi

Name: Blogvision
URL: http://www.blogvision.com/
Description: Small search engine
Add your blog here: Doesn’t appear to be any way to add a site

Name: Blogwise
URL: http://www.blogwise.com/
Description: Categorized Blog search
Add your blog here: http://www.blogwise.com/submit

Name: Bloogz
URL: http://www.bloogz.com/
Description: Blog search engine
Add your blog here: http://www.bloogz.com/man_en/add_your_url.php

UPDATED! Name: Boogieplay
URL: http://www.boogieplay.com/
Description: Blog search engine with audio and video content
Add your blog here: Doesn’t appear to be any way to add a blog.

Name: Daypop
URL: http://www.daypop.com/
Description: News oriented search
Add your blog here: http://www.daypop.com/info/submit.htm
Note: Requires your site to be "frequently updated"

Name: Eatonweb
URL: http://portal.eatonweb.com/
Description: Blog search engine
Add your blog here: http://portal.eatonweb.com/add.php

Name: Fastbuzz
URL: http://www.fastbuzz.com/
Description: Search and aggregate RSS feeds
Add your blog here: http://www.fastbuzz.com/channels/insert_public.jsp

Name: Feedster
URL: http://www.feedster.com/
Description: Blog search engine using RSS feeds
Add your blog here: http://www.feedster.com/add.php
Note: Need RSS feed

Name: Get Linked
URL: http://fried-spaghetti.com/links/
Description: Small search engine
Add your blog here: http://fried-spaghetti.com/cgi-bin/links/add.cgi

Name: Globeofblogs
URL: http://www.globeofblogs.com/
Description: Blog search engine
Add your blog here: Click "Register" in upper-right corner of front page
Note: Strange site, requires extensive classification of blogs

Name: LocalFeeds.com/GeoURL
URL: http://www.localfeeds.com/ , http://www.geourl.org/
Description: Blogs and headlines by geographic region. GeoURL is by lat/longitude while LocalFeeds is by ZIP or country.
Add your blog here: http://www.geourl.org/add.html (for both)
Note: Complex instructions, you must edit your blog’s meta tags prior to submission.

NEW! Name: Memigo
URL: http://www.memigo.com/
Description: Customized news portal
Add your blog here: http://www.memigo.com/feed

Name: NewsIsFree
URL: http://www.newsisfree.com/
Description: Search for RSS feeds
Add your blog here: http://www.newsisfree.com/contact.php

Name: Pepys
URL: http://pepys.akacooties.com/
Description: Geographically categorized blogs
Add your blog here: http://pepys.akacooties.com/cgi-bin/links2/add.cgi

Name: Popdex
URL: http://www.popdex.com/
Description: Hot topics listing and search engine
Add your blog here: http://www.popdex.com/addsite.php
Note: "Fast Track" if you link to Popdex

Name: RDF Ticker
URL: http://www.anse.de/rdfticker/findchannels.php
Description: Search and aggregate RSS feeds
Add your blog here: http://www.anse.de/rdfticker/addchannel.php

Name: Read A Blog
URL: http://www.readablog.com/
Description: Blog Search Engine
Add your blog here: http://www.readablog.com/AddFeed.aspx

Name: Rootblog
URL: http://www.rootblog.com/
Description: RSS Aggregator
Add your blog here: http://http://www.rootblog.com/Ping/
Note: Can also be pinged automatically with every post.

Name: RSSFeedsDirectory
URL: http://rss-feeds-directory.com/directory/
Description: RSS Directory
Add your blog here: Not clear

Name: Search4Blogs
URL: http://www.search4blogs.com/
Description: Blog Directory
Add your blog here: WIthin each category
Note: A lot of adult blogs.

Name: Search4RSS
URL: http://www.search4rss.com/
Description: RSS Search Engine
Add your blog here: Not available, must be added by site owners.

Name: Sindic8
URL: http://www.syndic8.com/
Description: Search and aggregate RSS feeds
Add your blog here: http://www.syndic8.com/suggest.php?Mode=data
Note: Need RSS feed

Name: Technorati
URL: http://www.technorati.com/
Description: Index of links between millions of blogs
Add your blog here: http://www.technorati.com/ping.html
Note: Programmatic interface available as well.

NEW! Name: Waypath
URL: http://www.waypath.com/
Description: Keyword searches and "find similar" searches
Add your blog here: Automatically adds blogs through a spidering process.

NEW! Name: Zopto
URL: http://www.zopto.com/
Description: Index of links between millions of blogs
Add your blog here: No submission process, Zopto indexes all pings to blo.gs into a search engine.

The traffic rank is based on three months of aggregated historical traffic data from millions of Alexa Toolbar users and is a combined measure of page views and users (reach). As a first step, Alexa computes the reach and number of page views for all sites on the Web on a daily basis.

The main Alexa traffic rank is based on the geometric mean of these two quantities averaged over time (so that the rank of a site reflects both the number of users who visit that site as well as the number of pages on the site viewed by those users)

Ways to Increase your Alexa Rank

Here is a collection of methods you can use to boost your Alexa Rank. Most of these tips are derived from several fellow webmasters I know who claimed to have derived positive results through their experiments with the Alexa Rankings.

Some of the other tips were derived articles and sources, which I have duly referenced at the end of this post.

Do these tips work? According to some, yes they definitely do work. But do note that most of them require active effort of some sort and hence, they will work as long as long as you are consistently performing specific actions.

To increase your Alexa rank in the long run, I would highly recommended that one focus on developing quality content which attracts and maintains a large audience instead of purely focusing on artificially increasing your Alexa Rank.

Great link-worthy content will leads to an natural increase in site traffic and is an excellent way to passively increase your Alexa rank.

It is important to emphasize that you should devote most of your efforts in growing your site audience alongside integrated implementation of any of the following tips below.

1. Install the Alexa toolbar or Firefox’s Search Status extension and set your blog as your homepage. This is the most basic step.
2. Put up an Alexa rank widget on your website. I did this a few days ago and receive a fair amount of clicks every day. According to some, each click counts as a visit even if the toolbar is not used by the visitor.
3. Encourage others to use the Alexa toolbar. This includes friends, fellow webmasters as well as site visitors/blog readers. Be sure to link to Alexa’s full explanation of their toolbar and tracking system so your readers know what installing the toolbar or extension entails.
4. Work in an Office or own a company? Get the Alexa toolbar or SS Firefox extension installed on all computers and set your website as the homepage for all browsers. Perhaps it will be useful to note that this may work only when dynamic or different IPs are used.
5. Get friends to review and rate your Alexa website profile. Not entirely sure of its impact on rankings but it might help in some way.
6. Write or Blog about Alexa. Webmaster and bloggers love to hear about ways to increase their Alexa rank. They’ll link to you and send you targeted traffic (i.e. visitors with the toolbar already installed). This gradually has effects on your Alexa ranking.
7. Flaunt your URL in webmaster forums. Webmasters usually have the toolbar installed. You’ll get webmasters to visit your website and offer useful feedback. It’s also a good way to give back to the community if you have useful articles to share with others.
8. Write content that is related to webmasters. This can fall in the category of domaining and SEO, two fields in which most webmasters will have the Alexa toolbar installed. Promote your content on social networking websites and webmaster forums.
9. Use Alexa redirects on your website URL.Leave this redirected URL in blog comments as well as forum signatures. This redirect will count a unique IP address once a day so clicking it multiple times won’t help. There is no official proof that redirects positively benefit your Alexa Rank, so use with caution.
10. Post in Asian social networking websites or forums. Some webmasters have suggested that East Asian web users are big Alexa toolbar fans, judging by the presence of several Asia-based websites in the Alexa Top 500. I suggest trying this only if you have the time or capacity to do so.
11. Create a webmaster tools section on your website. This is a magnet for webmasters who will often revisit your website to gain access to the tools. Aaron Wall’s webpage on SEO Tools is a very good example.
12. Get Digg or Stumbled. This usually brings massive numbers of visitors to your website and the sheer amount will have a positive impact on your Alexa Rank. Naturally, you’ll need to develop link worthy material.
13. Use Pay per Click Campaigns. Buying advertisements on search engines such as Google or Exact Seek will help bring in Traffic. Doubly useful when your ad is highly relevant to webmasters.
14. Create an Alexa category on your blog and use it to include any articles or news about Alexa. This acts as an easily accessible resource for webmasters or casual search visitors while helping you rank in the search engines.
15. Optimize your popular posts. Got a popular post that consistently receives traffic from the search engines? Include a widget/graph at the bottom of the post, link to your Alexa post or use Alexa redirection on your internal URLs.
16. Buy banners and links for traffic from webmaster forums and websites. A prominent and well displayed ad will drive lots of webmaster traffic to your website, which can significantly boost your rank.
17. Hire forum posters to pimp your website. Either buy signatures in webmaster forums or promote specific articles or material in your website on a regular basis. You can easily find posters for hire in Digital Point and other webmaster forums.
18. Pay Cyber cafe owners to install the Alexa toolbar and set your website as the homepage for all their computers. This might be difficult to arrange and isn’t really a viable solution for most. I’m keeping this one in because some have suggested that it does work.
19. Use MySpace . This is a little shady so I don’t recommended it unless you’re really interested in artificially inflating your Alexa Rank. Use visually attractive pictures or banners and link them to your redirected Alexa URL. This will be most effective if your website has content that is actually relevant to the MySpace Crowd.

Here are some methods to increase traffic to your blog or website. Some of these techniques will help increase sales as well as hits.
1. Have Your Own Domain – If you use WordPress or blogger, try to avoid using sub-domains or free hosting services. Pay for some web hosting and get your own unique domain name. This will make your website more memorable and encourage visitors to return.
2. Create a Professional and Unique Design with Logo – Code your own template or modify an existing theme for your site or blog. What makes your blog so special if it looks the same as 1000 others on the Internet? Make sure you have a great memorable logo so when people see it; they know it’s your websites. Your design should be clean and simple so it’s easy to navigate. Once you have made it, test it and check everything works, a site with errors will lose visitors.
3. Content is King – You need to consistently write great content on your blog or website. The posts that you make need to be worth reading and have some impact on the visitor. If I am visiting your website for the first time, I want to be impressed and bookmark your website so I return to see what else you compose.
4. Post Linking – When a link is made to your blog from another blog, if activated, it places a link in that blogs comments back to the relevant post. This will help increase back links to your blog and therefore increase traffic.
5. Personality – Do not pretend to be someone you are not as a blogger. Be yourself and do not act otherwise. This is best because your readers want someone to connect with, someone who is a real person and not just a blog with no face.
6. Always Room for Improvement – Always strive to improve your blog or site any way you can. Play around with ad placement, colours and graphics and other features to make your blog more appealing. Ask for reviews to find area’s for improvement.
7. Reply to Your Readers – This means replying to comments and any e-mails that you receive. This is part of your personality and showing that you are a real person who exists and cares about the topic you are blogging about.
8. Real Posts – Ensure that you sound human in your posts. Do not post in the third person. Use words such as “I” and talk about your personal experiences.
9. A Picture – A picture paints a thousand words so why not show your readers who is writing the blog. Upload an image of yourself onto your about page, or if you are not quite comfortable to do that then have a cartoon of yourself made.
10. Comment on Other Blogs – This is a very powerful technique, I know I find myself clicking the link to a person’s website after I have read their comment and this is what you can achieve by leaving your comment on as many other blogs as possible. Blogs that are about the same topic will help you get targeted traffic. Ensure your comment is worth reading and not just a load of rubbish.
11. Question Your Readers – Ask your readers questions in posts, this will help to provoke a response from them. You give them an important role to play and they respond by commenting their opinion. This will encourage repeat visitors to respond to your posts with their opinions.
12. Internal Linking – Linking to previous posts that you have made will create more back links and also encourage readers to re-read or look at some of your older work. Readers of a particular post will be interested in related posts so ensure you link to them.
13. Alternate Text Images – When you use images on your site, ensure that you use alternate text “alt” tags to insert keywords or the name of the image. This will help get the images listed on image search engines and result in traffic from that source.
14. Submit to Directories – Submit your site to online directories. Do this to as many as you can to improve your PageRank. This increased back links to your website and there for you receive higher rankings on search engines. Quality back links are important so try and obtain some from high Page Ranking sites that have similar content to your websites.
15. Image Use – Try to use images when posting on your blog. These make posts more fun to look at and can break up boring text.
16. Join Forums – Join many forums and message boards that are related to your websites content. Place a link back to your website in your profile and signature and frequently post useful information to other members.
17. Keyword Rich Content – When writing articles or posts on your site or blog, ensure you include relevant keywords so that people searching for the topic will have an easier time finding your article.
18. Write Intriguing Post Titles – Ensure that you write intriguing post titles that have keywords in. This is what is going to show up on search engines so ensure your spelling is right and that you would want to click it.
19. Meta Data – Get as much use out of Meta data as you can. Try to have a different page description and keywords on every page of your website.
20. Write a Press Release – Write a press release about something to do with your website and publish this on news sites or press release websites along with sites that are relevant to your niche.
21. Merchandise – Create pens, pencils, t-shirts, mouse mats etc that have your websites logo and address on. Maybe sell the t-shirts from your website however give you the free pens in your local area.
22. Advertise Locally – Place an advert in your local business newsletter or in a local shop. List what the purpose of your website is and hopefully you will receive some interest. Local traffic can really help especially if you are selling something. Visitors will be much more inclined to purchase from someone locally than from the other site of the world.
23. Share a Secret – It is likely that your website will be based on something you have an interest in, so why not share some inside knowledge that many of your readers may not know. Let them know something that has helped you and only you in the past. Curiosity is a marvellous thing.
24. Advert Experiments – Naturally most will want to make some money from their website and therefore adverts will be on there. Try and experiment with your adverts placement to see which gets better results. Do not overload your website with adverts because this will deter visitors. Maybe implement a membership system that removes 50% of adverts when logged in.
25. Social Bookmark Posts Plugin – If you have a blog then get a plugin for your posts that allows your readers to click a button and this will then bookmark your site on digg, stumbleupon, reddit etc. 
26. Ask for Diggs – There is no harm is asking your readers to Digg posts that you have written. This will help increase the number of dig users visiting your website.
27. Ask for Comments – Ask your visitors in your posts to post their comments about the post. If you are not getting as many comments as you would like then anything is worth a try. 
28. Ask for Subscriptions – While asking for comments you may was well ask for other things such as subscriptions to your RSS feed. Ensure there is a big button that can be clicked that allows subscriptions to be made simple and stress free.
29. E-mail Subscription – Allows users to sign up by e-mail so that your blog posts are delivered to their e-mail address. This will ensure visitors do not miss any of your posts.

30. MyBlogLog – This is a great service that shows an image of your visitors on your website if they are registered. There are similar blog social networking sites that can also be used for this.
31. Post Rating – Enable a plug-in on your blog that allows visitors to rate your posts. This is a simple way that does not require registration to enable readers to report on how good a post is.
32. FeedBurner – Using a service such as Feed Burner allows you to monitor the number of subscribers you have. Many readers will be interested to see how many other users are reading your blog and are subscribed to it. Use their publicize services to show the number of readers.
33. Commenting – Try enabling and disabling the “must be registered to comment” feature to see which yields more results. You should find that without registration, more comments will come through; however this does mean that you should implement some spam protection feature.
34. Online Homepages – Many people use Google for example and have iGoogle activated. This is why you should have an RSS plug-in that allows users to click and it adds to feed to such services.
35. Write a List Post or Article – Writing a bulleted list can sometimes be easier on the reader and writer if you have lots on information to roll off in one post. This is a list post and makes for easy reading.
36. Article Marketing – Write an article and post it on sites such as article beech or ezine articles. Ensure you include a link back to your site in the article. Make sure the article is great so that people will want to read more of your work.
37. Autopinger – use sites such as autopinger.com to submit your blog to lots of websites.
38. Submit Site to Search Engines – Manually submit your site to the major search engines on the web and also use auto submitter websites for lesser known search engines. Organic search engine traffic is great and will increase your ad revenue.
39. DMOZ – Submit your website to dmoz.org. if you manage to get listed this will really help your traffic stats.
40. Site Contests – Offer a prize to the 1000th subscriber or commenter to encourage whatever activity you want. The prize could simply be a text link on your website, however the more appealing the better.
41. Banner Exchanges – You could try a banner exchange service however you may not be able to choose what type of banner is placed on your site. Try and contact other bloggers with similar content and ask for a link exchange.
42. Site Load Time – Check how long it takes your website to load and increase the speed if necessary. This is important to ensure visitors are not leaving before the site has fully loaded. Try to use smaller images or multimedia if your site is slow.
43. YouTube – Create a YouTube account and add you link in your profile so that you might get traffic from people who view any videos that you upload. Make videos relating to your website content so any traffic is targeted.
44. About Us – Get your site listed at Wiki – about Us Wiki Page, this is another way to increase back links. On the site you can put information about your website.
45. Tags – Tagging your posts or articles on your website is a great way of entering keywords to help search engines. Make the most of these where you can.
46. Categories – If you have a blog then use blog categories with meaningful names that use keywords so that these show up in the websites URL and on SERPS (Search Engine Result Pages)
47. Permalink – Check to see if this features is enabled. If its not then enable it and have the post title in the URL.
48. Holidays – These are great for marketing so ensure that you are ready. Start making posts and site content about Christmas / Easter or whatever about a month before the event. This gives search engines chance to list your posts. Then when people search for Christmas XXXXXX your site will be there. – Maybe decorate your site to suit the holiday theme.
49. Interviews – Interview other sites and post the interview on your website. Alternatively get interviewed by other sites yourself.
50. Selling your site? – Pretend to sell your website. I sold a site recently and the traffic shot up. If you can list your site free then you have nothing to lose apart from responding to offers. However the chances of any of the traffic you received returning is slim. You may benefit from padding out your MyBlogLog section.
51. Surveys – Have a survey or poll on your website, not large, just a small one in the sidebar somewhere that allows visitors to vote on a controversial question or something that will change on your website depending on a vote.
52. Blog Networks – Create a blog network where you can link all your blogs together. This will take up a lot of your time, however if you have it spare the more the better providing the content is unique and remains at a high standard.
53. Create a Site Template or Blog Theme – As the title states, create a theme and have a link back to your website in the footer. 
54. Plugins / scripts – If you have the knowhow, create a plug-in or script for a website and have a link back to your website.
55. Comedy Writing – If you can write funny content, this will attract lots of readers. I know I have returned to a blog in the past due to its humour.
56. Social Networking Site – Use social networking websites such as MySpace, gain lots of friends and then post a bulletin about your website.
57. Reviewing – If you are honest and able to post great reviews then review sites and products and post about them on your website. If this is successful then other sites will want to be reviewed by you.
58. Get Reviews – Go to other sites and ask them to review your website. No one like’s criticism so be prepared to take some. It is likely to benefit your site in the future though.
59. Post News – Try and be first to post breaking news in your niche. Get listed on news websites such as Google News which will increase your traffic.
60. Awards Program – Create an awards brand. Get webmasters to submit their site and you offer prizes or just a graphic that states they won or passed your tests for a great website. Use your imagination.
61. Resources – Write posts that link to resources that may be useful to your type of reader. A webmaster blog may link to free stock photo sites as a post and list them in order of best first.
62. Treat others as you wish to be treated – This speaks for itself. If a reader of yours needs a hand then take the time out to help them. They will appreciate you for it.
63. Edit Posts – Go back over old content on your website and update it if it needs updating. Insert relevant links into old pages that go to content that is similar.
64. Yahoo Answers – Get an account at Yahoo Answers and post your blog URL in answers where appropriate. Only do this when you have a good reputation and the content is relevant and will actually help the user.
Great! That’s it for this time. If you learned at least one thing from this post it was worth reading!

Comments are the lifeblood of any website. It keeps pumping some interesting views and discussions into a post. However, I have seen several blogs which close comments for posts which are older than say a month or two.

The major concern which plays a factor in closing down comments is spam, since many users believe that spammers usually target. However, the spam plugins available today are very effective at curbing spam if not entirely stopping them.

However, getting back to the point. I do close comments on certain blog posts like contests and posts which are totally out-dated, but using a mass closure on comments results in several problems, which include:

• For example, say when I write about products, more often than not I have seen authors of those products commenting on that post to tell everyone about a new version availability. This helps both me and the readers to know about the newer version.
• Some posts are evergreen and will spark a discussion no matter when they were written. If you use an option to automatically close comments, those discussions will no longer happen.
• More often than not I have seen users ask questions on older posts, several times they have been useful for me to update the old posts or write new ones.

I have listed just few of the several reasons why I do not automatically close comments on the older posts. Do you do that? Whatever your answer to the question, it would be interesting if you tell me and others about your thoughts on it.

Let’s take a look at 18 timeless blogging tips on how to improve your blog and stand above the competition.

1. Judge a blog by its cover – If it doesn’t look pretty, people have a hard time focusing on what you have to say. Take a look at the home page of your blog, focusing on the uppermost region (without scrolling down). Would you want to take a look around after arriving on the home page as a new visitor?

2. Comment smartly and consistently – Bloggers are tired of seeing the overused “Nice post!” or “This is really interesting!” Stand out by trying to put some thought into your comments and, most importantly, make it sound like you actually read the article.

3. Get a Gravatar- Before you start commenting on blogs, it’s a good idea to register your own gravatar. If you follow step 2, readers and blog owners will become familiar with you for better or for worse.

4. Show your personality in your writing – Establishing a voice in your writing is a crucial element is producing content that people will want to keep coming back over and over again for more. Don’t be that Average Joe in a sea of Average Joes.

5. Use plenty of pictures in your blog posts – No one wants to see endless blocks of text, especially while reading online. The moment your readers’ mind wanders off, they’ll be jumping to another site before you know it. Here are some great sources for finding images: Flickr, Photobucket, picapp, Google Image Search.

6. Study SEO like your life depended on it - Driving traffic to your blog through search engines is what you call “organic traffic.” Other types include referral sites, and direct traffic. Of the three mentioned, organic traffic is what you need to be able to sustain long-term visibility of your blog. To help you get started, take a look at this comprehensive guide on SEO: The Definitive Guide to Higher Rankings For Your Blog.

7. Start with a WordPress.com blog and then switch over to a self-hosted WordPress blog - Three reasons to use WordPress: 1) Lots of people use it 2) Recognition and reputation 3) Strong support. If you are just started blogging, I recommend you get a free WordPress.com blog to get your feet wet. It can’t hurt you to do so and besides, what’s the rush?

8. Avoid grammar mistakes by proofreading – One thing that really annoys me about a blog is poor grammar. If you were listening to your teacher lecture about quantum physics and his grammar is dreadful, you would want to leave that class in a heartbeat. Same thing with blogs. You came looking for value but it’s all mixed up with a misplaced “has” and “their” and terrible spelling. Would you want to keep reading? Probably not.

9. Make you blog content rich in media – In my Studio Art class last quarter, we studied about human culture and psychology (Shrug). It would’ve been the most boring class in my entire schedule if my professor had not included numerous videos and other media into out 1- 1/2 hour long lectures. It kept me attentive and engaged. and helped me connect topics more cohesively. In other words, utilize the power of Youtube and other media sources and incorporate them accordingly into your blog content.

10. Figure out your niche and stick to it – If someone asked you what your blog was about, would you be able to answer without hesitation? If not, write down in 140 characters or less(no pun intended) a succinct and clear definition of what your blog is about. E.g: Pet Food Blog- The Blog where Pet Owners can Learn How to Better Feed Their Beloved Pets. The second important thing is “to keep the main the main thing.” If you feel like writing a post about electron polarization and its effect on our ecosystem (shrug), do you really think that readers to your Pet Food Blog would appreciate it?

11. Blog on a set schedule – There is no right answer to how often one should blog. Whatever schedule you start out with, make sure you stick with it every week. Take for example, Mashable. After visiting the site a couple of times, you can safely expect to see a new article every single day. The important thing is that they stick with that routine.

12. Reply to comments on your blog – Replying to questions or comments from readers is your way of letting people know that your blog is “alive.” It gives readers the opportunity to interact and engage in conversation. Best thing of all? It artificially inflates the true number of people who comment on your blog. Very sweeeeeet.

13. Make it easy for readers to navigate your blog – If it takes more than 3 seconds to look for a search bar or category list on your blog, than your site’s navigation needs to be improved. No one likes the feeling of being in an unfamiliar place with no directions to their destination. They feel desperate, unhappy, and hopeless. The thing with being lost in an unfamiliar site as opposed to being lost in a shopping mall is that readers can easily exit with a single click of a button. This will definitely not help your blog traffic.

14. Put an author section in your blog posts – No one wants to read material written by a face-less author, let alone by one without a name. Check out this article by Chris Spooner on how you to create your own author section.

15. Forget about the stats – How much time do you spend checking the stats of traffic to your blog? You’ll be amazed by how much more productive you will be if you focus on maximizing the time you spend writing new blog posts instead. One method to fight off your debilitating addiction for numbers is to disconnect your computer from the internet. Say what?! Yep, that’s right. If you can’t get online, you can’t get look at your stats. Pull out Microsoft Word and start writing your next blog post there. It’ll work out. Trust me.

16. Don’t think about making money…at first – If making money from your blog is your primary goal, I will not argue against that. The problem with focusing solely on money in the beginning is that you lose sight of the far more significant goal every new blog must reach first: quality content. What good will you provide your readers if you only post hundreds of affiliate links and self-promotional articles in the hope of winning people’s credit card numbers? Don’t be greedy. Money is great but don’t let it destroy your blog.

17. Write killer headlines - With eye-catching headlines, you have effectively completed over 50% of your blog’s advertising. Tell me, would you rather read an article titled, “How to Cook Delicious Spaghetti Sauce” or “How to Make Your Spaghetti Sauce Taste Orgasmic” ? (I apologize if you were eating) Anyways, the point is to avoid the overused and generic blog titles and strive for ones that are unique and thought-provoking.

18. Guest post – Don’t let the thought of submitting your written articles to other reputable blogs intimidate you. Remember, if you don’t try, how can you possibly succeed?

WordPress Tutorials/Hacks

1.WordPress Theme Hacks (Source: Web Designer Wall)

2. No More CSS Hacks (Source: Style Gala)

3. Create a Dynamic Sticky (Source: Maxpower)

4. Styling Individual Posts Using the_ID (Source: WP Designer)

5. Show Category Images (Source: JTPratt)

6. Separate WordPress Comments and Trackbacks (Source: Hack WordPress)

7. Customize your WordPress Login (Source: David Airey)

8. Date Image Hack (Source: YugaTech)

9. How to place a login form in the sidebar (Source: WP Designer)

10. WP: KeyBoard Shortcuts (Source: Tip Monkies)

11. Making Better Use of Your Error “404″ Page (Source: Hack WordPress)

12. Customize Your 404 Page (Source: Theme Playground)

13. WordPress accessibility hacks (Source: Bruce Lawson)

14. Reset your Lost WordPress Administrator Password (Source: Village Idiot)

15. The Definitive Guide to Semantic Web Markup for Blogs (Source: Pearsonified)

16. Do-It-Yourself WordPress Hover Menu (Pop-Up) (Source: WP Designer)

17. How to Protect CSS Mods for ANY WordPress Theme (Source: Pearsonified)

18. WP Contact Manager (Source: Design Canopy)

19. WordPress and the custom fields, a overlooked feature (Source: Gate 303)

20. DiggProof your WordPress (Source: Circle Six Blog)

21. WordPress Ajax Commenting revisited (Source: Zeo)

22. Widgetizing Themes (Source: Automattic)

23. Cloaking to Stop Scraping (Source: Plagiarism Today)

24. Server load button for blogs (Source: Jesse Chilcott’s Journal)

25. Giving each WordPress post a thumbnail, and display the thumbnail on the home page(Source: WordPress Garage)

26. How to create overlapping tabs (Source: WP Designer)

27. How to Optimize Your WordPress Title (Source: Hack WordPress)

28. Blocking Your WordPress Categories and Archives From Google (Source: Hack WordPress)

29. Adding An Author Page To Your WordPress Blog (Source: Hack WordPress)

30. Make a Mobile Friendly Version of your Blog with Google Reader (Source: Digital Inspiration)

31. How to Use WordPress as a Membership Directory (Source: WP Designer)

32. How to Format Images for Feed Readers (Source: Pearsonified)

33. Add Del.icio.us Daily Blog Posting To Your WordPress Blog (Source: Hack WordPress)

34. Huge Compilation of WordPress Code (Source: Hack WordPress)

35. 4 Simple ways to Speed up WordPress (Source: WP Candy)

36. WordPress Date Button (Source: WP Designer)

37. Wicked WordPress Archives in One Easy Step! (Source: Pearsonified)

38. Make Yourself Available to Readers with a Contact Form (Source: Hack WordPress)

39. WordPress as a CMS – Content Management System (Source: Graphic Design Blog)

40. Installing Xampp and WordPress (Locally) (Source: Tamba 2)

41. WordPress Category Page Hacks (Source: Jehiah)

42. 3 WordPress Hacks For SE-Friendly Blog Archives (Source: SEO Egghead)

43. Opening Links in New Windows (Source: Ajay)

44. WordPress Thumbnail Size Limit Hack (Source: Lorelle on WordPress)

45. Restore your WordPress Database (Source: Tamba 2)

46. Validating WordPress (Source: WordPress Codex)

47. Backing Up WordPress (Source: Lorelle on WordPress)

48. Moving Your WordPress Blog to a New Directory (Source: Big Biz Blog)

49. Moving Your WordPress Blog to a New Directory (Source: Big Biz Blog)

WordPress Video Tutorials

50. The Best WordPress Plug-ins

51. How to embed YouTube Video in WordPress

52. How to Upgrade WordPress

53. Make Your WordPress Blog Search Engine Friendly

54. WordPress.com – Step-by-Step Tutorial on How to Blog

55. How To Create A Custom WordPress Page Template

56. WordPress tutorial–installing on a local server

57. Recover WordPress Password When You Have Forgotten It

58. WordPress Tutorial – Edit a Sidebar File Using a Text Editor

59. WordPress Tutorial – Make Menus of Links With the Blogroll 2

60. How-to: Use WordPress/PodPress to podcast to iTunes

61. How to Put Adsense on Your WordPress Blog

WordPress Podcasts

62. The WordPress Podcast

63. The WordPress Weekly