Author: Barbara Swafford

I recently applied to LinkShare’s affiliate program, and got accepted. Today I reviewed their site and picked a handful of companies to advertise. Click here to become a LinkShare.com Affiliate! LinkShare has different advertisers than Commission Junction. I think by using both, I will have a good variety of products… read more Add LinkShare to Generate Revenue

In memory of the Virginia Tech victims, please take a moment of silence to pray for the families and friends of the victims, as they mourn the loss of their loved ones. Their lives will never be the same, but may they find hope and comfort in knowing that people… read more In Memory of the Virginia Tech Victims

In my previous article, I wrote about AWStats. Keep in mind, the progress of your blog can be seen in your AWStats. As a new blogger, I have decided to have some fun and have made a copy of my awstats for my first 16 days. I’ve reached over 100… read more Watch Your Success in Blogging – Track Your AWStats

Only recently did I learn what AWStats are. AWStats are a free reporting tool that analyzes traffic to a website, or blog. It records the number of visits to your site, the number of unique visitors, the “hits” and “pages” numbers and gives you charts of very detailed information about… read more What Are AWStats?

Read about blogging, and you’ll also find having a RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feed on a blog is very important. I noted that I had a RSS “item” in my sidebar, but when I clicked on it, it wouldn’t work. I researched the HTML code for it, but couldn’t find… read more Learning About & Problems with My RSS Feed

I recently was researching what the expected traffic counts should be for a new blog, but I keep getting hits for ‘increasing your traffic’. As a new blogger, I am curious as to what traffic numbers I should expect. I check my awstats and webalizer stats, and see my traffic… read more Traffic Counts For A New Blog

As you can see, I have added advertising to my blog. I signed up for Commission Junction shortly after I started blogging, and took time to go through their extensive list of advertisers. I picked advertisers for both this blog and my other blog at www.observationmountain.com. Since I strive to… read more Pick Your Advertisers Carefully

Yesterday I was messing around with my other blog’s (www.observationmountain.com) theme editor as I wanted to change some of the ads. When I was copying and pasting, I thought, ” I should really save a of copy of the existing “code”. You guessed it, I didn’t follow my intuition, and… read more Copy, Paste, and Save Your HTML Code

TAKE TIME Take time to think – It is the source of all power Take time to read – It is the foundation of all wisdom Take time to play-It is the source of perpetual youth Take time to be quiet-It is the opportunity to seek God Take time to… read more Take a Break From Blogging & “Take Time”

While learning HTML and XHTML yesterday, it was brought to my attention that apparently not all browsers can “read” HTML code if it’s not “valid”. Thus, it’s important to make sure your site is “XHTML validated”. On my blog site, I have a “button” (Valid XHTML), I can click which… read more Validated XHTML

Today I decided to begin learning HTML (Hyper Test Markup Language).  I searched on the internet and found a great, free website, www.w3schools.com.  They have a quiz you can take, which I like, so I know if I, indeed, learned something about HTML or XHTML.    Having looked at my “presentation” – “Theme… read more Learning HTML & XHTML

Blogroll: As you’re searching the internet and reading blogs, you’ll see a category on a lot of blogs that says, “blogroll”. I see this as a list of your friends or relatives, or, in the case of blogging, usually strangers, who have helped you as you learned how to blog…. read more Blogroll, Links, Sidebar, Post, Content: More Definitions

Lately I’ve been researching and reading a lot about blogging. I read about SEO (Search Engine Optimization), page rank, rating of pages, crawlers, spiders, robots, pinging, trackbacks, mega tags, links, stats, traffic, etc…..the list goes on. As a novice blogger, this information can get to be overwhelming. Should I be… read more The Crawlers, Spiders & Robots Are Coming – Start Posting

Even before I started to blog, officially, I kept running in words that I had seen before, but never took the time to learn what they meant. Blog, being one of them. Now I know that blog is short for web log. Anther “word” you see often, is “http“. This… read more HTTP, FTP, FTP SERVER,PUBLISH, & FLICKR – MY Definitions

My inspiration for blogging came from The Secret. I was watching Oprah one day and she had the author of The Secret on, plus a panel of other guests. I was curious about the book, so I went out and bought it. While reading The Secret, I had a “light… read more “The Secret”, and How It Inspired Me

Okay. I had my domain name registered, and a webhost. Now I needed to find a blogging software program. Based on what I had been reading, WordPress got good reviews. I decided to go with them, but before downloading the software, tried to get an understanding on exactly what I… read more More Information on Setting up Your Blog – Part 3

If you’re looking for technical information, this is not the blog for you. I am a novice in blogosphere, who is doing my own spin on how I am learning how to blog—and continue to learn. If you want to hear it in my own words, then read on. Domain… read more Picking a Domain Name for Your Blog – Part 2

I don’t think blogging is for everyone. It takes not only a good plan, time out of your day, but the commitment to stick with it. Before you even think of starting a blog and spending money to do so, sit down and make a plan. 1) What do you… read more Before You Begin Your Blog-Step 1

When I first decided to set up a blog, I did quite a bit of research on the internet about “blog” sites. In a lot of the blogs I read, the authors said they use WordPress. I didn’t know one blog “software” from another, so I, too, decided to go… read more Product Review: WordPress

I can’t believe how many papers I accumulated over the past few weeks as I was setting up this blog and www.observationmountain.com. Every time I signed up for something I would get more information I needed to keep track of. i.e. User names, passwords, procedures, emails, printouts of information I… read more Organizing your Blog information

In my journey of setting up this blog, and my www.observationmountain.com blog, I gained tons of knowledge from other bloggers. The first website I found helpful was www.stevepavlina.com. He writes on life’s issues as well as on blogging. I listened to a lot of his podcasts, and read many of… read more Give Credit Where Credit Is Due

I’m finding that getting very familiar with your WordPress blog pages is very important. I recently signed up for a Paypal business account, and then I added a Paypal “donate button” on my blog. I played around with it for awhile, and had to correct a few things in my… read more Working with your Blog

Over two weeks ago I was all set to create my www.observationmountain.com, blog. But then I realized, I wasn’t ready. I didn’t know what my first step should be. In the process of trying to set up my first blog, I inadvertently created a second one…..the one you’re reading. During… read more My Blog Had A Baby