Tom Chuong, SEO » General Stuff

Long Handle Spoons

admin — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 03:05:15 +0000

I’m not exactly a religious person, but I strongly believed in one God. I’m also very certain that God does NOT favored one race over another. Lastly, I also know as a fact that God is known by different names in many different countries.

Here’s an email my friend sent me today that I wanted to share with you.

“A Holy man was having a conversation with the Lord one day and said, ‘Lord, I would like to know what Heaven and Hell are like.’

The Lord led the holy man to two doors. He opened one of the doors and the holy man looked in. In the middle of the room was a large round table. In the middle of the table was a large pot of stew, which smelled delicious and made the holy man’s mouth water.

The people sitting around the table were thin and sickly. They appeared to be famished. They were holding spoons with very long handles that were strapped to their arms and each found it possible to reach into the pot of stew and take a spoonful. But because the handle was longer than their arms, they could not get the spoons back into their mouths.

The holy man shuddered at the sight of their misery and suffering. The Lord said, ‘You have seen Hell.’

They went to the next room and opened the door. It was exactly the same as the first one. There was the large round table with the large pot of stew which made the holy man’s mouth water. The people were equipped with the same long-handled spoons, but here the people were well nourished and plump,laughing and talking.

The holy man said, ‘I don’t understand.’ ‘It is simple,’ said the Lord. ‘It requires but one skill. You see, they have learned to feed each other. The greedy only think of themselves.’

When Jesus died on the cross, he was thinking of you. It’s estimated 93% won’t forward this. If you are one of the 7% who will, forward this with the title ’7%’. I’m in the 7%.

Remember that I will always share my spoon with you.”

Let’s Pray for the Victims of Fort Hood Incident

admin — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 21:27:32 +0000

The tragic shooting at the Fort Hood has probably left many of us feeling vulnerable. In this depressed economic time, it is disheartening to discover that a fellow US citizen of the United States, and an officer of the US armed services has committed a violent act that is being called an “Islamist terrorist” according to Ralph Peter’s article.

Major Nidal Malik Hasan shoot dead 13 people and injured another 29 others at the Fort Hood military base in Killeen, Texas.

It’s very easy to label anyone regardless of race, or religion a terrorist if they injured or killed more than one person in particular country, and proclaimed their intentions loudly. With that in mind, we have to ask ourselves what truly motivated his acts of violence.

On this planet, we’re all living in a collective group which consists of many discrimination, and prejudice . Each one of us that is alive now is harboring thoughts that could be translated into violent actions as a result of another person’s degrading behaviors.

Common sense tells that no action is ever committed without being provoked by an outside force. In the US, just like other countries in this world, one or more people are collectively provoking someone with their gestures, or verbal affliction. We behave this was because our beliefs tells us we’re better or more superior than another person.

Let’s begin by being more tolerant of people regardless of race or religion. We all originate from the same energy Source, and so let’s behave and think like we’re all the same people.

It’s time for you to think more critically, and determine the root cause of these issues. Do whatever you can to undermine your biased attitude, and send loving-kindness to everyone.

As someone who has briefly served in the armed services, I have great admiration for anyone who is serving active duty in any of the wars that US is involved in right now. Although I wished for them to come home and be with their families, the wars that we’re in now is being driven by a momentum that has already been set in motion. I can only hope and pray that President Obama will act quickly and bring the troops back home to their families and love ones.

Let’s not dwell on this horrific tragedy, but rather let’s pray for all of the family members of the deceased. Right now, they need your prays, and blessings more than ever. If you’re close to Fort Hood, ask or do whatever you can to help the families involved. Your good deeds will not go unnoticed by God.

Right now, please take a few minutes and send loving-kindness thoughts to the surviving families. Lastly, let’s all pray for the assailant because he needs as much guidance as we do. He may be temporarily punished by this Country, but he can not escape the eternal punishment of God.

Best Free Passwords Manager

admin — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 21:32:29 +0000

Nowadays, if you can automate a daily routine, you’re making yourself that much more effective. And if you can find a software that will seamlessly integrate into your routine, you will become an efficient, and productive worker overall.

As an SEO Expert, one of my biggest daily challenges is managing all of my passwords. Regardless of your professional, you will more than likely experienced the same issue too. If you think that trying to remember 10 passwords is a lot of work, then you need an automated solution.

Previously, I was using an Excel spreadsheet to maintain ALL of my passwords. I had to manually update it every single day. Needless to say, it was a daunting and time consuming task.

I was looking for a better solution, but I never found the time to actually look for a solution.

Sometime, I would forget where I’d saved the spreadsheet, and would spend time looking for it. What a waste of time, right?

One day, it became clear to me that I did not enjoy copying and pasting my passwords from the spreadsheet to a website just to login. Although, I did enjoyed the absolute control of seeing all of my usernames and passwords in one place, I knew I had to give up control.

This constant managing of this spreadsheet was driving me crazy because copying and pasting is not a perfect solution. It is even more frustrating when you’d copied a username and missed one or two characters in the process.

I’ve had enough of this ineffective, and frustrating method of maintaining my passwords. Clearly, I needed a solution fast and I knew just the place to look.

I googled “passwords management”, and I was presented with a plethora of software choices.

After looking at a few possible choices, I’d settled on KeePass, KeyWallet, and Roboform. With the exception of RoboForm 10 passwords limit, all three of these password manager are free to download, and use.

Even though Roboform has a 10 passwords limit, you can easily upgrade to the paid version for only $29.95. With the paid version, you could store more passwords, get free updates, and technical support via a toll free number. In fact, if you use this RoboForm coupon “NEVR1″, you can save $6 off their regular price right now. Click here if you want to buy now and download RoboForm.

KeePass is a free and opened source passwords management tool. This freeware offers many features that are also available in many of the other shareware passwords management. If you don’t want to spend any money on a passwords management software, I highly recommend that you check out KeePass.

KeyWallet is particularly interesting because it is browser independent, and it works on computers with the Windows 98 operating system. I’m not sure if KeePass or RoboForm is backward compatible with older OS.

The only drawback with KeePass and KeyWallet is that technical support is only available via a support forum that is managed by their respective contributors.

Personally, I preferred to buy from a company that has email, chat, support forum, and telephone contact. It’s because of these reasons that I decided to purchase the passwords management tool Roboform.

I’ve been using Roboform for over 4 years now, and I strongly believed that they have a superior product. Plus, they have really good customer service, and technical support staff. The last time I’d called them, a technical support staff answered my call within 20 seconds. For a company with millions of paid users, they have one of the friendliest and knowledgeable customer service staff that that I’ve experienced.

When I’d purchased Roboform, I quickly discovered that it also fills-in name, mailing address, telephone number, and other customizable information too. More importantly, you could also use Roboform to store your credit card, banking information, and other personal information.

If you want to organize your usernames, and passwords now, I recommend that you download of the two passwords management tools that I’d suggested above. I’m also certain you’ll attained a sense of freedom after you’ve downloaded and installed one those useful tools.

Please let me know what you think. I would love to hear from you if you think that you’ve noticed an increased in productivity from using any of any tools listed above.

Disclaimer: The author of this blog is currently using RoboForm, and is providing this unbiased review of RoboForm and other password manager tools for informational purpose only. The author of this website is an affiliate of Roboform, and we will be compensated by Roboform if you buy from any of the text links or banner showing on this website. You may or may no experienced an increased in productivity as a result of your purchased of RoboForm. The use of any software online or offline is greatly dependent on the user’s ability to learn how to use the software. We are not associated with KeePass or KeyWallet nor are we being compensated for reviewing their software here in this blog posting. You are downloading and using these softwares at your own risk.

Google Experiments With Real Time Search Results

admin — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 16:00:20 +0000

Yesterday, Google started experimenting with real time search. As you can see from this screenshot I took, they could be offering 6 different ways to display search results for a specific keyword. The default setting will be “Any time”, which would display your normal search results. I was playing around with the “recent results” link, and that particular link appears to be the real time that we’ve all been waiting for. All of the other text links in the left menu on are self explanatory.

Last but not least, I especially liked the ability to specify a date range. From an SEO perspective, you can look back in time and see what your competition was doing 6 to 12 months ago. This insight into the past allows an SEO to turn back the clock, if you will, and see what has changed in terms of search algorithm.

With so much information at our fingertips from Google, I see a new era in SEO that will allow seasoned SEOs’ to better optimize their client’s websites and drive more traffic to other webpages beside the typical homepage. Stay tune for more coverage on this new and emerging trend in the world of live search.

Google Live Search

Google Experiments with Sponsored Links within Google Suggest

admin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 21:23:31 +0000

Last year, I was delighted to see and use the new search feature called Google Suggest. For me, it helped correct my horrible and sometimes annoying spelling errors when I was searching. In fact, it had saved me more time than I’d realized because I was now researching keyword or phrases that I would not normally thought of.

Fast forward to September 2009, and it was only a matter of time before Google started experimenting with AdWords ads within it’s Google Suggest.

Here’s a snapshot for the keyword “att wireless”:

From an advertiser’s perspective, it could mean a higher click-through rate for their ads. However, it could also mean a higher CPC (cost per click) for the advertiser. Ultimately, the advertiser could see more sales as a result of the added exposure or impressions.

This is yet another attempt by Google to increase it’s AdWords exposure, and overall revenue. Clearly, exposing searchers to an AdWords ad within Google Suggest will definitely increase Google’s revenue. And since this is a new feature, many searchers that are not Internet savvy may inadvertently click on the ad because it’s more appealing that the other suggestions in the list.

Most importantly, it will give Google another opportunity to revised their advertising guidelines because currently only one sponsored link is being shown within Google Suggest. The quality of the ads shown may be better, but it may also present problems for many marketers, and new users of AdWords.

To bing, or not to bing? That is the question of the day.

admin — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 05:39:45 +0000

I’d just saw one of Microsoft’s commercial for bing.com, and it’s as confusing as the search results on bing.com. If you want to be overwhelmed with information, I highly recommend that you start making bing.com your default homepage on your browser.

I did a search for one of my favorite keywords “diet pills”, and bing.com displayed an array of information. The search results are brief, and right to the point. And if you scroll on the right hand side of each listing, you can see the long description, and other webpages from your website that bing.com thinks will benefit the users.

From an SEO perspective, I think it’s awesome because bing.com is dispaying up to 5 additional links to your website. This feature could bring extra traffic to webpages that would normally get any traffic from the search engines.

I’m not sure what criteria bing.com is using to decide which webpages should appeared in the more information box. When I find out, I’ll be sure to let you know.

In the meantime, check out bing.com and see where your website is ranked.

Is your business listed in local yellowpage directories?

admin — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 21:10:35 +0000

Sometimes, it’s not enough just to optimize for the major search engines. You also need to get listed in the local directories too. In fact, you need to do this if you have a local business that thrives on telephone calls from local customers. For example, if you operate a plumbing business, you need to have your plumbing business listed on as many local directories as possible. Doing so will ensure that you’ll get a constant flow of new and repeat business locally. And when I say local directories, I’m referring to popular destination like Google Local, Yahoo Local, and MSN Live.

Get listed here:

http://maps.google.com

http://local.yahoo.com

http://maps.live.com

Get listed today, and don’t delay. You could be losing customers to your competition. In fact, if you get listed in these local directories, you could potentially reduce your PPC advertising if you’re spending any money with Google Adwords or Yahoo Search Marketing. And in these disparate times, who doesn’t want to save money, right?

Don’t Get Caught without a Working Email Provider

admin — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:21:22 +0000

When your favorite online email provider is down, what do you do? Well, first you shouldn’t be asking yourself this question. If you do any work online, you always want to make sure you have redundant email services. When I say redundant email services, I’m referring to following:

Yahoo Mail
Hotmail.com
InBox.com
AIM Mail

Most of you reading this probably already have an account with one of these companies.

I’m guilty of using Gmail exclusively for all of my personal, and business email communication. In the past 3 months, I’ve seen Gmail go down twice. And usually within a few minutes or hours, it will work again.

What do you do when you want to check your other email addresses that are not Gmail based? In this case, you could use the free email client that came with your computer. If you’re using a PC, you probably already have Outlook Express or Outlook preinstalled for you. Simply open your email client, and input your email login information to access your non-Gmail accounts.

Keep in mind that Outlook Express or Outlook are both great application for checking emails. Unfortunately, they could crash if the emails in your Inbox exceeds several thousands. In fact, I’ve seen cases where Outlook Express would frequently crashed simply because the user has about a thousand emails in their InBox. To prevent this issue, I suggest that you use Outlook instead of Outlook Express. It’s more stable, but I’ve also seen similar problems with Outlook too.

Other popular and free email programs that you could use are:

eudora.com 7.1
Mozilla Thunderbird 2.0.0.21
Pegasus Mail 4.41

The point here being is that you don’t want to be caught without your email client not working. If you have other recommendations, please post your comment . Thank you!

Internet Marketing Trap

admin — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 06:29:45 +0000

Believe it or not, thousands of newbies are still being ripped off by Internet marketing gurus every week. If you’re an inexperienced entrepreneur looking to make some money online, read this article to recognize certain characteristics of really bad ebooks. Being aware of these gimmicks will save you money and frustration.

I’ve been doing SEO for well over 10 years now and I’m amazed and appalled at what Internet marketing “gurus” today will called an ebook. Despite this fact, stupid (newbies) people that belongs to a list are dumb enough to fall for the extremely hyped sales copy and buy the ebook only to be disappointed once again.

Here’s the basic scheme or tactics that they are using on you right NOW:

write an ebook to the best of their ability on a general money making idea
get another Internet marketing guru with a larger list to endorse their ebook
write a sales copy and hyped it up beyond belief (i.e. PayPal accounts, CB screenshots, etc..)
pre-sale to their small list and the lists of your endorsers (i.e discount coupon)
mention that the price is going up in 24 hours or sooner; limit the quantity of the ebook sales
add completely useless bonuses such as a membership to another site, or half-baked software
add video by using the half asleep voice of the author showing you how to do something in the ebook
continue providing more useless videos

In the Internet marketing field, I have admired, and have been utterly disgusted at many “gurus” that have put their name behind crappy ebooks. I have seen a complete nobody became popular over time because some established guru helped him sell, but in this case cannibalized his larger list.

If you’re wise, do not keep the ebook longer than a few weeks unless you plan to implement the general idea of the author on your own. After reading it and it does not make any sense to you, request a refund immediately from ClickBank or the credit card processor that you’d used to purchase the ebook.

Nowadays, it’s rare to find an well known or unknown author sell their ebooks without a bonus. If an ebook is truly valuable, the author does NOT have to offer you any bonuses to entice you to buy. Personally, if they really believe that the content in their ebook is valueable, they should sell it without a bonus.

Be on the lookout for Internet marketing gurus selling their ebooks using the tactics mentioned above and you’ll be a much wiser entrepreneur. Plus, you’ll have less debt on your credit card too.

Make Money Online

admin — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 05:19:37 +0000

Everybody wants to make money online. Unfortunately, only a few of us will take the necessary action to generate this money online. Even less people will continued after stumbling or running into a dead end. Fortunately, there are a few things that you should become aware of whenever you feel the need to make extra money online. You can follow these tips if you want to save money and frustrations. It could save you some time from working on something that will lead to no results or a waste of time.

do not buy anything labeled “system”
Note: You need to become aware that not all systems will work for you. Previously successful system for one person may not be successful for you. Keep in mind that everyone do things differently.
do not buy an ebook or videos based on popularity
Note: Once again, not everyone will produced the same results. Just because there’s a system in place that you could follow, it does not mean that it will work for you. Many experienced marketers will use the “bonus” pitch to convince you that you need a certain product. Unless the bonus is truly valuable and can be used immediately, it’s just another marketing gimmick to siphon money from you.
know YOURSELF and only buy systems or ebooks with the highest interest to you
Note: By simply understanding yourself, you will prevent yourself from buying online courses that is irrelevant to you or what you really want to do in your spare time. Do your best to make money online in your spare time even if the money you’re making is not enough for you to quit your job yet. At some point in your relentless pursuit to make money online, you will reach critical mass.

If you’re just starting out, please make sure that you spend the least amount of money on a new venture that you know nothing about. Take it slow and under the process of creating a website, and marketing it.

Along the way, you will encountered many obstacles. Once you overcome them, it will be easy for you. For many people looking to make money online, technical stuff like FTP (file transfer protocol), website design, and pay per click advertising may be very foreign at first. Over time, you will become proficient so don’t give up yet.