Choosing best webhosting for Blogger blogs

To many, blogging is not just a hobby, but a business, a career. Time and again, we have emphasized the importance of keeping a business-minded approach in order to be successful. Being a business of sorts, blogging should also be treated as such. Businesses require investments, and need to grow. So does blogging. When people create a free blog, they don't usually think ahead, and instead end up restricting themselves. The most people would do is, buy a domain and leave it at that, especially Blogger users. They don't realize the importance of a proper web-hosting. Hence, in this post, we talk about why you should get a web-hosting, and which host to choose.

Before we move on, I'd like you to take a look at what we've covered so far in this series.

Part 1: How to create your first blog - what platform to choose?

Part 2: Replace your blogspot domain with a Dot com domain From Godaddy

Part 3: Choosing best web-hosting for Blogger blogs

Part 4: 5 most practiced Ways of building Active blog Readership

Part 5: Basic SEO Tips for a Newly Launched Blog - Beginners Guide

Part 6: Making Money with your New Blog - Monetizing Basics

Why buy a web-hosting?

Web-hosting refers to storing your website files on a separate and dedicated web server. This is different from domain hosting. Domain hosting simply refers to purchasing a custom URL for your blog. While it is true that Google provides free web hosting for your Blogger, the fact remains that this hosting is really limited. You will face the following restrictions even if you buy a custom GoDaddy domain for your Blogger blog.

• You can not create sub-domains (subdomain.domain.com)


• You can not create a forum or any similar application


• You can not create custom webpages


• You will be limited to a few custom email addresses (if they are provided at all)


• You will not be able to host scripts on your site, and will have to rely on a third-party


• You will not be able to upload files that you want, except for images and videos that can only be added into your posts


• There's a limit of 1 GB to the total size of pictures you upload


• Each individual page be of at lax 1 MB in size

These are some of the many things that differentiates a blogger from a webmaster. Beginners often don't realize their importance, and are hesitant to spend money on a proper hosting. These features come in really handy if in the future, you want to expand the scope of your blog, and want to add custom pages, applications, tools, and add your custom scripts.

This very blog you are reading runs on Blogger, but is hosted at a custom web-host. We've had experience with many web hosting companies, and have found HostGator to be the best option for bloggers. We ourselves are using HostGator for hosting this blog, along with our sister blog Smart Earning Methods.

Why HostGator?

HostGator provides one of the best hosting services one can ask for. If you navigate over to their homepage, you will find that they have won numerous awards and achievements in their field. And if you search anywhere for the top web hosting companies out there, you will find HostGator everywhere. And not without reason. Their inventory of features is simply astounding!

• UNLIMITED storage space


• UNLIMITED bandwidth


• Free and easy website builder tools


• Free 24/7 customer support


• Feature-rich and easy-to-use control panel

And that's just the start! HostGator has three basic web-hosting plans; Hatchling, Baby, and Business plans. The above mentioned features apply to all. In addition, if you want further options, you can choose the Baby or Business plan.

These plans have flexible payment options. You can either pay on a monthly basis, or once after every three years. The longer plan you choose, the cheaper it will become.



We ourselves are using the Baby plan. It allows us to host an unlimited number of domains on our server. However, most beginners should go for the Hatchling plan, because they will most probably have to deal with a single domain at max. We have more than one blog, so that is why we need the Baby plan. So if you intend to create more blogs, you should choose the Baby plan. Otherwise, go for the Hatchling plan. They have much the same features, except for the option of unlimited domains for the Baby plan.

The Business plan is for corporate businesses, and doesn't apply to bloggers.



Recommended reading: HostGator best hosting Plans for Blogger



One thing that makes HostGator stands out is their excellent 24/7 customer support. They will help you at each step in the installation and setup of your blog. You can also use their live chat, which will connect you to an assistant within a minute! You can ask them any questions, and they will help you out as much as possible.



HostGator also goes crazy on its rates! It offers discounts all the time, and you can use a coupon code to get as much as a 75% discount! That, coupled with a long-termed plan will reduce your investment by a great deal.

So what are you waiting for? Go and get yourself a web-hosting at HostGator, and start enjoying a feature-rich environment where you can tweak your blog to your heart's content. Wish you all the best in your blogging career :)

Replace Threaded comments with Google+ Comments in blogger

You might be familiar with the latest commenting system Google has introduced that integrates Google+ comments with Blogger blogs. This new commenting system is a major improvement over the default Blogger system, and it supports threaded comments. It also looks a lot better. We earlier shared a tutorial on how to enable this new Google Plus commenting system for Blogger blogs. But some people still have problems implementing it on custom templates. For them, we have compiled this short tutorial on how to effectively implement and use this new improved commenting system.

Switching to Google Plus comments

To enable Google Plus comments for your Blogger blog, you will first have to connect your account to your Google+ account. To do this, just follow these steps.

• Log into your Blogger dashboard, and choose a blog you want to connect


• Click on the Google+ button from the left sidebar


• Click on the Get Started button on the top-left side to connect your account. This will not appear if your account is already linked.


• Follow the simple instructions to connect your blog.


• Once connected, you will see an option Use Google+ comments on this blog. Checking this will enable the new Google Plus commenting system.

This will turn your Google Plus comments on for default templates. But it won't work for custom templates. For that, you will have to tweak your template source code and make some edits as instructed in the section below.

Displaying Google comments on custom templates

There are two ways to do this. You could either use the easy way, which is the Revert to default option, or you could do it the geek way, which is via the HTML editor.

The easy way

Custom templates have customized widgets that usually override the default settings. And that is why this commenting system might not work with custom templates. However, if you were to somehow remove those overrides, the commenting system would display on your blog without a hitch.



To do that, you can revert your Blog Widget to defaults in your template HTML editor via the following steps.

• From inside your blog's dashboard, click on Template from the left sidebar.


• Click on Edit HTML

(Before moving on, we'd suggest you backup your template, just in case anything goes wrong)

• Click on the Revert Widget templates to defaults button


• Now, Be careful to select Blog1 Widget from the list. Do not select any other, as it will reset other widgets to default as well.

This will solve the problem most of the times, but there's a big problem. You will lose the customization in your Blog Widget. So if you want to preserve the look of your current widget, then I'd suggest you use the alternative geek's way.

The geek's way

This isn't as geeky as it sounds. All you have to do is replace a couple lines of code with another. From inside your HTML editor, press Ctrl + F and search for "threaded_comments". You will see a chunk of code as shown below.

<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == & quot;static_page&quot;'>
   <b:if cond='data:post.showThreadedComments'>
      <b:include data='post' name='threaded_comments'/>
      <b:else/>
      <b:include data='post' name='comments'/>
   </b:if>
</b:if>
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == & quot;item&quot;'>
   <b:if cond='data:post.showThreadedComments'>
      <b:include data='post' name='threaded_comments'/>
      <b:else/>
      <b:include data='post' name='comments'/>
   </b:if>
</b:if>

Carefully look at the bolded code, and then replace them with the following line of code.

<b:include data='post' name='comment_picker'/>

If you want to display comment count, you can simply modify the above line of code

<b:include data='post' name='comment_picker'/>

Still not working? Please feel free to mention your queries in the comments below. And please try to be as relevant as possible. Thank you :)

Replace your blogspot domain with a Dot com domain From Godaddy

One thing that makes people, who want to start a blog, hesitate is the set up of a custom domain. Even people who have a free blog don't immediately want to move to a custom domain, because it all seems like a a lot of work, and too complicated at that. Many are unsure as to where they should get a domain from, and are afraid they'll get scammed online. We have compiled this small guide to help such people overcome their hesitation, and take the big step that will essentially influence the growth of their blog. For this purpose, we walk you through Domain setup from GoDaddy, a large and reputable domain registrar.



Update: MBT Readers can signup now for an account with a special discount of 35% on all purchases: Offer Expires 30th april!

Before we move on, let me remind you that this post is a continuation of our Blogging Guide for Beginners series. If you have missed something, you can find it below.

Part 1: How to create your first blog - what platform to choose?

Part 2: Replace your blogspot domain with a Dot com domain From Godaddy

Part 3: Choosing best web-hosting for Blogger blogs

Part 4: 5 most practiced Ways of building Active blog Readership

Part 5: Basic SEO Tips for a Newly Launched Blog - Beginners Guide

Part 6: Making Money with your New Blog - Monetizing Basics

Recommended: 10+ Reasons why you should buy a custom domain for Blogger

What is GoDaddy?

GoDaddy is a large and reliable domain registrar and web hosting company that serves millions of domains - so you can be sure that they won't be running away with your money. The best thing I like about GoDaddy is, it is integrated into Google Blogger. If you have a Blogger blog, you can simply buy a domain from inside your Blog's dashboard!

Why choose GoDaddy?

GoDaddy offers some of the cheapest domain rates you could get anywhere. Their .com domains (which are usually the most expensive) can be purchased for as low as $10 (even $7 using some discount offers). They also give you plenty of features you can employ to extend the functionality of your blog.

• Hosting with site builder - A basic free and easy to use website builder for beginners who'd like to make a small website of their own in no time at all


• Easy starter guide - A detailed step-by-step guide to help beginners get started online


• Personalized emails - Get your own email addresses (you@yourdomain.com) instead of the conventional you@gmail.com (or similar) emails


• Sub-domains - Create personalized sub-domains such as contact.yourdomain.com instead of just www.yourdomain.com


• Domain forwarding - Easily forward or redirect to another domain


• And much more.....

Buying a domain

Buying a domain through Blogger is extremely easy. From your dashboard, click on Settings. Under the Publishing section, click on the Add a custom domain option.

You will get an option to choose from among a list of top-level domains (.com, .net etc). Choose any, and then continue to next step. Blogger will check with GoDaddy whether your domain is available or not. If it is, you can continue to domain registration, which is basically a form you have to fill.



Once filled, you can proceed to Google Checkout. It will ask for your credit card details, and will charge you only $10. Once the transaction is successful, you're all done! Sit back and relax as the Blogger team sets up and configures your DNS settings. Once this is over, you will be able to access your site at www.yoursite.com!



Was this post helpful to you? Do give your feedback in the comments section below. And remember: please keep your comments relevant, and avoid spamming and/or promoting your own blog/business. Thank you :)

How to Reduce Your Blog Bounce Rate?

Every blog that exists on the blogosphere has some motive behind it. Some bloggers may want to share their ideas with the world, some just want a medium to write, and few write on a mission to help others with their own experience. However, there's one thing common between the blogs i.e. to attract as many as visitors to the blog.

To increase the number of followers who come and read what you have written. One should keep track of the blog�s visitors which gives you an idea of how many people are visiting your blog per day or in a month. This will also give you an insight on the traffic which is bouncing off i.e. the bounce rate of the blog.
Read more �

How to create your First blog - what platform to choose?

Alright. So here's a topic that has been dragged around quite a lot by now. But it never seems to go out of fashion, because every year, more and more people are entering the blogosphere. Recent trends have changed the job-oriented mentalities, and have inspired entrepreneurship. Therefore, it is high time people should start looking into alternative sources of income, or even a productive hobby that can reward them for their time and effort. Hence, in this post, we are going to walk new users through in creating and setting up their first blog, and the platform they should choose.

Note: This post is the first installment in our Blogging - Getting Started series. Here's what we'll cover

Part 1: How to create your first blog - what platform to choose?

Part 2: Replace your blogspot domain with a Dot com domain From Godaddy

Part 3: Choosing best web-hosting for Blogger blogs

Part 4: 5 most practiced Ways of building Active blog Readership

Part 5: Basic SEO Tips for a Newly Launched Blog - Beginners Guide

Part 6: Making Money with your New Blog - Monetizing Basics

Is blogging worth it?

That depends on how you see it actually. The key behind blogging is hard work and dedication. Every job needs those two ingredients, but blogging needs them more than anything. If you are willing to give a couple hours or so to your blog every day, 365 days a year, only then can you hope to earn decent pay-checks.

Reward is something that comes later on. So blogging needs determination to wait out that time with all the hard work without hoping for an immediate reward. Tonnes of people fail at blogging simply because they want to 'get rich quick'. Please realize that there is no easy way out. And if you'd rather not invest as much of your time and efforts, then I am afraid blogging isn't for you.

If, however, you do have the determination, and want to create your own blog, then here's something you should read before creating a blog.

• Important things to consider before starting blogging in 2013

Choosing a platform

This is a very important question you must settle before you move on, because it will ultimately effect your growth. Although there are various blogging platforms available out there, two of the most used and recommended are Blogger and WordPress.

The debate between Blogger and WordPress is a long, and never-ending one. Indeed, different people have different point of views, and different reasons for liking either of the two platforms. The decision, however, ultimately depends upon what sort of a user you are, and what you intend to do with your blog.

Blogger

Blogger is the best option for you if you're a beginner user. It is easy to implement, and the learning curve is a very comfortable one. Blogger is customizable to a great extent, and doesn't need you to have any skill-sets for using it. Anyone can set up a Blogger blog. And best of all, there's little to no investment required. For your blog, you will only need to buy a domain, which is worth $10, give or take a few bucks.

Another great thing I like about Blogger is, it is pretty easy to tweak. There's a single template code which you can edit to change the outlook of your blog. And the implementation is pretty clean and efficient too. Blogger is optimized for search engines, and contains easy social integration.

There is, however, a catch. Blogger is limited in the sense that it isn't for programmers. You can not run PHP or ASP scripts on your blog, nor can you fiddle around with a database. There's also a limit to the number of stand-alone pages, and the number of users you can have.

WordPress

WordPress is an extremely powerful open source software that is customizable to a great degree. And best of all, it supports PHP, so it is the number one choice for programmers and web developers. You could create heavily dynamic content or flexible database applications on your WordPress site. Hence, it is preferred by the corporate and business sector, where functionality is the biggest priority.

However, the learning curve is pretty steep. WordPress can be difficult and challenging. Even the slightest of tweaks can take up a lot of time and effort. And since the software is constantly updated, plugins you are using currently might not work well with the next update. Hence, you will end up a lot of time debugging errors and finding solutions.

WordPress also requires you to invest a lot of money in it. You have to buy not just a domain, but a hosting as well. And if you want full customization, you will need to buy a framework. So even the start-up investment can reach as high as $150-$300 - let alone on-going investments in hosting renewals, plugin subscriptions, and so on.

(NOTE: There are two types of WordPress blogs. Free (www.yourblog.wordpress.com), and self hosted (www.yourblog.com). Free blogs are hosted on WordPress.com, and are extremely restrictive. They only serve as a demo for self hosted blogs (WordPress.org). In this post, we are talking about self-hosted blogs which are fully customizable, and not free WordPress blogs)

So in essence, between Blogger and WordPress, Blogger is the better option for beginners. WordPress requires a lot of time, effort and resources. But Blogger is totally free (apart from the domain). And it's not like Blogger blogs can't be professional. This very blog is run on Blogger. And you can see for yourself how much customization we have done. So WordPress is best for corporate and business sector websites, whereas Blogger is best for individuals who have little to no development experience. Hence, we would recommend you choose Blogger, and not WordPress.

Creating your first blog

Creating a blogger blog is really simple.

• Sign in, or register yourself at Blogger.com


• Once in your dashboard, click on the New Blog button on the left side.


• Now, you will see a pop up where you will be prompted to enter a Title and Address for your blog. Fill the fields, and then pick a general template.

• You are now done! You can now start writing great content on your blog. 

If you want to move off the blogspot sub-domain and buy your own, then please refer to the following guides which explain the process thoroughly.

• Blogger's custom domain setup process simplified


• How to buy Blogger domain without a Credit Card

Additionally, you might like reading the following posts once you have set up your blog and are ready to create content.

• Creating a blog that attracts clients


• 10 best blog ideas that will make you more money

Got any more questions regarding blogging? Ask in the comments below, or stay tuned for more of our posts on this blogging series, where we'll discuss various aspects of blogging. Cheers :)

Important Things you Must Have to Get Approved by Google AdSense

In our previous article(written by Rajat Grag) we saw the Top 8 Reasons Why your Blog is not Approved by Google AdSense?

From that article I hope that you'll find what are the reasons that AdSense won't approve your blog. In this article We are going to see the Important factors you need to get your AdSense account approved. ;)

You might have seen many articles on different site. You might read the entire article but still your AdSense didn�t approve.

Why? I think all people are providing the same article. They don�t know the real thing about AdSense.

Google AdSense approval is getting Harder every day. Don�t Worry You will get AdSense account soon? (After Reading This) ;)
Read more �

Top 8 Reasons Why your Blog is not Approved by Google AdSense?

Hello friends,

we all know that what AdSense is and why every blogger wants to get into it. AdSense is the Best source for bloggers to monetize their blogs.

Well, but AdSense does not approves everybody because of its TOS and it looks at all the websites submitted for approval very deeply before approving.

Many newbies just starts off a blog and try to apply for AdSense but gets disapproved because of some small mistakes that they don't think that are big but later they get to know that it is not that easy to get approved and even some of them leaves blogging.

So, Today I'm going to tell you what are the reasons that AdSense is not accepting you into their program.
Read more �

Create Open Source Projects with Google Summer of Code Program

Are you a university student with IT-related majors, and looking for some real hands-on development experience this summer? Then the Google Summer of Code program is just for you! Google once again is providing students with the opportunity to showcase their skills and work with Google to achieve greater heights. This time around, Google is providing students with a platform to work on Open Source projects sponsored by Google, and overseen by mentor organizations. This is nothing short of an internship, as you will gain real-world industry development experience that applies to your field, plus you will get recognition from Google, and a nice pay-check!

The Google Summer of Code 2013 Program

It's all about coding! The Google Summer of Code is an annual program that has been going on for 8 years now. More than 6,000 Students have worked on projects mentored by over 400 organizations. Students will get to work on actual open source software projects over the summer. These projects will be overseen by mentor organizations, who will guide the students and address technical issues.

Eligibility - There is an age restriction of 18+ for participating in this program. The students must also be enrolled in a college or university. Although preferable, students don't need to be majoring in Computer Science. It depends on the projects you are going for. And project fields also include computational biology and mining engineering etc.

How does it work out?

Big open source projects (like Linux, Mozilla etc) first choose administrators to represent their company as mentors. These mentors then submit a proposal to Google. If that proposal gets accepted, they get an account with the Google Summer of Code program 2013 (Students don't need to worry about this part).

Students then submit proposals for working on specific projects with mentors. The mentors will then choose from among the applicants, and the students can begin coding once they are oriented. Students have to hand in evaluations showing their progress as requested by mentor organizations, and they will pass or fail after evaluation is done by the mentor organization. Failed students are automatically dropped out of the program.

Benefits for students

Being a university student, you should know pretty well how useful these extra-curricular activities can be. Since you'll be looking for a job soon, you will get some real hands-on experience on how things are done out there in the industry. Besides, a project such as this, especially one sponsored and recognized by Google could do wonders for your resume, and would help you out immensely with job opportunities.

Besides, there's a nice payout! Approved and accepted projects will get $5,500 per student, $500 of which will go to their mentor organization. $500 are paid out after the acceptance of the proposal, and $2,250 are paid after the mid-evaluation and final-evaluation each! Real nice way to fill up your pockets this summer, if you ask me!

How to apply?

To apply to this program, visit the Google Summer of Code 2013 website, and register as student. Registrations for organizations have already been completed. Student registration deadline is till May 3rd (12 00 PDT). So hurry! There are a limited number of slots available!

Once registered, you can browse through 177 organizations to work with. Submit your proposal to the mentor of your choice (max proposal limit is 5), and wait for acceptance.

For full details, please visit the GSOC 2013 website. You will find all the instructions available there, along with guidelines on how to submit a proposal. Give it your best shot, because your selection will be made based on your proposal! If you have further questions, please feel free to ask me. Also refer to this FAQ for answers to your questions. All the best :)

Install GooglePlus Comments Widget on custom Blogger Templates

Blogger recently implemented Google Plus comments on their Blogger platform, and we know that many bloggers like you have gone ahead and implemented this new functionality to your blogger blogs. But a lot of our readers have been asking us how to add Google Plus comments, or Google Plus comments API  to Blogger custom templates? This feature turns on and off smoothly for default templates. But most bloggers don't use default templates. For them, we have compiled this short tutorial on how to implement Google Plus commenting system on custom Blogger Templates.

Why enable Google Plus comments?

Google Plus comments are much more flexible, and allow you to keep track of your conversations better. They also help keep the discussions organized. Besides, readers can share their comments, or make comments on your Google Plus posts to make them appear on your blog. This expands your reach as your followers' extended circles can see your content too.

Although there's some controversy regarding the usefulness of this commenting system versus the harms (something we discussed at length in our last post), the choice is really yours. But if you do want to implement this feature on your custom Blogger templates, then here's how you can do that.

Enabling Google Plus comments

To start off, first log into your Blogger account, and click on the blog you want to add Google Plus comments to. Now, click on the Google+ option on the left sidebar. You must be the admin of a blog to be able to view this option.

Now, you need to upgrade our account, and integrate it with Google Plus if you haven't already done so. You will get a "Get Started" button if you haven't. Follow the simple instructions, and then move on to the next step.

Check the option that says Use Google+ Comments on this Blog - For default templates, this is pretty much all you need to do.

For custom templates, here's what you need to do;

• Click on the Template tab from the left sidebar, and then click on Edit HTML.


• From the code editor, press Ctrl + F, and search for 'threaded_comments'

• You should see the following lines of code

<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == & quot;static_page&quot;'>

   <b:if cond='data:post.showThreadedComments'>

      <b:include data='post' name='threaded_comments'/>

      <b:else/>

      <b:include data='post' name='comments'/>

   </b:if>

</b:if>

<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == & quot;item&quot;'>

   <b:if cond='data:post.showThreadedComments'>

      <b:include data='post' name='threaded_comments'/>

      <b:else/>

      <b:include data='post' name='comments'/>

   </b:if>

</b:if>

• Replace the code written in bold with the following line.

<b:include data='post' name='comment_picker'/>

Take care not to make a mistake while editing. And it would be a good idea to backup your template (Backup/Restore option at the top-right), just in case.

For comments to work on custom templates, you need to add the code as well as to enable it. You can see the demo of a custom template above for yourself. I hope this post answered all your questions. If not, please feel free to ask more questions in the comments below. Cheers :)

Some Disadvantages of enabling Google+ comments on Blogger?

The Google Plus comments integration with Blogger is turning quite some heads now, and a lot of bloggers have gone ahead and implemented it. This seems to be one of the biggest improvements in Blogger over the recent past. And at first glance, it looks pretty slick, with a clean and solid implementation. It makes things really easy, especially for bloggers who can track the conversation more easily. At the same time, readers can contribute right from Google Plus, without needing to open the blog. However, upon closer inspection, it seems that the new implementation isn't without its flaws.

It has been some days since this feature came out - plenty of time for us to play with it. And there do seem to be some disadvantages of using this new commenting system. These might manifest themselves later on, if not immediately.

Disadvantages of using Google+ comments on blogger

Firstly, to use this feature, users need to use their Google account ID, which can be a bit of a problem for readers who are using alternatives.



But the real problem lies in the fact that this commenting system is dependent upon the URL of your blog. If you change the URL, for example when you are migrating to another domain or re-branding, you will not be able to migrate these comments, and they will be deleted! Unlike Facebook Comment API, Google comments aren't stored on any app accounts. This means that migration is not an option, and that, you'll lost all your comments should any such thing happen.



Another big disadvantage is the increase in Page Load Speed. It takes some time before all the data is fetched from Google. Usually, this isn't noticeable, but try loading your blog on a slow dial-up connection, and you will see those comments appear much later.



Some people have also reported that the comment statistics are no longer accurate (or sometimes visible).



All in all, it's a pretty good package, but Google really needs to spend some more time with it. If you have problems, or have suggestions, please feel free to comment in the section below. Cheers :)

How to use Google+ comments on Blogger?

Keeping the conversation going has to be one of the biggest challenges bloggers face nowadays. Readers now want more than just information - they need answers! And you, as a blogger, are responsible for answering them, and defending your content. Readers will talk about your content on a multitude of platforms, such as your blog's comments, or on social media such as Google+. So keeping track of all those conversations can be a tedious and indeed a daunting task, which is why Google has now decided to help out its Blogger users by integrating Google Plus comments into Blogger blogs (finally :P).

Google is slowly building upon Google Plus, improving its functionality little by little. Up until now, it had only integrated Google+ share button in Blogger, so you could share to Google Plus right from your Blogger dashboard. Considering that, this comments integration is a big one, and can serve multiple purposes at once.

Track conversations easily

The aim of this new functionality is to provide a means for better conversation tracking. Comments on Google+ and Blogger are now integrated. So you will see two types of comments - direct comments, and comments from Google+. Suppose you or someone has shared your blog post to their G+ profile, and people are commenting on it. Those comments are nicely integrated to appear in your blogger blog. This helps you keep track of conversations really easily, and also helps readers get to know more about what other people think about your blog.

Check out an example of this functionality in action in the image below.

Privacy concerns

Google Plus has decided not to make the same mistake as Facebook, so this new integration doesn't come without its privacy settings. People who comment on a Google Plus post, or on a blog through a Google+ ID, they have the option of sharing their comments with specific circles. So readers can essentially control the people they want their comments to be visible to.

Expand your reach!

Another great +1 of this new integration is that, you can grow your reach. Just like content shared on Facebook or G+ gains reach beyond your fan-base, so do the comments that users make about your blog post. These comments appear in the news-feed of people in the shared circle, i.e. the people who are actually beyond your reach. In this way, you could build a whole new audience and increase traffic to your blog by just taking advantage of this integration.

Integrating Google Plus comments with blogger blogs

Google has made this integration really easy. Just sign into your Blogger dashboard, and follow the following steps.

• Find and click on the Google Plus tab in your blog's dashboard


• Click on Enable Google+ Comments.

Keep in mind that you will need to upgrade to Google Plus before you can use this functionality. Also, comments already made on your blog posts will continue to work with this new widget.

There's another very important thing to keep in mind as well. This trick won't work with custom Blogger Templates, nor some latest Blogger templates. For that, you will have to add a certain piece of code. Mohammad will share a post on adding this functionality to custom templates as soon as his exams are over, so stay tuned! And if you have questions in the meantime, please shoot them our way! Cheers :)

How to use "x-default hreflang" for international landing pages?

Delivering your blog's or website's content in a multitude of languages can make your web entity accessible to a wider range of audience. Indeed, this is one of the many strategies webmasters employ to increase their website traffic. They can simply configure their homepages to point towards specialized content tailored for different users' different language requirement. but now, there's a new and more SEO friendly way of doing this. Webmasters can now specify such specialized homepages using a new rel-alternate-hreflang annotation that Google only just introduced, and is compatible not only with Google, but other search engines as well such as Yandex.

There are two basic ways of delivering multi-lingual content; either through redirecting users to another page with the corresponding language setting, or dynamically changing your page's content to match the preferences of the users (and based on other things as well like their geographic location etc). But whatever way you deliver the content, this markup will still work perfectly.

'Rel-Alternate-Hreflang'

Take this site as an example. Suppose we were to serve our content in four different languages, English, Spanish, French, and German. The respective URLs would look something like this.

• http://www.mybloggertricks.com/en/


• http://www.mybloggertricks.com/sp/


• http://www.mybloggertricks.com/fr/


• http://www.mybloggertricks.com/gr/


• and so on.....

If we were to add this annotation to our site, the best approach would be to use <link /> tags in the head of our HTML documents. Here's the syntax for this annotation.

<link href="http://www.mybloggertricks.com/en/" rel="alternate" hreflang="en" />
(for English content)

The 'x-default hreflang' attribute

You can use the "x-default" value in the hreflang attribute to indicate that a page indicated by the href attribute doesn't have any specific language preferences, and is the default page for any type of audience. This should be used when the link points to the homepage, and not to any language-specific page. For example;

<link href="http://www.mybloggertricks.com/" rel="alternate" hreflang="x-default" />

As mentioned earlier, it doesn't matter whether you change the content of your website dynamically to accommodate different languages, or redirect users to specific pages. This annotation will still work. If you have problems with using this annotations, please feel free to ask us in the comments below. Also share your feedback on the selection of topics at our blog =D

Become a Google Student Ambassador for your College today!

Are you a fun guy who's always looking for something new to explore? If you're a college/university student eager to look into new opportunities, then here's something you might like. Would you be interested in becoming a Google representative for your college? Google has a program called Google Student Ambassador Program that will empower students, and offer them new opportunities for grooming their skills.

What you get?

Under this program, you will get the opportunity of enhancing your personal development, leadership, and communication skills. And there's more! A certificate from Google, and an entry in your resume for being a Google Student Ambassador would prove invaluable when you're out there, looking for a job.

Besides, there's the swag of working under Google's name!

Google Ambassadors get to learn about innovative Google products and programs. They will be kept updated with the latest happenings, and what's currently going on at Google. And this is a big +1 for Google enthusiasts like myself.

These Ambassadors serve to help Google better understand university cultures. Their responsibility is to plan and host fun events on their campus, and they will serve as campus contacts for Google teams. In this way, these ambassadors will get a chance to get to know people at Google, get tips and advice, and more. Connections like these can be invaluable.

Who can apply?

The applicants can be from any major, and not necessarily from IT or technology-related fields. The only requirement is that, you should be social, and ready to take up social responsibilities like these. They should also be involved in their college communities. That, and the fact that they should be enthusiastic about Google and technology, because otherwise, what's the point?

How to apply?

To apply, you must fill this registration form. But along with the registration form, you need to have the following;

• Certified proof of enrollment in your university for the year 2013


• Recommendation letters from 1-2 professors, lecturers, or former Google Ambassadors


• A short video of at most 1-minute length about yourself or your plans as a Google Ambassador. Make this unique and original. Surprise Google!

Hurry up, and grab this opportunity before the registration expires! The length of this program will be one academic year, but the things you learn will stay with you forever. It's a one-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and you wouldn't want to miss it! Good luck :)

How To Create a Sitemap For a Specific label to Increase Page Rank

Page Rank of a blog is very important for every bloggers because it shows the domain authority. It also helps readers to get an idea about how popular a blog is which they are reading.

There are many professional Blogger Tricks that you can use to increase your blog page rank. But basically Page rank depends on the number of quality backlinks and internal linking of blog posts.

Internal linking plays a main role in increasing page rank and search engine crawl rate.

Also Read: 7 Ways To Increase Your Blog's Crawl Rate In Google

They also help to increase our blog page views and reduce the bounce rate. We internally link our related posts and categories into our content. But in blogger there are labels in place of categories.

If we internal link to a label page, then the link juice will be waste because labels link have no value. They only used to categories the posts according to proper label. If you ever checked your robots.txt file then you will definitely aware with the fact that by default the labels link are disallowed for search crawlers to index.

You are much smarter to think if a link is blocked by search crawlers then what�s the benefit to use it for internal linking. To get rid of this issue today I come with a very solid trick that will help you to increase page rank of all of your blog posts.

Let see how to achieve this goal.
Read more �

Depositphotos: The Perfect Place to buy and Sell Photos

Are you a blogger or designer who is constantly in search of high quality images and vector graphics to work with? Or are you an enthusiastic photographer and/or designer capable of creating high quality images and graphics or a Blogger who loves promoting affiliate products? In either case, Depositphotos.com is the place you want to be, because it's your one-stop-shop for stock photography, high quality vector graphics, and even videos. You no longer need to pay steep rates for buying photos, as you can obtain royalty-free images from Depositphotos at very inexpensive rates. And if you're a photographer, you can make money while sitting at home by selling your high-quality images!

• Read also: Which Photographs Sell well and Make Serious Money?

What is Depositphotos?

Depositphotos is a U.S based microstock agency that has met with remarkable success over the past few years. It was founded in November 2009, and in a span of just over 3 years, more than 13.6 Million files have been uploaded to this site. It now serves customers in over 192 countries and over 15 languages.

So why Depositphotos, you ask? It is a creative content marketplace for your graphics, but there's a lot more to it than just that. Here are some of the reasons why bloggers and web designers should take a closer look at Depositphotos.

• Smart search - You can browse images by categories, or search for them using advanced search filters with a lot of variety and sort options etc. You can search by category, contributor, keyword(s), file type, file size and orientation, and so on.


• Depositphotos API - An API for developers that allows integration.


• A plethora of files to choose from - From Abstract and Vintage/Retro, to Travel, Cities, Sports and Technology, there's a host of over 37 categories you can browse images from. And there are millions of files available, with new files being added daily. So you'll never run out of images and videos to choose from!


• Pay-by-SMS - A great and flexible option for buyers in certain countries, who can pay via SMS. All they need to do is send an SMS, and the purchase cost will be deducted from their mobile phone credit.


• Free trial-subscriptions


• Inexpensive rates, free trial subscriptions, and attractive contributor incentives (see below).

Opportunities for Bloggers!

Now here are some special opportunities for bloggers to outshine others! If you're a blogger, you have the chance of obtaining a free subscription from Depositphotos for your personal use, or for holding a give-away for your readers. All you have to do is, write a well-written review for Depositphotos on your blog/site, and then follow the instructions given in the link above. If you pass their requirements, you will get a free subscription which will entitle you to download high-quality images for free!

Affiliate Program

Contributors and buyers get incentives in the form of an Affiliate program that rewards them for every friend, family member, or co-worker they refer to Depositphotos. They can also win rewards by promoting the company in several ways.

• Bloggers who have photograph related websites/blogs can get $10 for putting up Depositphotos banner on their site. $20 if the site has an Alexa ranking of below 50,000.


• If a contributor you referred makes a sale, you get $0.03 per sale. The more you refer, the more you earn!


• For every purchase made by a buyer you referred, you get up-to 15% commission.

Pricing and payment options

Buyers have two options to buy photos from Depositphotos, i.e. via the "PRO Subscription plans" or the "Pas-As-You-Go Credits".

• PRO Subscription Plans - With the PRO Subscription plans option, you can subscribe for 1 month, 3 months, 6 months or an year. You can choose a subscription type as well, i.e. between 5 photos per day (minimum) to 200 photos per day (maximum), and this will let you download the respective number of photos per day. For most bloggers, anywhere between 5-20 photos per day should be sufficient. The longer and the more images you subscribe for, the better value you get. You can get anywhere between $0.46 per image to $0.15 per image this way.


• Pay-As-You-Go Credits - Alternatively, you can buy credits, which you can later use to download images. There's no download limit per day for these subscriptions, as long as you don't exhaust all the credits. You can buy a minimum of 50 credits for $50, and the more you buy, the lower the cost per credit.

You can also buy stock images without a long-term subscription. The prices range from $0.5 to $9, depending upon the size of the vector image.



Depositphotos has flexible payment options, and you can pay through PayPal, MoneyBookers, or Webmoney. You also have the option of payment via SMS as discussed earlier.

Payout to sellers

That's a good question actually. Sellers can't set the price for their photos, because that's standardized by Depositphotos exclusively. So image prices do not vary from one to another. Rather, they vary depending on size.



As far as as the amount of money paid out to sellers is concerned, that also depends. There are five levels of contributors, and their rank is determined by the number of downloads they get. The rates for different types of subscriptions also vary, as in, purchases via Pay-As-You-Go and purchases via PRO Subscriptions vary in amount (since they vary in the price as well for buyers). The following table sums up contributor levels and their payouts.

		Purchase method
Level	Criteria	Subscription	Credits
Green	> 499 Downloads	$0.30	44%
Bronze	500 - 4,999 Downloads	$0.31	46%
Silver	5,000 - 24,999 Downloads	$0.32	48%
Gold	25,000 - 149,999 Downloads	$0.33	50%
Platinum	150,000+ Downloads	$0.35	52%

Your views?

So what are you still waiting for? This could be your chance to earn big money out of your passion for photography and graphic design!



If you need to ask questions, please feel free to ask them in the comments section below. In the meantime, sign up with Depositphotos now, and start clickin' Especially don't miss it if you are good with Photoshop or any other image editing software.  :)

Now Check your AdSense Earning Reports inside YouTube Analytics!

Are you a registered YuuTube partner, or aspiring to be one? YouTube Partners are high earners who make a living out of their passion for creating videos. And some are pretty good at it too. Thousands of people are now capitalizing over this opportunity. For them, the AdSense and YouTube teams want to make things easier, since a lot of them are giving feedback. And Google listens to feedback. So to make things easier, YouTube has now integrated your AdSense earnings right into its analytics, which means that you can now check your AdSense earnings from your Videos from inside YouTube analytics!

Previously, AdSense for Content Host earnings for partners were calculated and displayed inside the AdSense accounts. Now for a blogger (using Google Blogger or something), this might not have been a problem. But YouTubers don't especially like to go all the way to AdSense t check out their earnings, especially if the only source of their revenue is YouTube. Now though, with this latest update, such people can view their earnings without leaving YouTube!

YouTube Analytics

YouTube Analytics will now display accurate and consistent performance data for your videos. This won't change the way you are paid. You will still be paid via AdSense, and will see monthly earnings and other data you see on AdSense. The difference now is, you will get more comprehensive details about the sources of income for your videos.

The timeliness of earnings reporting has been improved to 24 hours after the end of the day, but you can still see page views and clicks. You can also review ads and manage ad blocking for your videos, just like in AdSense.

For YouTube partners, there are two major forms of income. Auction-sold ads, and reserve-sold ads. The auction-sold ads went to AdSense earnings before, and reserve-spot ads went to YouTube earnings. Both AdSense and YouTube reported their own respective earnings. But now, all earnings related to your videos have been integrated into YouTube to form a more streamlined feature which will help you keep track of your total earnings and your video performance better.

This new feature is aimed at reducing confusion, and helping YouTube partners grow by making things simpler for them, leaving them to focus on their video performance. Are you a YouTube partner? How do you like this new change? Leave your interesting comments below. And feel free to ask any question too.

A humble request: Please try to stay interactive when you post your comments, and avoid promoting your respective blogs and/or websites. We respect your right to advertise yourself, but our aim is to build an interactive community, where people interact with each other, rather than promoting their respective web domains. And please, also avoid the cheesy and artistic signatures, as they can be considered akin to spamming. Please also understand that this request comes from the fact that we want to respond to every comment or question you might ask. And if you spam and leave out cheesy comments just for the purpose of promoting yourself, then this hinders the conversation process. Hoping for your co-operation. Thank you :)

6 Best SEO Practices for using rel=canonical

The rel=canonical is an important part of your website structure when it comes to SEO. A couple of days ago, we shared some common mistakes people often make with rel=canonical attributes, knowing little that the consequences could be more than they bargained for. Anyhow, we discussed the mistakes before. Today, we are going to some best practices you should always try to follow when canonicalizing your pages.

The rel=canonical attribute is a way of letting search engines know that there is a canonical, or alternate version of the current page available somewhere else. The current page might have the same data as the original source, but organized differently (sorted, summarized, formatted etc). This reduces the risk of your site getting penalized for duplicate content. And search engines like it too, because it's one less page they have to crawl and index.

To help you make the best out of your rel=canonicals, here are some best SEO practices you should keep in mind.

6 SEO practices for using rel=canonical

• Don't canonicalize unless the duplication is large - Do not add rel=canonical unless there's a large portion of duplicated content. Similar topics with closely matching, but not exactly matching content do not qualify. A good litmus test would be looking at the pages from the perspective of someone who doesn't know that language. If someone without knowledge of that language can tell if the two pages have same content, then you probably should canonicalize them.


• Only use one rel=canonical per page. You can't point to multiple source pages. Rel=canonicals that come after the first one are ignored.


• Decide which URL you want to show - You can make either of the pages appear in search results. But make sure you make the correct association, and not add a rel=canonical on the original page.


• Make sure that the target to your canonical doesn't lead to a 404 page.


• The original page must not contain a "noindex" tag.


• Include in the head - Make sure you place the rel=canonical in the <head> section of your site. If it comes in the body, it will simply be ignored.

Hope these best practices will help you out, and make you use rel=canonicals better. If you have questions, shoot them our way! Cheers :)

4 amazing New Improvements to Blogger Template HTML Editor

Are you an internet-savvy blogger or web developer who likes to make webpages and templates? Diving into this work, you will find yourself immersed into a whole new world of coding, which geeks will definitely love. Well, for those Blogger 'geeks' out there, here's some good news! Google Blogger has just updated the Blogger Template HTML editor, and added four new features to make your experience even better! Now, whether you're a casual blogger, or a geek who likes tweaking his blog's template every now and then, this is place you now want to be! Check out these latest features now!

The Blogger Template HTML editor lets you edit your website's source code, and tweak it to your liking. If you know HTML, CSS and/or JavaScript, you can fully customize it to your preference. The sky is really the limit if you know what you're doing.

To get to this HTML editor, go to your Blogger dashboard, and open the blog you want to customize the template. From the Blog dashboard, click on the Template option from the left sidebar, and then find the Edit HTML button.

What's new with the Template editor?

The new features are centered more towards user-friendliness (or rather, programmer-friendliness) and aim at boosting productivity. Previously, the Template HTML editor was much like the shapeless, bland HTML editor you get with Blogger posts (not that I'm complaining, it's a good way to keep things fast and simple).



But editing posts is one thing, and editing a template is quite another. One often had to download the code (I know I had to), make changes to it in a more comfortable editor (such as Notepad++), and then upload it again, just for the sake of keeping track of things more easily. Now I am no expert, but testing out your website or blog this way is one hell of a job. And unless you wanted to spend the whole day just making your posts look more presentable, you needed a better solution.....



.....which, by the way, has finally arrived! Blogger has made the template HTML editor much more comfortable to use by adding the following features.

• Line numbering - Now, you can see line numbers on each line, making it much much more easier to spot errors and keep track of your code.


• Syntax highlighting - Much like in advanced code editors, you can now see syntax highlighting. The editor will actually color code different objects in your source to make it much more readable.

• Auto-indentation - I love code editors that auto-indent code for me so that I won't have to press all those extra Tabs and Spacebars. But more than that, this feature helps you keep your code organized, and you can easily keep track of what belongs where. For example, you can easily figure out what's inside your div tag, or what have you included in a list etc. You can see auto-indentation coming into action while you're writing some code. Blogger template editor will automatically put in the spaces for you. You can also use the Format Template option to clean up the indentation of your entire template.


• Code folding - I love this option too. Once I'm done with a particular piece of code, such as a div tag, I can simply fold the code, and not have to look at that large chunk of code again. You can see this from the image below. If you follow to where the arrow is pointing, you will see a small, grey arrow (?) next to line number 13. And if you look at the line number below, you will see 582, which means that the editor just saved me from having to scroll down through 569 lines of code!

• Jump to widget - Now, you have a quicker way of jumping to particular section of code in your template - code that belongs to a widget. Just click on the Jump To Widget button at the top of the editor, and you can see a list of all widgets you can jump to. Clicking on any will take you to the respective section in code.

Like these new features? Tell us what you think about them in the comments section below. And as always, feel free to ask questions. Peace :)