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Friday, March 06, 2009

I.T. versus Web Master

Would you ask the guy who does body work on your car to fix your engine? That is the best analogy we could come up with. More to be read below:

Information Technology personnel are usually trained in the functional aspects of computers and software. I, as a web master turn to these people when I need a computer at the office networked together with other computers or when I have a hardware or software issue I cannot easily fix on my computer. Like any field there are good I.T. people and not so good I.T. people. In the worst case scenario if you hire a bad I.T. person your email or other basic systems may not operate smoothly. In most cases a web master can fix and or help you in this area.

Web Masters are personnel who specialize in web architecture. As stated by Wikipedia their primary work is done in designing, developing, marketing and maintaining websites.  What Wiki doesn’t tell you is there are several aspects of web development that have their own specialties inside the term “web master.” These are Designers, Programmers, Search Engine Optimizers and finally people who understand Search Engine Marketing which is basically pay per click or pay per impression advertising. It is rare to find anyone with all the skills mentioned above.

If someone decides to go to school in the field of computers they will not be in the same class if one picks Information Technology and the other picks Web Design. Paontheweb.com has taken on interns from the web design aspect. Frankly, we are not impressed with the level of knowledge our schools are turning out. The most likely reason is a good Web Master is worth his weight in Gold. You will not be likely to find them teaching for lower wages. The old saying comes to mind, “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach”.

Many people will tell you they can put you into a website. That is true. Just about anyone can do that today. So, what is the difference? I’ll give you a list:
1. Does your website look like a kid did it or a professional?
2. Do the images look correct and stay out of the way of your text?
3. Are your images search engine friendly?
4. Does your website show up on the search engines for the terms you want to be found under?
5. What are your traffic statistics like. We can guarantee a certain number of visitors.
6. Do you need to store data (information) online and retrieve it from anywhere, privately?
7. How about giving you the ability to control parts of your website?
8. What about your Title, Description and SEO score? Does 40 to 50% sound good or would you rather have 90 to 100%.

Paontheweb’s approach is a three person team. Each person has knowledge of all areas of being a basic web master. However, each member of our team has their strengths. We create custom designs that convey your image to the world. We specialize in search engine optimization and only turn to search engine marketing when absolutely necessary. We create sites that gather and store information you can access anywhere from an internet connection. We supply you with the ability to change any area of your website content, add pages and more.

We respect I.T. professionals and even call on them from time to time. If you needed a heart transplant would you go to a general practitioner or a specialist with a good reputation?  Would you ask the guy who does body work on your car to fix your engine? We do hope you get the picture. Why not contact us today to see what we can do to improve your website.

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Spam Scam

If you receive something like this it is a scam. The message reads:
To Whom It May Concern:

I am tired of receiving messages containing malicious computer programs (viruses) from your e-mail address!!!
If within 1-2 days you do not stop sending messages to my e-mail address, I will have to address this issue to the Police!...
Today I received a hard copy of your data logs from my Internet service provider. The copy contains your IP address, logs of sending malicious programs and your e-mail address details…
I am sending you the copy of the document containing your data and logs of sending malicious programs as the proof of your fault!!!!!!
You must print the document containing the list of your data and logs of sending malicious programs and pass it on to your Internet service provider with, so that they could find out why the viruses are sent from your computer to my e-mail address!!!!

Ask your Internet service provider to resolve this problem!!!!

Do this now!!!
Once again!!! If you don’t stop sending the letters, I will address to the Police and file a lawsuit against you!!!

There is also a zip file attached IPLOGS.zip. See http://isc.sans.org/ for more details.

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Why use PayPal?

We’ve been using Pay Pal and a regular point of sale module for several years. I find PayPal.com to be more beneficial in several ways. First, they only pull one consistent fee. At the writing of this it is 3.9% and 30 cents per transaction. Google check out is better at 2 percent and 20 cents per transaction but does not allow for recurring payments. Google continues to say it is coming but it never seems to get here. Like most businesses I am left with high priced point of sales modules that charge different fees for different cards plus other strange (hidden) fees that pop up from nowhere. Or, a single point consistent option called PayPal.com.

Other strengths of PayPal are its ability to track well for tax season making it easier on my accountant, allowing for either the seller or the buyer to cancel the transaction without going through hoops and a very easy to use interface and finally they even pay you a little interest through a money market. It accepts all majore credit cards too! My best bet and recommendation to all is go for PayPal.com.

Notice we don’t have a link to PayPal here and we’re not making one dime in referrals. This is a simple unsolicited recommendation to all.

Saturday, November 10, 2007

How do I set up Outlook and Outlook Express

1. Open Outlook Express
2. Click Tools then Accounts from the top drop down menu
3. Click Add (top right) then select Mail
4. Set Display Name (the name you want people to see when they get email from you) then click Next
Note: The Display Name is called Your Name in regular Outlook. This name should include the name of your website or company. Example, Mike Kelly PAontheweb is how mine appears.
5. Enter full email address then click Next
6. POP 3 is the default, let it there and then put incoming and outgoing mail as mail.yourdomain.com, example mail.paontheweb.com would be ours and click Next
7. Account Name is your full email address, not just the first part.
8. Password is your password and select Remember Password check box then click Next and Finish

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

What are templates?

Recently, a potential client said to one of my sales reps, “that looks like a template.” What he probably meant is the site looked like a prefabricated website where they all look the same. Let’s clear something up. ALL websites start out with a template. There are several kinds of templates when it comes to website design. The definition of a Templae taken from Dictionary.com is below:

Computer Science
A document or file having a preset format, used as a starting point for a particular application so that the format does not have to be recreated each time it is used

1. First and foremost, templates are usually created for Webmasters or “do it yourself” types. You can buy a template but then you need a program like Dreamweaver, Front Page, Adobe Go Live or others and some skill to FTP it to your hosting platform and make it all work. PAontheweb.com creates custom templates. We match your business colors, insert your logo and do other custom design work for your website template, business cards etc. All websites start with a template, either custom made or prefabricated.
2. Next is your search engine optimization. It is one thing to have a good looking website it is quite another to get it ranked with Google and other search engines. This is where 99% of all websites fail. Few Webmasters (so called) actually know what they are doing when it comes to getting your website found for the terms you want. That is one of our specialties.
3. There are prefabricated templates that you can get from places like Template Monster. These templates have two distinct prices.
a. A low price as anyone may have this template. That means 100 or more people may be using the same template as you.
b. A much higher exclusive price which means you pay 2 or 3 thousand and you are the only one that can have that design.
4. All websites start out with a Template. When we create a website for your company it is called a Custom Template. This Template is applied to most if not all pages of your website.
5. Our system allows you to purchase and display different templates at different times of the year. For example, you may purchase a website from us but want to decorate for the holidays like Christmas, Independence Day and many other holidays. In less than 2 seconds you can change the entire look of your website without disturbing the pages and the content already on your website!

We hope this helps you understand a bit more about templates.

Monday, August 13, 2007

Hits, Visitors, Unique Visitors and Page Views Defined

In July of 2007 PAontheweb.com went over 1.7 million page views. Everyone wants to know what the difference is between Hits, Visitors, Unique Visitors and Page Views.

PAontheweb looks closely at Page Views since that is the number of times we can expose a site wide advertiser to the public. A Hit is a series of links on that particular page that is seen by the public. Looking at it as Hits, PAontheweb received over 4 million hits in July 2007.

These Hits and Page Views were generated by 142,576 Visitors. The number of Unique Visitors was 82,429.

Without getting too technical about it, Unique Visitors is very unreliable because of the way the internet works. When a visitor comes to a website the I.P. address of the computer connecting to the website is checked. That is a unique visitor. The problem with this is many companies run off of one I.P. address. If a company has 10 or a thousand computers and more than one individual looks at the same site it is only counted as one Unique Visitor.

Visitors are not the best way to measure your website success either. In the case of PAontheweb.com, many Visitors click a website, see what is provided click a link on the page and are taken to another website. The real measure of our success is how many pages are viewed in a given month. That means a site visitor has actually seen your ad or link. They may not have clicked it but they did see it.

The bottom line is the more times you’re exposed to the public the better off you are. If you need Brand Identity we suggest using an image link. If you’re interested in more clicks we suggest a text link to go with your image or a simple text link.

Text links are clicked on more frequently than images. Most people have trained themselves to not click images. The reason is simple. For years, advertisers used image ads for Pop Up advertising and this caused people to stop clicking images. While PAontheweb.com uses Pop Ups when you click a link it is not an advertising pop up. If you click one of our links we are supposing you may not find what you want. If you close that window you will be brought back to the page you were on. You can then check out the next link.

In some cases our advertisers request that their link not open in a pop up. In these cases we comply and you will have to navigate back to PAontneweb.com to do another search.

I know this went beyond the question about Hits, Visitors and Page Views. However, it is all intertwined with they way we do business.

Friday, April 27, 2007

I get Spam Email from my own domain name

We have increased the security level of the SPF record. However the issue is that SPF is still in the alpha testing stage and the majority of e-mail servers do not check for SPF records at all. Adding SPF to mail will most likely be fully available as an accepted standard some time in the next 5 to 10 years. The problem is that e-mail is an outdated standard in which e-mail can easily be forged and send from any computer anywhere in the world claiming to be someone else. Any changes to these standards over the next few years will eventually require every mail server and every end user in the world to change to new software. Currently what happens now is that the receiving e-mail server then parses the information and if a bounce message is generated, it returns to the domain that the mail claims to be from. About the only alternative means to deal with this is to file a complaint to the FTC by sending the entire e-mail including the header information to spam@uce.gov
.
How to Get Full Headers From Microsoft Programs
http://www.haltabuse.org/help/headers/microsoft.shtml

You’ve Got Spam: How to “Can” Unwanted Email
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/online/inbox.shtm

Friday, February 16, 2007

My email is not getting through to some people

If you are having trouble getting through to an email address try the following:

Go to your Outlook and Click Tools and select your Email Account. (Other email clients like Eudora work in a similar way)

Change your Outgoing mail server (smtp) from mail.yourdomain.com to smtp.yourISP.net or .com etc. Example, if you’re ISP is Comcast you would set your Outgoing mail server to smtp.comcast.net. If you are unsure ask your internet service provider for this information.

In the More Settings block deselect my outgoing server (smpt) requires authentication.

Click Test to make sure you set it up correctly. Your incoming mail server information should remain the same, example, mail.yourdomain.com.

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

How do I set Outlook to keep or not keep a copy of email on the server?

Outlook has not made this easy to find. Even when you try their Help it is difficult to uncover where to change this setting. Follow the instructions below for Outlook 2003.
1. In Outlook click Tools and Email Accounts
2. Make sure View or Change existing e-mail accounts is selected and click Next
3. Select the account you want and click Change (some people have more than one setup in Outlook)
4. Click the More Settings (bottom right)
5. Click the Advanced tab
6. Click the Delivery option check box (bottom) to leave a copy on the server and set the number of days or uncheck the box to Not keep a copy on the server.
7. Click OK, then Next and Finish. You’re done.

Saturday, November 04, 2006

How do I ensure email that I do want gets through

Spammers are very sophisticated these days. They use a variety of means to gather email addresses. Email addresses at highest risk of spam are those email addresses that are listed on websites. Robots search websites every day. They can easily gather email addresses to spam. Once you are in their system it is impossible to get your email off their lists.

Most hosting companies and email interface providers like Microsoft Outlook come with various methods of intercepting spam. The problem we usually have to address is how to make sure you get the email you should or want to get. This is a difficult task. However, most systems come with a “white list” or “this is NOT junk” option.

There are too many systems to try and deal with. Therefore, it is up to you to figure out how to “white list” emails that you want to get. If you are a Paontheweb.com client we provide a simple solution. Inside the cpanel of your website there is an interface called Horde. In the Horde Options area and in your inbox area there is a whitelist feature. Simply add the email you want to get and it will come through to your inbox. This does not prevent Microsoft Outlook and other email interfaces from intercepting and wrongly marking your white listed email as spam. You will have to frequently check your Junk folder and mark good email as Not Junk.

Thursday, October 26, 2006

Very Cool and Absolutely Free Virus Protection

New free anti virus for home users

It works with most operating systems

Get AVAST from Download.com or follow this link read a bit about it and to download it now.
http://www.download.com/Avast-Home-Edition/3000-2239_4-10680976.html?tag=lst-0-1

How do I get rid of spam that gets through my filters?

Recently there has been a rash of spam getting through filters and clients are asking us how to stop them. The spammers keep changing their email addresses and subject headings. To filter your email further follow these instructions.

1. Login to your Cpanel by going to http://www.yourdomain.com/cpanel
2. Enter Username and Password.
3. Click the Mail Icon
4. Click Email Filtering
5. Click Add Filter
6. Find something in the body of the offending email, i.e. the first line or whatever is repeated in the offending emails.
7. Select Body and then Paste in the words from the first line of the email.
8. Set Discard as your Destination.
9. Click Activate and you’re done.

Note: Make sure you don’t select common sentences that might be sent from a friend. I know nobody who sends me lines like these.

We are living in a time of natural resources….

Sunday, October 22, 2006

Maps

Everyone wants Pennsylvania Maps. There are tons that you can find on Google and other Search engines. Our favorite map system is Google Maps and you can find a link to it here. Once inside Google Maps you can select various options. For example, you can see a satellite view, a road map view or a hybrid view that gives you a mix of the two. In addition, you can get driving directions in a faster and easier to use format than Mapquest. It all depends on what you like. Soooo, if you’re looking for maps, try this link and click Google Maps.

Other Directories

Yes, we own other directories and plan to open more. We currently have PA B&B a Pennsylvania Bed & Breakfast directory that is independent of PAontheweb.com. We also opened PAMortgagebrokers.net to help you find Mortgage Brokers and Real Estate Agents in Pennsylvania by location. One of our favorites is GolfPA.net a directory dedicated to Pennsylvania Golf lovers.

In addition, we’ve opened EverythingOuterBanks.com for finding your favorite destination websites in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. We have plans to open in New York and many other states under various names.

Friday, March 17, 2006

How long have you guys been around?

Paontheweb.com officially opened on 17 March 2004. The significance of opening on St. Patrick’s Day was due to the proximity of completion to the holiday and the owner’s birthday. Since he is now an old guy he knew he would forget the day it opened. It had to be done on a day that he could remember.

Was the orange color scheme picked for a Protestant Irish reason instead of green? No. It just so happened that the design staff created it in orange. It is only a coincidence that the owner, Mike Kelly, born on St. Patrick’s Day is Protestant and Irish.