Dec 26

Link checker – Bad neighborhood

I often get requests for me to add links to my sites. Usually it is just someone looking for something simple that will deliver them some relevant traffic.
What I have found though is that one should ALWAYS verify that the link destination is okay. It should not be in a bad neighborhood. In addition, it should not link out to bad neighborhoods. These bad neighborhoods will get sites that link to them penalized in the search engines.  That’s right – the sites that you link to can get your site penalized. Not only that, but the sites THEY link to might get your site penalized.
The link below has a bad-neighborhood checker. It will scan a URL and determine if there are questionable links. Then it will scan the linked to pages to see if any of their links are questionable in nature. It’s a great little tool and I highly recommend using it.

Aug 09

You must have a plan for revenue

Starting a business isn’t that hard. Making money with one however can be very difficult. If you’re not making money you’re not really a business owner. Instead, you are a consultant [link to BlogMaverick]. Mark Cuban asserts that what is really important in business is making money. And to make money you need to make sales.
 
Staying in business is about making money – period. Even as a non-profit the company should be thinking about how to make money and how to close the sale. I know it seems obvious (to some), but it’s not that clear to everyone. Go ahead, read the post from BlogMaverick and then read the comments. You’ll see that not everyone agrees. Some think it’s okay to not make money for a prolonged time. Some think you have to go into debt or spend a lot of money to make money. Well, if you don’t have a good revenue strategy you can go into all the debt in the world trying to spend your way to success and you will fail miserably. Have a plan to create revenue quickly with your business or find another business.
From the article:
“On the flip side, if you want to start and grow a business that you retain control of, put money in the bank from  and can make a long term commitment to, then always remember that sales should be the first thing you focus on when you wake up in the morning.  Profitable Sales to happy customers is the best path to making money. If you go to bed at night thinking about how to sell more and how to make your customers happy. You probably are in a good place.  If you go to bed and wake up thinking about how to raise money to stay in business, you might as well get the new business cards and think about what your new consulting blog is going to look like” – MC