speed your site to earn a seal of approval
Posted on General

CloudFlare – A Walkthrough

In a prior post, we looked at the CDN provider Cloudflare as an option for speeding up our site.  In this post, we will take the promised deeper dive into their offering.  We will focus on the free features and note the paid ones available. The Cloudflare Dashboard When you log into CloudFlare, you will be able to select a website if you have more than one tied to the account.  Then you will be taken to the dashboard screen.  There is a lot of content on this page.  The main tabs/buttons across the top are: Overview Analytics DNS Crypto Firewall Speed Caching Page Rules Network Traffic Customize Apps Scrape Shield This list may seem like a lot to cover, but... Read more

Buffer screen shot
Posted on General

A Buffer Walkthrough – Easy Social Content Management

Buffer is an excellent tool for anyone interested in social media marketing.  Other tools have their strengths and weaknesses.  However, we use Buffer a lot and feel a tour is helpful.  You can get a free account at buffer.com and join us as we walk through the menu options. Buffer Manages Multiple Accounts The first thing you need to do is add an account.  The free version of Buffer allows you to add one per social platform so at least add a couple.  We use LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter for nearly all of our posting.  Each platform handles authentication a little differently.  In most cases, select a platform, login to your account, and you will have it added to Buffer.  Add... Read more

CDN Content Everywhere
Posted on General

What is a CDN? CloudFlare to the rescue

When you tackle the issue of speeding up a website, the concept of a CDN will come up.  Since this is obviously not a push to host your server in Canada, it begs the question, what is a CDN? So, what is a CDN? The letters are short for content delivery network, and it is an important concept to understand for performance tuning.  At its simplest, a CDN is a network of servers that help bring content to users from as close to them as possible.  Think of the Postal Service as a form of CDN.  You can go to the nearest office to you to pick up your mail.  It even goes a step further, and you have a... Read more

evaluate performance
Posted on Tech Notes

Evaluate Your Site, Get Improvement Suggestions, For Free

In a prior post, we looked at the Google speed test tool. It is an excellent way to evaluate your site and comply with what they consider to be user-friendly guidelines.  The essential purpose of their guidelines is to get sites fast, secure, and mobile friendly.  Although their tool is free and useful, we can get more help from another free tool.  Let’s look at what GT Metrix can do for you. Evaluate Your Page for Free The GT Metrix site offers a free page evaluation just like Google.  The tool is not a web crawler.  Thus, we recommend that you test every relevant page on your site.  The tests should include the home page, landing pages for ads, and call... Read more

speed your site to earn a seal of approval
Posted on Tech Notes

Getting Your Site the Google Seal of Approval

Any website that wants to attract traffic (all of them, right?) has to work with Google.  Opinions vary about the company itself, but Google is too big to ignore.  The good news is that Google provides a “seal of approval” process for any website owner.  To be clear, the “seal of approval” is not a physical thing, but instead good grades with Google’s assessment.  The goals are based on what Google describes as an ideal internet site.  Additionally, I recommend them for any professional website. Seal of Approval Assessment Tool Google wants to help webmasters.  Thus, they have created a tool to assess a site and generate a list of changes that will improve its Google ranking and appeal to... Read more

No spam sign
Posted on Tech Notes

Handling Spam Comments in WordPress

WordPress is a great tool for getting content to the masses.  Sadly, the most significant proof might be how quickly spammers will start posting comments to your blog.  Spam can be a headache to manage.  However, WordPress has methods to address the problem.  They provide configuration settings and an easy to maintain list of comments for review. Review All Comments The first step in avoiding spam is to make sure comments are not posted to the site without review.  This is a good approach for non-spam comments as well.  Sometimes website readers get fired up about a topic and use inappropriate language or go no tirades that would reflect poorly on the site.  Save yourself some headaches by setting all comments... Read more