luni, 6 decembrie 2010

Damn Cool Pics

Damn Cool Pics


Chinese Traffic Accident Compilation

Posted: 06 Dec 2010 04:54 AM PST

Chinese drivers drive their new cars like what they used to ride: bikes. The result is disaster. Traffic accidents captured on CCTV in China.


TSA Sexy Maneuvers

Posted: 06 Dec 2010 02:32 AM PST

Cleavage karate chop, two-handed testicle twister and other sexy TSA maneuvers.


















































Chinese Designer Builds Sustainable Egg House

Posted: 06 Dec 2010 02:22 AM PST

Struggling college students could really learn a thing or two from Daihai Fei. The recent college grad discovered that rent prices in Beijing were more than he could afford. Instead of moving away from the city or becoming homeless, he decided to build his own mobile home.

Daihai Fei's home is an shaped like an egg and is self-sustaining. A solar panel on the roof provides power for his reading lamp, and the abode is spacious enough for a small bed and bookshelf. Daihai Fei spent only $960 building his home, which he has smartly parked right across the street from his workplace.

Daihai Fei built his amazing egg-house on a bamboo frame, covered with various insulating materials, and topped with a layer of stitched bag. The bags themselves are filled with sawdust and grass seeds, which he sprays with water regularly, to help the grass grow faster. Inspired by the grass-covered roofs of Norway, he knows the grass will over greater protection for his home.














































Image Source: imaginechina


Epic Fails - Part 9

Posted: 06 Dec 2010 12:07 AM PST

Cool Matching Tattoos

Posted: 05 Dec 2010 11:49 PM PST

Selection of the coolest matching tattoos.
























Only on TV

Posted: 05 Dec 2010 11:25 PM PST

Weird stuff spotted during TV shows.










































Don't SuperSize Me (Infographic)

Posted: 05 Dec 2010 11:02 PM PST

Analyzing the caloric intake on America.

More Infographics.

Click to Enlarge.


Source: registerednurse


SEOmoz Daily SEO Blog

SEOmoz Daily SEO Blog


What Are Your Best Tips for Link Builders?

Posted: 05 Dec 2010 02:38 PM PST

Posted by Justin Briggs

If you want to boost rankings, few things are as effective as link building. It's also one of the hardest and most time consuming parts of SEO. I'd love to hear from others, so in the comments below share your best or most unique tips for link builders.

Following are nine of my tips to help you as a link builder. You may already be using some of these, but hopefully you'll find a helpful nugget of information in here.

#1 Hide Behind Content StrategiesSomeone Hired a Link Buildersomeone hired a link builder

If you want to want to engage in less than pearly white link building tactics, do it behind cover of content based tactics.

Consider some of the tools available today, which can publicly show link velocity graphs (links acquired over time).


Graph from MajesticSEO.com

If a spike in links acquired happens without any other change to your site, it may appear a bit suspicious. I recommend starting your link building push at the same time as launching content. This way, there is a corresponding purpose behind a spike in your link profile.

#2 Be Approachable

When sending out link request emails, try to be approachable. I recommend including an offer to speak with them over the phone. It's just one more trust element, and can set you apart from mass link request emails. Another way to be approachable is building links as a girl. Girls seem to build links more effectively than boys.

girl link builder

Geoff, who’s been working with me on link building recently, wrote a pretty clever post about using OKCupid data to improve link requests.

Being non-traditional can help put people at ease. Recently, I got a link by using this in a link request email.

 "I think it'd be epic to bust out in Spanish like Stewie on Family Guy while blowing the head off a zombie with a shotgun"

A non-conventional link request is more effective than a standard "Dear Webmaster" email. And always test your emails, because some small changes can go a long way. I was able to increase my response rate on a campaign from 20% to 87% by reframing the link request. I find that less formal emails work better.

#3 Know the Basic of Sales

A few of my more valuable experiences as a link builder were the ones that taught me how to be better at sales. Knowing how to be persuasive can improve your link building. I recommend approaching a link building request as a sales pitch to be closed.

  • Build a relationship first.
  • Help them out.
  • Be a bit manipulative.
  • Frame the request.
  • Create a sense of urgency.
  • Overcome objections.
  • Make them a hero.

Some books I’ve enjoyed reading are Never Eat Alone, Predictably Irrational and the Little Red Book of Selling.

#4 Mining for Information

Dig in deep to find a prospective linker's contact information. It's a bit like stalking, but spending the extra time to find a way to get in touch can pay off.

I've found it useful to search email address on major social media sites, then cross reference any usernames or screen names I found with KnowEm. This can help find alternative ways to connect with a webmaster other than email.

I recommend using CTRL + F to search for rewritten email addresses. For example, check for [at], (at), a/t, [dot], d0t, etc. A lot of webmasters hide their contact information from spam bots by rewriting it. This destroys any obvious pattern, which can make finding the email tricky, but searching for some common rewrites usually does the trick.

#5 Get Smarter About Guest Blogging

“Matt made a point to mention that users are more likely to click on the first link in an article as opposed to a link at the bottom of the article. He said put your most important links at the top of the article. I believe it was Matt hinting to SEOs about this.” - Search Engine Land

As guest blogging becomes mainstream, it’s getting spammed more. I think guest blogging is great, but if this becomes a spammed link building tactic, expect it to become less effective, especially as SEOs start to automate guest blogging.

#6 Paid Links Work

Although I don’t support paid links, let’s just say that paid links work. There is a lot of risk associated with buying links, but if you’re going to.

  • Don’t buy obvious paid links.
  • Don’t buy from networks.
  • Don’t buy from anyone who discloses selling links.
  • Don’t use perfect anchor text, especially high value terms.
  • Buy links to link magnets and linkbait.
  • Mix it up and have no pattern.
  • Buy for juice / trust and not just anchors.
  • Donate and sponsor.

Just because you can, doesn’t mean I’m saying you should. SEOmoz doesn’t endorse buying links and there are ways to buy links without buying links.

#7 A Robust Profile, Not Just A Robust Link.

We all have a concept of the “perfect” link, but obtaining a link that’s relevant, high authority, and has the right anchor text is challenging.

I recommend building out a robust *profile*. Get what you can, where you can. I can get my juice in one place and my anchors somewhere else.

A lot of tactics that shouldn’t work still do, especially on sites that have an authoritative link profile otherwise. If you have a site with a strong link profile, but lacks anchor text optimization, think of some easy ways to get the anchor text you want.

#8 Understand Diminishing Returns

Shoot for domain diversity when building links.

At a certain point, the marginal value of a link from a particular domain starts to reduce. If you look at a factor like anchor text, the marginal value of a link may become negative.

diminishing returns

  1. Get a link from a domain and move on. (20 links on 20 domains > 20 links on 2 domains)
  2. Vary your anchor text often. (Over optimization can suppress rankings)

#9 Keep Up With New Tips and Tricks

Some of my favorites over the last few months are link profile visualization, Multi-links for Firefox, and that Excel and Google Docs have hyperlink functions. (Thanks to Tom & Ben for the hyperlink protip.)

I’ve even shared one of my own tricks, which is using GCSE to replace Yahoo! linkdomain.

Keeping your finger on the pulse of the link building community can help you find these little nuggets. Other than SEOmoz and Distilled, I really like stuff put out by Wiep, Ontolo, SEER, Blogstorm, and SEO Gadget.


I'd love to hear everyone else's tips and ideas.

Feel free to connect with me on Twitter if you ever want to chat about link building. 


Do you like this post? Yes No

Michael Gray - Graywolf's SEO Blog

Michael Gray - Graywolf's SEO Blog


Sonos Wireless Dock Review

Posted: 06 Dec 2010 07:16 AM PST

Post image for Sonos Wireless Dock Review

Since my last Sonos post a few months ago (see Sonos Review), I’ve really become a big Sonos advocate. I’ve been telling people about it and recommending it to anyone who asks. In fact I’ve even added a Sonos S5 to the master Bedroom. So when Sonos asked me if I wanted to review their new Wireless Dock, I was pretty excited.

The wireless dock is a dock for your iPod/iPhone/iPod Touch that allows you to connect to your Sonos music system. You plug the unit in to the wall, sync it with your Sonos system and, in less than 2 minutes, you’re ready to start playing music. The best way to use the wireless dock is to put it near your main audio system, so if one of your friends come over you can play music directly from their player throughout your house without needing to move files around. It’s really painless. The second best way is to put a  Sonos S5 in a guest room so your guests can play their own music. When you set up a wireless Sonos dock, my advice is to configure it to autoplay on the most appropriate Sonos Player.

There is one criticism I have about the wireless dock: it won’t work with an iPad. Right now I’ve got a jury rigged iPad Dock and JVC Soundstage for when I’m watching Weeds Reruns on Netflix while making dinner … err …  I mean Ted Videos … yeah, that’s the ticket … ’cause the native iPad speaker is too low. If the Sonos wireless dock had a slot that accommodated an iPad I could replace those two with one unit. Other than that, it’s a nice addition to the Sonos product line.

Disclosure: This is not a paid review; however, I was sent a Sonos Wireless Dock for review.


Creative Commons License photo credit: seyed mostafa zamani

tla starter kit

Related posts:

  1. Sonos Review A few weeks ago, I twittered about the demise of...
  2. Review Dropbox.com – Online File Storage Dropbox.com is an online file storage system that allows you...
  3. Esca Review – Dinner with Dave Pasternack One of the highlights of my trip to SES in...
  4. Review Box.net – Online File Storage Box.net is an online file storage system that allows you...
  5. Text-Link-Ads.com Review The following post is a paid review of Text-Link-Ads.com. This...

Advertisers:

  1. Text Link Ads - New customers can get $100 in free text links.
  2. BOTW.org - Get a premier listing in the internet's oldest directory.
  3. Ezilon.com Regional Directory - Check to see if your website is listed!
  4. Glass Whiteboards - For a professional durable white board with no ghosting, streaking or marker stains, see my Glass Whiteboard Review
  5. Need an SEO Audit for your website, look at my SEO Consulting Services
  6. KnowEm - Protect your brand, product or company name with a continually growing list of social media sites.
  7. Scribe SEO Review find out how to better optimize your wordpress posts.
  8. TigerTech - Great Web Hosting service at a great price.

This post originally came from Michael Gray who is an SEO Consultant. Be sure not to miss the Thesis Wordpress Theme review.

Sonos Wireless Dock Review