Included in this new package-deal are lots of extras that will offer a complete business web presence ready to take on 2012. I’m making this available to anyone for less than $800.

I am also liquidating an established website forum for only $1500. Both are extraordinary deals, so please continue reading for all the details.

Start 2012 With A Modern, Professional Website

With this web development special you are getting much more than a customized design. I am offering a complete business website launch done right with search and website optimization, design, marketing, social network integration and much more.

The following 10 features and services are all included in this limited-time special offer.

1. eCommerce, Social or Membership Sites – Using the latest online business solutions such as WP-eCommerce, BuddyPress and more, we can create a wide variety of feature rich websites.

2. Professional WordPress Theme Customization – Take your choice of premium layouts from ThemeForest or other professional themes and frameworks as a starting point for your business.

3. Logo and Graphic Design – In addition to customizing your website however you like, a great looking new brand and promotional graphics will give a finishing touch.

4. Comprehensive SEO – Starting from the beginning, your website will be optimized to rank for targeted keywords of your choice. In addition to complete on-site optimization, I am now offering initial link-building and other methods of driving traffic and gaining authority for your new site.

5. Website and Marketing Copy – Content is king. So, for your business to succeed in 2012 you need great web copy. I have written for the web for over a decade and would be happy to get you started with website copy for your products or services. I will also include starter content for your company blog and social profiles.

6. Comprehensive Website Optimization – Your site will load lightning fast and will prove to be a great experience for your visitors. Several plugins, features and tweaks will make your business up to par with the latest website optimization standards.

7. Hand-selected Plugins and Extras – Along with SEO and website optimization, I will also share my favorite WordPress management plugins and other unique solutions that may fit your needs.

8. Six Months of Free WordPress Hosting – I will be glad to host your website on my server for up to 6 months at no additional cost to you.

9. Custom Facebook and Twitter Profiles – You don’t have to worry about finally getting a Twitter profile and setting up your Facebook page. Included in this package are custom social networking profiles that will be linked with your website and drive leads for you in 2012.

10. WordPress Instruction – Each of the elements of your new site may seem overwhelming, but they are really not, and I will be available to walk you through the process of managing your website effectively and easily.

All these services are included in this New Year Special for only $799.

Because many of these services demand a lot of time, I will only be able to accept a limited number of clients. So, please contact me now to express your interest in working with me to build your online business.

Example Works

Here are a few sites I’ve completed for clients who took advantage of some of these services.

RaleighPersonalTraining.com

JukeBoxxMedia.com

UDRP-Attorney.com

WritingAssignmentHelp.com

Contact Me To Get Started

Thank you for your interest in my web development services. For just $799 you can have a professional online business presence. Please contact me here as soon as possible with the details of your online business needs.

Start 2012 With an Established Twitter Forum

I am looking to liquidate TweetSocial.com a nearly 4 year old Twitter Forum. This online community of over 3000 members features discussions on all things Twitter and additionally features an application directory.

Liquidation Sale! Own this website today for just $1500.

I have not attempted to monetize or extensively market this site in recent years, however it grows organically through rankings for key terms on Google. The site receives just under 5000 unique visitors per month.

Included in the sale is all site content, design, and ownership of the Twitter profile (@TweetSocial) with 6710 followers, which as an easy way to send more traffic if you have just a few minutes to spare.

For only $1500 you can be the proud new owner of the TweetSocial Twitter Forum and app directory. Please contact me here as soon as possible with your interest in purchasing this website.

Have a great new year!

New Year Web Development Special: Start 2012 With A Great Business Website DotSauce Magazine

For almost any type of website you’re looking for, I can create a great solution using WordPress, the webs’ most popular and user-friendly content management system.

Get this cool deal on professional WordPress development for only $300 until the end of this sweltering hot summer.

Here is a list of types of websites available as starting points, though I would be happy to discuss other options you might be interested in.

• Personal blog
• Professional portfolio
• Professional business web presence
• eCommerce or affiliate product portal
• Niche magazine
• Startup web presence
• Community / forums
• Question & answer hub
• Directory
• Classifieds
• Job board
• Membership site

August Development Special

Included in this special offer are the following features and services.

• Beautiful designs using the latest standards. Integrate your existing logo or get a new one.
• Full search engine optimization services
• Social media integration and other interactive features
• Advanced WordPress plugins make site management simple and boost performance.

Let’s Build Your Professional Website

I will be in close contact with you throughout the development process to get your feedback and direction as well as to explain how to manage the site. My work will not be complete until you are 100% satisfied with your website.

Hot August, Cool Deal: Professional Website Development Only $300 DotSauce Magazine

What was traditionally thought of as a blogging CMS has been transformed into a powerful, user-friendly development platform. Virtually any type of business website can be created using a combination of innovative WordPress theme design and advanced plugins.

Continue reading to enter to win professional logo design! (No purchase necessary)

For a limited time I am offering these special rates on development services for the following turnkey web development solutions powered by WordPress.

Updated June 22 – I’ve lowered the prices to make them even more attractive. Pay half up-front to get started and the remaining half when your website is completed. Contact me to get started.

Magazine / Blog / Business – $350

Below is an example of the many high-quality, visually appealing and flexible themes for creating a web based publication, blog or business website.

Affiliate Product Portal – $350

Create a niche affiliate site and earn commissions by referring customers to popular products. Bonus: A plugin will track stats and create custom affiliate URLs.

Product Reviews – $350

Similar to an affiliate portal, you can review products and promote affiliate products. This layout is intended for ratings and reviews from you and a community of visitors.

Q&A Site – $400

Question and answer sites are a popular new trend that is great for business and getting advertising revenue.

Classifieds – $400

Find an audience for professional classifieds site to help people market their products and services. Collect listing fees through PayPal.

Job Board – $400

Certainly a great time to develop a job board as many are looking. Connect employers and job seekers and collect listing fees through PayPal.

eCommerce Storefront – $400

Whether you have your own products or are selling digital goods, this turnkey solution makes use of a flexible shopping cart, but has options for external purchase options.

Membership Site – $500

With premium membership plugins you can setup private membership site and collect subscription payments. A-List Blogging site shown as example.

Group Buying Site – $650

This wildly popular trend is sweeping the world by helping small businesses profit and customers save money. It will take some commitment to get the site started, but the rewards can be big.

These innovative new WordPress themes use the latest standards from WordPress 3.0. Much more than incredible designs, they are built for turnkey online business. Theme and plugin files, documentation and authorized licences are included.

You can select one of these turnkey solutions  to customize and launch your online business, or you can request a comparable design to work with. Pick any premium WordPress theme the web has to offer, the cost will be included in the service fee.

Added Features & Services

The following features are included with all turnkey development options at no additional cost.

• Professional logo design and theme integration
• Design customization and widget setup
• Social media integration
• Navigation and content map setup
• SEO review, consultation and latest plugins
• Website performance optimization and plugins

Pay half to begin development and half upon completion!

That’s right, I can get started for an initial payment of half the special rates listed above. You can then pay the remaining half when the website has been completed and you are 100% satisfied.

I would be happy to discuss design options or answer any questions you might have about the development process.

Please get in touch as soon as possible; availability will be based on demand. Contact me here with details about your development needs to get started.

Logo Design Giveaway

The team at Logo.com has been kind enough to offer professional logo design services to one lucky DotSauce reader.

This is a $199 value!

There is no purchase necessary, anyone is eligible to win. Simply connect with the Rewards widget below and follow the instructions to earn entries.

• Comment on this post saying how a new logo design will help you (+1 entry)
• Like DotSauce on Facebook (+1 entry)
• Tweet about this giveaway (+1 entry)
• Bonus (+unlimited entries): Share your invite link to earn +1 entry for every unique click-through and +5 entries if your friend joins the giveaway.

Enter to Win

Update: Abhinav Gulyani has been selected as our lucky winner. Enjoy your new logo!

This giveaway ends on June 30th at midnight EST. Thank you for participating and good luck!

Again, please contact me soon with your interest in my turnkey web development solutions.

Turnkey Professional Web Development Special and Free Giveaway DotSauce Magazine

I’ve kept watch and tried out many new web development techniques. I’ve also held an active interest in engaging with readers directly on site and through social networks as much as possible.

In this article, I share the optimization techniques and resources that have been most beneficial to me as a web developer and blogger.

Site Header Tips

1. Optimize your title. By default, WordPress and other CMS’s append your website name to the end of title tags on posts and pages. Using your choice of SEO optimization plugin, such as All In One SEO or WordPress SEO, you can configure post titles to contain just the title of your post.

This technique has proven to be beneficial for ranking well for key terms within post titles. It works because you will eventually receive backlinks with better anchor text and more relevancy on social network shares.

2. Set a default image URL for Facebook & LinkedIn sharing. In the past, images accompanying my articles when displayed on social sharing services like Digg, Facebook, bitly, and others always seemed to be the wrong one or missing entirely! The problem annoyed me to the point that I had to seek out a solution.

I was ecstatic to finally work out a simple way to define the proper post image every time. Plug this code into your site header to define the image URL.

<link rel="image_src" type="image/jpeg" href="post-thumbnail.jpg" />

3. Set an author link attribute. (New) Google, Bing and Yahoo recently announced a joint initiative hosted at Schema.org. This HTML tagging platform will work as a framework for defining the structure of a website and individual bits of data. This initiative to create a more open web filled with rich data is just getting started.

Google is getting started right away with a new way to connect authors with their content across multiple websites. Simply define rel=”author” when linking the author’s name in post display as shown here.

<a rel="author" href="http://markfulton.com">Mark Fulton</a>

Site Speed Tips

4. Track page speed with updated Google Analytics code. (New) Last month Google introduced a revolutionary new feature as part of the upgraded Google Analytics, tracking website load times.

With a little adjustment to your tracking code you can begin receiving reports on site speed analytics. Get this rolling and watch as the next few tips greatly reduce page load times.

_gaq.push(['_trackPageLoadTime']);

5. Minify JavaScript and CSS files. WordPress Minify is a must-have plugin for any site using JavaScript files and detailed CSS.

Automagically have all these files compressed and combined. This will reduce the number of HTTP requests, significantly speeding up page speed performance.

6. Compress images and serve them across multiple sub-domains. Another highly recommend solution for improving website speed is the WP Smush.it plugin which compresses images as you upload them.

I still recommend saving all images for the web using PhotoShop before uploading. Then let Smush.it work a little extra magic to reduce the file size further without noticeably compromising quality.

Additionally, hosting some images on different sub-domains allows them to be loaded simultaneously instead of one at a time.

7. Place non-critical JavaScript calls in the footer. By placing your JavaScript calls just before your closing tag you make sure all critical content and design layout is rendered before JavaScript enhanced elements. This is as important for user experience as page loading time.

Ironically, the new Google +1 button code suggests placing the script tag in your header. Put it in the footer instead!

Increase Conversions

8. Split test your business and lead generation copy. We’re hearing more and more about split-testing or A/B tests in recent years as easier tools are made available. The smallest of changes in copy, color or positioning of call to action elements can sometimes yield big returns.

Here are some economical choices for getting started with split testing your website content.

• Google Website Optimizer
• A/B Theme Testing Plugin for WordPress
• Visual Website Optimizer

9. Reduce bounce rate by engaging readers. There are a lot of great methods for engaging website visitors, encouraging them to stick around longer and click-through to further pages on your site.

I’ve written some common sense suggestions for reducing bounce rate in the past. Simple things like improving your navigation or adding images to content can help.

I have been pleased with increased engagement here at DotSauce Magazine using the following applications.

• Wibiya Toolbar (red toolbar at bottom of window) – An incredibly useful toolbar with lots of applications.
• Punchtab Rewards (“Rewards” icon at bottom left of window) – Encourage return visits and sharing content with Punchtab’s innovative new social rewards layer.
• HelloBar – Run a promotion in the header of your site to get immediate attention. Simple app with lots of thought put into it.

I have 5 beta invites to HelloBar for those interested. Please leave a comment and let me know you’d like one.

Extend Your Reach

10. Go mobile. I use the WPTouch plugin which automatically generates a mobile optimized version of DotSauce Magazine. Have you looked at your Google Analytics browser reports to see if many visitors are using mobile devices? It’s likely more than you think.

Greatly improve their user experience and conserve server resources by implementing a mobile optimized display.

11. Get social. Love them or hate them, social networks are driving traffic and allowing your following to engage and endorse your content. Discover the best widgets and sharing buttons for your website and include them in prime positions such as at the top of your sidebar or directly after post content.

I recommend you highlight the big 4; Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and email.

• Facebook Social Plugins
• Twitter Website Resources
• LinkedIn Share button
• Google +1 Button (New)
• Sharedaddy (Part of JetPack for WordPress)

12. Become a curator of the latest news and resources. This suggestion goes hand-in-hand with getting social. The most influential people on social networks are found generously sharing editorials, news and resources. It’s a great way to build a following and get recommended.

Every day I share a selection of domaining, online business and web development resources on Twitter, the DotSauce Facebook page, LinkedIn, social bookmarking and social news websites. I’ve been doing this for years and have found the practice to be very rewarding.

I’m now using Keepstream to publish a monthly roundup of the best links here on DotSauce. You can also find over 90 industry leading publications at the new DotSauce News site.

Next Up: Optimizing Publisher Experience

I hope you’ve enjoyed these tips and techniques for optimizing websites for both search engines and readers. I’m considering a related post that will feature methods of optimizing your experience as a publisher on the backend of a website. This year, I’ve discovered some very interesting tools and resources that make professional blogging that much easier. Stay tuned.

Thanks for reading my tips. Please leave a comment if you have any questions or suggestions about this article, I would love to hear your thoughts.

12 Tips and New Standards for Optimizing Your Website DotSauce Magazine

I take great pleasure in curating and sharing the most valuable articles, editorials and resources related to domaining, online business, marketing, web development and SEO. I hope you’ve had a chance to use and pass these resources on to your following.

It’s been some time since the last Twitter link roundup. I had considered discontinuing that post series, but the content shared in May is definitely worth a second look even if you did happen to catch the updates on the DotSauce Facebook page or the @DotSauce Twitter feed.

Domaining

Domain name industry news, articles and resources from DotSauce and around the web.

Small Business & Startups

Big collection of inspiration, editorials and resources for small business and entrepreneurs.

Marketing

Powerful techniques and tips for the constantly evolving world of online marketing.

Web Development & SEO

The latest in website development, design, management and optimization.

Like what you see? To stay up-to-date with our online business resources, follow @DotSauce or Like DotSauce on Facebook to receive ALL the updates. Thanks for connecting!

Domaining and Online Business Link Roundup from May 2011 DotSauce Magazine

You heard right, DotSauce now has a free rewards program. See the “Rewards” button at the bottom left of your browser window? Securely connect with Facebook to earn points for simply reading articles. Earn enough points to claim prizes including free .Com domain registration and other special offers from the DotSauce Domain Club.

For National Small Business Week 2011 we want one lucky entrepreneur to start their summer with a professional website, absolutely free.

Small Business Startup Package

• Your choice of 1 domain name from DotSauce Domain Club inventory
• 1 month free trial of Domain Club Pro membership
• Professional WordPress website development with premium theme
• Logo design and theme customization
• Search engine and website performance optimization
• $100 Google AdWords gift card (for new accounts)
• Free web hosting for 1 year

Giveaway Details

Follow the instructions using the widget below to take part in the giveaway. There are many ways to gain entry points for better odds of winning the Small Business Startup Package.

Connect with the Giveaway widget and follow the instructions for earning entry points.

• Leave a comment on this blog post (+1 entry)
• Like DotSauce on Facebook (+1 entry)
• Tweet about this giveaway (+1 entry)
• Bonus (+unlimited entries): Share your invite link to earn +1 entry for every unique click-through and +5 entries if your friend joins the giveaway.

The giveaway will run through May 22nd at midnight. A winner will be announced on May 23rd.

Enter To Win

Update: The winner is Abdel Toughrai!

Note: If you are viewing through an RSS reader or have ads blocked you may not be able to see the widget.

Best of luck to you and all the many small businesses getting started this year.

Small Business Week Startup Package Giveaway DotSauce Magazine

After reviewing the full offering, I am convinced that CodeGuard is going to be a must-have service for serious web professionals and I am thrilled to be using it to protect my websites.

[Image by Flickr user Aaron Landry]

Super Backup

CodeGuard connects to your site through FTP and seamlessly goes to work for you backing up and monitoring your files.

Unlike traditional cloud storage services like DropBox, CodeGuard can be setup to backup your website hourly, daily or monthly and stores a unique image of your site each time.

Thwarting Hackers

Over the years I have seen a steady rise in attacks against websites and have even fallen victim to some very devious hacks and exploits myself. I wish CodeGuard would have been around to alert me about those issues.

CodeGuard continually scans your website files for unauthorized code. Pro members can be alerted by email in as little as a few minutes if anything malicious appears.

Mishaps Be Gone

CodeGuard Pro members never worry about breaking their websites. An amazing “rollback” feature works just like an undo tool, letting you effortlessly restore a previous version of an entire site.

The rollback feature could be particularly helpful when dealing with CMS updates that can at times break a customized website.

FREE Beta Offer With Activation Code: DOTSAUCE

CodeGuard is offering up to 5000 free accounts during their beta launch. They have been kind enough to provide DotSauce readers with an invitation.

Simply enter DOTSAUCE as your activation code when signing up for CodeGuard. You can use this activation code to backup one site for free or get CodeGuard Pro features and backup multiple sites for just $10 per month.

If you’re interested, hurry and try out the free Beta offering while it’s still available.

What do you think of CodeGuard? Leave a comment below to let us know how it works out or ask any questions you might have about CodeGuard’s service.

CodeGuard is a Must Have for Website Backup and Malware Monitoring – Free Beta Offer! DotSauce Magazine

Last week, I announced the Domain Club Grand Opening prize giveaway that will run through March 28th. Free professional web development and design services are featured as one of the prizes.

A lot of people have shown interest in this particular prize, so I’ve decided to host this special
March Madness discount. You can take advantage of these services now for one low flat fee.

March Madness Web Development Special

All of these professional services and features are included for just $300.

• Business, personal or eCommerce website development; whatever your project requires, I have the resources to make it happen.
• Beautiful design using the latest standards. Integrate your existing logo or get a new design.
• Full search engine optimization services
• Social media integration and other interactive features
• WordPress and advanced plugins make site management simple and boost performance.

Pay $150 to start and $150 when your project is
complete and you are 100% satisfied.

To get started, contact me here with specific details of your website development project or if you have any questions. I will review your request and get back to you soon with design options.

Don’t delay, this offer will only run through March. Availability is subject to demand.

March Madness $300 Professional Website Development Special and Free Giveaway DotSauce Magazine

[Image: Nic McPhee, Wrapping one's head around the data, via Flickr Creative Commons]

I set out with a goal to create a page that hits-home on three of important aspects of domain development:

1. Unique Content and SEO
2. Automation
3. Maximum Revenue Potential

My Dream Parking Page

The following mock-up shows my vision for a perfect domain parking page. A solution like this is what it would take to get me back in the game.

I created this concept page using a nifty application called MockingBird and will continue to edit my Dream Parking Page as new ideas and monetization opportunities present themselves.

Click image for full page mock-up.

Psst! PromoEssentials.com and other quality domains are currently available
for $19 each, exclusively for DotSauce Domain Club premium members.

Unique Content and Search Optimization

It may not look like it, but this page can contain a large amount of unique content. The trick is that not all of it is displayed to users at once. Using well-formated list-styling with a little XHTML and CSS magic, the tabs can contain extensive resources, apps and information for visitors on-demand.

Parking pages and mini-sites face an SEO dilemma in that we would like to be more like a single landing page to convert as much traffic as possible into revenue through PPC or acquiring leads. The problem of delivering unique and fresh content to stay relevant on search engines then becomes an issue. For this reason, my dream parking page would be mostly one-page of content aside from an added Q&A application to take advantage of user-generated content.

Customization of navigation and other website element text is key to be able to include the domain keywords where appropriate. As you can see in the mock-up, there are keywords in all the major elements of the page including the title, slogan, tabs and search bar.

Automation

The main tabbed section can contain interactive applications such as the Amazon product feed shown. These popular products would update automatically based on a master keyword and can then be refined by the visitor.

Affiliate promotions and more content can be featured within the other tabs. I’ve shown an example of connecting to a daily deals network such as Groupon or LivingSocial affiliate programs.

All of the site elements would ideally be editable through a WordPress theme options panel or plugin. One could then use WordPress multi-site to create and manage pages for all of your domains.

Maximum Revenue

It doesn’t look like it, but almost every clickable element on my Dream Parking Page leads to a revenue generating source. Whether it’s referrals to Amazon products, Google AdSense or an affiliate offer, all exits lead to profits.

I have additionally included a prominent notice at the top-right of the page stating the website or domain may be for sale.

The are three advertising positions placed strategically for exposure and page flow. Most mini-sites typically use just two alloted AdSense units. The third position can be used for affiliate banners, direct advertising or an alternative ad network.

Additional site elements such as video and social buttons compliment and balance the advertising so that it isn’t overwhelming.

What would your dream parking page be like?

I would love to receive feedback on my mock-up. Maybe you have first-hand experience with domain parking optimization or can give advice from a user perspective. Any suggestions at all are welcome.

Let’s crowd-source the perfect domain parking page for 2011 and beyond. Please leave your suggestions and ideas in the comments area below.

My Dream Domain Parking Page DotSauce Magazine

In this roundup, I’ve collected and sorted all the top links to articles and resources shared on Twitter thus far in 2011. I’m sure it’s possible for even my most dedicated followers to miss some updates, so I have hand picked the top links and organized them by category for your convenience.

You’re welcome to share these resources with your own following. Mentioning @DotSauce would be very much appreciated . Enjoy!

Domaining

Domain name resources, articles and news.

Web Development

Web development articles and free resources.

Business & Entrepreneurship

Articles and editorials encouraging online business success.

Please follow @DotSauce on Twitter where I frequently share links like these that are related to the domain name industry, website development, online business, social networking, internet marketing and more.

You can also Like DotSauce on Facebook to receive instant updates on the latest articles at DotSauce Magazine. Of course, if you’re feeling very motivated, you can leave a comment with your thoughts and share this roundup post with your friends and followers.

Twitter Link Roundup 2011 Edition: On Domaining, Web Development & Entrepreneurship DotSauce Magazine

I’m not writing this to get you to convert to Google Chrome, but I am going to tempt you with a collection of amazingly useful new applications and extensions that can be found in the new Chrome Web App Store. Enjoy!

[Image: Ian Manrue, Wrenches, February 28, 2009 via Flickr, Creative Commons Attribution.]

Web Development

Window Resizer – Quickly change the size of your actual browser window to see how your website looks at common screen resolutions.

Web Developer Tools – This is identical to the web developer toolbar that is so popular for Firefox users. Featuring an assortment of useful web dev tools.

Development & Code Search – Provides quick access to documentation for popular programming languages.

IE Tab – As the name implies, launch a tab running Internet Explorer inside chrome to see how your website looks for those poor souls.

Sight – Automatically highlights code syntax when source of websites is viewed in the browser.

Pastebin – Quickly store or retrieve text or code from a secure or public location on Pastebin.com

MeasureIt! – Determine the pixel width and height on any element of a page.

Speed Tracer – This official Google plugin really puts your website performance to the test and provides valuable information for improving load times.

csscan – Quickly view the CSS properties of any element on a page.

Blogging

Create Link – Allows you to copy the current page URL and title as a fully formatted HTML hyperlink or customize your own link structure.

SEO SERP – Check the search ranking performance of multiple websites against particular keyword term or phrase.

SEO Site Tools – A comprehensive suite of tools for researching and analyzing SEO and social performance of any website.

Pixlr Grabber – Useful for taking a full or partial screen capture of any website and instantly enables crop and editing.

Word Count – Watch what you’re writing. This app counts the words and characters within a selection.

RSS Subscription – Amazingly, Chrome does not automatically recognize RSS feeds. This application remedies the problem and helps you quickly subscribe to the feed of any blog.

Social Media Marketing

Session Manager – Enables you to save individual sets of tabs to open anytime you want. Use this to quickly open a set of important websites or for repetitive tasks that require multiple windows.

Personalized Web – This powerful application allows you to mold the web to work for you. Modify the code of any site to your liking.

iMacros – Automate repetitive tasks with ease with this advanced application. Record and playback actions to make your PC do the grunt work.

Stay Focused – Limit the amount of time you spend on time-wasting sites or manage your marketing efforts by making sure you cover all the bases before you run out of time.

Proxlet Tweet Filter – An amazing new web application layer for Twitter.com that enables useful features such as filtering your twitter stream, hashtags, and blocking annoying Twitter applications.

Thank you for browsing this list of tools for website development, blogging and social marketing. What are your favorite items from the Chrome Web App store? Let us know which tools you can’t live without.

If you found these Chrome applications useful and know someone else who might, please consider sharing this post.

Chrome Web App Store’s Useful New Tools for Web Developers, Bloggers and Marketers DotSauce Magazine

Building a domain portfolio website can be an extremely valuable resource for making domain sales.

As you read through my reviews of these 5 new domain portfolio websites, you will discover that there are many different variations in Domaining business style and marketing methods. These are all nice domain portfolio websites that can be effective in their own unique way.

Dandy Domains – This website represents an excellently designed and well-thought out Domaining business. Dandy Domains features testimonials from satisfied customers, bold call to actions and helpful visual cues. Upon visiting the website you can tell a lot of time and effort has gone into the business model. This reflects the fact that this company has probably been in the industry for many years.

The search form is very clean and features options to filter domain criteria, categories and price ranges. Dandy Domains has several articles about the company and domain industry practices.

Premium domains feature their own full page of content and a welcoming and simple contact form. Taking the time to do this can bring about valuable targeted search traffic to each domain sale page.

dnwired – This portfolio has been designed to look ultra professional.

While i’m not sure about the neon green font, the graphics do have an appealing touch. The multi-column layout lends the eye to move about the site in a orderly and thorough manner.

The dnwired site features some innovative service offerings. How about a free 5 page WordPress starter website with every domain purchase? That includes a logo design, hosting and consultation. They additionally have a page with extended and full web development packages.

You can make an offer on domains listed for sale at dnwired, but the buy-it-now prices are seemingly out of reach for most small business. Domains are priced well in excess of $10k unfortunately.

Domains New Media – This portfolio is laid out very well because it’s powered by WordPress. Even though it is a commonly used blog layout, the site features a lot of great content and a blog which is well suited for the platform.

This very large portfolio of high quality domain names is owned by industry veteran Skip Hoagland. Skip is the visionary behind numerous high profile geo-destinations such as Atlanta.com and MyrtleBeach.com.

The site features several top key niche categories with a simple alphabetized list of the domain portfolio. Each name is linked to a parked page, so you will need to use the contact form to inquire about domain purchases.

DomainNameSales.com – Frank Schilling’s new portfolio website has been around for many months now, but I couldn’t leave it off the list. This portfolio immediately represents a nod to category defining domain names.

Frank has returned to occasional blogging under this new domain. His editorials are always good for inspiration, educating on the value of domains and really seeing through the clouds towards the big landscape picture of our industry.

Frank’s portfolio receives dozens of purchase inquiries per day as detailed on the “Recent Action” page. The full portfolio is not actually listed. Interested parties will need to complete a keyword search to find targeted domains, but they are sure to be amazed by the results.

Many.co – I believe I discovered this large portfolio of one-word .CO domains through one of my Facebook contacts. While this portfolio is in Chinese, I wanted to feature it to show how effective and easy it can be to get a fully featured domain portfolio online.

In this case, Many.co is using the free DNSPortfolio script and has customized the design to a nice orange and silver color scheme. They have additionally used an eye-catching graphic set to feature some of the best domains.

Building Your Portfolio Website

I hope you learned a thing or two about the inner workings of a domain name portfolio website. Take the elements that work best for you to build your own marketplace and customer following.

These domain portfolio examples prove that good content, regular updates, a little love and innovation can go a long way towards building a nice web presence for your domain sales.

If you have any questions about setting up your own domain portfolio website, don’t hesitate to ask the DotSauce Q&A Forum community.

5 Refreshing New Domain Name Portfolio Websites DotSauce Magazine

• Shopping cart tricks
• Privacy swindling
• Friend spamming
• Disguised advertisements
• Even the Facebook like button gets called out.

The developer and curator of the site, Harry Brignull is a highly experienced User Experience Consultant (and Evangelist). He has started the collection off by explaining some of the most common black hat practices being employed by many well known businesses online.

Domain name registrar 123-Reg, based out of the UK, was put in the spotlight for the all too common trend of sneaking items into shopping carts.

Coincidentally, 123-Reg was just featured here on DotSauce as one of the Top 100 Domain Websites. The #1 site, GoDaddy is probably the most notorious for similar tactics. Many other registrars are just as guilty.

How many times have you seen alternate domain name extensions selected that you did not specifically search for? A user should not have to un-select additional domains simply to purchase what was intended.

Some registrars preselect 2-year registration periods. This practice doubles the necessary cost of a registration. First time domain buyers are being taken advantage of as they may be unaware that paying only 1 year’s fee is even an option.

What other shady tactics are registrars employing?

Will this trend continue? I can imagine many have already jumped-ship for down-to-Earth registrars like Name.com that don’t play these games.

Have a look at DarkPatterns.org to learn about all of the unethical, annoying and often infuriating practices your business and your wallet should avoid at all cost.

Domain Registrars Called Out for Black Hat Design Patterns DotSauce Magazine

My personal web presence at MarkFulton.com has been around for over a decade and has gone through many different concepts and designs.

A new update is nearing completion and I’d love for you to visit.

I will now be sharing lots of short articles, app reviews, videos and other resources related to social media, domains, business, and web development at my personal blog.

Latest Posts at MarkFulton.com

• So You Think You Have A Competitive Advantage
• Interactive Social Media Survey
• Epic Win To-Do List iPhone App
• Google Me Will Challenge Facebook With Social Groups
• Microsoft Introduces WebMatrix Beta for Windows
• Link Directories Making A Comeback

New PliablePress Theme

The site is now powered by the PliablePress Chalemeon framework which allows me to manage each element of the site through an innovative and easy to use admin interface.

Not long ago, I featured complete details on PliablePress during it’s launch.

The Chameleon framework has been a pleasure to work with since updating my blog. It took me just a few minutes to set up the layout, widgets and other features. I have not had to open up the theme files at all to this point.

PliablePress is pioneering a level of WordPress customization without coding or theme editing knowledge. I am looking forward to customizing the layout and design further as I continue development.

About Me & DotSauce

If you’re curious about who I am and my history, I’ve written an updated bio.

A few months ago, I published a list of my services. I don’t regularly advertise these services, but may be available for certain things.

I’ve also included information on DotSauce Magazine and other projects.

Thanks for checking out my personal blog!

Featuring More Domaining, Development, Business Content at MarkFulton.com DotSauce Magazine

Nearly 10,000 test pilots participated in the study, 9,667 users to be exact. Every single mouse click and action taken within the browser was monitored over the course of 5 days. Mozilla has published a dynamic graphical representation of the heatmap study here.

Several trends are very clear to see after viewing the usage data. Two elements leap out that get more action than the scrollbar!

Your Worst Enemy

93.1% of participants used the back button, clicking it 66.7 times on average over the course of 5 days.

The technical term for this action is referred to as a website’s bounce rate, which occurs when a visitor decides not to click anything on the site and leaves entirely. Time spent on site is also something you should monitor and hope to increase over time.

Today, it is critical to engage a visitor and capture their attention. We do this by making effective use of graphic and design cues, headings and short, consumable pieces of information.

There are several other things you can do to get started dealing with your worst enemy, the back button. I’ve previously written some tips for reducing bounce rate and increasing website usability that you should check out.

Your Best Friend

95.6% of participants used the location bar, clicking it 430.1 times on average over the course of 5 days.

That is a huge amount of activity! A website should be optimized for both direct navigation and search navigation to increase website traffic.

Direct navigation does not often get the credit it deserves. It is not easily monitored, but when studied it has proven to contribute a much higher percentage of traffic than one would expect. Additionally, visitors who directly type domain names are extremely targeted.

I believe analytics software will soon place a larger emphasis on direct navigation. More attention should be given to branding and domain names while developing a website. They should be memorable, easy to pronounce and easy to type.

The location bar now doubles as a search bar in all major browsers, so visitors will come indirectly from search navigation. Your site should be as optimized as possible (without going overboard) to make the search experience better for these visitors.

One of the simplest and most effective forms of SEO is to make sure important keywords and phrases are included within titles, headings and content. For more tips read my article on common WordPress SEO mistakes.

I hope you get along nicely with your new acquaintances.

If you enjoyed this article, don’t click back! Like this on Facebook and have a look around.

Firefox Heatmap Study Reveals A Web Developer’s Best Friend and Worst Enemy DotSauce Magazine

WordPress 3.0 has introduced some exciting new features, not the least of which is a merger with WordPress MU!

That’s right, the WordPress team has made it much easier to quickly deploy a network of WordPress powered websites on the same host, using the same WordPress installation and administration.

How To Enable WordPress MultiSite

To get your website network started, you will need to enable the WordPress Multisite feature and become a Super Admin! Reason enough, right?

I’m going to direct you to this great MultiSite walk-through at Weblogtools Collection to get the job done.

Follow a few steps, and once enabled, you will notice a new “Super Admin” menu appear.

Setup Domain Names for Each Site

Next, you’ll want to be able to map your domain names to each of the websites you setup in your new network. Unfortunately, this requires a special plugin that has to be installed manually.

Not to worry though, Otto on WordPress has created this great MultiSite domain mapping tutorial.

Follow these two simple guides and you will be well on your way towards building a powerful website network. Your websites will have their very own administration panel, unique plugins and themes.

Each site on your network will be empowered by the innovations and flexibility that WordPress has to offer.

Make Your Network Beautiful

The new default WordPress 3.0 theme “Thelonius” has some cool features and is pretty customizable, but I would like to recommend an even more advanced and more customizable new theme from PliablePress: the Chameleon framework.

With this one theme you can make each of your websites look unique. Setting up the theme options is fast, without any design or coding skills required.

You can learn all about PliablePress here at DotSauce. For a chance to win a free PliablePress theme, join the all new DotSauce Q&A Forum to be entered into our prize drawing!

Build Your Own Website Network Easily With WordPress 3.0 DotSauce Magazine

The Pro Blog Design team has just launched a wonderful new set of feature-rich, premium WordPress themes called PliablePress.

Continue reading for previews of the lovely themes and innovative features or if you simply can’t wait… Visit PliablePress through this link.

PliablePress Theme Features

These themes use the latest innovations in WordPress theme design by taking advantage of an advanced theme control panel as well as useful custom fields.

This is what PliablePress is calling the Chameleon Framework. These new features make each PliablePress theme extremely customizable; simply drag and drop the elements of your design to arrange.

Those custom fields I mentioned make your new PliablePress blog SEO friendly by letting you set a custom title and meta tags for each post as you write the post. This is one of the most important things for WordPress SEO.

Also of note, each PliablePress theme incorporates nice social bookmarking features and RSS subscription for both readers and email delivery via Feedburner.

PliablePress themes come with comprehensive documentation, video tutorials and a full support forum if you run into any trouble or want to take your customization to the next level.

PliablePress Theme Designs

This is what you’ve been waiting for. These awe inspiring designs are not only flexible and functional, but visually appealing, highly usable and coded with the strictest standards.

Chameleon is the backbone of PliablePress themes, but it is also very stylish on it’s own as a clean design with beautiful typography.

Creative Soul is a vibrant theme that comes in 3 different colors.

Creative Soul Minimal is for those who love the features, layout and details of the original, but not quite so wild.

Backdrop is a bold magazine style theme that color-codes content and highlights imagery very well.

Oracle is a very professional style magazine theme with a wonderful layout for articles and imagery.

More theme designs by PliablePress will be released soon!

Video of Chameleon Framework Control Panel

Michael from PliablePress walks us through the innovative control panel included with the themes.

Saves Time for Developers

Chameleon is used as a framework for all of the other PliablePress themes. Highly flexible design features make using it for your development projects a pleasure and a time saver.

Even if you are not a WordPress pro, you can create awesome looking unique WordPress themes of your own! (With the full flexibility of the Chameleon control panel to impress you clients!)

So, to recap PliablePress themes are…

• Awesome designs
• SEO friendly
• Innovative admin controls
• Affordable
• Fully documented with support forum
• Highly flexible and customizable
• A no brainer!

Check out all the details and demos of PliablePress themes now!

Innovative New Premium WordPress Themes from PliablePress DotSauce Magazine

Here are three businesses that really get it when it comes to uniting well designed logos with domain names.

Brandstack

Brandstack (formerly IncSpring), which I wrote about here and listed in the Top 20 Places to Buy Domains in 2010 was originally a marketplace of logo brand designs.

Designers were naturally coupling domain names with their brand creations to further increase their value and interest. It works both ways. A quality .com domain name will make a professional logo design all that much more valuable.

Brandstack has continued to improve their platform over time to make it a user-friendly marketplace for both buyers, sellers, designers and domainers. So, they now have a unique area just for domain name sales (with or without logos).

Brandbucket

Brandbucket is similar in concept to Brandstack, but they cater specifically to quality, pronounceable and short .com domains.

If your domain qualifies to be listed on Brandbucket they will create the logo for you and help to market your brand for sale. I have not listed here personally, so I can’t speak from experience, but there is likely a hefty commission fee to be paid upon a sale.

Pricing across Brandbucket seems to be inflated for the majority of listings. I’m sorry, but you’re not going to get $4000 for Oscula.com, don’t fool yourself.

Castello Brothers

Castello Cities Internet Network at CCIN.com is owned by brothers Michael and David Castello, two or the biggest players in and supporters of the domain industry. I’d like to point out some of their portfolio as they obviously understand the value of a quality brand image.

How To Cash In on Logo Designs For Your Domains

With the vast array of open source software and tools available today for web development. Web design, logo creation and branding is actually the biggest challenge a business or individual faces when launching a web presence.

Obviously not every domain name is destined to be a brand. It’s ultimately up to you to decide which of your domains is best suited for brand creation or if it is worth the investment to hire a designer.

Like I mentioned previously in the bit about Brandbucket’s pricing, you need to be reasonable with your asking price and have a clear goal in mind. That goal should be to make a sale. Many of the brands on these marketplaces will sit for years because they are asking for a fraction too much, making the sale unrealistic.

Get In Touch With The Creatives

Connecting with designers is now easier than ever. Twitter is a great place to start. I have been creating a Twitter list of designers myself that you’re more than welcome to check out. There is also a list of domainers if you’re interested.

Alternatively, there are always popular freelance marketplaces like oDesk, available to hire designers on the cheap and you can post an ad for your design job for free on FreelanceSwitch.

Here’s an idea: If you can’t afford a professional logo design for your domain, consider befriending a designer and offer them a percentage of the proceeds from the sale of the brand.

Has creating a logo brand for your domains help you make a sale? Do you know of any other businesses or services that get it when it comes to domains and logo designs? I would love to hear about your experiences. Please leave a comment below.

Logo Designs Can Increase Domain Values By 100x or More DotSauce Magazine

1. Delicious.com Tag: free

If you’ve been using Delicious bookmark service for any length of time, you’ve probably noticed the community is a bunch of geeks! This makes for some fresh design, software and web service freebies almost daily.

2. DevSnippets Free Code & More

Packed with great resource articles and lots of juicy code snippets for bloggers and developers of all experience levels.

3. WebDesignLedger Freebies

WDL provides extensive resource articles, graphic freebies and design goodies.

4. Smashing Magazine Freebies

A crowd favorite for great freebies ranging from WordPress themes, Icons, Wallpapers and more.

5. BittBox Freebies

This great blog has been offering up free graphics for quite awhile and has amassed one of the largest collections of design freebies ever! Textures, fonts, vectors and more.

6. Envato Network Blogs

Oh, how I love ThemeForest and the rest of the Envato marketplaces. They generously offer up one file from each marketplace each month, so stay tuned for the newest freebies.

7. Noupe Design Freebies

Yet another awesome blog featuring regularly updated graphic design freebies.

8. Tutorial9 Freebies & Resources

Top quality design resources, tutorials and icon sets and some code to boot! You’ll need to subscribe to the newsletter for some exclusive downloads.

9. SEOMoz Free SEO Tools

Some of the most innovative and advanced search optimization tools available are found right here. Alot of SEOMoz tools are free to try and can provide some juicy data on your website.

10. BoagWorld: Free Software for Web Designers

Fresh article points out some quality free alternatives to pricey software designers need.

11. TUTS Plus Free Tutorials

TUTS+ is the leader in quality tutorials for web professionals. They have a huge archive of coding, design, audio, flash, and web development tutorials. I’m a member myself (well worth the $9/month) and love the source files and accompanying video tutorials.

12. Lifehacker Tag: #free

This wildly popular blog often shares free software and resources to keep your PC in tip top shape.

Know of any more great places for web design or development freebies? Please share your favorites in the comments area below.

If you found these freebie locations helpful, definitely bookmark them and consider passing this article on to your network!

12 Great Places to Score Web Development and Design Freebies DotSauce Magazine

Usabilla, a usability testing startup, launched earlier this month and congratulations are in order, as they have already been featured on Mashable.

While there are many popular and effective services for getting feedback about your website or application, Usabilla is bringing powerful tools like heat mapping data display and an innovative test interface to the masses.

As expected, the Usabilla member dashboard is extremely easy to use and building a usability test for your webpage is done in minutes.

Here is a quick video introduction showing Usabilla in action.

Usabilla works by displaying an image of your webpage to a participant who is asked to perform a task or answer a question about the page they are viewing.

Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to ask your website visitors questions like these?

• What things draw your attention the most?
• Which images are most appealing?
• What elements of the page do you like?
• What things would you remove from the page?
• What things need improvement?
• Where do you click to purchase?
• Where do you click for contact info?
• Where would you click next?

Now you can get valuable feedback from these questions and more.  Participants respond to tasks by tagging or clicking areas of the page and can additionally leave comments.

Once all of the data is collected, you can analyze a test through various methods including a visual heat map (shown below), or you can select a specific element of a page to view corresponding results.

You can use Usabilla on up to 5 pages and share the test with up to 25 participants for free. For those with the need to reach more participants and test more pages, there are Usabilla plans from $50 a year.

While reviewing Usabilla, I did notice that flash objects do not show up in their generated screenshots, so you may want to look into uploading a pixel perfect screenshot of your own to get the best test results. I recommend FireShot for Firefox, it can capture an entire page beyond the page fold.

I would love to hear if you give Usabilla a try and how the results work out for you. Please leave a comment below with your thoughts.

New Usability Tool Provides Valuable Feedback for Website Owners DotSauce Magazine

With so many options available today, selecting the right WordPress theme for your website or blog can be a daunting task. ThemeGrade was created to make finding quality themes with the features you want much easier.

ThemeGrade is not your typical WordPress directory. Quality themes are selected to be reviewed (2 per day) and are then scored against over a dozen critical points related to theme design and search optimization.

Tried and Tested

Each theme is given a bronze, silver or the coveted gold seal of approval. Gold rankings are awarded to themes which excel across the board in general usability as well as enhanced design features like browser compatibility, threaded comments, and designer support.

ThemeGrade also makes sure that top ranking themes perform well for key factors that effect search ranking performance.

• W3C Compliant – XHTML
• W3C Compliant – CSS
• Home page Heading SEO
• Post & Page Heading SEO
• Post & Page Title Tag
• Content Code Position

Sweet Select-boxes!

Searching ThemeGrade is very simple. They have implemented a nice selection box theme fetcher. I’ve never seen this style of search on a WordPress site, very cool! Simply select the boxes related to your interests and go.

ThemeGrade features both free and premium (paid) themes from select designers.

Sort by design structure (1 or 2 columns, magazine style, portfolio style, etc.) or  by theme category (Business, Art, Nature, Internet, etc.).

And, of course, you can select themes by their gold, silver or bronze rankings.

ThemeGrade Tip:

Don’t be discouraged by themes with low SEO ranking.

Proper title tags and other factors can be corrected with a few tweaks to theme files. Stay tuned to DotSauce for more on that very topic soon.

Be sure to check out ThemeGrade WordPress Themes now and follow along by RSS or @ThemeGrade on Twitter as new themes are reviewed.

ThemeGrade SEO and Usability Scores on Quality WordPress Themes DotSauce Magazine

After you’ve received your tricks, be sure to sample the jaw-dropping collection of downloadable treats for web developers.  Have a safe and fun time out there!

8 Killer Domaining Tricks

These tips, tricks and guides on domain names come highly-recommended. If you are already involved or interested in buying and selling domains or if you’re just looking to be sure to get a quality name for your business then these are for you!

Warning: The domaining tricks below may scare you into buying better quality domains and learning more about this awesome industry.

1) Expired Domains Explained

Domainer Income published this nice looking chart quite awhile back, but there are many people who still don’t know the actual processes going on behind the scenes in the life-cycle of a domain name registration. Great info to know especially when playing the expired domain game.

2) 5 Tips on Selling Domain Names for Maximum Profit

DotSauce shares an in-depth look at being a frugal domainer. Information on finding free marketplaces, avoiding high commission fees, setting up your own domaining business and more.

3) “The Domainers Language” Guide

Arbel Arif has composed a great glossary of domaining acronyms and terms. Must know information for anyone interested in domaining.

4) Is Your Domain Name Killing Your Business?

INC Magazine delves into the world of domain names with some no-nonsense advice on selecting the right name for your business.

5) Expiring Domains Research Pro Tips

DotSauce feature 7 tips and a couple secrets for getting the most out of your domain name research. Information on selecting the right keywords, data you need to analyze and things to avoid when researching expiring domains.

6) Get Your Domains Listed for Sale in GoDaddy’s Registration Path

Andrew Alleman of Domain Name Wire recently wrote about a new feature at GoDaddy. The Premium Listing service can looks promising for getting your domain in front of targeted end-users, but comes at a price with a steep commission going to GoDaddy.

7) Advice from the Most Successful Domain Investors of All Time

Elliot Silver asked some of the most successful domain investors in the business for their advice and has kindly shared it with everyone. Follow through for a killer PDF containing advice from some industry pros.

8) Google’s Matt Cutts On Keywords In The URL

Search Engine Land shares a video by Google’s Head of Web Spam team, Matt Cutts. Confirmation that keyword in URLs lend aid to search rankings in some way. For more from Matt Cutts check out our SEO Advice of the Year feature which includes a presentation by Mr. Cutts on successful blogging.

10 Delicious
Web Development Treats

For your enjoyment, a collection of downloadable goodies and fresh resource lists. Don’t you go and try to download these all at once, your PC may get dizzy!

1) 99 High-Quality Free XHTML/CSS Templates

2) Free E-Commerce Widgets Usable on Any CMS

3) 500+ Free Download Quality Photoshop PSD Files for Designers

4) 23 Free E-Commerce Icon Sets for your Designs

5) 75 Free Icon Sets for Web Designers and Developers

6) 55+ Seriously Useful Front End Web Developer Cheat Sheets

7) 51 Web Apps for Web Designers and Developers

8) 10 WordPress Themes and Plugins for Turnkey Online Business

9) 10 Most Useful Google Plugins for WordPress

10) 10 Best WordPress Plugins for Blog Traffic

This treat bag never ends! So, be sure to pass it on to a friend!  Click here to Tweet this article.

Happy Halloween!

8 Domaining Tricks and 10 Web Development Treats DotSauce Magazine

DotSauce is now sporting a fresh new look! This new layout should help new and old readers alike stumble upon valuable articles that may not have been so easy to find before.

Our homepage has sections for the top categories as well as a new featured content slider. Please take a moment to familiarize yourself with the new layout and browse some articles or categories that look interesting to you!

In other news, the DotSauce Domaining Directory will soon become an extensive collection of domain name and web development resource links.

We’re looking to tackle one category at a time over the coming days and weeks, but of course we don’t expect the links to ever end!

So far these categories are being populated:

• Domaining Blogs
• Domain Conferences
• Domain Forums

See anything you like? Be sure to rate and review your favorite sites.

If you have a favorite link that’s not been added then please join the directory project and submit as many resources as you like. We’ve got lots of great categories to fill out.

Not all websites will be approved as we would like to include only the most high quality resources.  Also, don’t worry about adding any snapshots if you decide to submit.

Any comments on the new website layout would be greatly appreciated!

Fresh New Design at DotSauce + Domaining Directory in Progress! DotSauce Magazine

These 10 WordPress themes and plugins could each be used to launch your own online business or breathe new life into your existing website.

1. YellowPress

This premium quality theme features custom plugins which transform your WordPress website into a yellow pages style directory. Accept payments automatically through PayPal and have your members sign-up and create their own listings. A ThemeForest exclusive.

2. WPAuctions

This is a plugin that you can incorporate into any WordPress Theme. A sleek user interface and powerful auction administration make this a great plugin for managing your own private live auctions.

3. WPClassified

Created by the same developer as YellowPress. WPClassified has further features for managing classified style listings directory through WordPress. Potentially generate good revenue from user listings. A ThemeForest exclusive.

4. WordPress Affiliate Theme

Developed by the Unique Blog Designs team, leaders in WordPress design and development, Affiliate Theme overhauls your WordPress admin and allows you to quickly customize and develop beautiful mini-sites, landing pages and blogs without touching any code!

5. Flexibility

This advanced theme is similar in concept to Affiliate Theme, allowing you to create an unlimited number of landing pages and squeeze pages for your products or affiliate offers.  Advanced backend features give you the ability to customize and build great landing pages.

6. WordPress Shopping Cart

Market Theme adds excellent shopping cart and product management features to your WordPress dashboard. Using custom fields you can transform blog posts into product features.

7. wpShop Reloaded

Another WordPress shopping cart plugin featuring a light and dark style.  Advanced features for publishing, managing and making product sales through WordPress. A ThemeForest exclusive.

8. WordPress Wiki Theme

A beautiful theme that comes in 6 vibrant color variations and features some innovative details for developing a user-friendly Wiki or FAQ website. Unique sidebar features and a clean layout with great whitespace.  Wiki Theme is a ThemeForest exclusive.

9. ReviewAZON

This plugin can incorporate Amazon customer reviews into your blog posts. Earn more affiliate commissions from Amazon when you write about any product your readers can view relevant reviews from actual customers.

10. OIO-Publisher

The premier WordPress plugin for managing advertisements, affiliate offers and sponsored content on your blog. You keep 100% of advertising profit and set it on auto-pilot!

I hope you enjoyed the list! I would love to hear your comments and would appreciate it if you would share this post with fellow WordPress fans.

Powered by WordPress: 10 Themes and Plugins for Turnkey Online Business DotSauce Magazine

Twitter Friendly Links – Yup, Your Own Short URL

Download Twitter Friendly Links or Visit Plugin Website

This is quite simply an in-house URL shortening service that creates links using your short post ID’s.  For example you can visit http://DotSauce.com/1632 to access this very post!

Twitter Friendly Links plugin can help you preserve and increase your domain name brand exposure on Twitter and give your shared links more credibility.

The only caveat is that you are sacrificing click analytics, though I’m sure the developer of this plugin already has that in mind.

Analytics360 by MailChimp – Bringing Google Analytics to WordPress

Download Analytics360 or Visit Plugin Website

To use all of Analytics360 options you are asked to register a free account with MailChimp,  a web based email marketing and newsletter management system, but you don’t necessarily have to use their service.

Analytics360 adds a feature to you WordPress admin that connects with Google Analytics to display traffic stats, top referrers and most viewed articles.

A really cool feature of Analytics360 is the orange dot marker next to each of your blog posts over time so you can visually see how your posts are performing!

Disqus Comment System – Revolutionizing Blog Comments

Download Disqus or Visit Plugin Website

The default WordPress comment system is severely dated! I tried the WordPress threaded comment system for awhile and while it is slightly better it still fell short. Disqus simply has alot of appealing features…

• Track your comments across all blogs
• Verified emails and avatar uploads
• Instantly connect with Twitter and Facebook
• Moderate comments via email or assign moderators
• Top commentators and recent comments widgets

I am extremely happy since installing Disqus. It was surprisingly easy to install as any WordPress plugin usually is. Large sites like TechCrunch and Mashable have adopted Disqus and I foresee it soon becoming the standard for blog comments.

WP Smush.it! – Better User Experience by Reducing Image File Sizes

Download WP Smush.it or Visit Plugin Website

I was ecstatic when I found this plugin, a plugin that actually shrinks your image files on the fly!  Most people should know how to use the “Save For Web” feature when working with images to keep file sizes down.

I found that Smush-It actually works better than PhotoShop for getting down to the smallest file size, especially with GIF and PNG files! Amazingly, no image quality is sacrificed.

You can even go in to your gallery and smush previously uploaded files!

Sexy Bookmarks – Making Social Sharing Fun

See Live Example Below!

Download Sexy Bookmarks or Visit Plugin Website

This plugin is quite literally beautiful! There are lots of social bookmarking plugins available for WordPress already, but this is by far the most appealing and unique set of bookmarking icons. In just a short time since installing I have noticed a few readers making use of my Sexy Bookmarks!

So yea, maybe you want to have unique looking icons and that’s cool, but I think it will actually benefit blogs on the whole because readers will be able to instantly recognize Sexy Bookmarks buttons and share blog posts.

These plugins rock, huh? Please share this post using my Sexy Bookmarks buttons…

5 Fresh WordPress Plugins Ready to Enhance Your Blog DotSauce Magazine

Members of the popular SitePoint Forums marketplace received an announcement this morning about the upcoming launch of Flippa.com, a rebranded and enhanced SitePoint Marketplace. All 36,000 SitePoint members will be able to login with their existing username and password.

An official date has not been set on when the site will be public.

The Flippa interface is quite simplified but is lacking the defined categories that exist in the current marketplace such as Established Websites, Domain Names, and Startup Websites for example. However, Flippa’s Advanced Search feature may make up for it.

Here is what SitePoint had to say about this specific change…

“In the old marketplace we defined what a ‘start up site’ was and an ‘established site’ and so on. This caused way too much confusion. It’s now up to buyers to define their own categories based on data that sellers have entered for their listing. For instance, I might setup a saved search for “sites with more than 10,000 page-views a month” and I might call that ‘established sites’.” via Flippa Blog

The team at SitePoint seems to be focusing on website sales with this new marketplace brand.  The lack of defined categories could be beneficial for domainers to have their domains placed in the same marketplace stream as websites, especially if those domains are earning revenue.

It has yet to be announced if goods and services like hosting, links, consulting, and scripts will even allowed to be listed on Flippa.

There are some noteable improvements to the process of buying and selling websites through classifieds as well as features from the original SitePoint Marketplace.

Here is a snapshot of the handy statistics widget embedded within each listing.

What are your thoughts on Flippa? I for one am excitied to see it grow and gain more exposure to domain and website sales.  Please leave your comments and questions below.

SitePoint Set To Launch Flippa.com Enhanced Website Sales Marketplace DotSauce Magazine

This poll includes 12 popular online industries that are in some way directly or indirectly related to domaining, so I expect alot of you will show some interest in at least a few of these.

You may select as many industries as you like, but please try to select only those which you are actively interested in.

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post’s poll.

Thanks for taking the time to answer. If I missed something please let me know in the comment area below.

Check back later for the results!

Poll: What Online Industries Are You Active In? DotSauce Magazine

Something unique to the ThemeForest web design marketplace is the fact that they show sales stats to the public.  I have purchased several themes from ThemeForest because of their exclusivity, professional designers and design standards.

It’s not to be left out that alot of their themes have some really cutting edge features.  I’ve previously featured the WordPress Wiki Theme and others on DotSauce as part of the Innovative Use of WordPress series.

The themes featured below are sold exclusively on ThemeForest and have not been so fortunate as to get alot of sales. Maybe it was poor branding or lack of promotion by the designer… either way these themes are gems that got passed over!

The themes listed below have official stats of just 4 or less total sales.  Meaning only 4 total people could possibly be using these themes at any given time.  Of course, that number may go up after this article is published, but you will still be able to see the stats on ThemeForest.

This is a chance to own and use professional WordPress themes on a budget and you won’t see them all over the web.

Membr Theme by Cams – View Theme

WPB Wood by Mateous Souza – View Theme

Magazine o’ Tuts by Dan Harper – View Theme

Business Solutions by rkquest – View Theme

Colour Vault by Cams – View Theme

Modern Portfolio/Blog by Hein – View Theme

Sweet themes, huh?  Hope you enjoyed the list and possibly get some use out of these rare WordPress themes!

Great WordPress Themes Nobody is Using – Be One of a Kind on a Budget DotSauce Magazine

Cross Promote Your Current Domain & Website Sales

When submitting a listing to the marketplace choose a category and then select “Classified” as your listing type.  This will allow you to bypass the built-in PayPal payments system.

Simply tell us a little about your domain or website for sale and provide a direct link to your current auction or official aftermarket listing.

Extra Exposure, More Bidders & Maybe That End User You’ve Been Waiting For

Here’s an example… Say you have a live domain auction coming up for sale on Bido, Sedo, Afternic, SnapNames, SitePoint, etc. and you want some extra exposure, more bidders and possibly an end user to come along.

Submit a listing in the Domains – Auctions category with a Classified listing type.  Include a link to your live auction and your golden.

If your domain is of high quality we may also promote your DotSauce marketplace listing to hundreds of domainers on Twitter, through our email newsletters, over 1000 community members and to the 1000+ unique visitors DotSauce attracts every day.

3 Great New Marketplace Categories

Services - Advertise your web services here.  Such as web hosting, scripting, SEO, marketing, consulting, etc.

Domains Wanted - Request a specific type of domain name that you would be interested in purchasing.

Industry Job Listings – Hiring? Post job positions available in the domain name, development or design industry.

Get Started Selling on the DotSauce Marketplace!

It’s easy to start selling your domains, websites and services on the DotSauce Marketplace.

• Simply register for a username or login.
• Visit the marketplace to submit your listings for free!

For more details about the great features our marketplace provides please read our grand opening announcement.

Cross Promote Your Domain & Website Sales on the DotSauce Marketplace DotSauce Magazine

Mini site development has the potential to increase revenue and pay-per-click (PPC) conversions on domain names with traffic, especially those with natural type-in visitors.

Mini sites also allow you freedoms and features that current parking companies simply can’t and won’t provide you. If you have a domain with strong keywords there is also the possibility of ranking high in Google and increasing traffic significantly in due time.

Ron Jackson at DNJournal has recently published the DNJournal March Cover Story featuring an introduction to the rise of mini site development lately and list of other mini site development companies.

Each company is unique and has different features, models and methods to their developing madness.

Some are automated like WhyPark or Parking Revolution which places more interaction and content control with the user, others are on the pricey side but provide a hands on experience with true custom content, graphic and promotional work.

DN Media has announced today the launch of MiniSites.com. The new company provides mini site development services to domainers, which is as mentioned above, a hot trend in recent years for those seeking an alternative to falling revenue from traditional PPC parking companies.

MiniSites.com has three different mini site development packages to choose from which include features and services such as the following…

• Dedicated Project Manager
• Unique Content Creation
• Custom Text Logo Design
• Attractive Graphic Header Design
• Flexible Monetization Options
• Targeted Keyword Research
• Search Engine Optimization
• Easily Add Your Own Content Post-Launch
• Free Hosting for as Long as You Own the Domain

Looks like a great all around package for having someone develop a quick mini site for your domain name.  The base price is set at $120, but they do have discounts for bulk orders.

Surprisingly, the service price nearly triples from $120 to $350 when you want to add on advanced link building and advanced monetization packages.

No details are to be found on the company site regarding hosting or a user control panel. But, I think they are on the right track and I am sure more information will show up soon on MiniSites.com as they push through the new launch.

Would love to hear your comments about mini site development or MiniSites.com, please leave one below!

Mini Site Development Services: Creating Small Websites Based on Big Ideas DotSauce Magazine