Simple Steps to stay safe online

With the advent and increased participation in hacking and phishing attempts, one must be sure to be safe. A busy blogger (obviously not a potato blogger) or a workaholic designer or an innocent professional who thinks that the web is safe enough is obviously and blatantly mistaken. The terms Online Privacy, cookies and IPs are being popular day by day. Staysafeonline.org celebrates world privacy day on 28th January too. So one must learn to retain their information and stop it from falling into the hands of bad guys. What do you do? Obviously a request on your Facebook page or personal blog will not deter the shady guys wearing a sly grin. (Notably this actually worked against spammers at codemakit when they were informed about Nofollow attribute.. digress..). So one must employ a better and sometimes more sophisticated way of hiding your personal data.

Why do we need to hide our data?

The answer can be very well explained to you through a rhetorical question. "Why do you keep your bank passbooks and checkbooks safely? Or why do you keep your credit cards, super safe?" Simply because there are chances of such things being misused and in most cases against you!

Let us take a really simple case, many people use their middle names or nick names or their combinations as passwords, a quick look by a cyber criminal on your Facebook/twitter page will reveal phenomenal details about you. A cyber criminal with a grudge against you (Now that's something you would not want) will skim through social networking sites and try accessing your email account through such passwords, eventually if he/she gets through, you will have a lot to worry about, as most online accounts have a facility of resetting passwords

The criminal can go to your account enter your email address and click "Forgot password". Now the website on receiving such request will innocently reset the password and send a new one to your mail. Only catch is that the cyber criminal has access to your email address. He/she can wreak all kinds of havoc on your life by messing with your online persona. Usually the popular ones include accessing your social network and posting a vulgar video or an obscene picture or a hilarious yet defaming comment about yourself like "I am coming out of the closet now!" or some other less subtle messages. But the ones which do not make the headlines are the sudden loss of a large amount of money from a bank account. Even less reported are the cases of Blackmail.

The Steps for staying safe online

In Order to Avoid hassles and to stay super safe, outlined are a few steps that your must follow to keep yourself safe online. remember better safe than sorry! So lets go through the process once.

Take Charge of your Accounts and Email

1. Keep your accounts close!

You might have many accounts at various websites, but do you know how to keep them safe. How to prevent your login information from a previous article where some offline methods are discussed to store your Usernames and Passwords.

2. But your Email closer!

First and foremost just as the above example depicted, You must first take control of your email. Conventional emails offer simple username password security out of which username is always known to people. You just rely on your password to keep your account safe. The password might be really long and extremely convoluted but in the end it is just a combination of characters (You would be shocked if you find how simply websites store usernames and passwords).

If you are using Gmail (If you're not See a complete list of features of Gmail) kindly opt for Google's two step protection. You will have to provide your mobile number for the same and if you're logging-in from an unknown computer, you will receive a code from Google as a text message which forms the second step of protection. Without entering the code you cannot go further. Some email service providers also provide an arrangement for two passwords, which is not as effective as Google but it does the job doesn't it?

3. Use Disposable/temporary email

Sometimes people need to provide email address for web content. Websites are often found begging and sometimes strutting while asking for your email address. In simple words, I have an eBook, You have an email address, lets exchange! (codemakit too asks for email address for its SEO and Content Guide ebook) but don't get us wrong. there is an inherent theory behind asking email addresses, Often websites with quality content are targeted by their competitors who employ hackers/helpers in large numbers to harm the website. An email authentication or just the provision of an email often helps curb this menance. But if you do not want to give your personal email address to a website you do not trust, you can either check out the website certifications, you can use a temporary one. here is a list of

Temporary mail providers

1. Guerrilla Mail is know to scramble the address too. It Updates the inbox in every 10 seconds and exists for about 12-15 minutes after which it vanishes.

2. The 10 minute mail obviously exists for 10 minutes and then disapears. Until then you will recieve mails to your temporary inbox.

3. Get airmail has one blatant advantage over every one of its competitors, there is no time-limit to your inbox. The mail will remain valid indefinitely until and unless you close your browser.

4. Yop mail is one of the most trusted providers among its competitors. You can even name your own email which would look more authentic than a bunch of randomly generated numbers.

But websites have their own ways to check. so sometimes the method does not work (maybe 5-10%) If you do not want such hassles of visiting the site again or creating a new one every time you need something, It is better You create a permanent mail which will hold all your junk emails. This mail must have really simple username with an even simpler password which can be recalled any time you need. Even if it is hacked, It will be the hacker's loss and not yours.

Take Charge of your Browser

There are cases when you need to employ security tactics at the root of internet surfing, i.e. the browser, It is the application which actually transforms your request and returns with a webpage. So, how fo you safeguard your browser?

1. Delete your traces

Firstly, your browsing history, stored cookies, passwords(important ones), and other information that the browser has stored for your luxury; in one word; DELETE. The above elements stored ina  browser are one of the richest source of information about you. Your cookies, browsing history tell a lot more that you could ever tell in a day. Also remember to disable chrome autofill settings. A regular deletion of such information will provide you an assurance of "My browser has nothing you can steal, (The Mojojojo Laugh)". 

2. Browse Incognito

Secondly If you're really cautious, You must operate your browser in the famed incognito mode. Nearly every browser offers an incognito mode where none of your personal data or browsing activity will be stored in the computer. So you don't have to come back and delete the stuff again. Usually the incognito mode(as Google Chrome Calls it) can be found in almost all browsers and can be activated by a shortcut key combination. Here are the list of browsers and Shortcut key combinations.

	Browser	Method
	Google Chrome	CTR + N
	Mozilla Firefox	CTR + SHIFT + P
	Internet Explorer	CTR + SHIFT + P
	Safari	Settings - Private Browsing
	Opera	CTR + SHIFT + N

3. Virtual Private Settings

You Can even surf cautiously. For places where you cannot afford to make a mistake, you can use a proxy server, where you hide yourself and then browse it is comparable to wearing an armor and going to war.

Geeks are often known to use VPN or Virtual private networks, a discussion of these methods is beyond the scope of the article. However you may find information at PCWorld or at Howtogeek. Information on IP Masking can be found at whatismyipaddress.

And Finally, Surf Safe

Another thing you can do to prevent your information from falling into the hands of smirking black hats is by setting your privacy policy at the other end, i.e. the websites you use like facebook, quora, twitter (list would have stopped at 5 miles). Go there, click on settings and find out privacy settings. Change them to your personal accord. Just five minutes once is enough to spare you the hassle of a lifetime. More the methods you employ, the safer you feel, the next time you surf on a website.

Note. If missed a step or if you know any better method, just post it in the comments section.

Do you feel safe now?

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How did a sentence reduce Spam comments by half

Comments are by far the most important and the most useful social media engagement technique used in blogs. A comment has the ability to spark a discussion and give a new meaning altogether to the article. 

A comment can motivate the author and can also act as a critic thereby controlling the quality of the articles proceeding. But there is a downside to commenting scenario. Most blogs do not allow anonymous commenting; this is because of the extra time and energy they will have to spend in moderating the comments if they allow. So they ask the reader to login or register with the website to post a comment. Or they would ask the visitor to leave their email id, which is again no cool for the reader. A casual reader who wants to show his appreciation for the exemplary work done by the author, cannot do so if he/she is pestered by the site before leaving a comment. True comment is always extempore. 

An ideal situation is that the reader goes through the complete article and reaches the end. After reading the article he is tempted to post a comment. He just writes it and posts it. The comment is published and the user is happy. Such is the case with anonymous posting.

The Case Study,

The following is a case study on how a simple method was enough to stop spammers and give more readers to the blog as a side effect.

Codemakit had some problems in the past regarding lower comments. As is evident, low or no comments give ‘low quality’ jibes to the readers. So to increase the comments and increase the social interaction at the website, codemakit started anonymous comment. In short anyone who knew how to read and write could write just about anything in the comment box.

The First Day
The first day, codemakit received 24 comments all of which were basically spam. The number reached 57 on the third day and was not stopping. The only thing standing between a spam comment and unsuspecting readers was the blogger’s comment filter which did its best in keeping spammers at bay.

It was sufficiently clear, why websites do not keep anonymous comments. It was becoming simply impossible to keep up with such large numbers. The process of comment moderation took more than an hour daily, which ate up the time required in the maintenance of the website. Each and every comment had to be read properly before coming to any conclusion.

Some were straightaway spam which could not be filtered by blogger’s systems whereas some were cloaked up pretty good and some were even funny. But there was a plus side, the true or legitimate comments increased to five on the third day.

The Solution

As the days crept on, it was becoming increasingly difficult to moderate comments in such huge numbers. From SEO’s perspective, if a particular article has a PageRank of suppose 3, then this will be distributed to each and every link hosted on the page. So in short codemakit was leaking PageRank to the hyperlinks in the comments. 

One solution to the SEO problem was to hire personnel for filtering spam, which was expensive. Also you cannot post an ad on a newspaper or a website saying, "Wanted, an enthusiastic and intelligent individual for sorting spam at my petty little blog! I'll pay you in installments :-)"

Solution Two, Another solution was to hire a freelancer, which was too convoluted solution for such a simple problem. The blog at that time was a one person project which obviously didn't need another person just to sort spams.

Solution Three, Last solution was attaching a nofollow attribute to the complete comments section, thereby taking off the load of moderating by the author

The third solution was finally implemented. So the SEO problem was resolved (i.e. the rankings of the website will not be affected due to the low quality links in the comments section. But another problem on the softer side was too large to be overlooked. What will happen to the image of the blog when readers see fifteen to twenty comments, most of which are spam? This will affect the image of webmaster and the blog. 

The Process

So the second problem which floated was that comment moderation was still needed. One unique solution was to display a custom message instead of the default ‘Thanks for your comments’, another message was planned thinking if spammers are warned that their tactics will not work here, may be they'll stop.

‘Spammers Kindly remember, any hyperlink in the comments will not be indexed by search Engines because of NoFollow attribute. http://www.codemakit.com/2013/01/add-nofollow-to-your-blog-comments.html’

The message was specially crafted keeping in mind the mentality of spammers. Since blogger does not allow any hyperlink in the message section.

The URL of the methodology of adding NoFollow attribute was also added. Another important thing included in the particular webpage was a proof that Nofollow was added to the comments section with the help of a Firefox add-on.

The Results

It was thought that spammers who once add a spam comment would be greeted with the particular message and this would deter them from adding any more comments. But, the particular solution did more than what was expected.

The comments reduced to just the legitimate ones and since the message was displayed, there was not a single spam comment on the webpage. The Number of true or legitimate comments actually increased and so did the total number of comments.

Another side effect of the message being displayed was an unusual increase in the visitors of the website. It is not wrong to say that nearly each and every visitor of the NoFollow Webpage within 3 to 4 days were all spammers. The webpage which received 200 visitors in 15 days received 2300 visitors in just 2 days.

The following are the screenshots of the anomalies observed on the site.

The particular article on adding a NoFollow attribute became famous overnight, garnering 3075 followers in just 3 days.

It even surpassed the previous most read articles like remove youtube logo from embedded videos and Animated Flash Tag Cloud or even the article on Faults in your SEO and how to rectify it.

The peak observed was pretty amazing as the site had never encountered such amount of traffic before. The following is a screenshot from blogger dashboard.

So in a nutshell the complete procedure did more good than expected and can be used by webmasters for their respective websites.

 Try this and post your anonymous comments. I'm sure we'll be thrilled to receive your results.

This was all about, 

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Create an Auto Responding Google Form

Corporates and institutions often accept information from public through online forms. The best (Non Google) form creation websites have already been discussed which do provide a lot of facilities. Often the best of them are disguised behind the paid ones. These are mostly inaccessible to the general web owners as the professional ones need a note for shelling out money from their firms and the freelancers just don't have the money. 

One such facility is the automated response which one receives after he/she has filled up an online form which might say "thank you for your responses" or something. The facility, though available on Google docs is not readily available. You would not see fancy buttons to facilitate your auto responding form. So, you'll have to do it yourself.

For this purpose an app needs to be created. The app will obviously have a script. but fret not, as most part of the script is already filled by Google. you just need to add a small snippet and your work will be done. Following are some really simple steps with instructive screenshots which will help you create an auto responding form which has the ability to send emails to the filler. But, do read the special note so that things go smoothly.

Step 1: 

Firstly you need to create a form at google Docs. The form creation has been explained pretty clear article at codemakit.

Step 2 : 

Now assuming you are accepting the responses in a google spreadsheet, You then need to open the spreadsheet where the responses for the form are stored.

Step 3 : 

You will land on the Google Script Window where you need to select, which script do you need to create. Since we're creation a script for a spreadsheet, click spreadsheet. A scipt will then be visible to you. Do not modify any code, Just add another piece of code given here.

The Code

Edit the code to your wishes, Do check the notes to understand the functioning. 

function formSubmitReply(e) { var userEmail = e.values[2]; MailApp.sendEmail(userEmail, "Yo! Thanks for your time", "Thanks for submitting your information to us, \n\n", {name:"Help Desk"}); };

Note. 

One must understand the intricacies of the code and not use it mindlessly.

formSubmitReply is a function, which handles events, this is the function that initiates the action. It has a parameter 'e' which basically is an array filled with values. Have a look at your spreadsheet containing responses, First one will always be the timestamp. If your table consists of 2 questions, ie.e 'Name' and 'email' address, you will have to put the array value as e[2] so that the app would know where to send the response.

Also the name of the sender is taken as "help desk" Which can be changed to suit your needs.

Step 4 : 

Now you need to set a trigger for the script you just set. Click on resources menu and select "All your triggers". You will see a window stating all your triggers, Click on "create new", which will create a new trigger instance. Select values from the dropdown window as is done in the screenshot below.

Step 5 : 

You might be presented with an authorization window where you need to click yes to go forward. Once you've authorized the app. Your form will start sending automatic responses to anyone who fills your form with an email address.

Related Reading

1. If you're unsure, why you need an online form, you can check out Why Online forms, A study (Part One) and the rest can be found out at Why Online Forms, A study (Part Two)
2. Need help creating a form using Google Forms, Try this.

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Why is it wrong to start a "popular at the moment" blog?

Bloggers are of many types, Some are the argumentative type and some are stickers, but recently one more type of blogger has crept up. The opportunist Blogger. Such people are not a rare sight on the web nowadays. 

Their creations are not hard to miss. Even you might have seen some of their creations. Okay lets see, a blog on the recent chess tournament, or on certain hot political topics, or on current trends, infamous actors, musicians, or famous personalities, award functions, high profile parties and even viral videos.

The opportunist blogger seems to find the most intriguing and the most happening idea at present and converts it into a highly talked about website with a lot of agglomerated content from different sources. One more thing worth noting about opportunist blogger is that their websites might, at one point of time, be swarming with visitors, filled with seemingly unending comments and discussions. Little do people know the PERILS OF BEING AN OPPORTUNISTIC BLOGGER!!

The Process

Let us first see the process of Opportunistic blogging. A person (The opportunistic Blogger) sees a trending topic. Lots of users discuss about the topic and forums are filled up with discussions on why one side is better than the other. The blogger takes up the topic, Finds and collects as much information as he/she could and spends the rest of the day churning the information.He then spends the rest of two days preparing the blog and publishing the information so produced. Then it is just simple work of maintaining the blog with small pieces of gossip that he finds in the foreseeable future. He does not care for a blog posting schedule, or what would happen if he stops the posts, just because he/she has the content, he thinks he can enslave the search engines and control the flow of visitors.

The Brighter Side

Let us see the bright side of Opportunistic Blogging, The person receives a lot of visitors during the time the trend is hot. The sudden surge of visitors often surpass the number of visitors a well to do blog manages to sustain. The blog becomes one of the most talked topics on the web (Of-course after the phenomenon it was made on). The blog manages to gain visitors in six digits with bounce rate as low as 25%. It garners back-links from the most respectable of websites and gains the trust of most cautious of webmasters.

After the advantages, I bet you must be feeling nauseated and green with envy, I felt it myself as we spent hours working on topics churning concepts, creating beautiful and marketable designs, but he takes all the credit? Why? 

The Dark Side

Webmasters, control your heat, cause here comes a string of disadvantages. A popular at the moment blog as the name suggests, is just popular at the moment. There comes a time when the water dries off and the merriment comes to an end. Since the popularity has been diminished why would someone in their right mind would want to come at such a blog.

In simple words, the blog would have lost nearly all his visitors. Bounce rates would first increase of-course (As people would come to revive a dying trend but would return due to lack of content) but then the values wouldn't matter. Pages per visit would decrease to 1 or zero and then the blog (after a long struggle) could have said to finally rest in peace. What use would such a blog cater, when the fame is short-lived? 

"What is glory if not eternal?"

The missed call

How ever there are moments in internet history when a blogger does not have the time to capitalize on the situation. This situation can be known as the "missed peak" situation. This is because by the time, blog is prepared and made, peak has ready passed, public interest has already reduced. It is worth noting that sometimes blogger do gain some advantage from the peak by forecasting the peak in advance, but that is not common and hence cannot be replicated by most.

Consider the case of a very popular Indian Song "Kolaveri Di", The song was released two weeks prior to its actual release and became a hit instantly. Take a look at the graph from Google trends. It is conspicuous from the graph that it was next to impossible for a regular blogger to capitalize on the situation. A potato blogger however, would obviously miss the peak.

So, when should you start a popular at the moment blog? When you are looking at a trend which you know would die. When you are looking for some quick money and quicker fame. Now, when you decide and know the risks, you can go an buy a domain for 3 months, 6 if you're optimistic and just crack-on.

Top Image Credit VR Marketing Blog

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How are passwords stored on websites? The Basics

Ever wondered how are messages transferred through email clients. What does gmail actually mean when it says your mail is encrypted before sending to another person. Or what does adobe mean when it says, "Your document is encrypted, Enter Password to continue.."

Data encryption has long been in use since the advent of data storage and transmission. It has been in use for website certifications, Storing your passwords and usernames etc. You will have to first understand how you need to protect yourself from divulging or giving away your passwords before understanding how passwords are stored on websites. A recent case of Adobe password leak is sufficient to say that encryption is one of the most important things which websites must remember.

The following article dwelves into the basics of encryption, Further posts might include a more deeper understanding. Lets start with the what and how of data security and privacy. 

Before we proceed..

For newbies, You must know this to go further, Input goes through a function (process) and comes out as an output. This output is called hash code. Using this analogy, Hash Code is the output generated by a Hash Function. This function varies and can produce different outputs based on the content of the message. The output is of a fixed length always and hence the code is a highly effective form of storing and transferring data, used in huge number of applications. There are many different types of Hash function methods available. 

An interesting discussion on data encryption would be for pretty good privacy method. Let us understand this based on an example. Let us assume a small string of letters for our convenience. Lets start with "sheep". Now this is the message we need to encrypt and send to a friend. 

The Pretty Good Privacy Method (PGP)

The Three steps to Encryption

1. First the string "Sheep" is used to create a key, Let us suppose the key created by string "sheep" is 22RX (pretty cool digits, huh!). This key will be used to encrypt the message (You Know, this key will determine which hashing function will be used).
2. Now using thie key, the string is encrypted. Let us suppose the key led to the simplest of encryption, i.e. converting into a hexadecimal value. (We use decimal values on day to day basis, i.e. 0 to 9 (Base 10). Hexadecimal values  on the other-hand is present in base 16 and ranges from 0 to E. Converting any text to hexadecimal is fairly easy to do. The converted hexadecimal value for Sheep is "7368656570". Now this was converted based on the key "22RX". Now, second step is encryption of the key itself. The encrypted value of 22RX is "32325258".  
3. Third stage is concatenation of both key and the message. So, the completed encrypted message would be 323252587368656570 (Assuming key comes first and not mashed into the message). A mashed message might however look like this, "372336252865658570", Which as you can see is much more difficult to decrypt.

The above flowchart would help you understand the encryption using PGP method without mashing.

The above flowchart would help you understand the encryption using PGP method without mashing.

One Step to Decryption

1. The decryption process is similar too. The message "323252587368656570" is received, the encrypted key is separated, This key is then decrypted and the value obtained is "22RX" now this key is used to decrypt the original message left after removing the key, i.e. "7368656570", After encryption this would be "sheep". This is how your friend will receive the message and privacy will be maintained between the two. Symantec acquired PGP on June 7, 2010. 

The above flowchart would help you understand the decryption process using PGP method.

Simpler Method

with a plethora of Hashing algorithm available, it might be really difficult to determine which algorithm should be used. Hsould you use SHA1 or SHA233? To avoid such mess, you can use your own key to be used for encryption and decryption. Let us go with the "sheep" again. This time I use a key 31, Suppose the function this key uses first interchanges the odd and even digits from the right, i.e. from "sheep" to "sehpe".

Then it is converted into hexadecimal values i.e. "sehpe" becomes "7365687065". Remember, no key is added to the string. So the message's reciever is dependent on you for the key. You send the encrypted value "7365687065" to him and contact him for the key. When your friend gets the key, he/she can very well use it to decrypt the message to get "sheep".

This methodology proves to be better than the previous method discussed. This is because, If one gets your message encryped using 'pretty good encryption' or pgp, he/she can spend hours/days/months on cracking the code but eventually, the hacker will know the contents of the message. However consider the case when a hacker intercepts a message encrypted using second methodology, It might be centuries before he/she could break the code without knowing the key used between you and your friend.

Secure Hash Algorithm

Lastly, one method, which is quite popular nowadaysis the Secure Hash Algorithm (SHA), which is a simple yet highly effective way of storing passwords, used by websites in the present. A simple explanation would be that it takes a string of characters (including numbers alphabets and special characters) and converts them into a code of a fixed size. 

The size depends on the alorithm used. (There are several types of SHAs used, SHA0, SHA1 etc. Secure Hash Algorithm follows a very simple algorithm (in computer's perspective ofcourse), Which will be explained later. There are many different functions too, which can be used to encrypt strings using hash tables, Geometric hashing etc. which  of-course does not come into the purview of "The Basics"

This explained (in brief) about

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Method to Double your Visitors with Proof

The web is filled with articles to double your website visitors. Every now and then a new blog post comes up claiming that it has found out the golden method to double the existing visitors on your blog. The truth is, there is no magical sure-shot way of increasing visitors, where you can finger some buttons, chant a magical hymn and behold! Your site is swarming with visitors!

So how do people manage to get millions of views per month? And how do they claim to have a bounce rate of less than 40%? The answer lies in simple methods and techniques that most people do use, but not properly. Here you will be presented with a method to double your visitors. This is no banal post with a list of thinks you should do for higher pagerank or a list of faults in your SEO practices. This is based on a simple mechanical technique, i.e. Smooth posting or regular posting with regular intervals. You will also be presented with proof that the technique works and sometimes even more than you expected.

The Method/Technique

The method is simple enough. You have a habit of posting an article whenever and wherever you like, But that will have to stop. You are no longer a master of your free will, but a slave of Google algorithm and your visitors. You will have to post regularly and punctually. The first step includes, Setting a timetable for your blog posts. Complete timetable for different type of bloggers is discussed in previous post.

Learn More at a previous article on time schedule for the Ideal Blog based on your need.

One that should not be altered at any cost. Following are some examples for posting frequency based on the expected growth of your blog from a previous article on when you should post an article on your Blog.

Here are the results from Blog X where such technique was applied. 

Before the technique was applied, the posting frequency was erratic, the blog sometimes witnessed a posting spree when 3 posts were published in a day and sometimes witnessed a draught where not a single post was published in a week. This led to a really erratic visitor statistics, which reached 200 per day in good times and wouldn’t even reach 50 per day in draught. Here are some statistics for the blog 

Before Applying the method,

The total visitors in a month barely reached 4,000. 
Page views per visit was 1.13
0.47 seconds was the average visitor duration
Bounce rate was 90.13

As per the ideal blog posting schedule explained in a previous article at codemakit, Case III from the ideal Blog posting table was applied on the blog. According to the contents of the particular case, the blogger is supposed to post an article 3 times a week, following a Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule.
As per another article on codemakit referring to the ideal blog posting time for a blog, the blog posting was scheduled at 4:30am.

After the Application

The following are the statistics for the blog after applying the method for about 20 days.

The total visitors in a month reached to a whopping 12,000
Page views per visit increased to 1.75
The average visitor duration was 2.20 seconds
Bounce rate came down to 79

Another change was observed in the social media. The Facebook page of the blog too witnessed a phenomenal increase in the audience. However the changes took place in about 20 days after employing the schedule. As is evident from the screenshot below, the Facebook audience increased two folds.

Technique to Social Media

To improve Facebook scenario, another technique was applied in addition to the scheduled blog posting. The technique has been in use by many other successful page owners too. It is a simple method of posting what is not in-house. What comes under this category? Let’s have a look,

1. Re-post/share other posts in the same genre
2. Create and post Images/Photos on the subject
3. Share important External and Internal Links

The above three were applied on the Facebook page with visible results.
You must remember that a really long interval in between two posts might result into an obituary of your blog.
If you have a website which has benefited after reading this case study, Please share your links

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What are Disavow Links and How do I use them?

It is a well-known fact that the quality of a site is judged by the content and the links. Content is controlled by the website owner, but what would you do when you find out that your website is getting visitors from questionable which cause aspersions on the web owners and the website itself. 

How does that happen, you ask? The story goes like this. An anonymous friend of mine used to run a civil engineering blog of his. The blog had everything from structural to transportation to geological engineering articles. All of them were painfully collected by him over the years. 

True Story

As any popular growing website, he too had a number of competitors. But, this one was different. Once during a hot summer day, he witnessed a substantial increase in the number of visitors to his website; on closer inspection he found his average bounce rate increase from 45 to 94 in just three days. Baffled, he tried to find the source of this traffic. He found that the traffic came from a very popular adult video community. When out of curiosity he visited the website, he found that links to his website was displayed in a misleading way. Some erotic photos were linked, pointing towards his website.

Obviously people looking for photos like that, landed on his website but left immediately when they found that it was another one of those dirty tricks that webmasters play to lure traffic towards their website. As a result people stayed on the website for a second or two and left, thereby increasing the bounce rate to such epic proportions. In short, this was an evil scheme hatched by his competitor who had started a similar web blog a few years back. It was speculated that the owner of the adult video/photo community was owned by a friend of his. The events happened 3 years ago and at that time it was difficult to force anyone to take down some content. Had Disavow been there at that time, things would have been much easier. 

The Solution

The page simply states, that if you believe your page is deliberately linked to websites that you do not want to be associated with, you can use this utility by Google. Finally it also goes on to summarize that simply disavowing is not enough, you should take every measure possible to prevent such links.

Had disavow been there for my friend at that time, He would have added the misleading domain in his disavow list and even though users would still come to his website searching for some sensual content, His rank would be protected and he would not be penalized by search engines for getting a back-link from a website containing irrelevant content than his (Read More about Google’s Quality content Guidelines and Blogger's Content Policy)

Google’s Support page clearly states, that it works very hard to ensure that other websites do not affect your website. If you really need to disavow such links, Remember two steps.

First: Try to remove or have it removed all the Spam comments and irrelevant or inappropriate links which can harm your website (See also Tips on comment Moderation). Of-course Google is here to help you, Use its specialized search techniques (Discussed Previously) to your advantage. For Google You should know about its quality guidelines. This can be done by asking the website owner to remove the link through an email, or by filing a complaint with the owner.

Second: Now you should start disavowing links. But mind you! Google’s word of caution says it crystal clear. 

“If used incorrectly, this feature can potentially harm your site’s performance in Google’s search results.”

Disavow backlinks

This is a two-step process. First, you’ll need to download a list of links to your site. Next, you’ll create a file containing only the links you want to disavow, and upload this to Google.

Note: When looking at the links to your site in Webmaster Tools, you may want to verify both the www and the non-vww version of your domain in your Webmaster Tools account. To Google, these are entirely different sites. Take a look at the data for both sites. 

More information can be found at 

Answers to questions which might be common to yours at, Google's Support Pages

Official Google Webmaster Central Blog where it discusses the launch of disavow.
Matt Cutts also Discusses Disavow in the Video Below.

This was all about,

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Tips for Comment moderation, what should you keep and what should you delete?

Any proven website would always feel the wrath of comment spams.

The secret would always be a powerful comment moderator which blogger does provide, thankfully. How would you protect your Blog's image from comment spammers.

Tips for Comment moderation, what should you keep and what should you delete?

Meaningless comments

One of the most easily found and the most easily structured comments, such comments have their own way of saying ‘I know your blog is all about burgers but, I will talk about home loans, bed sheets and laptops (that too, within the same line without grammar). You ask why? Because I’m drunk..’

Nevertheless, they do not have any meaning whatsoever and does not add to the content on the page. It is always better to remove them as they would distract your readers and speak lowly about your comment moderation practices.

The following comment was in Things before cc license

Replying to a ghost type

The spammer writes up a comment which is in reply to a previous comment. But there is just one problem; there was no previous comment in conjunction. The spammer just replies to a so called ghost with its usual trickery. People indulge in this type of comments because they’re of the opinion that replies to comments are overlooked during moderation or they’re treated with leniency because they are replies. Such comments must be removed and even the original one if they do not make sense.

The following comment was found in the article answering "What happens when I do not post for a week"

Good Job! Type

It is not difficult to differentiate the ‘Good Job’ comments from a spammer and an actual loyal visitor. A legitimate Good Job comment will be sans any link in the name and in the text. Such comments though are hard to find but prove to be a real support and motivation to the author. Finally, that is what counts.

 

The Harry Potter Cloak type comment

The spam or link is hidden under what looks like helpful text. Let us take an example, You’ve just written an article on a burger recipe and you receive a comment which reads like this. 

‘Oh! Loved this post, couldn’t have made is any better. I personally like the inclusion of cumin powder but I still find ‘Fisher’s cumin’ which tastes even better than that of ‘Fisher’s rye’’

The comment looks harmless at first but when you delve deep enough you find it is a spam to promote the ‘Fisher’s’ brand. Such comments can be removed if you like but it does not come under high priority as it still give meaning to your page and presents new ideas and materials. Until and unless the link provided in the comment is not of a defaulter, you’re good to go.

 

The ultra-serious comment

To promote a brand the spammer must remember to attract the readers towards his comment. So what do they do to lure the readers? They use some really serious words in it. The ultra-serious words may include, ‘death’, ‘gore’, ‘funeral’, ‘blood’ etc. Which means anything which will make the readers read the comment? (Note. It was because of these four words which forced you to read this particular paragraph).

The ultra-serious isn’t limited to such scary words, negative words would give the same impact (like the word ‘disgrace’ in this particular example). Neuro-Science Marketing website previously mentioned the dark side of Reader Comments, you should try and have a look at it.

 

I found you comment

These are the newbies in spams, their comments start with ‘I've been looking all over for this type of article’ and end with ‘I will share this everywhere’. Some even go to the extent of saying they missed reading such informative articles. They only thing they attach with the last line is a train of hyperlink words corresponding to their business.

Since you can very well determine this is a spam, you wouldn't even receive them anymore because of your blogging platform’s comment policies which will filter them before the’re published.

 

My name is my brand type

Some spammers often find that their comments will not be moderated if they do not include a link in the body of the comment. So they include the link in their own name. So you would often find comments like, 

BuyBestpendrive.com says: I like your article, it’s so informative!!

The comment author’s link is not that harmful as a link in the body. If you’re a strict blogger you can moderate such comments as they do no good and would gradually use your own link juice. Otherwise you can use NoFollow in your comments and leave them be.

 

Related Reading

For reading many other hilariously Funny comments you can read the articles here at part I and here at part II

You can learn to remove spam comments at codemakit.com

You can add a noFollow to your comment space also.

Read the second part of the article on comment moderation and get some awesome tips against comment spammers!

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