Big Foot Web Marketing

One of my dreams is to master or- at least having a working knowledge of how to use Photoshop. I have tried using several tutorials- including the excellent “Lynda” series. But I just can’t get it. I can follow step-by-step directions on how to do pretty much do anything using step by step intructions but to do it on-the-fly is above my abilities.

The software I use is called MicroGrafx Picture Publisher. The program came on a CD that I got with my first scanner- in 1996!.
It is with great shock when I write this and realize that I am using a piece of software from 1996 that is almost 12 years old. Gosh- does that make me feel old. It does what I need it to do.. most of the time.

I have been looking for FREE alternatives and found one called GIMP. I tree to make suggestions that anyone can do with little or no experience and little or no money- using free stuff whenever,.
I am all about free anything and open everything and this is an Open Source project. I found it looking for a tutorial on how to make rounded corner buttons. They look much slicker and more *web 2.0* then plain old square corners.

Make Rounded Corners On Your Buttons

The tutorial for making rounded corners is here: Gimp Tutorial

I am using the rounded corner images for ads and “Your Ad Here’ type buttons on some of my blogs. They are also good to make buttons to some of your “best” work posts or more popular posts, rather than just using text links which can get over looked.

I keep my buttons simple and not too jazzy mostly because of my limited abilities. if this is something you are good at- go for it.

Tags: Free Tools and Utilities, Internet Marketing and Blogs by Lisa Stewart
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I am posting the brilliant quote by Seth Godin, who has this simple headline in a post today.

The more people you reach the more likely it is that you’re reaching the wrong people.

It the “Who vs. the “how many”

This can be a difficult concept to get across to clients who believe in casting a big net or using the throw something against the wall and see what sticks style of marketing. Seth’s quote says it all- and elegantly!

Tags: Blog For Money, Internet Marketing and Blogs by Lisa Stewart
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No Reprieve For PayPerPost Bloggers

PayPerPost Bloggers still holding out hope for a reprieve from Google and crossing their fingers to see if Google with show some mercy and restore some of their page rank- which was wiped out last October.

PayPerPost is a service where bloggers are paid to review a site in their blog post. The controversy is over whether or not these links- which have no “nofollow” tags are advertising or link selling. Google thinks they are paid links and punished posties by giving them Page rank zero on sites they thought might be posting these kind of reviews.
Looking at posts on the PayPerPost there are many disappointed bloggers.
Not only did bloggers not get their page rank back- but many sites that were missed in last update had their page rank reduced to zero.

Looking at the PayPerPost forums reality does seem to be setting in with many bloggers using PayPerPost who were left gobsmacked last fall and posts seem to be of reconciliatory nature and acceptance rather than anger and dismay.

Tags: Blog For Money, Google by Lisa Stewart
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Some of my sites had page rank gain ( that I noticed) this morning. This site is still sitting firm at PR0 which has me wondering if I have some sort of penalty. I have no paid ads or links nor do I use PayPerPost on the site but I write about it often.

Some of my internal pages on this site have PR3 (!) while main page has PR0. This suggest to me that update not complete.
This page for example has PR3 while Main page ( www.bigfootwebmarketing.com) has PR0 showing in toolbar.

This link has PR3 : http://www.bigfootwebmarketing.com/2007/11/15/payperpost-scrambling-trying-to-implement-realrank-after-their-bloggers-page-rank-disappears/

Using some of the Page Rank Checkers I don’t see flux happening on other sites.

Some sites with no page rank now have have Pr3/4 and others went up. Several have no movement. Ones that had PayPerPost penalty of Page Rank Zero have not gone up and still remain at zero.
There are many disappointed PayPerPost bloggers.

How have you fared in in the latest update? Are you new to blogging and have your first page rank showing in tool bar? Let me know

Tags: Google, Internet Marketing and Blogs by Lisa Stewart
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