Domain Names - Mitash Digital

Is It Worth Upgrading To WordPress 3.0

With 28,000 downloads everyday and over 11.4 million active installations, WordPress is a force to be reckoned with. The release of WordPress 3.0 in June this year had Joomla and Drupal shaking in their boots again. But what difference will this new version make to the CMS world and website promotion and optimisation.

Multi User Integration

The biggest change with 3.0 is its ability to integrate with the previously separate WordPress MU (Multi-User) variation. Multiple blogs can now be managed under a common domain name within one installation of WordPress.

Themes

There is some change in the standard theme mode. The new custom Theme “Twenty Ten” is more customisable than its predecessor making it easier for newbies to jump straight on board. Take care though if you are upgrading to 3.0 from a lesser version, complete success depends on how customised your content is and the amount of static content your site.

Plugins

There is a bulk plug-ins upgrade feature which allows plugins to be updated en masse from both the plug-ins page and the renamed “WordPress Updates” page, which doubles up to list available theme upgrades as well.

Custom Post Types and Tags

3.0 also allows for the creation of custom menus as opposed to having to code HTML on previous versions. Where blogging is concerned the dashboard is sleeker but essentially no major changes have taken place. For advanced users there is the ability to create custom post types and tags. It’s now possible to create a database entry that represents for example, a film, with metadata that specifies the actors, director and release date etc.

Website Promotion and Optimisation

Where SEO is concerned there are no major changes, and to be honest its hard to see where there could be. And, to be honest, with the amount of independent developers developing SEO tools for WordPress they needn’t bother about building any website promotion and optimisation tools into the interface anyway.

In Conclusion

To the untrained eye WordPress 3.0 hasn’t evolved much, and that might be the case for the average blogger. But what WordPress have done is created a deeper side to the software in a solid attempt to attract those who prefer the complexities of say Drupal for example. Custom post types and multisite blog networks are versatile assets that can give experienced administrators the tools they need to realize their visions.

25/10/2011/by Ash Mehta

Pale Purple is the New Yellow Say Google

At one time the background of Google Adwords listings was a pale blue, then it was changed to yellow and now Google are switching again but this time to purple. It was about three years ago when Google switched from blue to yellow, and quite why Adword listings have to be highlighted I don’t know. Doesn’t the mere fact that they are top of the pile serve as enough of a click incentive? Many people have mentioned to me in the past that the fact that they are singled out by colour actually makes them avoid clicking on paid listings.

This change will affect searchengine marketing in that people respond differently to different colours. perhaps Google has been advised that purple is more effective.

The colour upgrade, so to speak, is apparently nothing to do with searchengine marketing psycology and is merely part of a general results page revamp and modernisation effort. So its good news for those who prefer purple to yellow. Here is Google’s official statement regarding this matter:

“Starting today and ramping up to 100% globally by the end of this week, we’ll be changing the background color for ads that appear above the search results on Google.com as well as our local domains. The ads, which currently have a pale yellow background, will change to have a pale purple background. This change is part of the ‘look and feel’ update to our color palette and logo that we made back in May of this year to keep the Google results page looking fresh and modern. This is purely an aesthetic change to our ads and won’t have any impact on the way we target or serve advertisements on Google.com”.

And here is how your new Google page will look with the purple ads:

Personally I prefer the old blue style below:

14/04/2011/by Ash Mehta

Domain Names, Internet/Online Marketing, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

The URL – An Underrated Search Marketing Tool

Previously we have touched on making effective use of a URL in terms of utilising the opportunity to target a keyword. But the URL is so much more than simply an opportunity to target a keyword; it is a major search marketing tool. In this instance I mean search marketing in terms of marketing to the consumer once the search results have been displayed. Once you have secured a decent search engine placement you will be fighting it out with another 12 or so first page rankers, and this is where the URL comes into its own. Read more

17/06/2010/by Ash Mehta