In order to switch your host, you have to change your domain’s name servers. Simply put, these name servers tell browsers where they can find your website. When you’re working on a deadline as I was last night, you need things to switch quickly so you can make sure the new site is ready to go as soon as possible. The problem is, the changes you make aren’t necessarily instant. It can take up to 24 hours for your site to redirect and the results aren’t the same for everyone. Someone in Utah might see the new site while someone in New York is still getting served the old one.

Last night, as I was in a hurry to restore the database and get Blog Design Guy up to speed before anyone noticed, I got served the old site.

In the past, I’ve waited up to 4 hours for the right site to show up. I couldn’t wait that long last night, so here’s what I did to get the new site loading almost instantly.

Google Public DNS

When you sign up with an Internet Service Provider, they usually assign the domain name servers you use automatically. That means when you type http://blogdesignguy.com into your browser, your browser asks those servers to look it up. If those servers don’t know the site’s new location, tough luck. You’re stuck getting the old one.

What I learned last night, though, is that you can actually assign your own domain name servers. And if there’s any domain name server that should be up-to-date, it’s Google’s.

I set my domain name servers to Google’s Public DNS. As soon as I did, I began receiving the new site instantly which made it a lot easier for me to get Blog Design Guy back in working order.

Here’s how you do it:

Setting it up on a Mac

I use a Mac so these are the instructions I followed, as lifted from Google’s support page:

1. From the Apple menu, click System Preferences, then click Network.
2. If the lock icon in the lower left-hand corner of the window is locked, click the icon to make changes, and when prompted to authenticate, enter your password.
3. Select the connection for which you want to configure Google Public DNS. For example:
   • To change the settings for an Ethernet connection, select Built-In Ethernet, and click Advanced.
   • To change the settings for a wireless connection, select Airport, and click Advanced.
4. Select the DNS tab.
5. Click + to replace any listed addresses with, or add, the Google IP addresses at the top of the list:
   • For IPv4: 8.8.8.8 and/or 8.8.4.4.
   • For IPv6: 2001:4860:4860::8888 and/or 2001:4860:4860::8844
6. Click Apply and OK.

Setting it up on Windows

1. Go the Control Panel.
2. Click Network and Internet, then Network and Sharing Center, and click Change adapter settings.
3. Select the connection for which you want to configure Google Public DNS. For example:
   • To change the settings for an Ethernet connection, right-click Local Area Connection, and click Properties.
   • To change the settings for a wireless connection, right-click Wireless Network Connection, and click Properties.

   If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation.

4. Select the Networking tab. Under This connection uses the following items, select Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4) or Internet Protocol Version 6 (TCP/IPv6) and then click Properties.
5. Click Advanced and select the DNS tab. If there are any DNS server IP addresses listed there, write them down for future reference, and remove them from this window.
6. Click OK.
7. Select Use the following DNS server addresses. If there are any IP addresses listed in the Preferred DNS server or Alternate DNS server, write them down for future reference.
8. Replace those addresses with the IP addresses of the Google DNS servers:
   • For IPv4: 8.8.8.8 and/or 8.8.4.4.
   • For IPv6: 2001:4860:4860::8888 and/or 2001:4860:4860::8844
9. Restart the connection you selected in step 3.

My blog is hosted on TypePad, but it seems like everyone is using WordPress these days. Should I switch to WordPress? If so, how do I go about doing that without losing the design and content of my site?

- Positively Present

It’s being reported that WordPress is now used by 14% of all websites on the internet. It is by far the most popular content management system on the web. There are thousands of plugins and premium themes available for it and millions of users to help you out if you hit a road block.

But is it right for you?

I absolutely love WordPress. It’s a wonderful product, but my advice to you is this: Don’t try to fix what isn’t broken. Have you already made TypePad a part of your workflow? If so, think about how much time and effort it will take to relearn how to use your own website. And then, even after learning how to use the new system, it will take many weeks to many months to return to the same level of productivity you had with the former system.

The only reason you should switch from TypePad to WordPress is if you are outgrowing TypePad. Are there features it sorely lacks? Is the system in general hindering the work you do? Are there limitations to how you can use it? If so, switch to WordPress (or any other better-suited CMS).

If you do choose to switch, it’s a pretty simple process content-wise. You can easily export your TypePad content and then import it into a self-hosted WordPress installation. Check out TypePad’s official documentation if you need help.

The design will probably be a bit more difficult, only because you’ll probably have to rebuild it. But with WordPress it’s simple. You can hire a pro to do it (like me, wink wink) or you can buy a kick ass theme like Headway. Headway will let you drag and drop your design. You don’t have to know HTML/CSS/PHP or any other exotic technical languages. You just use a mouse, drop down menus, color selectors, etc.

Either way, you’ll be up and running in no time.

As always, if you have a question or need free help with any aspect of your blog, contact me via this form!

I want to give some life and colour to my blog and make it a well designed blog. I do not know how to proceed. Please help me.

- Surendranath Menon, thejus.blogspot.com

The first thing I have to say is that, in my experience as a designer, the simplest and quickest way to give life and color to your blog is to use WordPress. Why? Simply because WordPress is a bigger platform than Blogger or any other competitor. There are more designers actively creating awesome themes for WordPress than for any other blogging system.

For non-designers, this means a massive collection of high quality free and paid themes to choose from with new ones being released every day. For those who want to choose a theme and forget about it, WordPress includes a huge directory of free themes built into its administration panel.

For those do-it-yourself blog design types, there’s an awesome premium theme called Headway that lets you design your site as easily as you might lay out a word document. It comes with a Visual Editor that lets you drag, drop, pick and choose your design and the possibilities are endless. Headway simplifies my development process and allows me to focus on the details of the design rather than “making it work.” That’s why I use Headway on Blog Design Guy and every other site I own.

If you’re not able or interested in learning how to use a theme framework like Headway, but you want a great looking custom design, you should consider hiring a professional designer to create a custom theme for you. I offer custom blog design services to anyone in this category.

If you’re dead set on using Blogger, then the Template Designer is the way to go. To learn more about how to use the Template Designer, check out this Google help page. It should tell you everything you need to know.

If you need free professional help with any aspect of your blog, from the design to content creation to monetization, contact Blog Design Guy using the Free Help page.

I am trying to set up a WordPress self-hosted blog, and I’m having a little trouble.  I think I need a geek’s advice to help unjumble all the tech jargon.  I’m using Blogger right now, and it is slowly driving me insane, so I was wondering what is the quickest way to set up a self-host?

Stacey Hume

Congratulations on taking the initiative to switch away from Blogger! I’ve never found Blogger to be nearly as useful as WordPress and I think you’ll agree with me once you make the switch.

Switching to a self-hosted WordPress installation is actually way easier than you think. I can go into all the technical details, but you don’t need to bother with that. The quickest, easiest way to get yourself on a self-hosted WordPress installation is to simply sign up for a hosting account.

Most major web hosts offer one-click installations of WordPress (and other open source apps). So if you sign up for GoDaddy, Dreamhost, BlueHost, WebFaction or plenty of other services, you’ll be able to install WordPress without ever having to look behind the scenes. It will just work.

The process for doing this on each host differs slightly, so it’s best to just choose a host and then to look up their particular documentation for WordPress.

If you need *free* professional help with any aspect of your blog, get in touch with Blog Design Guy through the Free Help form.

My blog is super basic… that I like. I just don’t think there is an easy way to find archived files. I know zero about blog design.

- Shaena Crespo, SheLaughsBlog

Thanks for your question, Shaena!

For those who don’t know much about blog design (or design in general), a basic theme is a really great way to start. It’s hard to screw up basic. In your case, Shaena, I see you’re using WordPress.com as your host and Twenty Eleven as your theme. (Click here to check out Shaena’s blog)

You’re right, browsing through your archive looks like it would be tedious. I would either have to click on the category dropdown menu in the sidebar, or click on a tag or category listed after a post:

Even if a reader would bother to check out your archive, there’s not much of a chance they’ll stick around. All they will get is a reverse chronological list of your posts. When people visit your blog, they want to see the best of the best. They don’t want to have to find it.

Normally I might suggest that you create a custom archive page, use Headway to create custom sneeze pages or install some plugin. However, using WordPress.com makes that pretty much impossible. Plugins and themes like Headway aren’t available to WordPress.com bloggers, only WordPress.org bloggers. I don’t know if you can do custom coding on WordPress.com, but if you can it probably costs extra.

In the future, you might want to look into moving away from WordPress.com onto a self-hosted WordPress.org so that you aren’t limited in the ways you can use your blog.

But, right now you have a problem. How can you help your readers browse your archive using the Twenty Eleven theme on WordPress.com?

If you head to Appearance > Widgets in your WordPress dashboard, you’ll actually find some really helpful options. You’ll see Archive at the top (which you’re currently using as a dropdown menu in your sidebar.) The easiest and quickest way to improve your archive for your readers is to drag the “Top Posts & Pages” widget to the main sidebar.

Now when people visit your blog, they’ll have easy access to the most popular content, the best of the best. You also might want to play around with the Top Rated, Calendar, Category Cloud and Tag Cloud widgets. While I don’t think any of these are the ideal solution for your blog, they are easy to implement and they work well on WordPress.com.

Do you have a question about your blog that you need answered? Get free help by clicking here.

]]> http://ideaanarchy.com/showcasing-archive-twenty-eleven-theme/feed/ 4 http://ideaanarchy.com/need-expert-help-with-your-blog-free-help-is-back/ http://ideaanarchy.com/need-expert-help-with-your-blog-free-help-is-back/#comments Mon, 12 Sep 2011 11:00:33 +0000 jdbentley http://blogdesignguy.com/?p=533 A couple months ago I took down the Free Help form. I was overwhelmed with questions at the time and thought it might be better if I used Facebook as my Q&A platform.

It wasn’t.

Facebook definitely isn’t made to take questions and it also excludes those of you who would rather not use Facebook. So, today I’m bringing back the Free Help form. If you need any help with your blog design, strategy, your host, or anything else related to your blog, ask away!

Use the form below to ask your question today or visit the Free Help page at any time. I’ll answer your question in an upcoming post, in as much detail as I can possibly muster.

I’m looking forward to helping you out!

- JD

Oops! We could not locate your form.

You can’t, though. No one can. We, as bloggers, must stand at the foot of the mountain of blogging greatness and stare longingly upward until we’re finally compelled to take that first step up.

It can be entirely overwhelming. Not only do you have to work hard to piece together all the (contradictory) advice from already-successful bloggers into a strategy that works for you, you also have to figure out how to do it within the constraints of a pathetic budget.

Apart from strategy, you still have the whole matter of buying a domain, getting a host, making sure the domain redirects to that host, then getting WordPress set up, choosing the right theme, customizing that theme to perfection, installing plugins and on and on and on.

How will you ever learn it all? If you’re like me, you’ll fall forward for years and years and waste literally thousands of dollars until it all finally comes together.

That’s the hard way, though. I know there’s a better way–it just doesn’t exist yet.

Everything You Need

A couple weeks ago, I launched Planning the Perfect Blog in 7 Days. It’s a free online course that helps you figure out the direction you want to take with your blog to ensure it makes money from the beginning. It’s essentially a series of lessons on what to do before you even get started. It’s just a fraction of what you need to know to become a successful blogger.

This isn’t acceptable. I want to give you absolutely everything you need, not just half of what you need. Why? Because when you don’t have the money to do anything, you need to be able to do what needs to be done.

I want to take you step-by-step through:

• Buying a domain
• Connecting it to a host
• Installing WordPress
• Securing WordPress
• Choosing a theme
• Customizing a theme
• Blocking spam
• Setting up an editorial calendar
• Installing a forum
• Turning your blog into a membership site
• and anything else you’ll need to do as a blog owner.

I’ve found that pretty much anyone is capable of controlling their blogs (and increasing their reach and profitability) if they just get some guidance from someone who knows how to do it.

I certainly know how to do it.

The Problem

While I definitely want to provide people with all the tools, resources and knowledge they need to succeed with their blogs, I also don’t want to waste my time and energy.

It took me two weeks of work to complete Planning the Perfect Blog in 7 Days and that was a relatively simple project. What I’m wanting to do now is much more complicated and time-consuming.

I want to provide you with detailed video instructions on how to do everything you need to know how to do to be a completely do-it-yourself blogger, to have complete control over your site and its profitability. The working title I’m using is Do-It-Yourself Blogging: The Ultimate Toolkit.

To make it worth all the time and trouble, two things must be true:

1. People Have To Want It
   I suspect there are thousands of people out there who could benefit from knowing how to have full control over their blogs and their online success, but having some suspicions isn’t good enough. I want to know that you, the Blog Design Guy readers and subscribers, really want this knowledge.
2. It Can’t Be Free
   Now that I’ve seen how much work it takes, I know I can’t just give this away. It will be the first digital product on Blog Design Guy. The knowledge I want to provide can help you save thousands of dollars, earn thousands more and avoid many headaches along the way. I’m planning on selling it for $197.

One month ago, I made a very calculated effort to take Blog Design Guy viral. By the time my experiment concluded, traffic to the site had increased by 4029%, from about 100 visitors per day to 5079 on the day of the experiment.

It’s actually much easier to do than you might think. I’ll show you.

How to Write Viral Content

While it might be time consuming to figure out all the specifics, there are really only three steps to creating a viral post:

1. Choose A Distribution Channel
   How will your post travel across the web? Some channels are more suited to viral content than others. Viral posts need to reach as many people as possible in the shortest amount of time while also enabling those people to spread the post further. Sites like Reddit, Digg, Twitter, Facebook and StumbleUpon are perfect for this. Since Blog Design Guy is about the geeky subject of blogging, I decided to try Hacker News.
2. Study What’s Already Popular
   Since I read Hacker News every day, I already had some idea of which posts would be voted up and which wouldn’t. Hacker News isn’t a site about blogging or WordPress tutorials, so I knew I needed to create a post that would appeal to the community at large. It just so happened that on the same day, I witnessed a website gaming Digg by paying for votes and comments. Few things enrage a geek like people abusing technology to the detriment of the community. Rage also happens to be virally contagious, so I decided to write a post calling out the owner of the site. I framed it as a “what-not-to-do” article for bloggers.
3. Give Your Post An Attractive Headline
   Make people want to click on it. The title is the most important step in making a post go viral. For mine, I went with the sensational, “How to Avoid Irreparably Destroying Your Reputation Before You Even Have One.” This can be kind of hit and miss, though. You can make some good guesses, but it takes experience to really know what to expect. This headline earned me over 5000 clicks, so it’s safe to say it worked out pretty well.

That’s really all it takes. For me, this worked the first time. Maybe it will take you a few tries, but whatever the case I guarantee you’ll get a post to go viral sooner or later.

Do you really want to, though?

Why Going Viral Sucks

With over 5000 people coming to the blog, I must have seen some pretty great results, right?

Nope.

Truth is, if you want to earn a living from your blog, you probably don’t want to attract viral audiences. You don’t want to go out of your way to avoid them, but there’s definitely not much benefit in working hard to attract them. To understand why, just think about the reasons a post would go viral.

Viral posts provide some kind of immediate gratification without requiring any work. It’s content that appeals to “lazy” people, people who are on a lunch break or just killing time for a while. It’s for people who have a few seconds to spare and want to be entertained. They probably won’t care about your newsletter or that ebook you’re offering or that webinar that’s coming up. They only care about having something to do for the short amount of time they have.

That being the case, viral audiences don’t do a lot. As I mentioned before, I have a particular hierarchy of action that I want readers to take. At the top of that list is joining my free blogging course/mailing list. At the bottom, RSS and social media shares. With 5079 visitors coming to my site, I managed to get 20 new RSS subscribers and a higher number of Tweets and Facebook Likes than usual, but only 4 email subscribers.

Of course, there are many things I could do to increase the conversion rate, but in general, viral audiences aren’t passionate about you or what you’re doing. They don’t care at all, they’re just killing some time.

So, What Should You Be Writing?

If viral content doesn’t really benefit your blog, what is there to write then? To borrow terminology from Corbett Barr over at ThinkTraffic, you want to be writing some epic shit. I like to think of epic content as “microviral” content because it should be especially awesome, especially attractive and especially shared by a smaller group of readers in your particular niche.

Epic content reaches your people, not all people. It’s the kind of content that gets consumed by readers who actually give a damn about what you’re doing and what problems you can help them solve.

How to write that epic content, though… well, that’s a topic for another day!

Just one weekend a month of these small steps can put you on a path to blogging greatness without wearing you out or discouraging you. This weekend is as good as any, right? So, let me show you what you can do to make sure your blog is in excellent shape come Monday morning!

1. Install the Perfect Theme

I can tell you all the coolest design tricks in the book, but if you can’t implement them, who cares. You’re a do-it-yourself blog designer, right? You’re probably doing it more out of necessity than passion. Make things easy on yourself and choose a theme that facilitates your goals. You want to design without programming, so choose a theme that lets you do that.

I personally use and recommend Headway. It lets you drag, drop, pick and choose to your heart’s content without ever touching any HTML, PHP, Javascript or CSS. You’ll be able to create the design you actually want instead of one you just have to accept. Before you take any other action, get Headway. You’ll thank me for it later.

2. Don’t Be Schizophrenic

Figure out what your identity is and stick with it. Implement it across all pages of your blog. Figure out how you want your readers to feel about your site and then decide what colors, layout, terminology and logo best evoke those feelings. If you need help, check out my guide on the Art of Blog Branding.

3. Know What You Want Your Readers to Do

This is one of the biggest lessons in my free course, Planning the Perfect Blog in 7 Days. If you don’t know what you want your readers to do, then how can your blog design be efficient? It can’t be. The purpose of the blog design is to facilitate your goals. If you don’t know what those goals are, you’re just decorating a web page for no particular reason. What should your readers see? Where should they go? What should they do when they get there? If you need to figure out what you want you readers to do, sign up for Planning the Perfect Blog in 7 Days. It’s free and you’ll learn everything you need to know to craft that perfect design.

4. Create a Custom Homepage

You might have noticed that a lot of blogs are starting to look less and less like blogs, they are looking like full-blown websites. This is due in part to the creation of custom homepages. If there’s a specific action you want your visitors to take, make a special effort to emphasize that on your homepage. It will encourage your readers to take a particular action and it also has the added benefit of making your site look larger, which is very helpful if you’re just getting started.

For example, here at Blog Design Guy, my top goal is to get readers to join my free online course, Planning the Perfect Blog in 7 Days. If you head over to the homepage, you’ll see that it doesn’t look like the rest of the blog. It’s laid out specifically to facilitate that goal. A custom homepage might be exactly what you need to bring your design to life and engage your readers!

5. Make Things Interesting with Video

Since its inception, the Internet has been built on the written word. In this age of YouTube and shorter attention spans, video really stands out and engages readers. Who knows, it might even be your thing! I love writing, but there’s nothing like opening up a recording program and just letting everything come out naturally and unfiltered. You’ll likely be able to connect with your readers more easily this way. It’s much easier to trust a smiling face or a friendly voice than a series of cold characters on a blank page.

If you’d like to try video, I can highly recommend a couple tools. I use these personally for all the videos you find here. For the videos you see of my desktop, I use ScreenFlow. It records your entire screen so that you can show people how to do things on their computers or on the web. It can also record from your webcam while it records the screen so people can see you talking.

For the general editing of videos (intros, outros, etc.) I use iMovie which is part of iLife. It provides lots of cool transitions, jingles, sound effects and more. It’s complex enough to make videos look unique and professional, but simple enough that a non-video geek can still get the hang of it.

Also, if you check out the video on the homepage, you’ll see that I also do presentation style videos. These are made with ScreenFlow and Keynote. Also highly recommended! If you’d like to do a blackboard-style video, you could also use ScreenFlow with Photoshop or another image editor.

So, Will You Do It?

If you don’t do it this weekend, when will you do it? Often, the most important step is the first one. I’ve told you what you can do, so go get started! Your blog will have new life on Monday!

Be sure to show off what you’ve done in the comments below. I’d love to see your weekend work!