Some of the key reasons why you should cloak your links are:

• Some of your visitors may not like to click on visible affiliate links, as more and more web users begin to realize that they are being directed to products that make you money
• While you are setting up cloaking links it enables you to replace your really long and ugly affiliate link with a keyword infused url
• It also helps you to protect your affiliate links and commissions from nasty automated scripts that steal your commissions by replacing your links with their own
• Google can also value your site less in search result rankings, because of all of the other peoples weak content affiliate laden sites

So what I personally use is a wordpress plugin called Wordpress Link Cloak which automatically cloaks you affiliate links by rewriting the URLs through .htaccess. This plugin is so easy to use, I just installed it on my wordpress, selected and entered the keywords I wanted to convert into affiliate links and it was done, no more worrying about the previous reasons I pointed out.

This plugin may seem rather expensive it costs $77, but for what it does and how easy it is to use plus adding to that you can use it on as many sites as you want, it is not tied to the one domain as so many of the scrits are these days. And also you only have to loose one click because of these points I spoke about above and you would have quite possibly lost what the price of the plugin is and then take into account how many sites you have and divide the price between them. Work it out, it pays for itself very quickly.

For more information and to buy this plugin check it out after watching this video below or go there staright away Wordpress Link Cloak.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Why Do Over 130,000 Webmasters Use SEO for Firefox?

Want to know why Google or Yahoo! ranks pages? If so this is the Firefox extension for you. SEO for Firefox pulls in many useful marketing data points to make it easy get a holistic view of the competitive landscape of a market directly in the search results.

Check out the video and if your interested have a look at their site where they also have a great free keyword tool SEO Keyword tools

Click here to view the embedded video.

What its key attributes are and what it can be used to do is:

• get rid of duplicate content issues?
• give a one-finger salute to scraper sites and proxy hijacking?
• get the most from your backlinks?
• get the most income from the ads on your site?

You must:

• Vary the content of a web page in real time so that no two page views of the page display exactly the same content;
• Publish unique articles in different article directories and on different Web 2.0 properties, with each site receiving its own unique copy of the article; and
• Use the same real estate on a page to rotate different ads and over time settle on the highest paying ad.
• Split test different ads and different wording, and over time settle on the best performing alternatives.

That’s what WP Spinner does for you, and more…

I would seriously recommend anybody to use this plugin, although I do not myself, I’m trying to run my blogs with my own original content, we will see how I get on with this……

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the means of improving the quantity and quality of visitors to your web site from search engines (such as google) by improving search results. Normally the higher up the page you are on a search result page, the more chances you have that you site will be chosen to be visited.

Using certain SEO tactics you can also target different kinds of searches: image search, area/local, and trade/business search engines.

When using SEO as one of your strategies, you take into account how search engines function and the keywords that people search for eg dog, president, news etc.. The easiest way to apply this strategy is through using themes and certain plugins that increase the relevance/placement of your keywords more readily to the search engine when it crawls through your site.

SEO is also used to refer to a couple of different systems:

• Search engine optimizers, a term used by the ever growing industry of consultants who charge money for optimizing your website.
• Search engine optimizers have been known to offer SEO as a stand-alone service, whether it be a program run from your computer, or as a one time service or as a part of a broader marketing campaign.
• The expression “search engine friendly” can be used to describe a web site design, navigation bars/menus, CMS content management systems and ecommerce scripts which are easy to optimize, although many companies/individuals will try and charge you a lot of money for this.

Features

• Templating system
• Integrated link management
• Search engine-friendly >permalink structure
• Support for >plugins
• Support for >widgets
• Nested categories and multiple categories for articles
• >Trackback and >Pingback
• Typographic filters for proper formatting and styling of text
• Static pages
• Multiple authors
• Can store a list of users who visit your blog
• Can block site visitors by IP address
• >Tag support

Source: >WikiPedia

When you signed up with your host, they would have given you their nameservers, this is so you can point your domain that you have just purchased to their servers. These nameservers normally look something like

ns1.domainhost.com
ns2.domainhost.com

At this point if you haven’t purchased your domain name, please do so as you are paying for webspace (use it) buy one over at Dotster.com.

Ok so you need to login to your domain name control panel, this will be found on where you bought your domain name from. Look for name servers, then edit them with your new name servers that yo got from your host. Once you have done this it will take anything up to 48hrs for them to propagate (so that your new domain is listed around the world and when someone types in your domain in their browser, it takes them to your new webspace). If after 48hrs your new domain name is not found when you type the address in your web -browser, please contact your new webshost or the place where you bought your domain name from (registrar).

Ok so you are ready, you have a working domain name, lets go.

Login to your webhost, if you have a host with one click install please select your webscripts these are normally found under Fantastico, if not I will be shortly adding a short tutorial on how to install your blog.

I would strongly suggest that you use Wordpress for your blogging needs. Follow the simple form to get your Wordpress installed, for instructions on how to do this either check your hosts faq or try here Cpanel Documentation.

Once you have installed the worpdress on the lst page when it says wordpress install complete, there is a little box where you can send confirmtaion of the installation to an email, I strongly suggest you do this incase you forget your password to your admin account on your wordpress installation.

Now that is done, go to your domain address and sit back and feel impressed with yourself, as you are now the proud owner of your own blog.

Once you have decided what you will mainly write about on your blog (you have found a niche).

Have a good think about the keywords associated with this topic, for instance:

lets say we would like to write about “Table Tennis”, keywords that come to mind are Tennis, ping pong, indoors, sport: you get the picture. I’m not saying in anyway to start writing about table tennis, this is merely a example.

We could start looking for a domain such as tabletennispro.com

Start to think about your niche/area and then your domain name. When your ready or just want to see what available, I prefer to use Dotster.com for my domain name searches.

• They can help you stand out in websearches, if someone is loking for paint brushes they are probably more intent on going to a website with the domain  paintbrushes.com than carweek.org.
• They can make it easier for people to remember your url, for instance if Joe wanted to tell his friend while down at the bar, about this great story he read on your site, it will be a lot easier for him to remember if your domain is Juliesrants.com than if it is simonslongstoryaboutlife.net
• They can be used with sub domains for instance I have one quite a popular domain is-easier-with.us, with only one site on it at the moment called stopping-snoring.is-easier-with.us this I earn about 30 earning clicks per month (through email ads) Note to self must do something about this domain. So you can see what I mean about the sub domains…

There are a lot of domain name registrars (places that sell domain names) on the web. One of the ones I use quite frequently is Dotster they have a great specal on at the moment 5 Free Domains At Dotster With Any Hosting Package! Enter Coupon Code “5FORFREE”.

First of all I can offer you some of the hosts that I or people I know have hosted with in the past.

These are in no particular order, just how I had them in my bookmarks.

FatCow Web Hosting. Their special offer they have at the moment is: Free Trial , Free Setup, Free Support – All risk free!

PowWeb Hosting One Package, One Price, *On Sale* $3.88 Per Month and 30 Day Money Back Guarantee

Apollo Hosting This host has been rated a top Host by CNET and TopHosts and many others, with plans starting at just $6.96 a month.

HostRocket 1000GB 50GB Web Hosting for only $4.95/month.

HostDime Web Hosting starting at $8.25/month, with free setup.

Ipower Web Professional Web Hosting Solution for low cost ($7.95/month). These guy always sem to have good deals

1 and 1 Hosting.
Try the 1&1 Hosting Special. They offer many things for free.

hostgator These ones have many different offers, always worth checking out. ( I’ve just change my host to these guys, as they are Green, their datacenters are powered by Windmills!!)

Now for one in a different area:

surftown there in Denmark, worth checking out if your looking to target Scandinavia.
I will be adding some more hosts to here soon, especially some based in central Europe and the UK.
Stay tuned for the next installment choosing and buying your domain