Hi guys, I’ve been pretty busy the past couple weeks trying to get some major projects wrapped up (more on that later) so I haven’t had a lot of time to write around here but I’ve got a small arsenal of content written so I’ll be scheduling some of my tutorials for release over the next week.
I love geeks, outsiders often laugh at our obsession with acronyms but truthfully most of the time we just come up with really silly names for things. Case in point, sticky posts … they’re literally posts that stick to the top of your list. We could have called them a million things but somewhere along the line they simply became sticky posts.
How’s it work?
By default, WordPress will always list posts from the newest to the oldest but a sticky post overrides this order and always appears at the front of the list, in the order of publication for sticky posts. It’s like having two lines in a bank, where one always gets served first.
Making a Post Sticky
I’m not sure why Matt and the boys decided to make this function so hard to find but I get a lot of questions from my clients about how (and where) to make a post sticky. In fact, it took me some searching the first time so I can just imagine how frustrating it could be to new users.
Once found, it’s super easy:
Simply click the Edit button located beside your Visibility option and check the checkbox. As I said, I’m not sure why this wasn’t put somewhere a little more intuitive but my theory is that with all the other great interface improvements in 2.7 they didn’t have the time to fiddle with this.
Jun
2009
Free Link Building from a PR5 Web Site is Back!
A couple weeks ago, I deactivated the link love plugin here on my website then I explained my decision why I deactivated the nofollow in another article and with the help of a great graphic from Josh, I think I got my point across. Link building only works if the links are genuine, remarkably since deactivating the plugin I’ve seen a tremendous drop in comments (both SPAM and otherwise) but not a noticeable trail off of traffic to the website.
The problem is that genuine comments tend to get lost and too many commercialized links slip through the cracks, after all working on my blog is a part time endeavor as I do actually maintain a full time job outside my blogging activities. The other problem is that while giving away free nofollow links to some wonderful websites is rewarding on a personal level, there’s no true incentive for me to keep it up which is what’s led me to deactivate the link love plugin and make the vast majority of the links on my website nofollow, including links to much my own content.
By ensuring the majority of links on my pages are now nofollow, it provides those links which I do want to promote significantly more value with regards to PageRank.
How PageRank Works
Simply put, PageRank is Google’s measurement of authority and it controls where you rank in the Search Engine Result Pages (SERPS). The higher your PageRank, the closer to the first page your website will appear on any given subject. While that’s an over simplification, the ideas are basically there.
When a web page links to another website, Google considers it a vote for the second website but it divides the ‘vote’ between all the links on a webpage except for those marked as nofollow. Simply put, the PageRank transferred is equal to the total PageRank of a page, divided by the number of links not using a nofollow attribute.
Spending Your Credibility
There are several ways I choose to spend my PageRank, and make no mistake that linking to other websites ’spends’ PageRank. Every time your website links to another website, Google assumes that you are voting for it by actually transferring a small part of your own site value to the new website. If you’re linking to higher value websites, there is no effect but if you’re helping to promote lower ranking websites Google counts your vote as your willingness to lose some authority while boosting another websites credibility. This process helps ensure link farming is discouraged while link swapping between genuine and reliable websites is encouraged.
Who I Link To
When I deactivated the Link Love plugin a couple weeks back, I was surprised by the reaction of a few commenters who’d assumed that my willingness to give a free PR5 link was something they simply had the right to have. In truth, nobody has the right to have links, not just from my website but from any website. I struggle everyday to earn quality links and honestly assume that everybody else does too. So who do I link to and how can you get a free link from my PageRank 5 website to yours?
Write a Guest Post
Take the time to write a guest post here on thisismyurl.com like Casper Christensen and build your website traffic by letting my readers know about your website. If thisismyurl.com isn’t your cup of tea, perhaps you’d enjoy writing a piece for one of my other websites?
Feature me as a Writer
A new section of my website called “What I’m Writing” can be found on the footer of every page and features a list of ten recent articles that I’ve written for other websites including my own.
Link to my Articles
If you’ve found an article interesting or a plugin useful, include a link to the posting here and find yourself included in the nofollow free Who’s Linking section on the bottom of every page. That’s where I list genuine, nofollow free Pingbacks to articles here on my website.
Do Something Amazing on Your Blog
Every week (sometimes more often) I write a summary article of what I’m reading on the web today, it also appears in the footer of my website and usual features a half dozen great links to wonderful articles I’ve enjoyed reading this week. It’s a great way to promote yourself.
If you’d like to learn more about how the PageRank tool works, I would encourage you to visit Ian Rogers great article on the subject.
Tags: Attribute, couple weeks, Cracks, Free Links, Free Web, full time job, Genuine Comments, google, Led, love, Measurement, nofollow, part time, Personal Level, search engine result, Simplification, spam, Time Endeavor, Vote, Web Page Links
Posted in Blog Posts