9/14/12: Site Builder (CoolTools) update 4.40 is fully deployed now. It includes the following updates and system enhancements. 

Feature Overview

• Button component (also available for page group links)
• Updated links list component
• New layouts
• New Google fonts
• IPAD text editor (be sure to enable pop-ups in Safari)
• ReCaptchaTM setting - enhanced form spam protection
• Ecommerce updates
• Popup overlay window support (click here for instructions)
• Mobile site enhancements
• PREVIEW: optimized checkout (single page)
• Miscellaneous corrections

To find out your current Site Builder version number, log into your web hosting account and look at the right-hand side of the page for the "System Update" graphic, which shows the update number and installation date, along with a summary of the most recent features (the sample at right illustrates System Update version 4.40).

For more details on all the features, please visit http://updates.bizsiteservice.com/sysblog.

Unwanted bulk email — also known as "spam" — is a serious problem throughout the Internet. But what if you want to send a message to a large group of recipients? How do you avoid spamming them? Here are some tips:

1. Do not send bulk emails if you have purchased the addresses rather than collected them with recipients' permission. This would violate the CAN-SPAM act, which sets the rules for commercial email, establishes requirements for commercial messages, gives recipients the right to have you stop emailing them, and spells out tough penalties for violations.
2. Carefully follow guidelines given in the following publications from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) about the CAN-SPAM Act:
   • http://business.ftc.gov/documents/bus61-can-spam-act-compliance-guide-business/ for specifications of this act
   • http://business.ftc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/bus61-can-spam-act-compliance-guide-business.pdf for a very readable PDF version of this information.
3. Send only to a list of users who have specifically requested to receive emails from your company.
4. Use our SiteBuilder web hosting system's mailing list manager or a similar system such as Constant Contact that:
   • Enables recipients to opt-out, as per the CAN-SPAM act.
   • Enables you to create both HTML and Text email (which is required by some email systems), and to send yourself a test message.
   • Provides templates that you can use for the HTML email message, and/or enables you to create your own templates.
5. Do not use a standard email client to send out bulk emails (again, because it typically does not enable recipients to opt-out).

Failure to adhere to the above will irritate email recipients and, much worse, may get you kicked off your email or web hosting system as a spammer.

Upgrading SiteBuilder Mailing Lists
All of our SiteBuilder (Cool Tools) plans offer a mailing list manager. If you are using our SiteBuilder system, you may upgrade your mailing list capacity. Simply log in to your site editor, click the purple Mailing List button, click the Upgrade Mailing List button (right-hand side), scroll down to Add-Ons & Upgrades, and select the Mailing List upgrade that you want. You may select 1000 - 5000, in increments of 1000. Click Apply Changes. 

If you need more than the 5000 maximum, the upgrade charge is $2.50 per 1000 emails per month. Please contact us if you require an extended upgrade and tell us how many thousands of emails you need per month; we will contact our web hosts to upgrade for you.

A recent article by Jennifer Kyrnin asked and answered the question "Is Duplicate Content Bad for SEO? (The Short Answer is Yes)". We've summarized key points below, but encourage you to read the source article about duplicating content and its effect on SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

When is Duplicate Content Bad?

• When the main purpose is to have your content display higher in search engines or you want to manipulate search results. (Your site may be viewed as spamming.)

When is Duplicate Content OK?

• When the search engine indexes multiple URLs separately, but all URLs point to the same page.
• When the duplicated content is created for platform- or function-specific versions of your site such as mobile or printer-friendly pages.

What Can You Do to Reduce Duplicate Content?

• Avoid posting duplicate content (obvious).
• Use permanent 301 redirects, which will tell search engine spiders to stop indexing the old page and replace it with the new one.
• Link to home pages the same way every time. For example, http://precisioncomputingarts.com/ rather than http://pcartsonline.com/fastwebdev/home.
• Use "noindex" on syndicated content (pages that you have duplicated from another source), which prevents the search engines from indexing the content on your site.
• Avoid repeating boilerplate content on your site. Instead, move it to another page and then link it as needed.
• Expand similar content pages (such as a travel site that has boilerplate content but just small amounts of unique information about multiple cities). Instead, provide more unique information on each page; or, combine the pages.
• Provide more unique product content rather than simply copy/pasting product details from the source, such as Amazon.com or a manufacturer's website.
• Use "rel=canonical" link relationships, which Google and some other search engines use to determine the preferred version of content.

• Content rotator based on the day of the week (use Design/Layout Components > Content Rotator; see example)
• Updated admin pages
• Updated file upload user interface
• New layouts/design options
• Date formatting for blog comments
• Image resize - the source image is saved for a period of time after upload so the size can be adjusted more easily
• Content slider - easier navigation between slides when editing  (see Design/Layout Components > Content Slider; see example)
• Mobile settings for redirecting directly to mobile site (see Site Editor > Settings > Mobile Website)

• New shopping cart buttons (see Design > Text & Styles > Shopping Cart)
• Pinterest support (see Site Editor > Settings > Social Networking)
• Australian tax display updates (see Store Manager > Advanced Settings > Shipping)
• Reward editing add/modify/delete (see Store Manager > Advanced Settings > Shopping Rewards)
• FedEx Web Service Freight (see Store Manager > Advanced Settings > Shipping)
• Shipping add on pricing options - a flat charge added to the shipping, most useful if you are using an automated shipping calculator such as built-in UPS calculator (see Store Manager > Setup Store > Shipping > Handling Fees (under Additional Settings) > Additional Handling Charges) 
• PayFuse Gateway, NAB Transact (see Store Manager > Setup Store > Payment/Gateway)

Creating an online presence with useful content is key to a successful presence on the Internet. The following summarizes an article about how to improve your company's overall Internet marketing strategy (The Costco Connection, May 2012, page 22-23). 

1. Offer information to consumers

Many people prefer to search online to learn more about a product or service seen in ads elsewhere. Your company's website should focus on helping visitors make smart buying decisions, educating consumers even before they call you or speak to a salesperson.

2. Make it easy to find

Use good keywords in your website's home page, title tag, and page content so that search engines will find your website. Be sure to interview your current customers to find out what keywords they would use to find your company. And, if you provide local services, be sure to include keywords that mention your geographic zone, such as "website design in Tigard and Portland, Oregon."

3. Focus on content

Good content is essential to Internet success! In addition to providing frequently-updated, fresh content on your website, you should seek quality links from other relevant websites as well as blogs of your own, links from other related blogs, and educational online videos that you create to help customers get the most from your products and services. 

4. Incorporate social media

Combining a quality website with a YouTube channel, Facebook fan page, online press releases, blog entries, Twitter, and other social media will round out your Internet marketing strategy and tie everything together to increase awareness of your company among consumers.

Other resources

• Google Adwords Keyword Tool (free tool for researching keywords and phrases tailored to your website)
• Wordtracker (free trial of subscription-based tools for finding good keywords and phrases and identifying websites that would be good candidates for a linking campaign)
• Ezine articles (free tool for posting informational articles that are offered free to websites and email newsletter publishers)
• SES (conferences about Internet marketing and search engine strategies)

Blogger platforms

• Blogger.com
• WordPress
• Technorati
• Cool Tools blogs (like this one)

» Read entire article in The Costco Connection 

Google recently has introduced SEO and spam penalties that can hurt SEO focused sites in Google's rankings. The best way to keep your site performing well in search engines is to add more content rather than over-adjusting the content you have.

Key do's and don'ts include:

• Avoid repeating the keyword phrase more than 10-15 times in your article or putting too many keywords on a single page
• Avoid titles that are stilted and repetitive
• Avoid multiple headlines using the keyword phrase
• Avoid including the keyword phrase in additional, less visible locations such as image "alt" text
• Write and expand content regularly to ensure:
  • Relevance and focus on delivering content to customers
  • Website provides expanded information on a topic
  • More of your pages found in search results
  • More linking opportunities within your website
  • More frequent visits by search engine spiders (they remember if your site is updated regularly)

» Read complete article by Jennifer Kyrnin

System Update: 4.20- [01/31/2012]  [02/15/2012 update]
System Update 4.20 is available to all Precision Computing Arts/Fastwebdev web hosting clients, and it's chock full of useful and fun features, which are summarized below. If you have any questions or would like us to help you implement these features, please don't hesitate to contact us!

Design Explorer (preview)

The design explorer preview is now available.  The design explorer preview is built to allow customers to easily try out different design options.   Customers can make design changes and then apply the changes once they are ready to make their changes live.

Access the design explorer through the design manager. 

Edit current design: Click the Design Explorer link on the design manager page.

Edit a saved design: click the "Edit" link next to a design in the design manager.

IMPORTANT: Design changes must be saved.  When customers want to save their current progress, they can click the "Save" button located in the top right of the design explorer window.  Customers can save their current progress, or save changes and apply them to their live website.

Please give the design explorer a try and give us your feedback.  This is an early access feature so we planning on making updates and enhancement based on your feedback.

Design system speedup

We have made several modifications to the design system that should speed up the process of generating design changes for many of the system layouts.

Ecommerce order processing

Several enhancements have been made to ecommerce order processing.  These enhancements are designed to make the order processing features easier to access.

Quick access menu.  Each order in the order manager now has a small drop down arrow that provides quick access to common order processing functions.  Store owners no longer need to view the order to access functions like email notifications and order printing.

 - View order
 - Send email to customer
 - Order notes/status
 - Print invoice
 - Print packing slip

Order status icon
From the order notes page, store owners can now set an order status color.  The status color is displayed on each line of the order manager.  The order status color can be used for any purpose.   Ex. a store owner may set an order to "blue" to indicate that they need to follow up with the customer.   

When the order status icon is clicked the order notes are displayed.  This allows store owners to see order notes directly from the main order list.

Customer email quick messages
Using quick messages, pre defined (stock) emails/messages can be sent to customers.   These stock messages make it easy for store owners to send order status updates or other information to customers.

Instead of typing a new message for each email, store owners simply select a message from the list and click send.

To create a new message, go to the email page for an order.  Select a message from the drop down list or select the option to create a new one.  Each message can be customized with the customer name, address, order number and order date.

Design

• 20 new layouts added
• New background textures
• More color options for new designs
• Larger design selection window
• Adjust quicklinks bar font size
• Enhanced design drop down menu for quicker access to design features
• Default styles for blog and image galleries
• CSS submenus now default to use menu slide animation
• Default groupbox spacing/padding
• New google fonts added

Header/banner

The header/banner settings area has been updated to let you use a content slider or custom HTML in the banner area. The system will now auto adjust to automatically use the width/height of upload banner images.

Design menu

The design options popup menu has been enhanced to provide direct links to more design areas (design library, design settings, design manager, web developer tools...). The menu is also available by clicking the right most design tab ("..."). This menu allows you to easily navigate between design areas.

Design manager - Design Explorer (coming soon)

The design manager explorer allows you to edit and customize your design before making the changes live on your site.

Content slider

The content slider has been updated with direct links to edit the slider text.

Photo gallery

The photo gallery has been adjusted to allow you to upload photos directly from the page editor. Edit a page with a photo gallery on it and click the upload button above the gallery display.

Google maps

The system has been updated to use the new Google maps API/service. You are no longer requied to user a developer key when setting up your map.

QuickEdit bar

A new QuickEdit bar option is available. The QuickEdit bar is positioned at the top right of your website. It allows to you easily scroll up and down the page as well as toggle between edit/view modes.

Ecommerce group coupon support

Automatically generate sets of coupons for group based coupon promotions such as GroupOn.

Ecommerce administration

You can now set up admin user accounts and give the account access to manage your store products. To configure admin access, go to the user accounts - administration users area.

Misc updates

• Page properties : advanced settings - set the page url (page name)
• Design manager enhancements
• Ecommerce - Canada post shipping