SEO Tycoon

**ForrestCroce** · 07-17-2007, 09:54 PM

Background: Sunday I spent about $4,500 on the top of Mount Ranier, that I really couldn't recoup. It's probably not that bad, but I haven't built up the nerve to test my gear yet.

I don't monetize my web site, but I publicize it as much as I know how. I got a deal to sell my work through a Starbucks, and I've sold images to one local company for an ad campaign to help them show they're local. The more people who see my site, and associate my name with good photography, the easier it will be to get more deals, and more lucrative ones, in the future.

People keep telling me I should have a blog for my site, and there are some compelling reasons. I have formal articles on my site, about photography technique and digital processing, but it takes me a while to write them, where a blog is more aimed at quick tips. A blog would also be pretty natural to show off my latest stuff if my camera still works.

My day job is software development, and I've written a couple of applications that I distribute through my site. A lot of the same could be said about moving the software to its own site with a blog, posting a few open source components, tips, gotchas, and whatnot. I seem to have a different approach than most people, so I'd be able to fill it with useful stuff that hasn't been covered to death.

So that's potentially two blogs, in addition to my main site. Although one of them would move the software corner. If I'm going that far, does it make sense to have a site for each of the software products? There are only about five in all; three of them aren't public yet. That would defeat the purpose of having a software site/blog with general advice and best practices info.

I'm over thinking this because I'm procrastinating the camera tests. Somebody talk some sense.

I can set up as many subdomains as I need on my hosting site. I tend to associate subdomains with spam, though, probably because so many Blogger sites are spam. And when I recommend a site to a coworker, most of the time it's in conversation, face to face, so speakable seems good. Would it make more sense to get actual domains for the blog(s) I'm considering?

**vangogh** · 07-18-2007, 01:44 AM

I think a photography blog belongs with your main site because the main site is about photography. I think it would work better as a subfolder on the site since a subdomain will be seen as a separate domain in the eyes of a search engine.

There are some advantages to that, but ultimately you're promoting two sites.

I can see the software site sitting on it's own domain. I think if forrestcroce.com is going to be dedicated to photography then the software blog works best on it's own domain, but I can see it working on a subdomain of the main site.

I might not necessarily link the two sites together a lot since the audience for one probably isn't the audience for the other. I'm sure there would be some overlap, though and you could link between the two if you want. I would make them separate sites though. Different look, different navigation.

I would have the photography blog look the same as the main site. You could even run the entire main site of of WordPress if you wanted.

**ForrestCroce** · 07-18-2007, 11:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vangogh

I think if forrestcroce.com is going to be dedicated to photography

That's a big if, but it's also my best and most enjoyable skill, so I think it makes sense to divide things up this way, and use the domain that's my name for photog.

Quote:

Originally Posted by vangogh

I would have the photography blog look the same as the main site. You could even run the entire main site of of WordPress if you wanted.

You can do stand-alone pages in WordPress? I thought it was a blog engine?

**ADAM Web Design** · 07-18-2007, 11:40 AM

No, it's set up to allow for standalone pages as well. If you look at my blog, all the menu pages (about us, legal, full link disclosure, etc.) are standalone pages. There's a section called Pages in WP for this purpose.

I'd create one site for the software, and one for the photography. They're two separate topics so they're two separate sites. You can run a blog off of each, but that may be too much maintenance.

If I were you, I'd focus on the photography and build the software site when/if you have time (or need the money). It's your biggest passion and it's also where I think your biggest money would come into play. Software tends to be the sort of thing where every lazy prick thinks he can do it better himself so he doesn't want to pay for it. (Or she, for the ladies out there...let it not be said that I'm not equal-opportunity when it comes to sloth.)

You do realize that this question is far too intelligent for most webmaster boards. Where's the requisite PR obsession, dammit?

**Learning Newbie** · 07-18-2007, 01:26 PM

Anchor txt n backlinkz, dude

I love me some Notepad++, and I notice both you and Adam like the software, too. Where do you get it? http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/ Note the address - subdomains aren't scummy in and of themselves. But then I moved from alexandersarchive.blogspot.com to great-library.com, but that's more to do with direct traffic (friends & family, like MCI) and having a memorable domain. Plus, it's perfect for my site. But you have a point that it should be something you can say and a person can get to.

Anyway, you already have the smart people replying. I just wanted to pipe in and say to things. Blogging is a hell of a lot of fun, way more than I expected. I like to think about big ideas, and communicate the ones that excite me, but I don't like writing dissertations. It's more like emails to the world, and they can email you back! I got linked to by an Israeli blogger. I didn't think anyone read my blog, and here I'm mentioned half a world away.

That, and I love WordPress. It's so easy. I haven't figured out the pages thing you guys are talking about, but even without that, it's just so easy, flexible, and a five minute job to apply a beautiful theme. Everything is intuitive. Ever use a Nokia phone? It's like that. Or, if you get stuck using a Mac for a few hours, then come home to a PC. WordPress just makes sense.

**vangogh** · 07-18-2007, 05:56 PM

I think that's three weeks for John in link exchange hell.

John and Forrest if you log into WP and click on Write there's an option to write a post or a page. Select page and write as usual and you have a page.

You'll want to do more, but if you write a page instead of a post it won't show up in the series of posts on your blog. It will show up in different menus, etc.

Chances are you'll want to turn comments off on you pages, but you don't have to. A common way to do pages is just like Adam handles it.

You can even access WP from the pages you create outside of the blog structure. If your blog sits at domain.com/blog you could still have pages in domain.com/services/ access the WP header, footer, template tags, etc. It'll require a little more familiarity with how WordPress is put together, but it's not too hard.

**ForrestCroce** · 01:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ADAM Web Design

You do realize that this question is far too intelligent for most webmaster boards. Where's the requisite PR obsession, dammit?

Sorry. Do I have to go to Link Exchange Hell, too? I promise I won't interlink my sites for the fun of it! Actually, part of why I'm doing all of this is I think there's a lot of value in segregating the creative from the engineering. I briefly ran a business called Valhalla Photos, and got some database jobs, but someone I had worked for in the past and really liked me said he just wouldn't be able to justify outsourcing IT work to a company with photos in the name. I'm not sure why a person can't be both, but that's how it is.

So, I've gone and set up http://blog.forrestcroce.com/ and changed the permalink structure to /%postname%/%year%/%monthnum%/%day%/ ... seems to make more sense than the default? Anything else I should do from the start? Am I allowed to change the look of the theme a little? Particularly the bg color for the "posted in" and "# comments" box?

I also bought http://www.exo-brain.com/ but haven't set it up yet. The idea is that we used to memorize everybody's phone number, but nobody really enjoyed it. Now, with cell phones, it's a convenient replacement for learning useless codes. Software is supposed to help people be more efficient, by doing things the brain isn't good at, like remembering precise details or calculations. Like outsourcing.

Edit: I found the option in the control panel here to enter the url for your blog's feed, and put http://blog.forrestcroce.com/feed/ which resolves and looks right ... any thoughts on why my "latest post" of all two of them isn't showing up?

**Learning Newbie** · 07-19-2007, 12:24 PM

Frig! Nice job! And on an unrelated note, I like your new avatar.

I'm a newbie at this stuff, so I can't give you much advice. But if I'm reading right, you changed the default link structure? Why did you move day and month to the end? I leave the year month and day at the start of the URL, it seems better to let people know what they're dealing with. In five years, how will people look at my blog posts about that criminal Scooter Libby? They'll probably be a little less worked up than we are now. So the date being right there at the start of the page url seems like a good idea. I would imagine technology like Photoshop and digicam whatever changes as fast as politics and foreign relations?

**ForrestCroce** · 07-20-2007, 09:10 PM

I put the date at the end of the URL because photography really doesn't change that often, and I think it's more useful to see the title of a post in the address bar than when it was written. Just a personal preference, really. But, my favorite lens, the one I dropped running across the road, is about a 15 year old design. It's one of the two best portrait lenses anyone has ever made. The design of a 50 mm lens hasn't changed much since the 1930s, and most photoshop stuff is based on film development techniques. Ansel Adams would be right at home with a good display and fast machine.

I've started moving my software to a new site ... does anybody have any thoughts on how to take an html template and convert it to a WordPress one? http://exo-brain.com/WebDomViewer/About.html I'm not sure if WP would work for what I'm trying to do here, since I'll be moving two apps over from my personal domain, each of of which will have its own section.