This is a guest post by Lesley DeSantis, who’s a content development specialist for Twiends.

Because of its brief posts, active user base, and real-time updating capabilities, Twittercan be a great way to promote yourself or your business. With the way Twitter users keep on top of the latest news, the site is an easy way to reach a large number of peoplein a short period of time, especially if you follow a few simple tips.People are easily flattered. If you stumble across an interesting Tweet, don’t hesitate to follow the author. He or she will get a notification that someone new is following their feed, and likely won’t be able to resist the temptation to check out your profile to see who you are.

They also might be flattered that you’re following them, and decide to return the favor. The same logic applies to Re-Tweets. When you come across a clever Tweet, Retweet it. The original author of the post is likely to begin following you and might Retweet one of your posts in the future. Everyone who Retweets you will be broadcasting your username and clever comments to all of their subscribers, netting you tons of traffic and likely a handful of new followers.

Link your Twitter feed to your Facebook account. Your Tweets will be broadcast to all your Facebook friends, allowing you to tap into whatever social network you already have. Not only that, Facebook allows users to “like” and comment on those posts, meaning your Tweets can make it to the homepages of friends of friends on Facebook. If these users see something they like, they can easily follow the link back to your Twitter page. Encourage your website or blog readers to find you on Twitter.

There are even blogging applications that let you port your Twitter feed directly into your blog, usually by posting it in one of the sidebars. If you regularly contribute to online forums, include your Twitter address in your signature. The more clever, insightful, and interesting your forum posts are, the more likely readers will be to seek out your wit in other places on the Internet.

Once you get new followers, it’s important to work hard to keep them. Post regularly, but not too often. Twitter is a dynamic, fast-paced site. Users are constantly reading, retweeting, forwarding, and commenting on the most recent hot topics. If you post regularly about the biggest issues of the day, you’ll keep your name swirling around the site through search pages and top tweets and retweets.

Stay silent for awhile, and not only will you lose out on that publicity, but old followers might unsubscribe from your feed. At the same time, it’s easy to lose new subscribers quickly by overpowering their feed with a new message every 30 seconds. Find a happy medium that works for your purpose but also keeps your followers satisfied.

Of course, the best and easiest way to get followers in Twitter is to be a good Tweeter. No one but your closest friends really care that you’re about to get on the bus to go to work, and not even they care that you’re about to clip your toenails. The mundane details of your life aren’t interesting unless you can present them in a clever or humorous way. If your online presence is more geared towards news and current events than personal information, creativity is even more important. In this case, even your closest friends won’t be interested in reading 140 characters that blandly repeat huge news stories that nearly everyone already knows. On the other hand, if you can provide insightful comments or humorous twists on the news, users will happily forward your comments along to their friends.

Be clever and creative, and you just might be the next Internet sensation!!!

Article By: Lesley DeSantis

She is a content development specialist for Twiends, a Twitter Directory that helps you learn how to grow your social network and how to get followers in Twitter.

How to Get More Followers on Twitter was originally posted on iBlognet by Guest Author.

A custom made WordPress theme helps you to stand out from other blogs, which makes your blog unique. And Thesis Framework makes it too easier to build your own branded WordPress theme. In my previous thesis  tutorial I showed you how to add a custom author box  below post with social media profiles which will also help to verify your blog Google Authorship. In this Thesis tutorial I will show you how to replace, normal text-based, post date in Thesis with a Calendar icon, which looks more like an image based date.

Step 1: Disable Default Thesis Dates

Go to Thesis Design options and in the “Display section” disable the two options for date as shown in the image below:

Step 2: Get a Calendar Icon.

Search for a calendar icon that matches with your blog theme or create a custom one using Photoshop or GIMP. Check out the sources below:

• Calendar icons not only for your blog
• Blank Calendar Icon Template PSD
• Calendar Icon from dryicons.com
• Gallery of Date Stamps and Calendar

…or create your own calendar icon:

• Calendar Icon Tutorial
• Calendar icon – Photoshop tutorial
• Creating a Blog Entry Date Calendar Icon Look with CSS, Mostly

…or do a simple Google Image search for blank calendar icons. For the purpose of this tutorial I will be using an icon as seen below. You can use it freely!

If you have found a matching icon for your theme upload to your media library or most probably your Thesis Theme custom image directory [thesis_184 > custom > images].

Step 3: Adding the Codes.

First add the following CSS code to custom.css file.

[css]
.custom .calendaricon {float: left;text-align: center;margin-left: -2em;margin-right: 0.5em;margin-top: -1.5em;}
.custom .month {color: #FFFFFF;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 10px;font-weight: bold;margin-top: -6.1em;text-transform: uppercase;}
.custom .day {color: #000;font-family: Impact;font-size: 22px;}
[/css]

The margins and fonts in above CSS code is adjusted as per the icon size. I have used icon size of 70×73 px. If your icon size is smaller or larger than mine, use Firebug to adjust the CSS styles and copy paste the code in custom.css

Now copy paste the following code if you want to display date icons in all pages.

[php]
/* CALENDAR DATE ICON */
function calendar (){ ?>
<div class=”calendaricon”>
<? echo ‘<img src=”http://YOURDOMAIN.COM/wp-content/themes/thesis_184/custom/images/date-icon-plain.png” />’; ?>
<div class=”month”><? the_time(‘M y’) ?></div>
<div class=”day”><? the_time(‘j’) ?></div>
</div>
<?
}
add_action(‘thesis_hook_before_headline’, ‘calendar’);
[/php]

Copy paste the following code if you want to display date icon on home page and Gravtar on post pages

[php]
/* CALENDAR DATE ICON */
function calendar() {
if(is_home()) { ?>
<div class=”calendaricon”>
<? echo ‘<img src=”http://YOURDOMAIN.COM/wp-content/themes/thesis_184/custom/images/date-icon-plain.png” />’; ?>
<div class=”month”><? the_modified_date(‘M y’) ?></div>
<div class=”day”><? the_modified_date(‘j’) ?></div>
</div>
<?php }
}
add_action(‘thesis_hook_before_headline’, ‘calendar’);

/* TITLE AVATAR */
function myavatar_post_title() {
if(is_single()) { ?>
<?php echo get_avatar( get_the_author_id() , 48 ); ?>
<?php }
}
add_action(‘thesis_hook_before_headline’, ‘myavatar_post_title’);
[/php]

Make sure you change image location with your domain name.

If you want to add superscript [like - 1st, 2nd, 3rd...] to the day, replace the following code:

<div class=”day”><? the_modified_date(‘j’) ?></div>

…with

<div class=”day”><? the_modified_date(‘j\<\s\u\p\>S\<\/\s\u\p\>‘) ?></div>

That’s it! You’re done. Your normal text-based date will now be replaced like in the image below:

…or…

If you got stuck in any of the steps above, leave a comment below and I will get back you soon. And if you don’t have a Thesis Theme, you should buy Thesis Theme right now!

Replace Post Date With Calendar Icon in WordPress Thesis was originally posted on iBlognet by Sahil Umatia.

StumbleUpon has been the best source to squeeze tons of traffic to your blog or website if used wisely. I myself have been a Stumble Upon addictive user hitting the Stumble button on my browser every day. Everytime I hit stumble button a new blog appears in front of me with new information available you never knew about before. Some of them were interesting to read and some of them worth to re-tweet, and vote them up again. But some of that were not so good, either due to content or design which makes me less than a sec to hit the thumbs down button.

What’s That Title.

Everytime  when you open up a page or stumble a page the first thing which loads on the browser is the page title . The title says it all, what the page is about. If the title doesn’t sounds interesting or catchy the user would quickly hit the stumble button to open up the next page.

The page title is an important aspect of a page, if you want to get traffic from stumble upon. It hardly takes 2 to 3 minutes to fabricate a boring title into a awesome title that would go viral on the web and also gives a huge helping hand to newcomers on your site.

Load Time.

Its been said by webmasters that a user would quickly go off the page if the page remains blank for more than 8sec. Obviously, why a stumble upon user would wait for a page that takes more than 5sec to load. It becomes more worst and the user would take less than a sec, if your page title looks less appealing to the user. So its important that you should quickly work out on your blog HTML & CSS to optimize it for readers .

 

Screaming Ads

We know that you are blogging for money and that’s why your are showing ads on your blog. But why your ads are stopping me to read your content. 90% of people thinks that blogging is quick way to earn money and unfortunately those 90% also thinks that displaying too many ads will increase CTR .

I have stumble many blogs which displays large size Flash banner above the head, then a 468×60 banner in the header, then again two rectangle sized ads below title, again 1 more ad in the sidebar, then comes up a nice large size image and then finally the content.
If you don’t make it easy for me to see what your page is about, then I’m stumbling on to next page, and I won’t even give you a thumbs down. You give the reader what they want, and you will automatically receive the perks !!!

Do I need a Magnifier???

Y ou might have a blog with good title and nice design, but why would I waste my time zooming in and out to read your blog content. I would simply stumble on to the next page. This is a common problem seen on every blog with regards to font size. I have stumbled on many blog pages which have a font size of 10px to 8px.

When its comes to blog, content in the form of text is an important element. A single pixel change in the font size, could give a huge relief to the readers eye. I myself have tried playing with the font pixel, and have found that a font-size in between 13px to 15px and a font-type of Times Roman or Georgia makes a perfect balance- not so big and not so small.

Bad Formatting!!!

Now this is a follow up to the above point. I have seen many blogs who writes great article with more than 500+ words but totally c hunked into one single para which looks more like copied from another blog. I usually find these articles boring to read which has no formatting at all . Your article doesn’t stand a chance to hit the like button, if nothing grabs my attention within 2secs. I would straight away hit the thumbs down button and stumble on to the next page.

What’s that Sound???

This is the most irritating one I have gone through many of them. I have came across many blogs, which do play an automated background sound screaming at you to turn you into a subscriber or download a copy of book which “he” created or simply add a song. I mean common man, I am here to read your blog but not to hear your favorite song. I will subscribe to your blog or download your copy of book if I find your blog interesting. The similar are for online videos which are auto played like YouTube.

Final Words!!!

Simple design, well formatted unique content will increases the chances of your blog fetching more readers, subscribers and traffic. These were some of my reasons for which I won’t stumble a page. What are your views? What’s your reason for not stumbling???

Why i Won’t Stumble Your Page was originally posted on iBlognet by Sahil Umatia.

There are many thing to consider when you start your online business. Like what type of CMS you should go for managing your contents, what should be the domain name and where you can get the best deal. But overall, the most important aspect of your online business is the Web Hosting part. It acts like a root, to your online business. If the root of your business is not strong enough, it won’t take more than a month to shut down. Its very much similar to buying a Super Computer. Some of you might just go for the cheap one for a start up, but later, the loss would be all yours. If price is not your criteria, then you could have the best web hosting, which can boost your business to top of search engines.

Now many times a user has similar confusion is choosing the right web hosting. Like which is the best web hosting provider, should I go for Shared or Dedicated, what CPanel features I need, do I need Back Up option, how Reliable it is in terms of uptime and customer support. And then there are many more thing, which makes a user muddled up in choosing the right one. So this article will basically guide you in searching the right Web hosting provider. Then you can do a research accordingly and buy the best one for your business at a fair price.

Space and Bandwidth.

First you need to know how much space and bandwidth will be required for your website. If you website is static with very few pages you can go for a limited monthly plan. If you website is dynamic, like blogs with new articles everyday, images or video sharing blogs, then obviously you would need an unlimited hosting package. The more simple your site the less space & bandwidth you will need to keep it online.

However it is advisable that you go for a limited plan, if your website is new. Because you can estimate the size of your website as it grows and the traffic it will receive. You can opt-in for unlimited plan next time. But, if your website has downloads or any video/audio streaming, it will dramatically increase the space and bandwidth requirement. So it depends on what kind of website you’re developing.

Shared or Dedicated Hosting.

In Shared web hosting service, many websites are hosted on a single server. Each website is hosted on it own partition, just like a hard disk is partitioned for different purposes. Shared hosting is cheaper and its doesn’t requires heavy maintenance. This type of hosting is basically for static websites with very few pages. Also Shared hosting usually has usage limits, but you should check for extensive reliability hosting.

In Dedicated web hosting, your website is entirely hosted on a private server. This type of hosting is basically used by dynamic websites, like hosting large number of videos, lots of contents or downloads. This type of hosting is more flexible than shared hosting as you have full control over the entire server. But it does requires heavy maintenance and its more costlier than shared hosting. In short if you have just started your website or its a static website with few pages, then you should go for shared hosting. And if you’re ready to spend some more bucks on the hosting part, and want full control over the server with additional features, you should go for Dedicated hosting.

Operating System
Now whenever you buy a hosting package, you also need to determine which operating system you would use, to run all those servers, software’s and plugins. Often there are three different types of operating systems to choose for: Windows, Linux  or Unix. [Mac is very uncommon nowadays] Each operating system has its own different features, functionality and price. And it depends on what type of website you develop.

Linux operating systems are widely considered due its better functionality and stability. Windows operating system are stable too, but some of its features are limited and are costlier. Both operating systems has its own differences. While Unix is almost similar to Linux operating systems, but it consists of two types: Free BSD and Open BSD.This systems are harder to install and it requires heavy maintenance. But once installed, the server works very smoothly, that you will get used to it very soon. But if you want some added security to your Unix server, you would have to compromise with some of its features, which you don’t want too. That’s why Windows and Linux operating systems are widely considered.

HTML pages and javascripts are supported by both, Windows & Linux operating systems. However, if you’re developing you website in CGI/Perl/PHP you should go for Linux operating systems because of its flexibility. Windows also support these features, but its very limited. However, if you’re developing website in ASP you should go for Windows operating systems. Also if you website is dynamically driven you would need to create databases using mySQL and Access. And here, Access is available only in Linux operating systems, while mySQL is available in both operating systems. So overall, Linux is the best operating in terms of flexibility and stability. But it all depends on what type of website you develop.

Reliability.
Whatever your hosting package might be, reliability is the main thing you should look for. There are many type of providers out there, to lure you with many features and best deals. But when it comes to reliability, they would just back off or won’t give you proper response during downtime or server crash. But not all of them are same. Many hosting companies provide 24/7 support. They reply to your queries and try to provide you with a quick solution as soon as possible. Now the main thing is that how would you identify them.

The first thing is to check the company track record. Search for some reviews about the hosting company on internet. These reviews would say a lot about the hosting company. Note down the positive and negative reviews about the company. The higher number of positive reviews, add a tick mark sign. The higher number of negative reviews, blacklist them from your list adding cross mark sign.

Another thing you need to check for is the up-time guarantee and back up options for security. Everyone’s not perfect, so don’t expect for 100% up-time. There’s always a 0.1% of downtime. And you don’t want your readers to go away from your site just because its loading too slow. So check if there’s a 99% of up-time available and a fast loading server. Also see if the company has a regular back up option available. You can restore you site to a previous state, if anytime your server crashes. Also check if the Web host offers spam filtering and virus protection. You don’t want your site to be attacked by a spammer or a hacker.

Other Things to Remember

• Price should never be the option. If the hosting company is offering you unlimited disk space and bandwidth for a low price, don’t go for it. The company will give you unlimited package, but you would have to compromise other features, up-time guarantee, technical support and many other factors.
• Good technical support via telephone, WebChat or email. Give a try asking them some queries about the hosting package, and check how long it takes for them to reply your query.
• Read the terms and conditions carefully. Check if there’s any administrative fee required during transferring or canceling of hosting package. Check for money back guarantee, if you have any problem with hosting server you can always get refund within a period of time.

Choosing the perfect web hosting for your website is an arduous task. Even the top web hosting provider has complaints and bad reviews. So its important that you do a proper research about the web hosting company and then make a final decision about the web hosting. If you think, that I missed something really important step in guiding you, please do comment below. Do share your views!!!

How to Choose The Best Web Hosting Provider was originally posted on iBlognet by Sahil Umatia.

Since I migrated from Blogger to WordPress , I’ve been playing around with WordPress and Thesis Theme a lot. If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you might have also noticed some changes to my current theme. Previously iBlognet was built on Thesis Page Framework and now it’s designed on Thesis Full-width Framework .

The theme is completely custom-coded by myself. So you can see the Custom Author info box with link to social media profiles without using any plugin. You can add a similar Thesis Author Box with Social Media Profiles to your blog. Just follow the tutorial below:

Step1: Adding Custom Fields To WordPress

Copy Paste the following code in your custom-functions-php

[php]
/* CUSTOM PROFILE FIELDS */
function show_extra_profile_fields( $user ) { ?>
<h3>Social Media Profiles</h3>
<table class=”form-table”>
<tr>
<th><label for=”google”>Google Authorship</label></th>
<td><input type=”text” name=”googlelink” id=”googlelink” value=”<?php echo esc_attr( get_the_author_meta( ‘googlelink’, $user->ID ) ); ?>” class=”regular-text” /><br /><span class=”description”>Please enter your Google Plus Profile ID.</span></td>
<td><input type=”text” name=”googlename” id=”googlename” value=”<?php echo esc_attr( get_the_author_meta( ‘googlename’, $user->ID ) ); ?>” class=”regular-text” /><br /><span class=”description”>Please enter your Google Plus Profile Name.</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th><label for=”twitter”>Twitter</label></th>
<td><input type=”text” name=”twitter” id=”twitter” value=”<?php echo esc_attr( get_the_author_meta( ‘twitter’, $user->ID ) ); ?>” class=”regular-text” /><br /><span class=”description”>Please enter your Twitter username.</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th><label for=”facebook”>Facebook Profile</label></th>
<td><input type=”text” name=”facebook” id=”twitter” value=”<?php echo esc_attr( get_the_author_meta( ‘facebook’, $user->ID ) ); ?>” class=”regular-text” /><br /><span class=”description”>Please enter your Facebook Profile URL.</span></td>
</tr>
</table>
<?php }
add_action( ‘show_user_profile’, ‘show_extra_profile_fields’ );
add_action( ‘edit_user_profile’, ‘show_extra_profile_fields’ );
/* CUSTOM PROFILE FIELDS BY iBLOGNET */
function save_extra_profile_fields( $user_id ) {
if ( !current_user_can( ‘edit_user’, $user_id ) )
return false;
/* Copy and paste this line for additional fields. */
update_usermeta( $user_id, ‘googlename’, $_POST['googlename'] );
update_usermeta( $user_id, ‘googlelink’, $_POST['googlelink'] );
update_usermeta( $user_id, ‘twitter’, $_POST['twitter'] );
update_usermeta( $user_id, ‘facebook’, $_POST['facebook'] );
}
add_action( ‘personal_options_update’, ‘save_extra_profile_fields’ );
add_action( ‘edit_user_profile_update’, ‘save_extra_profile_fields’ );
[/php]

Code Explanation:

• Line 3: Add a custom title to social media fields section in WordPress.
• Line 6 to Line 8: Add custom fields for Google Plus Profile ID and Profile Name.
• Line 11 to Line 12: Add custom fields for Twitter username.
• Line 15 to Line 16: Add custom fields for Facebook profiles.
• Line 27 to Line 30: Saves the field when user enters the information.

The above code will add Social Media Profile Fields  in WordPress like in the image below. If you want you can add other social media profiles too. Just be sure to add unique ID’s for those fields.

Step 2: Adding Author Box With Social Media Profiles.

Copy Paste the following code in custom-functions.php

[php]
/* AUTHOR INFO BOX */
function post_footer_author() {
if (is_single())
{ ?>
<div id=”postauthor”>
<div class=”author-info”>
<?php echo get_avatar( get_the_author_id() , 80 ); ?>
<h4>Article by » <?php the_author_posts_link(); ?></h4>
<br><p><i><?php the_author_description(); ?></i></p></br>
<p><b><?php the_author_firstname(); ?> has written <span><?php the_author_posts(); ?></span> articles on iBlognet</b></p></br>
<p><b>Author Connect »
<?php if ( get_the_author_meta( ‘twitter’ ) ) { ?>
<a href=”http://twitter.com/<?php the_author_meta( ‘twitter’ ); ?>” title=”Follow <?php the_author_meta( ‘display_name’ ); ?> on Twitter”>Twitter</a> |
<?php }
?>
<?php if ( get_the_author_meta( ‘googlename’ ) ) { ?>
<a href=”http://plus.google.com/<?php the_author_meta( ‘googlelink’ ); ?>” title=”Follow <?php the_author_meta( ‘display_name’ ); ?> on Google+” rel=”author”>+<?php the_author_meta( ‘googlename’ ); ?></a> |
<?php }
?>
<?php if ( get_the_author_meta( ‘facebook’ ) ) { ?>
<a href=”<?php the_author_meta( ‘facebook’ ); ?>” title=”Follow <?php the_author_meta( ‘display_name’ ); ?> on Facebook”>Facebook</a> |
<?php }
?>
</b></p>
</div>
<div style=”clear:both;”></div>
</div>
<?php }
}
add_action(‘thesis_hook_after_post_box’, ‘post_footer_author’);
[/php]

Code Explanation:

• Line 7: Adds the author gravatar size of 80. You can change it as per your requirement.
• Line 8: Adds author name with link to author archive.
• Line 9: Adds author description.
• Line 10: Shows the number of post by author.
• Line 11 to Line 24: Adds author social Media Profiles.

Copy Paste the following code in custom.css

[css]

/* AUTHOR INFO BOX CSS BY iBLOGNET */
#postauthor { background: #E6E6E6; border: 1px solid #CCC; padding:2em; margin:15px 0;}
.author-info{float:left; width:100%; padding:0 15px 0 0;}
.author-info img {background:#fff; border: 1px solid #ddd; float: left; margin-right:10px; padding:3px;}
.author-info h4 { color: #666; font-size: 15px; }
.author-info h5 {color:#666; text-transform:none; font-size:12px; letter-spacing:0;}
.author-info p { color: #515151; font-size: 12px; line-height:16px;}

[/css]

You can customize the CSS as per your requirement.

The above 2 codes will give you Thesis Author Profile box as in the image below:

That’s it! You’re done in two simple steps! The author box also links to Google+. This might be easier to verify Google authorship, if your blog have multiple authors. If you have any problem in following any of the above steps, then just leave a comment below or contact me through the contact form .

If you don’t have Thesis Theme, you can buy Thesis Theme right now!

Also Read: About Author Widget For Bloggers Similar To WordPress

Thesis Author Box With Social Media Profiles Without Plugin was originally posted on iBlognet by Sahil Umatia.

Hosting giveaways is considered to be an effective way to drive traffic to your blog. But sometimes, picking up a random winner may be a tough decision. You might not know who are your loyal blog readers and who are visiting your blog just to participate for the giveaway. Sometimes you might feel, that you should reward your loyal and consistent blog readers, who are visiting your blog commenting, sharing, tweeting, and liking your content. And you should do it, because in this way you can build a strong relationship with your readers.

Here comes PunchTab to the rescue to filter out your loyal readers. PunchTab is a service for publishers, retailers and applications vendors to develop an integrated rewards program created by YouSendIt co-founder Ranjith Kumaran and former YouSendIt employee Mehdi Ait Oufkir.

Its a simple plugin build for every CMS like Blogger, WordPress, Tumbler or any other. The application works in a simple way. You just have to create an account, add a script to your blog and it will start tracking your readers social activity whenever he/she visits, comments, tweets or like your content.

How to Setup PunchTab?

1. Visit PunchTab.com and Sign up with a valid email address.

2. Next go to the catalog sectionand add the giveaway name, description and required points to redeem the giveaway.

3. Then go to Installation page and add the code to your blog.
4. After you add the code to your blog you could see a red flag besides the like button, tweet button, +1 button and near the comment button.

How a user can participate?

If the user sees any one of the banner, he should click on it and login with his/her Facebook’s ID.

The user should see one of the box below, where he/she can check its position with respect to number of points accumulated for the giveaway.

How users can earn points?

Visiting your site every day – for their first visit to your site every day your users will earn 100 points
Liking your content on Facebook – for their first Like on your site every day your users will earn 100 points
Tweeting your content – for their first Tweet on your site every day your users will earn 100 points
Google +1 your content – for their first Google +1 on your site every day your users will earn 100 points
Commenting – for their first comment of the day your users will earn 100 points

For each activity, the user will earn 100 points, and when the users reaches the required points, the user will be eligible for the giveaway.

When a user redeems from the giveaway you will be notified by email; you must then contact the user by email (provided automatically) to provide delivery. The user will be notified by email letting them know that you will contact them shortly and the appropriate number of points will be deducted from their redeemable points balance.

You can delete any giveaway from the custom catalog at any time or add as many rewards as you like. Remember that you are responsible for the costs and delivery of all rewards in your custom catalog. For further more information check the FAQ’s.

PunchTab: The Best Way to Reward Loyal Readers was originally posted on iBlognet by Sahil Umatia.

StumbleUpon is a great site website to share and discover new content, images and new websites. The site has around 25+ million users registered. I have been using StumbleUpon from quite a long time, and iBlognet receives 25% of traffic from StumbleUpon. Whenever a new post is published on iBlognet, I manually submit the content to StumbleUpon. And if you have well written post, your post might get stumbled from the 25 million user base. You never know! [I won't mind if you follow me on SU.]

But if you’re looking for more targeted traffic, you should try out the Paid Discovery by StumbleUpon. It’s been a huge success. For few of those who are unfamiliar with Paid Discovery; Paid Discovery is an ad system by SU which lets you to submit a specific page where you want to receive targeted traffic.

Upto 5% of stumbles are reserved for Paid Discovery where advertisers directly insert web page into the user experience and the audience lands directly on your web pages when they’re in the mindset to discover something new. Each time a user clicks the Stumble! button, they are taken to a web page matched specifically for their interests and demographic. You can try out the ad system by signing up here. Before that, do check out the infographic below, to know how Paid Discovery works.

Source: http://www.stumbleupon.com/ads/blog/a-look-inside-stumbleupons-paid-discovery/

[Infographic] Get More Traffic From StumbleUpon Paid Discovery was originally posted on iBlognet by Sahil Umatia.

Namecheap and Hostgator both are the top Domain and Hosting providers. Both of them rank top in terms of uptime and service reliability and have a long standing reputation in the industry. I myself have been using domain names from namecheap and have around 10 domains hosted on it. And I have never faced a single downtime with them. Not only does this registrar have one of the cheapest rates in the industry, but it also is one of the easiest registrars to buy and sell domains with. Whether it transferring a domain or changing the ownership, everything is done without any hassles.

The same applies with Hostgator. Starting a website with Hostgator is like applying butter on a bread. Everything is setup so smoothly, that even a non-techie guy can host a website with Hostgator. One thing I like the most about Hostgator is their excellent support and response time. Your query will always be replied and never be left unanswered. Another thing I like is the automatic back up provided by Hostgator. Your website is always backed up on their server, so there’s no chance of losing your hard work.

That’s not all. If you sign up with Hostgator you will get $100 Adwords coupon, SEO Tools, unlimited sub domain, unlimited bandwidth, unlimited space and above all, a top reliable service.

So if you’re looking forward to start a website or blog, the combination and Namecheap and Hostgator will be the best one to get started.

Why?

Because Namecheap offers cheap domains than Hostgator $15 domain. While Hostgator offer Unlimited bandwidth and space at cheap rates when compared to Namecheap hosting. As a helping hand, you can save some money, by using the coupon codes below.

Namecheap Monthly Coupon Code.

If you’re looking to buy com/net/org/biz or de domain names you will get a discount of $1.08 + 1year Free Whois guard to protect your domain privacy + Positive SSL worth $1.99 + a free OX personal email account for a year. All this for a discount of $13.96 . Use the coupon below:

Namecheap also provides hosting services with great uptime. But I would personally recommend you to go for Hostgator hosting . But if you still wanna try Namecheap hosting service, you can get 10% discount for first month on any shared/business/reseller/VPS/ hosting packages.

Hostgator Monthly Coupon Code

Hostgator offers Shared, Reseller, VPS and Dedicated hosting packages.

If you are looking to buy shared hosting package, you have three plans to choose from: Hatchling , Baby and Business Plan. Hostgator itself provides 20% OFF on shared hosting. But you can get hosting in just 1cent if you use the coupon code below:

If you want to buy hosting just for a month. You can get Hatchling or Baby plan in just 1cent , while you can get the business plan in $5 which is priced $10.36 per month. Use the coupon below:

 Note: Use the above coupon only if you want to buy hosting for a month.

However If you want to buy Shared Hosting package for a long period you can get 25%OFF on all three plans. Just choose your plan and use the coupon code below:

Note: Use the above coupon only if you want to buy hosting for a long period. [like 6months or more than a year]

You can also use the same coupon for buying VPS hosting and Dedicated servers .

Hostgator also gives you the opportunity to be a reseller. A reseller is a company or individual that purchases goods or services with the intention of reselling them rather than consuming or using them. With the reseller hosting you can start your own hosting company. By default Hostgator gives you a discount of 20% on all reseller packages. But you can get at 25% discount using the coupon below.

Do let us know if you have used any above coupon code. Also do share your views if you’re an existing customer of Namecheap and Hostgator.

Namecheap And Hostgator May 2012 Discount Coupon Codes was originally posted on iBlognet by Sahil Umatia.