Create Some Static Pages And Electrify Your Blog!

One of the biggest complaints I’ve heard over the years about Blogger  in comparison to Wordpress is the inability to create pages.

But earlier this year in response to fierce competition from Wordpress, Blogger decided to introduce a new feature which allows you to add up to 10 stand-alone static pages.

Static pages are of course a great way of offering your readers more information about your blog such as “about”, “contact” “advertise” and even “archive” pages.

How to make a static page
Just go to postings and click edit a page. You will then be prompted to create a new page.  Give your page a title, and write your page up. Then hit publish. Now you've made the page you can then click and drag it to anywhere on your website. I’ve chosen to have my static pages just under the heading in a tab menu form but they could sit just as easily in the sidebar.

If you're in Blogging for the long haul creating static pages could help generate a bit more spark amongst your reader figures.

How to make sure your blog photos are copyright free

In this posting we’ll be discussing how you can easily breach copyright  law by using a photo you find online, and also  looking at where you can find copyright free images to use for your blogging.

“A picture is worth a thousands words” so the old adage goes and I’m a great believer in the idea that even the most complex story can be described with a single still image.

Newspapers and magazines use them all the time – so why not use a photo to help illustrate your blog posting . Advertisers use photos all the time to capture the attention of the reader and the 'right photo' encourages the reader to...read on.

You could get into trouble

But remember photographs like words are protected by copyright.  If you do a quick search on Google Images for a particular subject, thousands of images will pop up. But despite so many being available they are unlikely to be copyright free and if you use them without the permission of the owner you could get into trouble.

Most photos are not policed by the owners but some are. If you look closely at some images you will notice that they are visibly watermarked which spoils the image and make it unattractive to use. But others are invisibly water marked and software is availble so  they can be tracked , and traced to where they are being used. You could then be sued for breach of copyright. Some of the big companies that offer images have actually done this and slapped several web designers with law suits in the past for using images without permission.

Free photos                                                                                                                                          

But if you don’t have any suitable photos of your own to use to illustrate your story don’t worry … you can easily find thousands of companies offering copyright free photos.

Freefoto.com is one, as it freeimages.co.uk, freedigitalphotos.net, and everystockphoto.com to name but a few. But some companies do request a link back to their website for the use of an image which is, of course, a fair exchange.

So before you're tempted to lift that wonderful photograph you've just spotted, remember if you do that there could soon be an email on it's way to you demanding that you pay for its use, or take it down or be sued!

Save Heartache And Back Up Your Blog!

In this post we'll be looking at  why it's necessary to  regularly  back up your Blogger Blog and also how to do it in a couple of simple steps.

Imagine how devastated you’d be if you woke up one morning and found that all your Bloger  posts had disappeared. Imagine having to begin again from scratch – it would be both demoralizing and heartbreaking.

The threat of losing your blog is real and could happen to any of us without warning. Viruses, hardware problems and technical issues within your server provider are among the numerous causes of data loss. The good news is that we can all easily back-up our blogs so that we are able to retrieve everything if disaster strikes.

Backing up can seem like a daunting exercise, but it really is a very simple process that takes just seconds and will save all your precious posts

All the writing within your posts and the comments can be backed up by creating an .xml file. As well as saving it to your computer it is a good idea to copy it onto a CD, memory stick, or external hard drive that you can then take to another house – you can never be too careful when it comes to the blog you’ve worked so hard on. Try to get into the habit of backing up a couple of times a week or even daily if you post often.

To begin:
Click on the Settings tab on your blogger main menu.


Click on Export Blog in the top centre of the screen as shown below: 

Click on Download Blog and then save your blog in a safe place on your computer. Your posts can then be reinstated if the worst should happen by clicking on Import Blog to the left.

How To Add Google Analytics To Blogger

In this post I'll be discussing the benefits of adding Google Analytics to your blog and also showing you an instructional video how to do it step-by-step.

When you've set up your blog one of the first things I'd recommend that you do is install Google Analytics.

Google Analytics is a handy way of keeping track of the visitors to your blog, where they came from and what articles they are most interested in reading.

And if you're interested in commercialising your blog then without Google Analytics it would be like driving blind - you would have no idea where you are going or when you've got there!

Here's an excellent Youtube video which takes you through the setting-up the process.

If you're very new to blogging and not confident in going into the html coding a simpler way is to add it via adding a Blogger gadget. Go to add a gadget, scroll down until you see "add HTML/JavaScript Add third-party functionality or other code to your blog" Paste in the analytics code, and then click save and it's installed. But don't add a name to the gadget as as it's for your use only.