I was recently sent a Word 2007 document and without realising it I opened it. I only have Word 2003 and a strange message appeared. It mentioned something about a compatibility pack.

I was actually in shock because I didn’t think Microsoft would create a tool for forward compatibility. I mean, create a tool that was actually useful and would mean that they could potentially lose out on sales of a newer version. I just had to check it out.

I downloaded it from here and it works a treat.

No more telling my clients that they have to save the documents in a lower version for me.

Well done Microsoft for saving me some money.

In brief he recommended that you should:

1. Set up Permalinks
2. Add the Plugin Akismet
3. Add Google Sitemaps
4. Add the All-in-One SEO Pack
5. Add a Web Feed Management Service
6. Add a Contact Form
7. Add Tags to a post
8. Keep the Design Simple

Below I outline what I have implemented on my blog and how I have done it:

Permalinks

This is the very first thing that I did before creating any posts or pages. Permalinks will give your posts and pages a meaningful name. If you don’t set up permalinks, Wordpress will name the post/page with an identifier such as yourdomainname/?p=5. This will not help the posts and pages to be found in searches. By setting the permalinks to name the post or page url to be the same as the title, it will greatly improve the Search Engine Optimization. For example this post will be have a url of http://www.hotvasoftware.com/8-must-dos-for-a-successful-wordpress-blog.html. If someone searches for help on what you must do to set up a successful blog then my blog is more likely to appear in the search results than a post with the url www.hotvasoftware.com/?p=5.

To set your permalinks go to Settings > Permalinks > Common Settings > Click on custom structure and add /%postname%.html. Patrick’s article stated to add /%postname% but I later read an article stating that adding the .html will allow the pages to be indexed quicker.

You must be aware that no blog post can have the same title.

Akismet Plugin

The Akismet plugin is a MUST. Akismet checks user comments to see if they contain spam or not. So far all my comments have been spam, so this is a lifesaver. The comments are moved into a spam folder for you to check.

When I downloaded Wordpress 2.8 and looked at the Plugins, Akismet was already there and required activation. To activate it you require an AKI key that is provided by Wordpress when you sign up for an account.

Where can I find my AKI key?

To find your AKI key log into your www.wordpress.com Account. Go to My Account > Edit Profile and your key will be displayed at the top of the page.

Google Sitemaps

As blogs are always changing, Google Sitemaps is an extremely useful plugin. It will keep an updated sitemap file of your blog. This contains links to all your Wordpress posts. This will help search engines like Google to crawl and index your blog pages more intelligently.

Google Sitemaps can be found at the Wordpress site. You must have knowledge of using File Transfer Protocol (FTP) in order to upload the plugin file to your web server. It was easy to download and I was able to generate a sitemap immediately. Google sitemaps will automatically update the sitemap according to the settings.

All-in-One SEO Pack

I decided not to add this as I found there were too many negative comments about it. Here’s the link All in-One SEO Pack for you to make up your own mind.

Add a Web Feed Management Service

I have recently done this and it was extremely easy. A web feed management provider will allow people to subscribe to your blog. They will then receive all the content from your blog without actually revisiting the blog.

FeedBurner is a free web feed management provider owned by Google. You will need to create an account (unless you already have a Google account) and then enter your blog URL and add “/feed/rss2/” at the end of it if you changed the permalinks as described above. If not, you can add “/wp-rss2.php” at the end of your blog URL. You are then given instructions on how you go about putting a link on your blog. Feedburner will provide you with information such as how many people have subscribed to your blog and what posts have been read. You can also add adsense to your feeds.

There are services available that allow you to see the content of multiple blogs in one program. One such service is Google Reader and if you already have a Google account just sign in with those account details.

Contact Form

I was glad to find out there was a plugin contact form to use, as I had so many problems in the past with finding contact form scripts and also spam. It is really easy to set up and can be found here. The user filling out the contact form has to answer a question set by you.

Add Tags to Post

Tags are basically keywords that relate to your page or post content. It is advisable to use tags from the start. They are micro-categories for your blog. If a user clicks on one of your tags then posts with similar tags will show. So how many tags do you add to your post? At the start I went a bit mad with tags and included every topic covered in the post. I have since discovered top affiliate marketers (or the SEO plugin they use) use about 5 tags for a post. I have just figured out that you can delete tags by using the Quick Edit feature.

Keep the Design Simple

There are so many free Wordpress templates about. If you decide to go down this route then look at the code before you start. I recently did a project and gave my client the option of using a free Wordpress Blog template or having a customised website created. The Wordpress blog was the cheaper option and this is what my client opted for. I selected a number of templates for her to choose from but didn’t look at the code. When I came to updating the template that she chose I found the code was very difficult to understand. In my opinion, this is not good code.

This blog was created using a Wordpress Theme from Brian Gardner that I decided to purchase after reading Rosalind Gardner’s Super Affiliate Handbook. The code was really easy to understand and it was well worth paying £37.29 GBP ($59.95 USD).

Good luck with your first blog and if you have any questions please ask.

You could potentially be losing out on business. Your next client could be in amongst those cards.

I am excited to say that there is a new gadget available, that may very well mean the death of the business card!

The MingleStick is a small device that uses infrared technology to transmit an ID from one device to another. This isn’t a gadget for someone who likes complex gadgetry, as there is only one button to click. The person you are connecting with must also press their button. What could be simpler?

It holds up to 500 contacts and it is easy to upload your contacts. You simply plug your MingleStick into a USB port on your computer and connect to the MingleStick website. You will set up a profile and have full control on what information your contacts will see.

There isn’t a security risk if you lose it, as it only holds your ID and no personal information. All the personal information is held on the MingleStick web server.

How much do they cost?

A lot less than business cards, unless you get the free ones from VistaPrint! One MingleStick will set you back $25.94 or £16.50 (exchange rate date 04-Oct-09). The more you buy, the cheaper they are. You could buy in bulk and sell them at your next social networking event.

Where can you use a MingleStick?

The MingleStick is a social networking gadget, it is not restricted to business use. You can gather contacts at various locations, including:

• During your time at University
• At Networking Events
• At a nightclub

The Benefits

The MingleStick has many advantages including:

• Extremely simple to use.
• Saves you time – you don’t have to enter details yourself.
• Saves on paper – less business cards to buy.
• Saves you money.
• Your profile can include all your social networking sites e.g. twitter and facebook and a photo. You become a real person and not just a business card shoved in the bottom drawer!

The Drawbacks

The only disadvantages of a MingleStick are:

• Not many people have heard of them YET!
• It’s no good if you are the only person at an event with one. Although, it would be a great topic of conversation.

Let’s start mingling the smart way.


Purchase your Social Networking Gadget NOW.

]]> http://www.hotvasoftware.com/the-minglestick-will-it-replace-the-business-card.html/feed 0 http://www.hotvasoftware.com/free-pdf-to-word-software-converter.html http://www.hotvasoftware.com/free-pdf-to-word-software-converter.html#comments Wed, 05 Aug 2009 20:50:15 +0000 Chris Beamish http://www.hotvasoftware.com/?p=697 So you have a PDF document and you need to convert it to a Word document. You don’t have to purchase any software to do this.

NitroPDF offer a free online PDF to Word Converter at http://www.pdftoword.com.



As you can see from the screenshot above it is extremely simple to use. Just find the file you want to convert. Decide if you want it as a Word document or as Rich Text Format (RTF). Enter an email address that you want the file sending to and press Convert. The document will arrive a couple of minutes later in your inbox.

I found that during the conversion process all my styles that I had set up in the original document were lost. So don’t expect perfect formatting.

I did some testing on whether adding security to a PDF would allow the document to be converted. If the security is set to Changes Not Permitted then the document will not be converted at all.

NitroPDF also do a free PDF to Excel online converting service http://www.pdftoexcelonline.com.

Happy Converting!

]]> http://www.hotvasoftware.com/free-pdf-to-word-software-converter.html/feed 0 http://www.hotvasoftware.com/the-benefits-of-hiring-a-virtual-assistant.html http://www.hotvasoftware.com/the-benefits-of-hiring-a-virtual-assistant.html#comments Mon, 03 Aug 2009 19:33:58 +0000 Chris Beamish http://www.hotvasoftware.com/?p=673 Virtual Assistant vs a Temp

The first time that you utilise a temp it will work out cheaper but over time a Virtual Assistant will be more cost effective.

Repetitive Training:

Generally when you hire a temp on an adhoc basis it will be a different temp each time (a good temp will be on other assignments). Each temp you hire will need to be trained, introduced to the staff and shown where all the facilities are. This could take half a day before any actual work is performed.

A Virtual Assistant will provide you with a consultation to establish your requirements. You will only need to explain your methods once and the details will be recorded for the next time you use the Services.

Time Wastage:

You will pay a temp for coffee breaks, chats by the photocopier, and time spent using the facilities!

You will not be charged for any of these activities.

Minimum Hire Period:

A temp cannot be hired for one hour only and most temps want long term assignments.

If required, a Virtual Assistant can be hired for one hour only.

Repeat Business:

It is very rare that a temp will return to the same company, so there will be no need to make an impression. A temp is less likely to be proactive.

Virtual Assistants are self-employed professionals. It is important that we exceed your expectations so that you use our services again. We will offer suggestions for process improvements.

Virtual Assistant vs a Permanent Employee

Employee Overheads:

There are a number of employee overheads that you will need to pay, these include holidays, sickness, maternity leave and a pension.

As a Virtual Assistant operates on a self-employed basis you would not have to pay for holidays, sickness, maternity leave or a pension.

Constant Workload:

If you do not have a constant workload for a permanent employee, there will be times when they are costing you money.

You can utilise the services of a Virtual Assistant as and when required or on a retainer basis.

Additional Equipment and Space Required:

Additional equipment may need to be purchased for a permanent employee and desk space sought.

Virtual Assistants operate from their own premises and utilise all their own equipment.

Need a Virtual Assistant? Visit Help on Tap and start saving money.

]]> http://www.hotvasoftware.com/the-benefits-of-hiring-a-virtual-assistant.html/feed 0 http://www.hotvasoftware.com/full-time-employee-vs-a-virtual-assistant-cost-comparison.html http://www.hotvasoftware.com/full-time-employee-vs-a-virtual-assistant-cost-comparison.html#comments Thu, 30 Jul 2009 17:39:35 +0000 Chris Beamish http://www.hotvasoftware.com/?p=535 Full-time Employee vs a Virtual Assistant Cost Comparison

Want to SAVE over £30,000 in business expenses this year?
If you answered yes, read on …

COST COMPARISON	Full-time Employee	Virtual Assistant
Hourly Rate of Pay	£10.00	£18.00
Fringe Benefits @ 30% (Retirement Plans)	£3.00	None
Overhead Rate @ 60% (Office Space, Equipment and Office Supply expense, Insurance, Compensation, Overtime Pay, Administration Costs)	£6.00	None
Total Effective Rate of Pay	£19.00	£18.00
**Hours Per Year	2,080 hrs	480 hrs
TOTAL Annual Labour Cost	£39,520.00	£8,640.00

Difference = £30,880.00 per year

By hiring a Virtual Assistant…

You SAVE over £30,000.00 per year!

Although the Virtual Assistant’s hourly rate is more than the employee’s rate, you save the cost of benefits and overheads that would have to be applied to the new employee’s wage. Virtual Assistants are usually more experienced, more efficient, and better connected than the employee. You will need to devote far less time to the project to get the same results, only 480 hours a year versus 2,080 for the new employee.

**Remember, with a Virtual Assistant, you only pay for the time on task by the minute! You don’t pay for socialising, hour long lunches, frequent trips to the bathroom or cigarette breaks.

Your employee’s 8 hour day can be crunched into 3-4 hours with a Virtual Assistant.

Hiring a Virtual Assistant is more cost-effective. A Virtual Assistant will go above and beyond the normal assistant’s duties to impact your own productivity. No task is too big or small for a Virtual Assistant to handle. Even if you only have 1 hour of work a month. You wouldn’t be able to hire a temp for just 1 hour but you can hire a Virtual Assistant for 1 hour.

*Source: Virtual Assistant Networking Association Cost Comparison
(Converted from $ to £)

The Largest Global Network Online for Successful and Aspiring Virtual Assistants

If YOU want to save £30,000 a year and hire a Virtual Assistant visit Help on Tap for more information.

]]> http://www.hotvasoftware.com/full-time-employee-vs-a-virtual-assistant-cost-comparison.html/feed 0 http://www.hotvasoftware.com/free-software-word-to-pdf-maintain-your-embedded-hyperlinks.html http://www.hotvasoftware.com/free-software-word-to-pdf-maintain-your-embedded-hyperlinks.html#comments Wed, 29 Jul 2009 17:25:44 +0000 Chris Beamish http://www.hotvasoftware.com/?p=407 I have been testing a number of free PDF converters to find one that will maintain all my embedded hyperlinks. By embedded hyperlinks I mean a link within text e.g. Help on Tap will contain a link with the full URL of my Virtual Assistance website. I want that to be clickable once the Word document is converted to a PDF.

I have now found the answer and it is using OpenOffice. OpenOffice is free opensource software that is available to download from www.openoffice.org.

As you can see from the image below, OpenOffice has a number of applications including Spreadsheet, Text Document, Presentation and Database. It is possible to save any documents produced in these applications to their equivalent in Microsoft e.g. you can save a Spreadsheet as an Excel Spreadsheet. I highly recommend you download the software and try it.



To convert to PDF:

1. Click on Open a Document.
2. Locate the document to be converted to a PDF and click open.
3. On the top menu click File > Export as PDF.
4. Click on the Security tab if you want to add security.



5. Click Export.

Note that the PDF will not open automatically, you will have to locate it.

(P.S. I used ScreenHunter 5.1 Free Download to capture the images in this post – so unbelievably easy to use).

]]> http://www.hotvasoftware.com/free-software-word-to-pdf-maintain-your-embedded-hyperlinks.html/feed 0 http://www.hotvasoftware.com/problem-uploading-images-in-wordpress-2-8.html http://www.hotvasoftware.com/problem-uploading-images-in-wordpress-2-8.html#comments Wed, 15 Jul 2009 18:17:32 +0000 Chris Beamish http://www.hotvasoftware.com/?p=321 I decided to purchase a Wordpress Theme from Brian Gardner after reading Rosalind Gardner’s Super Affiliate Handbook.

It was a huge learning curve as it was my first Wordpress blog. The code was beautiful, until I got my hands on it! I am extremely pleased with what I have managed to do so far and with the quality of the theme.

I experienced problems with images from the start. When I first uploaded the theme it didn’t look right and none of the images were showing.

I contacted Brian on a Sunday evening and was not expecting an answer until at least the Monday. I received a response within an hour. He stated that the theme had been corrupted during the upload process and to try uploading it again. I did, but with the same result. I emailed him back and he uploaded the theme for me. It was all ready for me to mess up the code on Monday morning. Fantastic customer service.

Anyway, the problem with the images! I accidentally deleted all the images from my virtual assistance site . Being highly organised I had a backup. I uploaded the images and discovered that the images were being corrupted during the upload process to my web server (Brian was right all along!). I downloaded Filezilla, another FTP program, and uploaded the images without any problems.

I was uploading the images manually to my web server and all was OK. I then discovered that Wordpress could upload the images for you, via the Add Media link. But low and behold, it didn’t work.

After searching the internet for a solution and much investigation the problem was very simple. If you are experiencing problems, these are some of the resolutions I came across while investigating.

Try these:

1. Go to Settings > Miscellaneous > Store uploads in this folder. Check the directory where it is uploading your images to. This was actually my problem. It was pointing to hotvasoftware/wp-content/uploads. As my website is hotvasoftware.com it was creating a new directory called hotvasoftware. It is now using the default setting of wp-content/uploads and appears to be working.
2. Check the file permissions on wp-content. Here’s a good forum post on file permissions http://wordpress.org/support/topic/194297.
3. Apparently, plugins can cause problems. As I had no plugins on my blog at the time, I could take this out of the equation. If you have a number of plugins, try disabling them and adding them back, one at a time, to see if one of them is causing a problem.

I noticed that Wordpress 2.8.1. is now available so you could always try upgrading.

]]> http://www.hotvasoftware.com/problem-uploading-images-in-wordpress-2-8.html/feed 0 http://www.hotvasoftware.com/recommended-email-software.html http://www.hotvasoftware.com/recommended-email-software.html#comments Fri, 03 Jul 2009 19:49:10 +0000 Chris Beamish http://www.hotvasoftware.com/?p=179 I hear of VA’s and Business Owners sending their emails out in batches of 25-50 at a time. This is so the emails are not treated as spam and to supposedly save money. It becomes a time-consuming task when it is done this way. It is also open to human error.

Why not just press a button once and be safe in the knowledge that you have a 98%-99% guarantee that your email will be delivered? You can then receive vital information as to who has opened or deleted the emails. Email marketing software saves you time and thus money.

There are so many packages available and it can be a minefield. I am currently using AWeber on the recommendation of highly respected internet/affiliate marketers. All the email software listed below allows you to personalize your emails. This will improve your open rate.

AWeber

AWeber is highly recommended by top internet and affiliate marketers. It has the following benefits:

• Simple to use – you can turn website visitors into potential clients with the easy to create web sign-up forms.
• Build up a relationship with your subscribers by using Autoresponders.
• You can send emails as frequently as you like. Some services charge per email sent which can get expensive fast. Aweber charges you by the amount of subscribers you have.
• You can set up a number of different email lists e.g. if you have more than one website. If you set up email campaigns for clients you can set up a separate list(s) for each client.

Sign Up for a Risk-Free Trial NOW and Increase Your Income Potential

iContact

iContact is a simple and inexpensive email marketing software tool that allows you to:

• Test Drive the Software.
• Capture those important money making email addresses.
• Start an email campaign to your subscribers. Once set up these will run automatically.
• Obtain feedback from your clients by sending them a survey.
• Keep your subscribers updated with regular newsletters. You can use one of iContact’s 300+ professional email newsletter templates.
• Be reassured that your subscribers are receiving your emails as iContact has deliverability rates of between 98%-99%.
• Import any email addresses that you have already gathered.

Test Drive iContact NOW and Grow your Business.

Constant Contact

Constant Contact offers a free 60 day trial. Every free trial includes a subscription to their email marketing best practices newsletter and email campaign coaching tips.




Some of the features include:

• The ability to produce customizable website visitor sign up forms.
• Over 100 professional HTML email templates (newsletters, promos, invites and more).
• Automatic delivery in the correct format, HTML or text.
• Real-time reporting (including opens, who clicked on which links and more).

Try it FREE for 60-Days


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