David Fiske A subtle blend of affiliate marketing and web development

Articles About Useful Guides

03/10/08 - Step 6) Looking Forward

This series of articles has been designed to help explore the world of PHP. We've set up a site from scratch and added some basic functionality. Admittedly, I've probably glossed over some areas and gone into too much detail in other areas. All I know fo sure is writing a detailed tutorial is hard work :-)

So let's conclude the series by exploring what could be. What could we do with the site if it were a) a serious venture and b) on a much better domain name? More

29/09/08 - Step 5) Adding Functionality

Okay, back to the tutorial. Before we go any further, take a look at my chocolate recipe website (told you it was a pants domain name!) and have a good nosey at it. It's built using the tutorials as a basis although I've glossed it up only very slightly.

For prosperity, here's a screenshot: More

06/09/08 - Step 4) Getting The SEO Right

Let's talk SEO as it determines everything non-script related.

We've already discussed urls and have opted for a "url/recipe-id-title.html" structure. The benefit of this is that the keywords (presumably the recipe name) will feature in the URL. Some say it's not important. I prefer nice tidy urls over "url/recipe.php?recipe=1".

So what else do we need? More

05/09/08 - Step 3) Creating The Files - Part 3

So far we've got our template files laid out. We've got a sparse CSS file and we've got the basic pages required, empty but ready to roll.

The first thing to do is fill in the static files: terms, privacy, disclaimer, contact, about.....

You can do this following this file structure:

<?php
$pagetitle="Page title goes here";
$pagekeywords="list, keywords, here";
$pagedescription="Write a page description here";
include "includes/head.php";
echo "<h1>".$pagetitle."</p>";
echo "<p>Page text goes here</p>";
include "includes/foot.php";
?>

$pagetitle is used to define the H1 tag on the page along with the title tag in the head section on the html. $pagekeywords lends itself nicely to the keywords tag and thus the description tag also works in the same manor.

The only PHP files that should now be empty are index.php, recipe.php, category.php and rss.php. Before we fill them, let's sort out htaccess.txt and robots.txt. More

03/09/08 - Step 3) Creating The Files - Part 2

CSS is a wonderful thing, especially combined with templates. By changing the contents of one file, you can roll out changes site-wide (template files and CSS).

This site will make use a CSS template so at this stage, I'm going to set up a very basic style.css file.

The template page will be split into four areas: More

02/09/08 - Step 3) Creating The Files - Part 1

Step 3 will be split into 3 sub-steps. Firstly, I've going to take a look at the basic template system I'm going to use together with the basic pages required. Next I'll look at populating the stylesheet and starting work on a basic template. Finally, I'll look at the htaccess file and robots.txt file, together with the code on the crucial pages.

So, let's delve into the overall directory layout. More

29/08/08 - Step 2) Creating The Database

We need 2 databases: the recipes and the advertisers. We could make everything flat file (i.e. without a database) and whilst that would be 'easier' now, it would be more problematic when the site grows.

Here's how I would set up the databases: More

28/08/08 - Step 1) Purpose & Structure

The sample site is one I suggested a while ago - a recipe site. There's a lot of buzz at the moment about healthy eating, dieting, budgeting and a food shortage so this seems quite apt.

So let's take a look through what the site should do and how it should be laid out. More

27/08/08 - Learn PHP and MySQL

(This is a prerequisite article in preparation for the "quirky affiliate site" series.)

We all have to start somewhere and for me it was coding HTML using Microsoft FrontPage. Those days are long gone now as I tend to use HTML Kit to code PHP files. Back then, I never thought I would switch from WYSIWYG editors to text editors but alas, progression dictated that!

I used one book to learn PHP - PHP and MYSQL for Dummies. I like the Dummies range of books as they are simple to use as a reference encyclopaedia as well as a book. The book has mixed reviews on Amazon so I imagine it's like Marmite - you love it or you hate it. I love it - it suited my needs when I was learning. More

26/08/08 - Create An Affiliate Site With A Twist From Scratch

Over the course of the next few weeks, I'm going to take Tania up on the idea of creating an in-depth set of articles detailing exactly how to go about creating an affiliate site with quirky features and functionality.

The aim of the articles is to show how easy it is to get a site up and running using MySQL, PHP and some (open source) ready made plugins.

Here's the order of the articles to follow: More

19/11/07 - Anyone Need An Affiliate Manager?

Here's an email from Roman:

Dear Sir/Madam,
I'm writing you according affiliate(account) manager position.

Affiliate program manager is a person who managing company's affiliate program at affiliate networks like commission-junction, google adwords,etc.

I would appreciate if you could to advice a person I can send my CV if your company has a vacation to this role.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Sincerely Yours,
Roman xxxxxxxxxx

I've got a few problems with this message that may help to educate people who email affiliates. More

23/10/07 - 5 Tips For Increasing Your Productivity

Here are five simple tips to help you stay focussed on your affiliate marketing efforts. More

24/06/07 - How Cluttered Is Your Shared Server?

Spy on how full your shared server is!

If you're like me, you'll have thought "I wonder who else uses my server?". Today I stumbled across a website that does exactly that. More

16/04/07 - Guru Slayer, Day Job Killer...

Head over to A4U Forum and you will find a seemingly inconspicuous thread about PPC. In there, there are details on how you can read some of the latest ebooks on the net for free. I won't link to it from here as strictly speaking, the ebooks are protected by copyright and shouldn't be redistributed, especially for free.

Never the less, I accidentally read a couple of the guides. More

02/04/07 - Website Traffic Videos

I'm not sure how much attention you pay the ebook world but something that's big right now is Michael Cheney's Traffic Videos.

This product is released on 3rd April 2007 and is a set of videos that walk you through how to generate and boost your natural website traffic. More

28/02/07 - Where Do You Start With Affiliate Marketing?

As a reasonably prolific blogger/affiliate marketer, I thought I would construct a sensible map of where newbie affiliates should focus their energies.

Naturally, there will be some who agree and disagree with my map - that's what comments are for!

Let's crack on... More

27/02/07 - AdSense Alternative?

I have mentioned ClickBank in passing a few times and said how a lot of affiliates start there, then progress to UK based networks.

I had an email today offering me the chance to buy some AdSense rivalling software called ClickBank AdBox for a whole $7. That's about £3.50!

I've got a couple of sites where that would come in quite handy so I stumped up £3.67 (today's exchange rate through PayPal) and I now hold a copy of CB Ads in my hand (well, on my hard drive!).

So what is it and what's it like? More

31/01/07 - Tradedoubler Website Redevelopment

Tradedoubler have updated their website and changed from browns and beiges to blues.



Tradedoubler is the main network I use as I find them to work extremely well. More

18/12/06 - Another Small Investment Ready For The Next Phase

I have just placed an order with Amazon for two new books.

These books are about SEO and copywriting and so should help with developing Compare Sat Nav dramatically.

More

14/12/06 - Multiple Streams of Internet Income Book

As you may have gathered, I don't usually recommend products. Or at least, I only recommend those that are good and credible.

There are so many guides and books available that it is often difficult to select the right ones. A lot of people are writing drivel about making money yet provide no credible and logical content for the reader to act upon. In fact, these products usually recommend more guides to buy at additional cost (and usually profit to the author).

This recommendation is different. More

11/12/06 - Price Tapestry Script

Your niche site should be a very specialised and individual site. It should not try and be the jack of all trades but should be a concise set of information, offers, adverts and sticky features.

I highly recommend a price checking script called Price Tapestry for use on your site.

It is PHP based and is very flexible. More

04/12/06 - Niche Guides

Thank you to everyone who has contacted me requesting more information on niches.

Whilst this site covers niches in some detail, it is aimed at people who are willing to put some effort in to learning and researching.

However, there are some commercial guides out there that can help you with developing niche websites. More