PHP

Add a contact form to your site

Ever since I started my blogs I’ve been looking for a good WordPress plugin that would create a contact form. I tried one popular contactform plugin a while ago, but I could never get it to work on my blogs.

Now I’ve discovered Wp-ContactForm, and in combination with the Exec-PHP (note this isn’t the more commonly used PHP-exec plugin – this one works better, well for me anyway!) I now have contact forms on each of my blogs.

One of the features of this contactform plugin that I really like is the ability to create drop down lists within the contact form. There’s often more than one reason why someone might want to contact the author of a blog using a contact form. It might be to have a private conversation about a post or about exchanging links or perhaps to request advertising. You can see an example of this sites contact form by clicking on the word contact in the top nav bar.

You can add security questions of your choosing when you set up your contact form too. I’m using a simple math equation, but you could ask your visitor to answer a more complex question or repeat a code and you can request that the case of the letters be ignored or otherwise. Hopefully this helps prevent abuse by spam bots. I haven’t used the contactform plugin long enough to know how well this feature is working yet.

Try the plugin out if you want to give your site visitors another way to contact you other than via you comment section.

Make money using Text Link Ads

by Tricia

Every once in a while I plan to talk about services or affiliate related companies that I use to monetize this site or my other websites and blogs. One of the companies that I’ve been working with for at least the last 8 months is Text Link Ads.

Text Link Ads is a service that helps you monetize your site by helping you get advertisers to purchase link space – usually in your sites sidebar – for a week or a month at a time.

I know they base which sites are accepted by a mix of stats which include page rank, Alexa rank and I believe how many RSS subscribers the site has at the time of submission.

I went to test my theory. I’ve got two sites that haven’t been accepted yet so I resubmitted them and got the same results – well let you know when your site is accepted. Then I decided to try adding my husbands site Guitar Licks and it was accepted right away.

The only major difference between my husbands site that was accepted and the two of mine that are still waiting is that his has 8 more RSS subscribers … yet it’s a PR 3 and the site of mine that’s been waiting the longest (6 months) is a PR 4. I wrote to them to ask them to re-evaluate the two sites that I’ve had waiting for months manual. Hopefully they will do that for me because frankly I don’t see much difference in the stats of the site that was just accepted and the two that are waiting.

My advice is to not try to add a site until it’s at least a PR3, had a decent ALexa rank and hopefully at least 40 to 50 RSS subscribers.

BTW if anyone wants to subscribe to this sites RSS feed I’ll be happy to take a look at your site and return the favor.

Once you’ve added your site and it’s been accepted you must add a blank xml file to the root of that site. This is where any text ad info will be placed when Text Link Ads sells some links for your site.

Then you’ll be asked to set up how you’d like the links to appear once you have some. You can decide how many link spaces to sell. I think generally starting at 6 or 8 is good. You can also decide if you’d like the text links to be outlined in a box, if there should be a background color behind the text links and what the link color should be. I generally only use the text link color.

Oh there is a wordpress plugin that you can download and use on your site if you have a wordpress blog. I have a few blogs on the same domain. The plugin can only be activated for one site per domain.

Once you’ve set everything up properly and added the code that’s been created for your site to your sidebar you’ll see the words “Text Link Ad” in that space for approximately 6 hours. This will tell you that you did everything correctly.

After that there’s nothing else to do but sit back and wait for an advertiser to purchase a link on your site.

Some people have success almost right away, while others wait months before getting their first text link ad. Just keep working on your site, maintaining it’s current quality or improving it and I’m sure you’ll eventually get some links.

Advertisers might also be interested in purchasing Post links. These links are placed underneath a post. You can only use this feature with the wordpress plugin. I use the plugin on my main blog Tricia’s Musings and I’ve sold a number of post links.

You can approve or deny any text link or post link offers that are made. I believe you have three days to accept. If you don’t come to the TLA site and mark the offers as approved or denied I believe the links are automatically added.

I’ve never had a link offer that I’ve denied. They’ve all fit with the sites that they have been requested on.

I’ve done well with Text Link Ads. I make several hundred dollars each month with them and as I said I’ve still got sites to add (this is one of the sites waiting to be accepted) and empty link spaces to fill.

There’s certainly nothing to lose in trying the program.

Click this button to sign up now:

Create your own social network with iScripts Socialware

by Tricia

I’m sure that everyone reading this has heard of social network sites such as Facebook and Myspace. If you haven’t heard of these sites you’re either brand spanking new to the internet or you haven’t been paying attention because these sites are wildly popular.

Wouldn’t it have been cool if you’d been the one to come up with the idea for Myspace or Facebook?

While you can’t recreate what’s already been created, you certainly can create your own social network site using iScripts SocialWare social network script. Think of the possibilities!

The iScripts Socialware software is a program that’s been developed in PHP/mySQL and it’s totally customizable. You can use it to create a stand alone social network, or perhaps create a social network that goes along with your existing personal or business website.

If you like the idea, but you realize that you don’t know that much about PHP or mySQL don’t worry. When you purchase the iScripts software you may request that the iScripts team set up and install the script for you on your web server. The company will upload all of the program files and images necessary to run your new social network, set up and configure the script and they’ll even test the installation to make sure that everything works as it should.

How’s that for service?

Naturally this installation service is not free, however it’s offered at the low price of $49.99 which I believe is a reasonable price for the peace of mind it will afford you when you see that your new social network is up and running and ready to accept new members within approximately 24 hours of your purchase.

iScripts even offers a full customization service that clients may chose inquire about if they want a truly unique social network.

You can also try a Demo of iScripts Socialware via the website. Just click on the Demo button at the top of the Socialware page and you can sign in to a demo version of the user or admin section and get a feel for the product.

If I were considering purchasing this product I would definitely take it for a test drive, as well as visit some of the sample sites that are listed in the right sidebar of the web page, and I’d also view screen shots of the user and admin panels which can be reached by clicking on the Screen shots button at the top of the page.

So how much does this cost? Only $149.95. I think this is a reasonable price for a product that could give your existing website quite a boost, as well as creating the potential to be the next Myspace or Facebook. You’ll get free support for one year, but you can purchase one to three years worth of additional support if you’d like.

If I were considering creating a social network site this would be a program that I’d look in to purchasing. I did a quick web search to see what other ready made social network programs were out there and I didn’t have much luck finding full featured stand alone social network software of this quality. Therefore I’ve come to the conclusion that this is a fairly unique social network product well worth considering if you are interested in setting up a social networking website.

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