Freelance Work Blog http://blog.freelance-work.net Sat, 21 Jan 2012 13:26:35 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Top Five Must-Have WordPress Plugins http://blog.freelance-work.net/2012/01/21/top-five-must-have-wordpress-plugins/ http://blog.freelance-work.net/2012/01/21/top-five-must-have-wordpress-plugins/#comments Sat, 21 Jan 2012 13:26:35 +0000 admin http://blog.freelance-work.net/?p=13 Over the years WordPress has become one the most popular blogging platforms to use. There are countless ways to make use of WordPress and this includes the various plugins that are available to you to make blogging or creating websites easier and more enjoyable. Below is discussed the Top Five Must-Have WordPress Plugins to use. 

Akismet- This is a plugin that comes automatically with your WordPress installation but is very important. What is does is check any comments that are left on your blog or website against the Akismet web service to determine if the comment is legitimate or spam. If the service believes that the comment is spam, it will let you review it to make the decision to delete it or let it be posted.

All in One SEO Plugin- This is a very important plugin for anyone who wants to have their blog or website listed high in the search engines. The plugin lets you optimize your site to get the most traffic possible. You can customize your website for keywords, the title tag, as well as meta tags to gain more exposure in the search engines.

Google XML Sitemaps- This is one of the five must-have WordPress plugins because it helps with the ranking of your site in the search engines. It creates a sitemap of your website and submits it to the top search engines for better indexing.

SEO Friendly Images- For those that include any images on their blogs or websites, this is a must have as well. This plugin automatically adds ALT and TITLE attributes to every image which will improve traffic to your site from the search engines.

WP Super Cache- This plugin is especially great for those with bigger websites that load slowly. It helps your website load faster by storing static versions of it to load when a visitor comes. It also helps because it requires less CPU processing than from using WordPress all by itself.

]]> http://blog.freelance-work.net/2012/01/21/top-five-must-have-wordpress-plugins/feed/ 0 The basics of Organic SEO: How to Get More Traffic http://blog.freelance-work.net/2012/01/21/the-basics-of-organic-seo-how-to-get-more-traffic/ http://blog.freelance-work.net/2012/01/21/the-basics-of-organic-seo-how-to-get-more-traffic/#comments Sat, 21 Jan 2012 13:22:42 +0000 admin http://blog.freelance-work.net/?p=9 By following some best practices while developing a new web page the owner can get some organic SEO qualities. For instance, by insuring that all of the URL links have a title or ALT description you are following W3C Best practices while at the same time increasing your organic SEO score. Therefore, developing good design habits in the beginning insures many of the common SEO factors will already be built into the web page. 
These practices should also be implemented anytime the website is updated or changed too. Furthermore, the same concept works for images. This is because images use a description tag as well. At this point, it needs to be mentioned that using descriptions within the URL also helps those with handicaps. When they cannot see the image or the link, they can have a description telling them what the object is. To make these descriptions have an SEO aspects to them simply match the description as closely to the page content as possible. Using keywords in the object description would be most ideal.

Another way to gain a SEO factor while helping the user is to make two site maps. Make one that is in XML format and make the other in regular HTML. This does two things. First, the XML site map can be submitted it to the search engines. This is for faster indexing. The second site map can help the users navigate the website. Furthermore, the HTML site map can be followed by the search engines meaning they can index the deeper links. Another aspect of this navigation is the sidebar. As attractive as the flash navigation bars are the ones made using the old fashion the list method is easier to follow by the search engines. This has a direct impact on the many links are indexed and their SEO score.

Another important factor in SEO lately is page load time. In fact, the largest search engine, Google, has implemented a section in their web master tools regarding load time. Since load time is becoming a matter of focus, it would also be wise to use fewer images or run the current images through a cruncher, like RIOT. This will reduce the size of the images and make site load faster. Finally, one of the best ways to achieve organic SEO is to have quality content that is relevant to the websites name, URL, and keywords.

]]> http://blog.freelance-work.net/2012/01/21/the-basics-of-organic-seo-how-to-get-more-traffic/feed/ 0 Traditional Freelance Marketplaces and How They Work http://blog.freelance-work.net/2012/01/21/traditional-freelance-marketplaces-and-how-they-work/ http://blog.freelance-work.net/2012/01/21/traditional-freelance-marketplaces-and-how-they-work/#comments Sat, 21 Jan 2012 13:19:27 +0000 admin http://blog.freelance-work.net/?p=6 In today’s economic world where people are trying to work from the comfort of their homes and employers are trying to save precious payroll dollars by hiring freelance employees; both are turning to freelance marketplaces. This may sound like the perfect solution to everyone’s problem, but proceed with caution; sites like Elance and Odesk could just end up creating more problems for you or your company. 

While some may think that freelance market places such as Elance or Odesk could be their saving grace, others know that they do have their down sides for both freelancers and employers. For starters, there are fees on each job. Some sites are set up where the client pays the fees, while others have the freelancer pay the fees.

From the employer’s point of view, all you have to go on is the freelancer’s profile, which was written by the freelancer; or a review that was written by other employers.
Because people are from a vast amount of countries all across the world there is always going to be a language barrier. This can cause a major communication issue, so job quality suffers.
While there seems to be a vast pool of candidates to choose from, you are often looking at a quantity versus quality situation. You may think you are getting a better quality of work, and then when the job is finished; it is not what you needed. This often costs you more money in the end when it needs to be redone by another freelancer or someone else. In the end, this will just add to your payroll costs.

As the freelancer, you bid on the job, spend many hours giving it your best and then the employer decides that it is not what they want, and they are not going to pay. On top of that, they give you a bad review; so now, you have lost time and money and it has hurt your reputation on the site.
It is always best to do your research on the site, before you decide on having a working relationship of any kind. Know what you are getting into before you make any decisions, this will save you time and money in the end.

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