Michael Wilding

Category: Website Building

  • Build A Website In Under An Hour

    Build A Website In Under An Hour

    Today we’re going to build a website in less than an hour. In fact, when you’ve done this a few times, you can build a website out in closer to twenty minutes!

    I’m going to be showing you how to setup your website in cPanel, as this is the most common interface. 

    However, it’s possible you may have some form of cloud hosting that is using a different interface. That’s fine, contact your hosting to get the initial site setup done, then use the WordPress auto install in the same way as I outline below.

    Everything else will be exactly the same!

    Start by logging into your cPanel (or cloud hosting) and find the App Installers.

    Click on the WordPress icon to install WordPress automatically on your website.

    Once you click this button, it will either install straight away or you may have to click another install button like this:

    After this you will be shown a number of options, leave them all as default but make a note of the username and password to login, and then install WordPress.

    That’s it, wait for the confirmation message, and you’ve successfully just installed WordPress on your website.

    I told you it was simple!

    Get the full newsletter sent via email at 6:30pm tonight as a full Online Hustle member.

    https://michaelwilding.com/join-the-online-hustle-clean/

    All the best,

    Michael

    The Online Hustle

  • Cloud hosting, is it worth it?

    Cloud hosting, is it worth it?

    I mentioned just before Christmas, that my hosting company support has been getting worse and worse.

    I’ve looked at moving a few times over the last eighteen months, but now I’ve decided that it has to happen.

    Since I’m moving, I’m also going to take the opportunity to create a better structure.

    This means I want a web server and a database server, which allows me to optimise each for their specific function and provides better security.

    I will also create another mail server. Currently I use a small one with my current hosting, a managed one (through a great email consultant), and Amazon SES.

    However, I can’t use Amazon SES for our gambling emails as they don’t like them.

    So why another one?

    Because it’s a good idea when emailing is your primary source of income, to have a few delivery servers for your emails. It means if one goes down you still have backups 😉

    Anyhoo, the choices for hosting are…

    1) Amazon AWS
    2) Liquid Web Private Cloud
    3) Unmanaged Dedicated Server from Hetzner

    I’ve played with Amazon AWS, I’ve used LiquidWeb in the past and I’ve been recommended (and know someone using) Hetzner.

    I’ve been mulling over these options for the last few days.

    Amazon AWS is very tempting, the ability to auto-scale and keep everything separate is appealing.

    However… it’s also very complicated, will require a lot of managing (which will cost) and on price/power comparison it’s by no way the cheapest. I also understand that the auto-scaling isn’t quite as automatic as it sounds and the companies that do it successfully have to design their code and structure specifically to use Amazon’s platform.

    LiquidWeb provide a private cloud. This is essentially a dedicated server which you can create your own virtual servers on. You can then split the power of the dedicated server up amongst your virtual servers.

    Pretty neat.

    Because it’s a cloud based platform, if one of your virtual servers is under-powered you can move it out onto a dedicated cloud server.

    Oh yeah, and it’s managed 😉

    The server I would need to start with would be $389 per month, plus backup costs. And, to be honest, I’m not sure it will be powerful enough once split.

    Again, like Amazon AWS, I like the idea, but it seems like it could end up costing me more than I’m paying currently, and part of the plan is to reduce costs.

    So… it looks like I’m going to end up with two servers at Hetzner.

    I’ve been looking at their pricing, and for about $70 I can get a server that’s pretty much equivalent to the LiquidWeb server.

    Of course, that’s unmanaged, so I’ll have a $29 management fee and a $20 cPanel fee on top, bringing to the total $119.

    Still… that means I can get two of those, one for a web server and one for a database server, and still be paying $151 less per month than one equivalent server at LiquidWeb, which would need to then have it’s resources split up!

    In fact, I don’t think I need quite that much power for my web server, so I may reduce that a bit lower and increase the RAM on the database server.

    Overall this is going to be an interesting process. Having been with my current hosting for around eight years, it’s a big move, and slightly terrifying.

    Hold you’re breath, and I’ll keep you posted.

    Ciao,

    Michael

    P.S. Oh… I’ll probably use Amazon AWS for an mail server because I know there’s no gambling restrictions on their EC2 platform for the mail that goes out. This means you won’t be shut down, but your mailing reputation is in your hands.

  • Launches, launches, launches

    Launches, launches, launches

    It’s been pretty quiet from me recently, and that’s because we’ve got a ton of things going on in one of my busiest websites, The Race Advisor.

    If you’re interested in horse racing, you can check it out here.

    Because of that I’ve been a bit quiet on my emails here.

    So… since we’ve got a bunch of them happening, I thought I’d talk to you about launches today.

    There was a time when everybody and his dog were doing Jeff Walker style launches.

    These are the ones where you optin to a video sequence, usually four, and the first one tells you why the person is an authority, the second is about how to solve your problem, the third is proof and the fourth is the launch.

    Thing about these launches is… everybody knows about them.

    Which means that unless you’re in a market that doesn’t have very many digital product launches, people already know what’s coming.

    Whether this makes a difference or not, I’m not sure, there are too many potential variables to be able to track it accurately.

    But I do know this…

    …they take a shite load of work to put together.

    I mean huge amounts.

    So I started to mix it up, doing much simpler launches, changing things around and appealing to the immediate desires that people have.

    There’s a school of thought which says you shouldn’t make people wait ten days or longer to purchase a product when they want to give you money now.

    And they’ve got a point.

    Having now done nearly fifty different launches, in different styles, I’ve learned a few things about launching products.

    Here are the key points to take away…

    1) The style of launch doesn’t matter.
    2) If you sell immediately or in ten days doesn’t matter.
    3) Videos or sales copy doesn’t matter.
    4) The button colour doesn’t matter.

    The only things that matter are:

    * A very high quality product that over-delivers
    * Excellent sales copy, whether it’s video or text
    * A price point that matches your buyers expectations for the quality and value of the product (often higher is better)
    * Hot traffic from your own list and affiliate partners

    Those four things are the essentials, everything else may make a small difference, but generally the amount of effort, time and money that goes into creating huge launches can be skipped, and with no dentriment to your bottom line.

    So you know what… skip it!

    Michael

  • How important is the layout of my website?

    How important is the layout of my website?

    This is a very common question for people who are setting up a website for their business. You invest a lot of time and usually money into getting a great website set up, so you want every element of it to be just right.

    If you are using your website as part of your marketing strategy to drive sales, then getting the best out of your website will be a big priority for you.

    And, getting your website set up for success isn’t totally straight-forward!

    From what type of content to develop, to where to position your content for ultimate effect, you have a number of factors to consider.

    If you haven’t spent years developing websites and discovering what works in terms of content and layout, then you can take a shortcut by using this insightful infographic; 25 features every online business must have in 2017.

    Based on extensive research, the infographic will show you exactly what to do in terms of content placement and even provides useful tips on key features.

    Your content and how you use it is critical to the effectiveness of your website, so start using this infographic from the team at ukwebhostreview.com to base your layout on and you will soon see some quick benefits.

    Simple concepts like positioning the call to action button in a highly visible position at the top of your page and what else to include in your header are examples of the great information you will glean from the infographic.

    The positioning of content is so vital in terms of how effective your website will be in compelling your website visitors to contact you or make an online purchase. If you develop a good content creation schedule that is based on attracting your target audience and then place it using this guidance then you can expect to see great results.

  • The real charities vs. shamsters

    The real charities vs. shamsters

    The subject line of this email is probably going to get me a shite load of complaints.

    Particularly when I go into details.

    But hey… if you’re reading this, then it did it’s job, so take note about why I wrote it (there’s always a reason) and then rinse and repeat in your own email marketing.

    I don’t mean copy word-for-word, I mean use the principles yourself.

    To me there are two types of charities, the ones that are always fighting for cash and get very little support, the others are the huge ones that seem to have endless amounts of money.

    When I said shamsters in my subject line, I was referring to these giant businesses, but I need to clarify what I meant by it.

    I’m not saying that they don’t do some good, I’m sure that they do, what I am saying, is that I personally don’t believe they’re as charitable and giving as they make out.

    Just read books such as War Games by Linda Polman and you’ll begin to have your own doubts.

    Start doing some Google search on how much the people who run these companies earn, and those doubts will be solidified.

    Look into the way they direct market, relentlessly targeting vulnerable people, and you’ll begin to wish you never gave them your money.

    As far as I’m concerned, if you’re a charity, everyone who works for you should be paid a fair and reasonable wage, but when you’re at the top of the chain you should expect to get less than you would in a non-charitable private institution. After all, it’s a charity.

    Yes, yes, I’m aware of the argument about not getting the best, yada, yada, yada.

    However, I refuse to believe that there aren’t enough successful people in the world, who’ve earned all the money they need, who wouldn’t be happy to take a pay cut (while still earning well) to work for a charity.

    Anyhoo, I digress…

    We’re just about to head over to one of those smaller charities under the name of Shine. It’s for parents of children with hydrocephalus and spina bifida.

    Max, as you may know, has hydrocephalus, so we’re going to one of their drop-in coffee mornings.

    The first thing I ever do when I see these smaller charities websites, is start to assess what they’re missing.

    The Shine website is actually pretty good, but there’s a bunch of stuff they could improve on.

    So here’s what I’m going to ask you to do, go and take a look at it at:

    https://www.shinecharity.org.uk/

    Then…

    Head over to this thread in our private Facebook group and leave a comment saying what you would do to improve this site.

    Let’s use this site as a case study.

    When you’ve left your thoughts on how you would improve it in the Facebook thread, I’ll let you know how I would improve it.

    This will allow you to see if you got it right, if you missed anything and most importantly, it will start to give you an insight into how you can pitch to clients and get paid to give this advice 😉

    But more on that later.

    Michael