MediaGirl Toolbox

The Easy Way to Bypass Web Registration

This is a great website... BugMeNot.com. It's a database of userID and password combinations for websites that require that you login. The website claims 96,990 login combinations. That isn't to say that they all work, but a lot do. Here are the details from their tutorial:

BugMeNot Background
You're browsing the web and you click a link to an article on a site (let's say nytimes.com) but instead of getting the article you get a screen asking you to login or register. Infuriated at the idea of pointlessly registering for yet another site you turn to your good buddy bugmenot.com

Instructions

STEP 1: Make a note of the website address your are trying to access. For example:
http://www.nytimes.com/cnet/CNET_2100-1024_3-5567274.html or even just: www.nytimes.com

STEP 2: Visit http://bugmenot.com

STEP 3: Enter the address from step 1 into the box and press the "Show Logins" button

STEP 4: You should now be presented with a username and password. Make a note of them.

STEP 5: Go back to the site you were originally trying to access in step 1 and proceed to login with the username and password you noted in the previous step.

With any luck you should be able to access your article now!

Important Notes
It's important to note that all of the username/password accounts listed on bugmenot are added by users such as yourself. If you can't find a working login for a site then you are encouraged to register with that site (using fake details of course) and then add the username/password to bugmenot for other users to use. Never enter your real login details into bugmenot- everyone else will be able to see them!

Filed Under: Tools

Google’s Conversion University

Regardless of how you drive traffic to your site - paid search, search engine optimization (SEO), print, or any other medium - your challenge is to get more of the visitors you really want for the lowest cost possible.

Enter Google's Conversion University. This is a great site full of articles to help you with driving traffic as well as converting traffic. The articles include:

Intelligent Advertising for Small Business
by Alden DeSoto
You're a small business owner. You'd like more visibility for your site, and you've had a salesperson tell you about the benefits of buying a listing on her advertising or portal site. It sounds like a good deal, but how do you know?

A Benchmark Strategy to Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
by Alden DeSoto
In the frenzy to attain or maintain the highest ranking, it's easy to get caught up in keyword bidding wars. Don't give in to this temptation. There's a better way and it begins with finding a break-even cost-per-click benchmark.

Successful A/B and A/B/A Testing
by Brett Crosby
A/B and A/B/A testing offer scientific approaches to creating highly effective ads. Learn when to use each approach and how to set your test up successfully.

Email Campaign Best Practices
by Christine Lee<
When you launch an email campaign, get clear on your objectives and make sure that you can effectively track them with the campaign. Here are some tips and best practices.

Tracking Offline Campaigns
by Amit Singh
If you run offline campaigns, for example on TV or in print, you may be wondering how to track campaign ROI. Learn four approaches to tracking offline campaigns using Google Analytics.

Design Your Website for Increased ROI
by Alden DeSoto
It's easy to over-focus on driving traffic to your site while overlooking another equally important key to website ROI - content optimization. Make the time, money, and effort you've spent developing your online marketing pay off. Design a website that gets visitors to take action.

Five Tips for Writing Effective Web Headlines
by Ginger Makela
You're successfully driving traffic with AdWords, but 91% of your visitors leave your site after viewing just a single page. Clearly, you need to optimize your landing pages, but how do you know which changes to make?

Six Steps to Conversion Health
by Susan Minniear
Once a visitor lands on your website, the clock starts ticking and you have only a few seconds to convince them to stay there and make a purchase. Consider these six points and convert more visitors into customers.

Testing Keyword Landing Pages
by Alden DeSoto
Converting traffic begins with effective landing pages -- ones that reassure visitors that they've found what they are looking for. If you can match the right landing pages to the right ads, you'll increase conversions and profitability. But how do you start?

Divide and Conquer -- Segmenting Your Visitors
by Dan Daugherty
Learn how you can listen to your visitors with these Google Analytics segmentation tips.

Preaching to the Converted
by Lance Cotton
It's almost always cheaper to keep a current customer than to acquire a new one, and often your current customers will be your most profitable. If you have an online store, consider these tips for retaining customers and increasing conversions.

Five Objectives of Website Copy
by Alden DeSoto
Effective copy is a critical component of most successful websites. What should you write about? Here are five important points you can cover with website copy.

Filed Under: Freelance, Tools

Google Analytics Overwhelmed

Google Analytics tells you everything you want to know about how your visitors found you and how they interact with your site. You'll be able to focus your marketing resources on campaigns and initiatives that deliver ROI, and improve your site to convert more visitors.

Unfortunately, you can't signup for this free service because Google's been overwhelmed by the amount of people signing up for the service. Here is what they have posted on their site:

Over the last week, we've experienced extraordinarily high demand for Google Analytics, so much that we've had to disable new signups to ensure the best possible user experience for our customers. We are aware that some of our users have experienced a slow-down in seeing their reporting data due to the huge demand, and we're working hard to make report data as fresh and current as possible.

However, if you are interested in getting this service, you can submit your email address to receive notification when it is back online.

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Guru.com Lists 508,000 Freelancers

Guru.com has been around for a long time and is a great resource for freelancers looking for projects and projects looking for freelancers. I was listed on the site a number of years ago and was contacted by an IT guy in Fresno who I've done work for ever since. Today, Guru.com claims to have 508,000 freelancers listed. It might be a little more difficult to be found on the site but if you actively submit proposals, it should prove fruitful. And the site is no longer for just design/web people... It now includes categories for Finance and Accounting, Fashion / Interior / Landscape / Set Design and Engineering / CAD / Architecture.

Filed Under: Freelance

A List Apart

A friend recently turned me on to the A List Apart website a couple of days ago. It's an online magazine that "explores the design, development, and meaning of web content, with a special focus on techniques and benefits of designing with web standards." A great read for web developers at all levels.

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