However, if you don’t yet have an autoresponder, but want one without the monthly fees, I recommend Autoresponder Unlimted.  I am selling this in my eBay store at www.stores.ebay.co.uk/Info-Sources, under the ‘software’ category for £9.99.  This is about the same price as one month’s subscription to AWeber.

The main disadvantage though, with Autoresponder Unlimted, is you can’t send out Ad-hoc emails.  The main advantage is that you can install it on to as many websites as you want.

I have made two instructional videos to show you how easy it is to set up and use.

Video one shows you how to install Autoresponder Unlimted onto your website.

 

Video two shows you how to use Autoresponder Unlimted.

If you would like to own this software, visit my eBay store www.stores.ebay.co.uk/Info-Sources and click on the software category link down the left hand side and it will be sent to you on CD ROM.

I have just a few days ago completed a transfer process on my blog.  It’s nothing that will be visible to my blog visitor, as I have changed my hosting company to Blackwater Internet.  I have wanted to change my hosting company for some time, but I kept putting of making the move because I didn’t know how.

So, how did I do it then if I didn’t know how?  Well I will tell you.  I simply done a search for the information on the internet.  I typed into google something like  ’How do I change hosting for my wordpress blog?’.  Hundreds of results came up, so I had to siv through a lot of the websites until I found a guide that I could understand and was easy to follow.  This was difficult and even though I have changed my hosting, there was still one part of the process I did not understand and could not work out how to do it.  It is not a compulsory part of the process, so I didn’t worry about it to much.

Because I found it difficult to find an easy to follow guide, I thought I would write my own that may belp others.  So here it is.

1. Make sure you have updated to the latest version of wordpress.  At the time of writing this, the latest version is 2.7.
2. Backup your database(s) to your computer.  Back it up to at least one other media source as well as your hard drive.  If you are not sure how to do this, click HERE. 
3. Back up all of the files from your blog.  If you do not do this properly, you run a high risk of loosing comments, posts, plugin, themes etc.  It is therefore a very good idea to back this up to several different media types, for example, your hard drive, an external hard drive, flash drive or memory stick, cd/dvd.  You can do this from either in your c panal (control panel) or from your ftp program.  I prefer to use my ftp program, and use filezilla.  Log into your webspace using your ftp program.  Select where on your computer you would like to download your blog files to.  Find the directory on your webspace where your blog is.  If it’s in the root of your website, i.e. www.yourdomain.com then find the folder ‘public_html’.  Right click on it and select download.  If it is in a folder on your website, i.e. www.yourdomain.com/blog , then go to that folder in your webspace and right click on it and select download.  Once you have downloaded it, as mentioned above, now download it to another media type.  If you do not, and your hard drive corrupts or breaks down, you have lost your back up. 
4. This is the part of the transfer process I did not understand, but I will tell you the theory of what you should do anyway.  This step is not a compulsory part of the process.  Now that you have backed up your blog, any other posts you make, comments made from blog readers etc, will not get transferred over.  So until your blog is transferred do not make any more posts to your blog.  In order to stop getting comments left on your blog, it is possible to stop people from leaving comments.  The instructions that I found said to do this, ‘Log into your PhpMyAdmin panel and update the wp_posts SET comment_status to closed’.  This is the part I did not do.  If you know how to do this, please leave a comment below.
5. Now you have backed up your blog just in case anything goes wrong, during the transfer.  If you have not registered your domain name with your new web host, you will now need your dns settings from your new web hosting company.  If you do not know what they are, contact your host to get them.  Log into the control panel where you have registered your domain name and change the dns settings to the ones your new web host has given you.  This is called DNS propagation and usually takes between 24-48 hours.
6. You do not have to wait for the DNS propagation to be complete before you can follow this step.  In fact to give a seaming less no downtime to your blog, it is best to do this straight away.  Log into the control panel of your new web hosting and install the blog like you did when you first started your blog on your old host.
7. Log into your web space of your new host using your ftp program.  From the files you downloaded in step 3, find the folder ‘wp-content’ and upload it to the root directly of your blog, e.g. ‘public_html’ or ‘/blog’ etc.  As the folder ‘wp-content’ will already exist from the new install you done in step 6, you will be advised this file already exists.  Choose to overwrite this with all the files.
8. When you installed wordpress on your new host, this will have created a mysql database for it.  Log into your control panel and access this database so that you are logged into your phpMyAdmin.  Import the database file that you download from step 2 above.
9. As soon as the DNS propagation is complete from step 5 your blog has been transferred.

I hope that you have found this useful and found it easy to follow.  If you have experienced any difficulties, leave a comment below and either myself or one of my blog readers can leave a follow up comment with some help.

Remember, I did not have a clue how to move my blog, and I managed it, so I know that you can too.

With all of the doom and gloom about at the moment in terms of the recession, credit crunch etc, in 2009, you may be wanting to look for ways you can save yourself a few pounds this year.  Well http://www.moneysavingexpert.com can help you do just that.  It is completely free and unbiased information.     It is written by the very well known Martin Lewis who has been on TV many times.  In fact you may recall all of the uproar that started from banks overcharging on fees, for example bounced cheque fees, and unauthorised overdraft fees.  Martin Lewis lead this campaign against the banks to help people reclaim back their charges.  He done a TV program based on that.  Also he has written newspaper and magazine articles and his own books.

Here is a list of just some of the things you can find on the website:

• A newsletter you can sign upto (I recommend you do this)
• temporary special offers you may not otherwise know about
• where to find the best deals on credit cards, loans, and different types of insurance products
• Advice on financial budgeting and planning
• A blog and forum
• loopholes

And because Martin Lewis is completely independant, you know that if he recommends one company over another, you know it’s not because he gets a cut, because he doesn’t. 

 In the emails you get, should you sign up for the newsletter, you can expect to be told about money off vouchers, vouchers for free items which you can print off yourselve.  current deals on hotels, insurance, any magazine which is giving away a particularly good freebie and many other money saving tips.

Basically, the website contains much more information that I can tell you about here.  The best thing to do is go and check it our for yourselve.  Go to http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/.

It is targeted to British citizens, but if you want to know about a similar type of webiste for the country you live in, just search on one of the search engines. e.g. if you live in Canada, type ‘money saving Canada’.  If you are outside of the UK and you find a website on money saving for the country in which you live. share it with the rest of us by leaving a comment below.

This relates to my last two posts regarding the forthcoming changes on eBay.co.uk.

I mentioned that from the 24th September, there will no longer be shop inventory only listings.  You can currently list in your shop, items selling for £4.99 or less for just 3p without a gallery image, and 6p with.  These listings are only visible to people visiting your shop.  Until now……I have just found out by pure accident, that eBay shop inventory only items are now appearing in main search results on eBay.  So this means you can list your buy it now items for as little as 3p and they will appear in the main searches and appear for 30 days. 

I don’t think that eBay will pull your shop inventory listings on 24th September, they just wont allow you to list anymore from this date.  If you have an eBay store and you are planning on keeping it after the price increases, stop listing using the buy it now option and list using the shop inventory option.

This only applies to shop listings and buy it now listings.  When you list an item, you can choose how many in that one listing you want to sell.  If you sell just one item, when that is sold, your listing ends.  If you want to relist it because you have more to sell, you obviously have to pay another insertion fee.  Usually, if you sell more than one item per listing, your listing fee increases based on the combined value of the number of items you are selling in that one listing. 

Well, this promotion basically means you can sell as many items as you want, as long as they are identical, in the one listing, and you only pay the listing fee as if you are only selling one item.  For example, if you are selling something for £4.99, you will pay 15p.  If you sell 5 in the one listing, normally you would pay a higher insertion fee,  However just now you will still only pay 15p.  What this means of course, is when you sell one of your items, your listing will still continue.

I sell mainly CD ROMs, so this is very useful and I only wished I new when the promotion first came out.  This promotion runs up until the 23rd September which is day before the fees change.  From the 24th September, this will be the norm.

Just thought I would share it with you.  If you have any questions about this, please leave a comment below and I will answer it.

Marc.

Ladies and gentlement, allow me to introduce you to www.saynoto0870.com where you can either type in your non std phone number and it will search its database to give you other phone numbers including std phone numbers, or you can just search by company name.  I have used it on 4-5 occasions now to phone either my energy company, satelite TV supplier and others, and has not failed me yet. 

I have no affiliation with this website at all and that is not an affiliate link.  I just thought you might find it useful.  After all, saving money is a way of making money isn’t it?  The site is also supported by Martin Lewis and his website, www.moneysavingexpert.com.

Please let me know what you think of this website by leaving your comments below.  If you are not in the UK, but your country has a similar site, please share it with us, again by leaving a commnt below.

Regards,

Marc.

I have found this really great website where for a one of payment, you can download unlimited amount of music, games, movies, tv shows.  Click HERE for more.

If you buy a lot of mp3′s through iTunes, rent movies, buy cd’s, then once you join this site, you will not have to pay for anything again.  It is a no brainer money saver.

You search for what you are looking for, download it, and if you want, burn it to CD or DVD.  They even provide you with the software for doing so.  Then once you have burnt it, you can watch the movies and TV shows on your television.

I think it is a brilliant idea, and if you like watching movies and/or listening to lots of music, then click HERE to sign up.

Please write any comments you have, or give other readers your own review below.

Enjoy!

Marc.