Tips Tuesday – Money Maker Keywords, Product Review Schema, Cloudflare Tutorials

Hello Happy Site Owners and Webmasters!

Tips this week include:

• New Cloudflare tutorials available for webmasters
• PHP error log tutorials
• Some theme devs and hosts are way behind on PHP 8
• How to avoid the panic that’s coming in Nov when PHP 8 hits
• Price increases coming to .com domains
• Google adds new product review pros/cons schema support
• How product reviews can make you money
• DuckDuckGo will now block Microsoft trackers
• Why you should target Zero Search Volume keywords to make more money

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BlogAid Happenings

I’ve been a tutorial making maniac for the past week, and more are on the way.

Site Services Update

We are running on time for all site services with the usual 4-6 week wait list.

If you would like an audit, or you’re due for a checkup before the end of September, now is the time to fill out the request form.

And, if you’re ready for better hosting, see the Migration/Audit combo service and save money on both.

BlogAid Webmaster Happenings

New Cloudflare Tutorials are Available

Cloudflare tweaks and introduces new features and functions constantly, like every week.

But, they have finally settled on which interface they are going to use – I’ve seen 4 different ones in use this year, with some accounts having different interfaces for each site.

But now we will all be using the one they’ve had in beta for the last 6 months, which has access tabs down the left sidebar, which is way better than the icons across the top.

And they have changed the security settings too, especially for free plans. You get more of the WAF (Web Application Firewall) in the free plan now.

On top of that, I’ve been testing new firewall rules for the last 6-9 months that drop bad bot hits up to 70%, and me and my clients have had no issues with it.

And because of all this, for the past year my Cloudflare tutorials have grown out like a cactus in every direction. So, it was time to revamp the security setting tutorials into something far more cohesive with flow.

I’ll be going through the rest of the tutorials where the info still stands to update them with notes about the interface change and how to access those settings this week.

BlogAid Village Happenings

PHP Error Log Tutorials for PHP 8 Issues

I believe 90% of my clients and webmasters have switched over to PHP 8 at this point. The rest are waiting to move to better hosting, as the host they are on has bad PHP 8 settings that will bork their sites.

And now that we have finished checking our sites and plugins and themes on the front side, it’s time to have a look at our PHP error logs to see if there are any hidden issues.

Last week I released a tutorial to my BB Hub site audit clients and webmasters on how to check that log on cPanel.

And this week I’ll be releasing a tutorial on how to check the system error log on InterWorx VPS, as it’s very different.

Theme Devs and Hosts are Way Behind on PHP 8

What we’ve found in our tests is that WP itself is PHP 8 compatible, as are 99% of our plugins.

But, most hosts have bad PHP 8 settings that will break your site. 

Poorly configured servers is the main reason I’m moving everyone to (affiliate link) better hosting with Iridium where the servers are correctly configured with care.

We’ve also discovered that some older themes, or those based on older code are not PHP 8 compatible either.

In fact, the devs at Feast Design are so far behind the curve that they think it is premature to even be testing with PHP 8. I guess nobody told them that testing actually started a year ago, or that support for our current version of 7.4 will end in November.

But then, they always make their users wait months after I okay a WP release before they have their themes ready for it.

If you’ve followed me for a while you will remember how many times I have reported debacles with this theme company and why I’ve been suggesting for 2 years now that you move to a better theme.

But some folks didn’t listen to me and now they are in an emergency theme redesign situation. I just hope they can get it done before that November deadline. And let this be a lesson to do things the first time they are mentioned, instead of waiting until you’re in pain about it.

That’s just not the BlogAid way.

Avoid Panic

And because of the all these bad hosts and themes, I expect to hear a LOT of screaming come the end of this year and into next as folks are rudely awakened by it.

But me and my peeps will be calmly living our lives and making money through the holiday season because we stay so far ahead of the curve and get things done in a timely manner.

THAT is the BlogAid way.

We were way ahead of the curve on:

• Site security
• HTTPS
• Speed
• Accesibilities compliance
• Moving into the creator economy

as well.

While all these other bloggers were running around screaming that they would not meet the deadline on yet another Google edict, me and my peeps had those things done a year ahead of time.

Wouldn’t you like to be proactive instead of reactive with your site?

Get an audit, get ahead, and stay ahead.

That’s all the happenings around here. Let’s jump into this week’s news and tips.

Biz Tip

.com Price Increase

NameCheap sent out emails this past week letting folks know that the prices for a .com domain will increase soon. That’s for new purchase and renewals.

You may recall last year that the cap came off .com pricing and domains that whoever controls such things deems as a big deal have exorbitant price tags now.

I looked up one I thought I might want to use for a niche membership site related to HeartwoodArt and that domain was $3,500 or such for the first year. After that, the regular renewal rate would apply. I said no thanks.

Now, even though this will cost us a bit more, keep in mind that .com is considered an e-commerce extension. So they expect businesses to be using that extension.

And there are tons of other extensions available these days, and more folks are getting used to all sites not being the .com version. That’s especially true with new tech and future-focused sites, which are all .io these days.

I wasn’t able to get the .com for BlogAid until 4 years after I had made the .net version a success. But the only reason I went ahead with the .net at that time was because the .com was parked, and had been for a few years, so I knew I would not be competing with it until I could get it. The .com is forwarded to the .net. And I’ve thought many times about switching over to the .com, but at this point, I’m not sure I care anymore, as it won’t affect my ranking or make the company any more valuable because it all runs off what’s in my head anyway. So, not something I’m looking to sell.

However, for my new secret project, I not only got the .com, I also got .shop and several other extensions that I most definitely plan to put to use with it, not just tie up. 

SEO Tips

Google Adds Product Review Pros and Cons Schema Support

For the past year Google has really been cracking down on fake product review sites.

A LOT of these sites rank super high in Google Search, and that’s because they were made by pro SEO folks.

They pay folks to read through reviews on Amazon and spin up a brief summary of the pros and cons of the top 10 products, and then put them in a post with a title that shows up in Search like “The Top 10 Blenders for August 2022” or such.

None of the products listed anywhere on that site have been used by anybody associated with that site.

They just know all of the tricks to get that site ranked high, and they are the ones raking in all of that Amazon affiliate money.

Well, Google released an algorithm update about 6-8 months ago that got rid of most of those fake review sites.

And ever since they have been calling for real people who do real product reviews so they can put those sites at the top of Google Search instead. 

And they are HEAVILY favoring video product reviews from real people too.

Well now Google just finished rolling out another product review algorithm update and they will also now be supporting the schema markup you can put around a product for Pros and Cons. And they may pick up that section of content to feature in a snippet too.

I’ll be looking into how we can add that to our product review posts and I’ll be publishing it in the DIY SEO course material, I think. But, I may start a new course on direct pay models instead, and this would be more useful there.

There’s a LOT of money to be made with product reviews, and there’s a whole strategy to it because it goes beyond just what you can do on Google and YouTube. So, I think this really deserves a dedicated course.

What do you think?

Do you do product reviews now? Are you wanting to get into them?

Let us know in the comments.

DuckDuckGo Will Now Block Microsoft Trackers

You may recall in last week’s Tips Tuesday that I reported on Google kicking the can down the road for another year with regard to dropping 3rd party cookie trackers, and that Google and Chrome are the only search engine and browser left that doesn’t give a damn about your online privacy.

Well, the DuckDuckGo got into some hot water earlier this year when a security researcher released findings that they share some tracking info with Microsoft, who are also the makers of the Bing search engine.

DuckDuckGo has found a way to remedy that and will now block those Microsoft trackers.

Some of my clients report they get quite a bit of traffic from DuckDuckGo, and I don’t know how this tracker block will affect that.

Please do share with us your findings over the next few months and if you see any difference.

Why You Should Target Zero Search Volume Keywords

The importance of keywords – this is the first SEO topic that many new site owners hear about.

And all of them jump on the free version of Ahrefs and try to find high search volume keywords because they think that will bring a lot of traffic to their post on that topic.

Yeah, well 40 million other bloggers are thinking the same thing and you just set yourself up for a ton of competition.

Try this instead.

Look for the Zero Search Volume keywords.

I’m not kidding.

In fact, one such keyword phrase has turned into my highest hit post and video over on HeartwoodArt for the last 3 years.

It’s literally a topic that no one else is writing about and I get ALL of that traffic.

AND I get paid because of it.

You know those error messages you get on your site? Those are the titles of my posts about how to fix them on BlogAid.

And those keywords are considered low volume searches.

Well, low compared to what?

When I get 100s of 1000s of hits to my site over time because my post is the top ranking one for the 100s of 1000s of folks who search for that error, I do pretty well with all the new eyeballs and business it brings me.

And even if it’s a flash in the pan type thing, you can still make money.

I have one client that was making $800/mo from a little-known book that had a fiercely loyal following for that genre. That traffic burst only lasted 3-4 months, but hey, what would you do with and extra $3200?

And she got that keyword idea from Google Search suggestions – which is free.

And this is something I teach in the DIY SEO course too. There’s a whole workshop on keywords that actually make you money.

So, stop with that free Ahrefs scan crap and use the other free tools that show you where you have far, far less competition and a real shot at ranking in a way that makes you money.

And see this post from Search Engine Journal for even more reasons why to go for those low volume and zero volume keywords.

Wrap Up

That’s a wrap for this week’s Tips Tuesday.

Thanks for sharing this podcast and post with your blogging buddies, and for leaving comments and reviews too.

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Be sure to visit BlogAid.net for more tips and resources and I’ll see you online.