Just after starting this blog I created a (very poor) video showing people how to cloak their affiliate links and load them onto their websites via FTP.

In the comments I was asked: “As a complete newbie I’m not sure why I should cloak my affiliate links? Could you enlighten me please?”

So I went on to explain:

Sometimes our affiliate links can be bypassed, for example:

http://www.d9hosting.co.uk/clients/aff.php?aff=XXX is a D9 affiliate link. There are lots of people that would just copy the http://www.d9hosting.co.uk and go directly to the same page but without a referral, meaning you would loose any commission.

This is a follow up to my last post where I explained some blog feed errors that I, and some of my friends, were/are having both with our RSS titles and when our content is being shared on the social media sites.

The response to the post was really good with some blogging friends stepping forward to help me try and resolve my RSS title error.

Lisa Buben of Inspire To Thrive had noticed the issue on social sharing and thought it may be the WP SEO plugin as she was having issues when sharing her posts via the Buffer button on the Digg Digg plugin.

Ah Blog Errors

You’ve finished writing your blog post, tweaked it here and there, got your catchy title and image ready and made the post look as presentable as possible.

You preview your post and double check everything once more, the layout, the images, the links all work…. When it’s all tickety boo and you’re finally happy with it you hit the publish button and set about letting everyone know your new post is online.

You copy the URL and go visiting the Social Media Networks, start pasting your link and F F flipping hell there’s an error in the description ARRRGGGHHH!

That’s the exact position I found/find myself in and I see that many of my blogging friends have the same issue.

I was recently approached by a good friend of mine, who informed me that she had partnered up with another good friend of mine to create a Brand New Membership site specialising in the dedicated support we often need to succeed online.

My good friend, Mandy Allen, explained how she and Steve King had got together to create Marketing Mini Classes and asked if I would take a look over the site, test everything and give them my feedback on it.

I’m so impressed with the site that I thought I’d take you all on a video tour of it as well as share some details about the hosts, Mandy and Steve, and how I know them.

How many people do you know online who have tried, struggled then given up?

How many of those people do you think would have succeeded in their goals if they’d had the right support?

So many of us buy into different schemes and programmes online but often find them difficult to understand or impossible to implement with our little knowledge.

Finding the right support is the key to your success.

There are many great marketers online who will give you the support you need and will guide you through their programmes of learning. But not every teaching style will suit you, not every mentor will have the skills you need to help you to go forward.

As 2012 draws to a close many of us will look back and assess our year and the achievements we’ve made, the lessons we’ve learnt and the goals we’ve reached during the year.

For some it’s been a successful year and as you make your way around the various blogs you visit you’ll see posts detailing their success throughout the year and their plans for 2013.

Good on them, it’s really nice to see that some have had a successful year and achieved everything they wanted to. If you fall into this category congratulations, I know it takes a lot of hard work sticking to the plan and not getting distracted along the way.

How much attention do you pay to your sidebars and the content you’ve added to them?

Do you ever check the links or banners you’ve placed there to ensure the sites are still up and running?

I read a post by Adrienne Smith recently in which she mentioned some of the mistakes that bloggers make. One of which was Two columned sidebars and the content of them being overloaded.

So I’ve been checking some sidebars and the content that people have in them and guess what…. Adrienne’s absolutely right… not that I ever doubted her!

Some of the blogs I’ve looked at have all manor of CRAP on their sidebars and seem to have placed everything but the kitchen sink in them. I’ve seen no end of “My Favourite Blogs” linked to that have been taken off line.

As Thanksgiving approaches us, even though we don’t celebrate it here in the UK, I’d like to give thanks to my blogging friends who’ve given me loads of support this year.

Due to circumstances beyond my control I haven’t been online as much as I normally would have, yet my blogging friends still come and leave me comments knowing that I’m unable to return visits as much as I’d like to.

Blogging, to me, isn’t just about promoting my products or telling people what I’ve been up to. It’s also a great way of learning new skills without having to go through loads of trial and error mistakes, although they’re not bad things either