Web Site Tools Reviewed
Here are some web site or general computer tools I've reviewed
These are real reviews of Windows software for the rest of us, web site hosting companies and web software. I've really tried these programs or hosting companies or use them myself.
Today, it seems like everyone has a web site. I've been working on the Internet since 1986, which makes me an old-timer - like Al Gore, I guess. Over the years, I've used hundreds of scripts or programs for webmasters and found many of them useless or at best, failed to deliver on their promises. Here are some web site tools I either use, or have installed on web sites I've built. On some of them I make a commission if you buy, on some of them I don't, but recommend them because I like them. I reviewed and tried at least three of the competitors in each category before spending my own money. Mostly these are relatively inexpensive, but are seldom freeware or the cheapest in their categories. To me, they are the best values.
Oh yeah, I am available to design web sites. If you like this one, it is one of my simple designs. What is more important is that you found it. I am good at search engine optimization and that is worth a lot.
Website Visitor Tracking and Analytics Software
I stumbled onto Hit Sniffer and am frankly amazed. It not only tracks visitors, search terms and so on as the Google Analytics but it does it in real time. I tried some expensive programs that do the same thing ($25 a month) and this does something they don't - it tracks the external links you have for other sites. So if you sell ads, you can say with authority that 3,129 visitors from your site clicked on the ad. Or if you just have links, you can see how valuable they are. And it will track the links that others clicked to get to you. All the stats are in real time, which is quite fun to watch.
All this for less than $10 a month. But wait! There's more. It also comes with proactive chat. Anyway, I use Hit Sniffer and am proud of it. Check it out by clicking here.
Web Site Hosting
I have been around the block several times with web hosters. I only recommend web hosting companies I use/have used or friends use. Right now, I needed a service that offered VPS (Virtual Private Servers) and the choice of Linux or Microsoft hosting.
Choose them 1&1 if you want reliable hosting and need extra services. Their dedicated servers are also quite reasonable. They also have inexpensive plain hosting (as low as $4 a month).
Classified Ads For Your Website
You don't see a classifieds section on this site. That's because I bought and tried several classifieds scripts over the years and none of them worked well. Fast-forward to today. I have seen a script on Mexico-My-Space that is simple, works well and seems to avoid spam robots. The script is BM Classifieds, the web site is I've talked to Greg, the programmer and owner and he is really quite a good guy - the kind you'd like to do business with or invite to your barbecue. He doesn't promise you that you will make a fortune with classifieds. But he promises and delivers a solid program.
Newsletter and Email Marketing
I have used a couple of commercial newsletter managers as well as the free ones like Phplist. You could get by with the free ones or the cheap ones. Some of the commercial ones are more trouble than they are worth, as are most of the free ones, if you aren't a coding genius. I used SendStudio (now Interspire) and was initially impressed, but found it to not be worth the money. So I don't have a good newsletter program to recommend yet.
Web site design
Dreamweaver (an Adobe product) is still the best web design program. FrontPage is an affront to many designers. I used it to start and graduated. Namo WebEditor is another I used to use until I wised up. If you are on a budget, it will do. But if you can spring for Dreamweaver. It costs, but is worth it. If you can swing it, get the CS5.5 bundle. They upgrade every 12 months now, so the new CS6 won't be available until mid-2012. CS5.5 adds the ability to design for mobile devices.
Web statistics
I still use Goggle Analytics stats in addition to Hit Sniffer. Google is free. Your hosting program also probably has free AWStats or something similar. For many, that is enough. It was for me for years.
Menu Makers
If you want DHTL menus that are truly search friendly, the menu creator here worked fine for me.
DHTML menu creator Menu Creator with site map Complete Web Site tools Mail Expert Follow up tools
Affiliate Managers
An affiliate manager program that offers more SEO benefits is Clickinc. Theirs is a hosted program with a monthly fee, but they do offer to integrate with your custom shopping cart, which is something that iDev won't do. Check them out here.
Another affiliate manager program that I have installed on clients' sites. It works well and is around a hundred bucks.
FTP programs
Why is something so simple so complicated? I was happy with CuteFtp until they couldn't find my registration after my house fire and would not validate that I had a paid version. So I bought WS_ftp. This worked just fine for 13 months, then kept crashing. Customer support would not support it after 1 year, nor would they answer a simple email. I was not about to spend more money with them.
Got FileZilla (free). Once I got it to work it was fine. Got SmartFTP (trial). Seems to work fine. Tried HS FTPExplorer. Kept crashing. Tried CoreFTP Lite (free). I was really impressed. But I ended up with AceFtp3-Pro. Now use CoffeCup FTP and it works very well, especially 'keep-alive.'
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