Today I am going to show you a pretty decent way to make some extra cash, or to at least increase your website traffic.

Everyone has used a screensaver, and there are plenty of people who still do. A screen saver is not just a collection of pretty picture moving around on your screen, they actually do play a role in saving your screen! Screen savers are one of the easiest ways to attract people to your website. When a screen saver is made, you are able to put a footer message, for example, on the screen saver, perhaps saying, “Created by Webtrepreneur.co.za”.

Before we start making a screen saver, we need to things:

• Screensaver creation software
• Stock photographs

A program which I have used to create screensavers is called Saver Forge. It is freeware, and is downloadable here. The download is small, and the program installs in a few seconds, and allows you to create a screen saver in a few minutes. Stock photographs - A stock photograph is a photograph with no royalties, which basically means that the photographer took the photograph and has not claimed it as his own property, and is therefore legal to use and distribute how you wish. Finding websites which offer free stock photos is not a simple task, so I have included a few links below for you to start with:

• http://www.free-photographs.net/index.html
• http://www.istockphoto.com/index.php
• http://freestockphotos.com/
• http://www.freeimages.co.uk/

There are actually plenty of resources online, which offer free stock photographs, you just need to spend some time googling for them. But for now, just take a look at the ones I have listed above.

I am not going to go into explaining how to create a screensaver with Saver Forge, as the process is extremely easy, and once you have installed it, I don’t think you will have any problems, of you do, leave me a comment here, and I will help you out. Below are two screen savers I made, which you may download and look at if you want an example:

• Ferrari Screensaver
• Audi Screensaver

Right, let’s talk a little more about monetizing these screen savers. This is where things will get a little more technical, but if you can take your time reading through this, I’m sure you will be able to follow.

There are a number of affiliate companies online, which pay for installations, one easy example, which most of us know by now is Google Toolbar. Each time someone clicks your referal link and installs the toolbar, Google pays you out a referal fee. What does this have to do with a screensaver? Well, read this next paragraph and hopefully feel inspired.

When you create a screensaver, you can compile it into an install file, which is effectively an .exe file. Most people know that an .exe file cannot be edited, even with some fancy software you will struggle. So, what we want to do, is rename this screensaver.exe file to perhaps images.db. Now we need to create something to link us between installing software and installing the screensaver, so what we are going to do is create a batch file. At this point we will have three files:

1. Images.db - the actual screensaver.exe file renamed
2. Tempfiles.db - this is actually an .exe file to install the google toolbar, for example.
3. Screensaver.bat - the linking file, which can be renamed to .exe as far as I know.

The batch file will contain commands to rename Images.db to screensaver.exe, and rename Tempfiles.db to googleinstall.exe and then run both of these programs at the same time. We will first execute the screensaver.exe file, which will ask the user if he/she would like to install the screensaver, and then it will run the googleinstall program, which will ask the user if he/she would like to install Google Toolbar. I’m sure that you can now put two and two together and successfully arrive at the beauty of this idea. You can get information on the various commands required for the batch file here or here.

Once you have created the three files above, you will need to zip them up together, and then distribute however you choose to do so. Perhaps on freeware websites, perhaps on your own website, or even via email to your friends. Beware of install programs which install spyware or adware, you don’t want people downloading your screensaver and finding out that they suddenly have spyware running on their computers, as this is just not fair!

Give it a bash, perhaps you will land up with some nice extra revenue, and if you use your mind here, I’m sure you can think of many other ways of incorporating interesting things into your screensaver install file. *hint* launching a website while they are installing, leading them to your website, which contains Google Adsense or other information

The Webtrepreneur wishes you luck!

I came across these two great programs while actually trying to code my own little C# application to make postings easier than having to use wordpress wp-admin area posting system.

Windows Live Writer

This program is wonderful. Download it here, and once you have downloaded it, install it and get started, honestly, it’s that simple. What it does is, when you install it, it will ask you whether you use myspace or another webblog, in my case, I chose other because Webtrepreneur is powered by Wordpres. The following screen asked for my address, so I punched in ‘https://webtrepreneur.co.za’, and then the program asked for my login details (This is the username and password you use when you access wp-admin). It then makes a connection to your webblog. Once that is done, blogging couldn’t be easier! The program comes with a quick view mode changer, which allows you to move from standard view to html view to web preview view with the click of a button. There are quicky links to add images, tags and web links. WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) editors make things so easy. Take a peak at the image below:

Windows Live Writer Firefox Plugin

Another great piece of software. This is a Firefox Plugin, which means you downlod the file, install it, and it appears in your Firefox Browser. You get a couple of options with the plugin, the first one being: add a new blog entry.. this will basically load up Windows Live Writer. You simply type in the title for the post, and type your post out and click submit! The second feature is pretty handy - Let’s say you are currently reading a blog entry on someone elses website and it catches your eye and you want to write about the same topic, you simply choose the “Blog This” option, and Windows Live Writer will load with the a premade link to the article you were reading - damn handy!

Here are the links: Information | Download Windows Live Writer | Download the Firefox Plugin

Blogging couldn’t be easier! This post is posted using Windows Live Writer.

I have spoken quite a bit about SEO (search engine optimization), I’ve covered a few topics on how to go about optimizing your website, and I have listed a couple small online programs to help you achieve this, but what I did not do, is release the big guns!

Webceo

Webceo is probably the most powerful search engine optimization software available on the Internet. It is comprised of 12 SEO tools in one, and packs a power punch when it comes to getting your website ranked in the top results on any search engine.

1. Optimize

• Find best keywords. Our keyword mining software will help you pick out keywords with lowest competition and highest demand, i.e. best from the SEO POV.
• Optimize your site for high rankings: the page analyzer built into our SEO software will give you detailed SEO advice in plain English.

2. Promote

• Submit your URLs to search engines by using our wise and safe SEO submission software.
• Know who links to your site, and to your competition. Our link analysis software reports inbound links, and even analyzes their text which is important for SEO.
• Find link partners and build link popularity. Any SEO software would be incomplete without a tool for building link popularity.
• Manage paid search campaigns. Though not directly related to organic SEO, PPC software is an important Web marketing tool.

3. Analyze

• Check your rankings with search engines. Web CEO software allows for tracking your SEO success with an advanced ranking checker and keywords trends.
• Track and analyze your visitors, ad campaigns, transactions, revenues, etc. with more than 120 live analytical reports built into our software.

4. Maintain

• Pinpoint broken links and other errors on your site
• Edit your Web pages in the WYSIWYG mode
• Upload HTML and other files to your server
• Monitor your website to know if it is up or down

If this does not catch your attention, then I don’t know what you are thinking, and perhaps you should read over these points again. This software will basically do everything you need to optimize your website. I tested out the software with this website, and I have see a huge success already, and it’s only been two days since I used it! The software is not hard to use at all, the interface is very user friendly, and they offer a useful help guide, which you can download as well.

The software is free - yes, that’s right, FREE.

The Webtrepreneur recommends it!

Read More | Download