Here’s a quick web hosting review of the GoDaddy’s Economy Plan on their Singapore-based servers.

If you live in South East Asia, India and Australasia this got to be good news to you. Now you have one more reliable web hosting option at very affordable pricing.

GoDaddy means Huge Storage Space, Unlimited Bandwidth

GoDaddy web hosting offers you a lot more storage space(10GB) and unlimited bandwidth for as little as USD3.99/month (12-month prepaid).

  ==> Unlimited Hosting at GoDaddy.com!

This is probably one of the cheapest web hosting plans with unlimited bandwidth you can get for a Singapore-based data center. All the other local hosting plans will cost you at least SGD5/month for a paltry 0.1GB storage and 3GB bandwidth.

Fast Local Access Speed: 25ms Ping

And you get very fast speed when accessing Go Daddy APAC data center. I know because I have been hosting one of my new website with GoDaddy Singapore data center for the past 10 days.

Affordable VPS Hosting Plans

Now that I am quite happy with Go Daddy shared web hosting, I really hope to upgrade to a $29.99/mo VPS hosting so that I can migrate my other domains to GoDaddy Singapore VPS plan.

And you get an even better deal on domain registration and web hosting when you sign up as a reseller.

With more people spending more time on the Internet and increasing online marketing activities, web hosting, be it shared, VPS, dedicated servers or cloud hosting is expected to grow exponentially in Asia over the next 5 years.

So don’t wait, go get the Unlimited Hosting at GoDaddy.com! now.

What an audacious title! Is this an April Fools’ joke. The journalist reported that the newly launched map site, OneMap is “Singapore’s own version of Google Maps”.

First Impression of OneMap Singapore

The map is very high resolution and detailed. It is better than www.map.gov.sg which is now redirecting to www.onemap.sg.

In terms of resolution and information details, Google Maps really “got-no-fight”. Really impressed with what the Singapore government can do. I think I will start using OneMap to find accurate location of places and bus stop information but I am not about to abandon Google Maps yet. Google Maps still load up so much faster. And I am so used to using Google Maps – be it on the PC or iPhone.

OneMap Singapore may have very detailed information but not the latest. I could not find Parco Marina Bay at the time of writing.

OneMap SLA is Slower

With OneMap Singapore, there is still a lot more getting used to and if people don’t use it often then they won’t use it at all. I really think beside the detailed information on OneMap, SLA should also have to make it work faster. Imagine the agonizing snail pace if I were to access OneMap SLA with a cheap netbook connected to the free Wireless@SG.

Has the government invested in a technology that requires the general public to use fast computers and high-speed broadband? Hopefully, the slow loading webpage will not turn it into a white elephant.

Also, there is another “small” problem and I think it’s the common canonical URL issue. If you type in just http://onemap.sg you will get an error in Internet Explorer. I got similar error when I used Safari and Chrome too.

I think many people will just enter “onemap.sg” in the browser address bar. Otherwise, they will be using the search box to type in one map or onemap singapore or even onemap.com which will not yield any result related to the SLA’s site.

So do you think we can “Forget Google” and use OneMap Singapore instead?

However, ready-made web design templates are not poor quality works. And, there is nothing wrong with using web design templates to build your new websites. You just need to customize it to suit your taste or corporate identity.

In fact, I find myself using web design templates from TemplateWorld.com more often lately. It is definitely cheaper than hiring a web designer.

Reduce Cost, Save Time and Increase Productivity

Usually, it will take between 1 to 2 weeks to get the web design and layout ready. With ready-made web design templates and armed with some basic Photoshop skills, I am able to customize a template to my expectation within 3 days. The time saved for the design stage can be spent on content creation and search engine optimization. Consequently, the cost of the website development project is further reduced.

If you have not used a web design template before, go try it now. WordPress templates start from as little as US$40 at TemplateMonster.com.

And if you have to create new websites every month, you may want to subscribe to TemplateWorld.com for US$49.95 with 6 months access to over 15,000 templates.

The Yahoo Search Marketing affiliate program is managed by CJ.com. And this Yahoo affiliate program actually earns me affiliate checks. Not a lot of money but still good pocket money.

Thank you for reading my blog and visiting those sponsored links.

I didn’t expect many people would be interested to use Yahoo Search Marketing in Southeast Asia. It was as popular as 3 years ago when Yahoo search had more than 50% market share. Still, Yahoo is the number 2 and there is still a lot of traffic going to Yahoo search.

Now I think it is time to consider and use Yahoo search marketing because:

1. it is pay-per-click, you pay only when people visit your page
2. there is lesser competitors compared with Google AdWords
3. people who use Yahoo are less tech savvy (actually less geeky)
4. your cost per customer is likely to be lower than AdWords or Facebook

So if you need an alternative to Google AdWords, go try out Yahoo Search Marketing. Click at the banner below and register today.

Upcoming Event:

IT Show 2012
8-11 March 2012
Suntec Singapore
Levels 1, 2, 3, 4 & 6
Opening hours: 12noon to 9pm
Admission Free

What were the Search Terms used to look for PC Show and IT Fair?

You will see that most people were using the 3-word keyphrases to look for the “it show” and “pc show” related search terms.

Here’s a list of keyword phrases which people use at search engines and ended up at my blog:

1. sitex price list
2. pc show singapore
3. singapore pc fair
4. computer fair singapore
5. next pc show
6. singapore it show
7. it show in singapore
8. pc fair singapore
9. it fair singapore 2010
10. singapore pc fair 2010
11. it show singapore 2010
12. singapore it show 2010
13. singapore computer show
14. next pc show in singapore
15. singapore expo computer fair 2010

The above keywords list is a segment of my keyword inventory – there are thousands of search terms that drive traffic to my blog everyday.

So why not start to blog about the next PC show in Singapore?

And if you need ideas to ignite your creative juice, why not check out what I’d written on the coming IT Show Singapore.

Or you can read about previous events…

• IT Show 2009 Buzz Already Started
• PC Show 2009 Shopping List
• Comex 2010
• Sitex 2008

More Consumer Electronic, IT and PC Shows

As for the upcoming events, here’s a list of IT and PC shows lined up for the rest of the year:

• IT Show – usually in March to coincide with the 1-week school holiday
• PC Show – usually in June, the 4-week school holiday
• COMEX – usually in August, over the weekend just before the 1-week school and
• SITEX – in late November, also during school holiday, just weeks before the Christmas so you can shop for a digital camera or a notebook computer for your loved ones.

Here’s the actual offer email I received yesterday. It would have been nice to have a “k” next to the $30

How To Estimate The Value Of My Blog

One of the easiest ways is the use this widget: How Much is My Blog Worth. You can see the estimated value of this blog at the box on the right by Technorati.

However, I think my blog is worth more than that.

Here’s why.

1. It would probably cost US$50 to US$150 to set up such blog.
2. There are more than 190 posts in this blog. The price to hire a blogger to write a blog post range from $5 to $500. Let’s say each post in this blog costs US$10, that would be US$1,900 for 190 posts.
3. The cost to hire a part-time Web master the host/maintain this blog would cost US$600 a year. So it’s US$2,400 for the 4 years this blog has been in existence.
4. Then for all the Google first page rankings and SEO-friendly features of this blog, you probably have to pay US$3,000 to US$8,000. So let’s take the mid-point price, US$5,000.

Estimated worth of this blog based on the amount of work and man-hours spent: US$9,400.

And then you can add the value estimated by the Technorati widget to the US$9,400 to get a better picture of how much my blog is worth – easily exceeds US$14,000.

Would you have sold this blog for 30 Canadian dollars?

http://mywebculture.googlepages.com

and

http://shihengcheong.googlepages.com

and they never got indexed and ranked. Maybe they will get indexed now that I put the links here. Anyway, if you think Google give preferential treatment to pages hosted in their websites then other search engines such as Yahoo and MSN might just blacklist these pages or keep them in the sandbox longer!

Ultimately, I believe you still have to following recommended webmasters’ guidelines and proper SEO practices to get your web pages do well in the SERP.

As for the above 2 websites, they are sub-domains of GooglePages.com and no matter high well ranked the GooglePages.com is, it has nothing to do with the sub-domains unless there is linking between these pages withing these websites.

I also made a new post on STOMP website and how SPH (Singapore Press Holding) was using woman and girls in bikini to drive traffic. You can see colorful photos of half naked girls in nearly every other pages of the national newspaper.

At_A_Glance

• Modified blogspot template
• Added links to a couple of my other blogs using chicklet
• Made a new post on STOMP and bikini girls ad in the Straits Times

Ok, ok… Make Money Right? Most of us build websites to make money. And if that is the case, it’ll be easy to measure success. You would set a target as to how much you want to make with a website right at the beginning. No? Most of us do not have the slightest idea how to build a money making website so I understand why we did not set a monetary target in the first place. Otherwise, it would be a lame reply… “As much as possible!”.

If you make more money than you initially invested, you’ll be in profit. Typically, a DIY website would cost you less than $100 to set up and maintain for a year or even two. So if you make $100 in the first year, you break even. If you make $100 every month from the 6th month onward you are doing really well. So build 20 such websites and you could probably tell your boss you don’t really need that job!

But do you know…

• How to make $100 per month with a website?
• What do you sell to make money?
• How much traffic do you need to make that monthly cheque?

It is true that your website revenue depends on the number and quality of visitors to your website regardless of what you sell – hard goods, e-products, subscription or advertising space (e.g. Google Adsense).

One of the easiest ways to monetize your traffic is to put up Google Ads by registering to be an Adsense publisher. Content website is probably where Google wants the ads to appear so you will need unique and useful content. You will need to optimize each of your web page for search engine so that you will get free traffic from Google, Yahoo, MSN and etc.

So you can see that the success of a website is a function of visitor traffic. Now, let’s determine how much traffic you’ll need to make a $100 cheque every month. We shall take the example of an Adsense publisher. Since you are a new publisher, let’s target less competitive keywords which you can still get ranked in the top 3 pages with proper SEO techniques. Each click will probably earn you $0.10 or less. You will need at least 1000 clicks to earn a $100 cheque. That will work to 33 clicks every day. If 5 out of 100 visitors click at one ad, you will need more than 650 visitors to your website every day. And that’s a lot of traffic for a new website for a newbie publisher!

If your website is not already generating 500 unique visitors a day then you’ll have to

1. Add more content to target more keywords.
2. Promote your website by submitting articles and press release.
3. Solicit backlinks by submitting to directories and other related websites.
4. Rewriting your content to make it search engine friendly and interesting to your readers.

Finally, one more tip for you to find out if your content is liked by your visitors. Go check you server log and see how many people bookmarked your website – people usually bookmark a website when they find it interesting and useful. You should have at least 30% of your visitors bookmarked your website.
###

Let’s face it, Google is bigger than Yahoo and MSN combined – that is to say even if Bill Gates were to buy over Yahoo search, MSN can only be number 2. So it’s time to consider seriously just optimizing for Google instead of wasting time on the rest of the search engines for they may never catch up!

Google Shores Up Search
Tuesday March 28, 1:57 pm ET
By Alyce Lomax

Despite rivals’ best efforts, Google (Nasdaq: GOOG – News) has increased its share of the search market, widening its lead in the space. It’s clear that Google has made itself the brand in search…

According to ComScore data for February, Google increased its market share to 42.3%, from 36.3% on a year-over-year basis. High-profile rivals Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO – News) and Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT – News) both dipped. Yahoo!’s search share fell to 27.6% from 31.1%, while MSN’s share dropped to 13.5% from 16.3%. In an interesting aside, IAC/InterActiveCorp.’s (Nasdaq: IACI – News) Ask.com increased to 6% from 5.3%. (Ask.com recently dropped long-time gentleman’s gentleman Jeeves and has embarked on a TV ad campaign entreating folks to give its search tools a whirl.)

As for Microsoft, I have no comment — well, other than the fact that I’ve made it clear in the past that I’m a bear, so why beat a dead horse. Although I have colleagues who think highly of Microsoft’s efforts to step up its search features, its rep for being an innovator — or even for being particularly on time with its products — isn’t too hot. Needless to say, the Vista delay hasn’t helped in that department.