Positive Thinking - Are You A Positive Person?

• A New Category For My Blog - Positive Thinking! •
• Changin’ Our Mindset - No More Stinkin’ Thinkin’ •

Do you REALLY  believe that by focusing your thoughts on positive expectations … meaning your hopes, dreams, desires, wishes and the resulting outcomes … that you will REALLY  receive and experience positive results? Hmmm?? Do you practice positive thinking in your life?

Positive thinking produces positive results!Well, I do!  I didn’t used to a few years ago. Honestly. Oh sure, I would say I wanted this or that good thing to happen to me, or that I wished my finances would improve, or that I hoped that new opportunities of one sort or another would come knocking at my door, but I just didn’t have a true spirit of positiveness and positive thinking instilled into the deepest core of my thought patterns.

Because I am now such a believer of the power of our thoughts, and how our thoughts really color and affect our entire life’s circumstances, I feel it is very important for me to begin to add posts containing words of positive thoughts and encouragement to my blog. And so, today marks that day!  :)

Here’s what I’d like to share with you today:

~~ “Your life will go in the direction of your MOST PROMINENT thoughts! ~~

How To Check For Broken Links On Your Website

• Broken Links Are Not A Good Thing! •
• Easily Check All The Links On Your Website •

I ran a broken link check yesterday after receiving an email from a woman who had visited one of my websites, and wanted me to know she loved the content I shared so freely, but thought I ought to know I had many broken links and also that my contact form just wasn’t working!

” … but I do want to mention that on your website I was unsure if you got my e-mail. I kept hitting ’submit’ but it didn’t do anything. Maybe it was my computer. Hopefully you didn’t receive a bunch of those duplicates. Sorry if you did. Plus, on your website, sometimes the links didn’t work. Like I said, maybe it was my computer or the server. Just thought you would like to know.”

This is NOT what any website owner wants to hear, let alone someone like me who promotes high quality website design services as part of her repertoire!

Even though I knew darned well I didn’t have any broken links, and also that my ‘Contact Me’ form was in 100% working order, I did two things to double-check the situation.

How To Check For Broken Links On Your Site - For Free

There is a great free piece of software called “Link Sleuth” - download it here. It’s been around for quite awhile and I can tell you it is great! It’s safe (no spyware or anything like that associated with it), easy to install on your computer and it works.

It checks all the the links on your site: the ones that link all your web pages internally, and any links you have on your site pointing out to other websites. You can set parameters of what it will/won’t check. It’s very efficient.

So, after running it, just like I was sure of … NO broken links on my website. :)

Then, I tested out my contact form and again, just as I was sure of … no problems with it submitting my name and email address. It also took me right to the customized ‘Thank You’ page I always put in place for all my contact forms.

And yes, I certainly emailed the individual back, letting her know I appreciated the heads-up, but that unfortunately the problems she encountered were on her end and with her computer (or ISP), and not with my websites!

It’s a good practice to periodically run a full site broken link check on all your sites. How often to run the check is up to you, but is also dependant upon how often you make changes to your website, and how many links you have pointing out to other sites. Remember that these other pages you have links pointing to may become non-existent - the website may no longer be available/active, or sometimes the web page you are linking to gets deleted.

Checking for broken links is just one of the many ways to maintain a search engine friendly AND visitor friendly website. ;)

Mercury Retrograde Effects In Your Daily Business

• Mercury Is Retrograde September 24 to October 15, 2008 •
• I’m No Astrologer But I Pay Attention To This Phenomenon •

Maybe you are saying “Mercury retrograde? Where the heck are you going with this post, Claudia?” I’ll tell you …

Oh boy is communication starting to get affected, both mine and with other business people around me. Stick with me here and you might learn some interesting information.  ;)

First though, I must tell you I am not someone who is very knowledgeable about astrology. But I have had my astrological chart cast for me professionally. And I do believe the planets have an affect upon me. I am not one to bother to read a generic “daily horoscope” as I do realize that our birth charts may be such that we really are nothing like the Sun sign we were born under. This holds true for me, thusly I learned long ago to not pay too much attention to generic horoscopes.

I do not mean to offend anyone who enjoys their daily horoscope in the newspaper or via the internet! I’m just honestly stating my personal opinion and telling you I am very far removed from the typical traits associated with my Sun sign. That’s all.

Anyway without trying to give you an education about what happens when Mercury goes retrograde, let alone what a retrograde is, I suggest you search “retrograde Mercury” and you’ll find many fine sites with good information.

Basically, Mercury is the planet that rules communication. And in business, well … communication is a large part of what makes business take place! After all, we depend upon our telephones, our emails, contracts, invoices, faxes … you name it, if communication of any sort is involved, I have come to learn since 1986 that a Mercury retrograde can affect my business dealings.

The astrological effects can manifest from a very slight, yet noticeable slow down in communications from customers, vendors, etc. all the way to big goof-ups such as major mistakes in contract wording (“but I proof read that darn thing three times before I sent it???), to things like what happened this morning to me. I was waiting for a live webinar to take place. I called in about 5 minutes before it was scheduled, to make sure I’d have no problems with the connection. (Remember, I keep vigilant during a retro-Mercury!).

Well, when I got into the webinar, I could hear the two moderators bemoaning the fact the featured guest speaker was not there yet, was not reachable via his email, nor could they reach him by any of his phone numbers. On top of this, they thought no one else could hear them bantering back and forth about what to do, where could he be, how could he have forgotten he was supposed to teach the webinar class, etc.

It was kind of amusing to me, and I thought “Ah ha … you don’t have to explain anything to me … Mercury is retrograde!!  :D

Evidently they could not hear those of us that were waiting on the lines, so someone used the “email a question” feature and told these people that we could hear everything they were saying! Then they started profusely apologizing saying “oh dear … we’ve just been informed everyone can hear what we are saying!”

And yes … they also told us the webinar would definitely be cancelled due to the no-show of the guest speaker!

That’s a pretty good example of just one of the types of snafus a retro-Mercury effect can do to us! The best laid plans can just go haywire and leave everybody scratching their heads as to how things got so goofed up.

As of today’s date, I am beginning to personally experience a light effect on anything having to do with communication in my own business dealings. As example, even though I swear I found no typos in an autoresponder email that I helped a client send out yesterday … there were three dumb typos in it! For the life of me, I read that email over carefully before I loaded it up for her.

That’s not at all like me. I am very careful of things like that, so yup … I really believe it is the Mercury retrograde phenomenon taking place.

Be aware that depending upon many different factors, a retrograde will affect some of us more strongly, or adversely, than it will other people. Right now I am keeping my fingers crossed I only have “light” snafus.

Take this for what you wish. I’m just sharing with you that we’re into the middle of this retrograde; that I am personally experiencing what it is doing all around me; and that I, for one, am going to just make sure to be very aware of anything as it pertains to communication. And I am especially going to slow down and re-read everything I write, whether a simple email to a friend … or a new SEO contract to a client. Oh yes, gonna double-dot my i’s and double-cross my t’s!!

I have seen some retrogrades really wreck havoc and be quite problematic. I’ve seen some be almost problem-free. Also, I do have many other friends and acquaintances who are business owners, who agree that a retrograde Mercury affects there businesses, too. So, that causes me to pause and take notice. It’s not “just me”.

I’ve come to pay attention to the thrice a year retro-Mercury’s as this is one aspect of astrology I have found to warrant my careful attention. Hey … to be forewarned is forearmed!

Though as is said … your mileage may vary. If nothing else, read up a little about it. You might find that being aware of when Mercury goes retrograde to be somewhat useful if not downright helpful to help keep your business communications flowing smoothly.

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