info [ AT ] redcardinal [ DOT ] ie
Happy Birthday Red Cardinal
Exactly 1 Year.
203 Posts.
1,417 Comments.
For me Blogging has been quite a life experience. Seriously. I’ve met so many people both on-line and off. I’ve partaken in some of the most fantastic conversations with some of the cleverest Internet people in Ireland and beyond.
Blogging for business?
Blogging is the life-blood of my business. I have never advertised, and this blog is the genesis of most of my leads. If you were to ask me what the one most successful outcome of business blogging has been it would be this:
My blog has created a brand recognition of both my name, and that of my company, within my defined target market which would be hard to achieve via any other medium.
The cost of all this? My time and 1 WordPress install (thank you WordPress).
To my clients who have kept food on my table
Of course without clients I wouldn’t still be here. So to everyone who approached me and those who commissioned my services over the past year – it has been a pleasure working with you. This next year is going to be even better.
Biggest thank you goes to you
Lastly, just to say that the very best part of the last year in my mind is the many comments people have left here. To all of you – my sincerest thanks. It’s your comments that have made this the most fun by far. Please keep it up.
Some of my personal favourite moments
1. Golden Spiders – Are These Really Ireland’s Best Websites? – My alternative review of the Golden Spiders. If you want to know how this all started out check out the comments on this post about W3C (I think there were more comments there than on any other post).
2. eGovernment Accessibility Analysis – That got me on the radio a few times 
A big thank you to Mr. Lost Luggage for helping me out with that post.
3. Click Through Rate of Google Search Results – If you were to ask me what is the single most useful SEO post here I’d have to say this one. ROI analysis and prediction is the toughest part of SEO. This post gives you some data that Google would never ever have released without the slip by AOL.
4. How NOT to steal someone’s CSS design – One of Ireland’s finest web designers served up some doctored CSS to a thief. One of the funnier moments (and there were a few).
5. Helping out some bloggers – Spiderability is the First Step to Search Engine Nirvana (Siopaeile.com), Getting you site out of supplemental index (Krishna De), Page titles and SEO (First Partners), SEO for Blogspot (Blogger) sites (multiple sites), SEO for photoblogs (McAwilliams), Corporate Blogging SEO (Bubble Brosthers), PageRank Flow, Comment Feeds in Supplementals, NoFollow & robots.txt (BifSniff). I think there’s actually some great tips in there, even if I do say so myself.
6. 13 Deadly Google Sins – I wrote this post as a honeypot article. It worked. Now if only the biggest design houses in Ireland would read it and then pin it to each monitor. Every day I am shocked anew by some of the monumental cock-ups I’m asked to look at. And they’re just the newly released websites…
Finally, a big apology to anyone who I pissed off along my journey. There are many of you I’m sure. But hopefully I’ve helped a few folk along the way also.
Oh, and one last apology. To those waiting for their free review. Hand on heart you’ll have them as soon as I find a small window of opportunity.
Again, Thank You.
Congrats. Is this post linkbait too?
Comment by Damien Mulley — July 18, 2007 @ 9:04 am
congrats Richard, thanks for all the tips & keep up the good work.
Comment by paul — July 18, 2007 @ 9:10 am
Lá Breithe shona dhuit!
)
(what?, no link to the very first post…
Comment by Cormac — July 18, 2007 @ 9:20 am
Well done, excellent and congratulations.
Comment by Parnell — July 18, 2007 @ 9:23 am
@Damien – actually no. Just something to mark what I see as quite a strange day. One year went by awfully quick. But all links are, as always, very welcome
@Paul, Cormac, Parnell – thanks.
Comment by Richard Hearne — July 18, 2007 @ 9:41 am
Congratulations Richard. It has been eventful all right. And you piss people off? Never!
Comment by Dave Davis — July 18, 2007 @ 9:50 am
Happy Birthday, Red Cardinal.
Hope that the next year of blogging is even more enjoyable and fulfilling.
Comment by Bill — July 18, 2007 @ 12:17 pm
Happy Birthday, young man. It’s hard to believe you’re only 1. You looked a few years older than that the other week. Must have been the jet lag!
Comment by Ken — July 18, 2007 @ 3:39 pm
@Dave – You know better than most!
@Bill – Thanks, your comment is much appreciated. TBH I owe quite a piece of my small success to you and the work you do.
@Ken – One of the best people I’ve met online is a guy called John Mueller. He wrote GsiteCrawler. He recently shared with me his secret to the 30 hour day. It involved cycling down a hill at close to the speed of light in order to make time last longer. It was very funny at the time
Comment by Richard Hearne — July 18, 2007 @ 4:19 pm
Congrats Richard! The first I heard of you was the GS posts last year and was glad to finally meet you on a couple of occasions, even if I was hungover on both of them! Heck of a dream start you’ve had!!! Best wishes for the future and good work so far! Rgds, Dave
Comment by David Behan — July 18, 2007 @ 4:26 pm
Congrats on one year of blogging
Comment by Michele — July 18, 2007 @ 7:27 pm
Hi, and happy birthday!
Impressive results achieved over just one year, so here’s to many more years of massive success to come!
Comment by Gleb — July 18, 2007 @ 7:48 pm
@David – I’ve been fortunate
@Michele – ta. All I have to do now is try to find time to keep it up…
Comment by Richard Hearne — July 19, 2007 @ 3:55 pm
Congrats Richard
Here’s to another year :O)
Comment by Peter Knight — July 19, 2007 @ 3:57 pm
Many congrats Richard and here’s hoping you have many more!
Comment by LT — July 19, 2007 @ 9:40 pm
@Gleb – thanks for the props.
@Peter – really sorry we couldn’t hook up. Frantic doesn’t even come close to the week I’ve had…
@LT – Very gracious. Ta
Comment by Richard Hearne — July 21, 2007 @ 5:17 pm
Congratulations Richard. I look forward to more great posts from the Red Cardinal.
Comment by Gavin — July 24, 2007 @ 12:27 pm
Hey Gavin – thanks for that. Sorry for delay in responding. Doesn’t take much to see that I’m neglecting the place something terrible
Comment by Richard Hearne — July 28, 2007 @ 3:11 pm
I have been away on holidays, so I am a bit late but belated birthday greetings, and many thanks for all the info you offer on your blog
Comment by McAWilliams — July 30, 2007 @ 10:35 am