60% Reduced Cost by Optimizing Google Maps API Calls
Would you like to save a chunk on your Google Maps API cost and have your maps API consumption volume drop like a rock? Then read on. Anyone working with Google Maps API knows that it can get expensive quickly, especially if it is a core part of your product. Depending what your implementation requirements are and how your site or app relies on maps, you may not only be paying for the visual maps, but geocoding, routing, places, and more, and all...How to use Cloudflare’s “Access” 2 Factor Authentication to Help Secure Admin & Login Pages For WordPress (or Anything Else)
Cloudflare’s Access feature is one of favorite features they provide because it makes it super easy to implement 2 Factor authentication. First, know that this isn’t 100% secure and you should implement additional security measures both in your WordPress installation and at the server level, because if someone finds the server IP address they may be able to bypass this completely. However, I am using it primarily to stop the first layer of simple brute-force attempts and bot attacks. And it...
3 Tips to Drastically Reduce Site Load Time. Mine Dropped By 50%
If you are reading this post you probably already know that site speed is a ranking factor and beyond that it’s a huge player in whether your visitors will be happy. Basically I look at it like this: Slow sites = unhappy visitors = higher bounce rates = worse rankings. With just a few tweaks (2 of them very simple, and 1 a bit more involved) I was able to cut the load time in half. My load time problem: One of my client...Fix WordPress Post SMTP “Warning: connected to mydomain.com instead of smtp.gmail.com”
I searched for this fix for quite some time. The popular WordPress Post SMTP plugin was returning “Warning: connected to mydomain.com instead of smtp.gmail.com” and not sending emails via any SMTP server. I checked DNS, telnet from command line and a bunch of other things until I came across this setting. Cpanel has some settings that were restricting SMTP to only a few users/processes, which was causing this error. Changing that setting in TweakSettings and making sure port 465 (in my...
ahrefs vs SEMrush SEO tool for Shopify stores. Which is better?
ahrefs vs SEMrush again? Yet another X vs Y SEO tool comparison? Well kind of. I'm not going to get into the nitty gritty of each tool and what they do, which one I like better and why, mostly because I use both and find different value or pros & cons with both. What I am going to share 1 huge difference between ahrefs and SEMrush for those who need to use one of these (or other tools) with a Shopify store and only want...
How to Fix Google Cache Showing 404 Error For Your (or any other) Site
When you're building links or wanting to see what a specific page on your site looks like in Google cache, along with the cache date and see this 404 error from Google's cache, it can be concerning. When it's happening for your own site, it can definitely put people into a quick panic, thinking that something is broken, all their SEO efforts are in vain, Google is going to de-index them, or any number of other things. I'll admit I had some of...