Fresh website content for your visitors can be of real benefit when attempting to generate repeat traffic. Most webmasters, however, just don't have enough spare time to frequently update or rebuild their pages manually. If your web site hosting company provides free access to PHP and MySQL, this article will show you how to combine those two open source tools and replace a portion of your websites' static content with frequently changing dynamic content.
Why do you need dynamic content for your website?
Static pages on a website eventually become "stale" and visitor traffic can fall significantly over time. The drop in traffic can be attributed to these primary factors:
1) The reluctance of search engines to include and display your potentially "out of date" pages in their search results,
2) The finite number of other subject related websites that would be willing to link to your information on a specific topic, and
3) Visitors that learn to view your static website with a "been there, done that" attitude.
Creating and maintaining a web site requires a significant investment in time and resources. Loosing repeat visitors diminishes the value of your investment. Without repeat traffic it is virtually impossible for a website to be a continuing success.
How can you add dynamic content without having to purchase expensive software?
One proven (and easy to implement) method of creating dynamic content for your website is by rotating information on key, higher traffic web pages using PHP with a MySQL database. Rotating content can take the form of a series of rotating articles, a rotating group of product listings, or even a simple "thought for the day". What is important is that your clients and visiting search engines find new and interesting information each time they visit your website.
As an example of dynamic content creation, we will build a system that rotates information about a group of products on the main page of a hypothetical retail sales web site that markets widgets. Our goal is to present information about a different type or model of widget available for purchase whenever a consumer visits the shopping web site.
Step One: Create a content table to hold your widget data.
There are a couple of options for storing the data to be displayed in your dynamic content rotation. The first option would be to create a new database, or perhaps simply add a table in an existing product database that will hold the information that you wish to display.
Let's take five theoretical widget products and design a table as follows:
+------+-----------------------+
| item | product |
+------+-----------------------+
| 1 | Plastic Widgets |
| 2 | Metal Widgets |
| 3 | Wooden Widgets |
| 4 | Rubber Widgets |
| 5 | Stone Widgets |
+------+-----------------------+
1-a) Create your table with the following SQL statement:
CREATE TABLE `content_table` ( `item` int(4) NOT NULL auto_increment, `product` varchar(10) NOT NULL default '', KEY `item` (`item`) ) TYPE=MyISAM AUTO_INCREMENT=6 ;
This table contains two fields. The first is an item number and the second is a description field that will hold the product name and features. Note: You can add fields to your actual table including: an image URL field, shopping cart direct purchase URL field, product page field, etc.
1-b) Insert the example data into your new table as follows:
INSERT INTO `content_table ` VALUES (1, ' Plastic Widgets');
INSERT INTO `content_table ` VALUES (2, ' Metal Widgets');
INSERT INTO `content_table ` VALUES (3, ' Wooden Widgets');
INSERT INTO `content_table ` VALUES (4, ' Rubber Widgets');
INSERT INTO `content_table ` VALUES (5, ' Stone Widgets');
Once you have completed these two steps you will have a table compete with data to be shown on your website.
Another option would be to utilize your existing product table. If there are hundreds of different models and styles of widgets already in one of the tables in your database, you could utilize the same structure we are learning now to connect directly to that table and display the already existing data.
Step two: Working with your new table:
For dynamic content displays to function there must be a mechanism in place that instructs your web page as to which item should be shown to the visitor. These mechanisms vary in complexity from extremely simple commands to the more complicated use of cookies or IP tracking to determine which item should be displayed.
For this tutorial, we will utilize one of the most effective mechanisms and perhaps the easiest to incorporate. This is the use of a random number generator for deciding which item will be shown.
To create a random number generator using PHP you must first calculate the total number of possible items that you want the system to choose from. In this example we had five items so the maximum number of choices will be 5. The reason we need this number is to limit the random numbers being delivered. If we have five items, we want the number generator to only give us a result of between 1 and 5.
We must now create a variable for our PHP code that will hold our new randomly generated item number as follows:
$mynumber = rand(1, 5);
This little snippet of code will act as the mechanism to "select" a widget product item at random from the five provided in the content table that we created.
If we created 100 different items for your dynamic display instead of just five, you would simply change the "rand (1, 5)" part of the code to reflect the different maximum number. In this case we would change it to "rand (1, 100)" so that the random number generator gives us back a number somewhere between one and one hundred.
We are now ready to extract the randomly selected item's information from your table so that it can be displayed on your webpage.
You can now connect to your database and query your table to find the data for the item that matches the random number you created, as follows:
$query_content = "SELECT * FROM content_table WHERE item = $mynumber ";
Step three: Displaying your data:
When displaying your data it is important to maintain consistency in presentation size. It is preferable to create a table of specified dimensions (such as "width=400") and display your results within this table. In this way the page proportions do not have to change with each new item (which can be very confusing for visitors).
Simply display the results just as if these where any other MySQL query using the echo command:
echo $query_content [' product '];
Every time your page is loaded a different widget product will be selected at random for display on that page.
What else can you do with your dynamic content?
The only limits are within your imagination. By adding a title and meta description tags to your content table, you can alternate the title and search engine description for that page. You can also utilize this system to promote affiliate programs or sponsorship opportunities by rotating affiliate links and banners.
The proper use of dynamic content can bring your website back into favor with search engines and encourage your visitors to return frequently to see what is new.
Don Beavers lives in Bryan/College Station, Texas and is an enterprise level PHP-MySQL programmer at both the Shopping Elf Shopping Guide, and the Datavor Web Directory.
There are many elements that are key to successful web... Read More
In the late 1990's three San Francisco based web developers... Read More
The growth in Internet usage around the world is astounding... Read More
Does your website have a links/resources page?Do you exchange reciprocal... Read More
When marketing your website, it's important to know which of... Read More
The Disability Discrimination Act says that websites must be made... Read More
Web sites are not just places to sell things; they... Read More
There have been many significant changes to the face of... Read More
Your ObjectiveYour small business needs an appealing and professional website... Read More
First, an eye opener. Making your fortune through affiliate programs... Read More
Simply ensuring your website is accessible to screen reader users... Read More
Wow, we`ve already taken a domain and chosen a web... Read More
If you are living in a country that its native... Read More
If you are developing your website on a host that... Read More
Every business needs to know how it is doing. That's... Read More
1. Splash pagesMost of the time splash pages are uncalled... Read More
Whether you have your own business already, or are looking... Read More
Today it seems everyone is jumping on the entrepreneur bandwagon,... Read More
How popular is online shopping? And is there room for... Read More
It may seem like the publishing industry's equivalent of Beanie... Read More
Creating a content management system either from scratch,... Read More
Every small business owner knows that they need a website,... Read More
A professional online reputation is essential to the flourishing of... Read More
The internet has taken over our lives with a vengeance,... Read More
Affiliate programs are a great way to earn an income... Read More
While most marketers are beginning to understand the critical importance... Read More
Better Web Site ROIHow to increase your business profitability by... Read More
I recently helped my mom to launch a website (www.mom2me.com)... Read More
Your web site will be your window to the world.... Read More
Just like all things in life, the ways to run... Read More
It never ceases to amaze me how many people set-up... Read More
That's right. According to a recent study by Nielsen/NetRatings, Amazon.com... Read More
Creating and maintaining an effective presence on the Web has... Read More
So you have decided that you want to do freelance... Read More
If you don't have a web site yet, are thinking... Read More
URL rewriting are major needs for your sites that produce... Read More
1. As the first step, "Hire a web designer."First create... Read More
A while ago one of my clients approached me and... Read More
Setting up a website is the very first step of... Read More
The Disability Discrimination Act states that service providers must not... Read More
A lot of people these days are interested in getting... Read More
SiteSpinnerSiteSpinner is a user-friendly web site development tool that includes... Read More
So your prospect, Mary, is sitting at the computer reading... Read More
Thinking about starting up a business? The web is the... Read More
See how you can create graphic effects on text with... Read More
1) A marketing necessityI still hear it said from time... Read More
Developing a website with content that entices visitors to return... Read More
Often time I've browsed sites and seen the same thing... Read More
Yahoo has long offered email, an online calendar, notes, bookmarks,... Read More
When you consider the billions of individuals and companies on... Read More
So what do you do if need to get a... Read More
SummaryHere's the scoop on what you must know when designing... Read More
If you ever want to create a state directory, article... Read More
If you are like me you have wanted to build... Read More
Psychology is a long word which everyone thinks, "no, that's... Read More
Are you, like many other website owners, frustrated at the... Read More
When we review the sites of potential clients, there are... Read More
When marketing your website, it's important to know which of... Read More
Building a new website can be a lengthy task. From... Read More
When you started reading this sentence you assumed lo acabarķa... Read More
There are lots of HTML editors on the market, however,... Read More
80% of your Web site is Maintenance!Once your Web site... Read More
Does My Web Site Require A Web Database?If your web... Read More
When you publish a content site there are times when... Read More
Although designing a great web site is an important part... Read More
In the big, wide online world there are millions of... Read More
Web Development |