Here is a great video created by the team over at JESS3 depicting some impressive Internet statistics.

JESS3 / The State of The Internet from Jesse Thomas on Vimeo.

One of the most overlooked and widely used aspect of the Internet is your browser’s start page.  What is a browser start page?  This is the page that is set as your home page every time you launch your Internet browser, whether you are using Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, or Opera, they all have them.  Most users that surf the Internet use the default browser home page that is set from when they purchased their computer or they use their Internet provider’s home page – that’s not any fun.

Just like a business’s Intranet web page that is personalized with their logo and links to most used resources, your browser start page should cater to your needs and be personalized to your liking.  Most users that surf the web either do not know of the different options that are out there for them or they do not know that they can even change their start page!

To answer most Internet users first question, “How do I change my browser start page?” let’s take a look at your Internet browsers settings.  Most Internet browsers store their settings to change your start page in the same area.  For this article, we will look at the settings for the most popular Internet browser used, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.  To change your browser start page, open your browser and click on the ‘Tools’ button and select ‘Internet Options’.  A new dialog box will open and the ‘General’ tab will be selected at the top.  At the top of the page you will now see a section with the title ‘Home page’.  This is where you type or paste your desired browser home or start page that you want to open every time you launch your browser.  Click ‘Apply’ and you’re done, it’s as easy as that!

Your next big decision will now be what to set your start page to.  There are millions of websites on the Internet now, so this can be a daunting task.  My recommendation is to set your start page to a website that enhances your online experience and makes browsing the web fun!  Above I mentioned that your browser start page should be a page that you can easily personalize with your own background and have links to all your favorite websites.  Unfortunately, there aren’t many websites out there that offer this type of service.  One such site is iGoogle from Google.  They offer a lot of neat widgets and RSS feeds and you can do quite a bit of customizing.  If you really want a start page that you can add your own personalized touch too, try Portalbella.com.  Portalbella allows you to add your favorite website links, upload a photo as your background, add web widgets, and choose from many popular themes that you can apply to your page.  Now that sounds a lot more fun than having a start page that you didn’t initially select or customize yourself.  Now get out there, and have some fun with your browser start page!

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Portalbella has recently gone under some new exciting and BIG changes!  One of which being a site redesign.  Portalbella.com now has a fresh new look that we know you all will love.  We wanted to give Portalbella a look and feel that everyone can relate to, is pleasing to the eyes, and makes you happy!   We have simplified navigation and made text boxes and buttons bigger for easier navigation and to really give it that Web 2.0 feel!

We hope you all enjoy the new changes as much as we enjoyed making them!

April was Poralbella’s second month, and actually first full month of being online and has surpassed all my expectations!  With over 20,000+ page loads and 400+ new users signing up, I couldn’t be any happier!  Also, all the positive feedback I receive from users via email makes my day every time I get one.  It makes me happy to see others benefiting from using Portalbella!  It’s very gratifying to see others spreading the word as well.

Thank you again to everyone and lets see what the Month of May brings us!

Thank you for stopping by and welcome to Portalbella.  From years of experience in working with corporate intranet pages and observing how integral and important, not to mention the convenience, these pages are, a light bulb went off in my head!  I thought to myself, what if everyone could have their, so to speak, own intranet page with all their favorite most accessed links, built in Google Search, the ability to add endless arrays of widgets, and allow for them to add their own background image to really make their home page, ‘Theirs’.

That’s when Portalbella was born!

Portalbella’s Blog will not only include updates and what’s happening in the world with Portalbella, but I will also be blogging about the tools and resources that I’ve used and found valuable and invaluable in the journey of creating Portalbella, marketing it, and evolving with the everyday change of the Web.

I hope those of you that decide to give Portalbella a try, find it as useful, fun, and convenient as I do, because this is why I created it!