Favorite Free Favicon Generator

[Marty Foley]

Favorite Free Favicon Generator

What is a favicon? As the name implies, a favicon is a "favorites icon." They're used to identify bookmarked websites.

Favicons can give your website exposure in multiple ways:

• Address Bar
• Desktop
• Favorites
• Links Bar
• Start Menu

Do favicons work? According to one statistic, 64% of traffic is direct traffic, which includes bookmarks and people typing domain names from memory. Coincidentally, just yesterday when I asked a customer how he found us, he said through a bookmark. Proof that my trusty favicon did its job in that case.

How to Create Your Own Favicons Free

With that said, it's easy to create your own favicons. There are a number of free icon generators. One favorite is: http://chami.com/html-kit/services/favicon/ . With it you can generate your own favorites icon in seconds from any image on your computer, including animated ones.

Once you've created your favicon, place it in your website's root directory. Although that's sufficient in most cases, to ensure it's availability from every page, add code like the following to each page you want people to bookmark: <link rel="shortcut icon" type="image/ico" href="http://whateveryourdomainis.com/favicon.ico">

To confirm that you've set up your favicon correctly, visit your site with a browser that recognizes favicons (such as Firefox or Internet Explorer). If you see your favicon displayed in the address bar, you're all set.

Enjoy the extra traffic.

Marty Foley