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Making Money Blogging: Top 7 Mistakes
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This article is guest posted by Amino Zawawi.
Making money blogging has become the general obsession in cyberspace with its many angles: SEO, traffic exchanges, link baits, etc. Is there a secret recipe for making money online? Are those abundant e-books effective?
The blogging medium has changed drastically – at least for someone who’s been blogging for the past 6 years. It went from a “You have a… what?” to a “Read what happened at the party on my blog” to a “Let me write a guide in light of my experience in parties”
Are people really making money blogging? As a matter of fact, there are a handful making money blogging like Problogger, Carl Ocab, Dosh Dosh, and many more.
So how come you’re not generating cash from your blog? There are top 7 mistakes why your blog is not earning the money it should.
1. Setting Unrealistic Goals
A goal such as “I want to make $1000 this month from Google Adsense” is definitely a far fetched and unrealistic goal if your blog has just started out, you have modest traffic, or your content is not well optimized. You must set realistic goals that go with your blog’s gradual growth. One e-book that hits the nail on the head in relation to realistic goals is Josh Spaulding’s $5 Mini-Site Formula.
2. Creating Empty Content
Empty or filling content is content that gives no real value for your reader. When you first start your blog, you ask yourself two questions.
- Why would anyone visit my blog?
- Does my content enrich, help, or educate my reader?
If your blog is filled with useless content designed as a beard for the ad packed website you’re running, chances are you won’t generate profit. Profit comes from loyal readership. Remember that no one loves those useless ad packed blogs!
3. Spreading Yourself Too Thin
Many bloggers start out by trying all sorts of techniques ranging from traffic exchanges, to affiliate programs, to paid posting, and private advertising. You should focus your efforts on your content for the mean time then think of advertising.
4. Advertising Too Early
Many people might disagree with this point, but you shouldn’t advertise if you don’t have enough traffic. Why? The revenue you get will not match the time you spend obsessing over it. In terms of blog age, you must wait at least for 3 months before submitting your blog to advertising companies such as Adsense, WidgetBucks, or Adbrite. Your goal in your first year is to develop your content for people to start reading.
5. Not Buying a Domain
Let’s think of this in terms of the real world. When do companies really start earning the big bucks? Is it when they’re renting a small generic office in a 120 office building, or when they rent/buy a ground shop with a glass front to show their merchandise? Sticking to free hosted blogs can be beneficial for those not aiming to make a lot of profit, however; buying your own domain serves as a branding factor and can make all the difference with how much control you have over your blog and how people view it.
6. Slowing Blog Down With Images & Flash
It is said that any internet surfer will lose a reader if his blog takes more than 8 seconds to load. Think of how many potential readers will stop visiting your blog because of the numerous images that take forever to load. Optimize your website to load in less than 8 seconds and you’ll see how money will start flowing your way.
7. Giving Up
Many bloggers have what I call the “Am I doing it right?” paranoia. Statistically speaking, many bloggers will abandon their blogs out of frustration, impatience, and moderate traffic. The key to building a profitable blog is patience, since it takes a lot of time to build readership, getting picked up by search engines, and increasing your website’s traffic.
Feel free to add other mistakes that starting blog entrepreneurs make. Remember you will reap profit in accordance with how much time and effort you invest in your blog!
21 Year Old Millionaire Sharing His Secrets
This post is sponsored by 21 But Rich and posted by Charles Lau.
Ever since the age of Internet, more and more millionaires are born quickly. And they are not old people doing businesses for a really long time to become millionaires. They find their niches, get their products and services ready, and market them straight to the Internet world. They don’t have to wait too long for the business to grow as it is almost an instant gratification of good or bad results within a short period of time. They learn through the hard way, filtering away so many Internet scams and overcoming all difficulties very quickly before they reach their goals. And the reason for being rich quickly is because they are getting more and more educated of avoiding the pitfalls that other people have fallen for a long time while making their own minor mistakes before they finally made it.
Video Review
As usual, I’ll show you a video review of my browsing experience in his website. I will talk more about his website and his ebook in just a while.
A long sales letter
David Sigouin is only 21 years old, but he has made his first million dollar in just one year. That’s why his website is claiming him that he is 21 But Rich. His front page of the website shows a sales letter of himself, pitching about this ebook “The 21ButRich Guide to Freedom”. This sales letter is written in a long page format. So in order to differentiate himself from other authenticated make-money-online ebooks (as well as Internet Get-Rich-Quick scams), he gets more personalized by making a video of himself driving an expensive car telling people how they can reach their financial freedom like him.
After reading through the sales letter, you might have a few questions in your mind whether this is the right book for you. Having thought of that issue, David came up with a page on Frequently Asked Questions. This FAQ should help in one way or another in his conversion rate because he totally eliminates the risk on the buyer if it doesn’t work for him. He is also trying to show proofs that his book is not a scam, and even offers alternative payment methods if credit card is an issue to the potential customer.
He also set up a page on giving affiliates a very big share of the profit if they are promoting his product. He gave a very detailed guide to his affiliates on how to promote them by providing them with all the templates.
With so many scams around the Internet, looking at his page might just be one of them too. And to find out whether a website is a scam or not, it all depends on the fulfillment of his products and services to the customers who are paying for them. And to prove his worthiness, David is smart to have his website reviewed here because I have to read through his ebook so that I can write a full review of his website and his product. I must admit that I am privileged enough to be able to read his ebook and to give a review about it. :)
A Peep At His E-book
When I first look at the subtitle “Everything from the beginning to the ultimate financial freedom”, I was wondering how concise he can get his point across for us to learn how to make money online from him. So, I took the time to sit down and read the whole ebook carefully. I can tell you that David is really very truthful in his words in the book. The things that he is teaching in the ebook, you can easily find it implemented right on his ebook and his website. It is like asking a millionaire for his blueprint of how he became rich and successful. If you are not going to read his ebook, you can “learn” his blueprint by reverse-engineering everything that he is doing right now. He has actually implemented a lot of things from his ebook on the frontend and backend of his own website. But his ebook has more than just those things…
I can safely say that this ebook has very good information about giving me an idea of how to start making money online if I have a niche in mind. I simply have to follow step-by-step of what he is telling me, and I can already imagine some money coming in… However on the downside, he is not talking much about the latest trend about social marketing such as twitter and facebook probably because the last update on his ebook is 2006. But nevertheless, he covers the more important skill to build our own list and to create a proven system to get customers and even repeated customers, just by applying his many proven techniques he has listed down in his ebook.
And to make his sale of his ebook more attractive, he even gives away a lot of free bonuses which cost very expensively if they were sold individually. I think those ebooks have pretty good titles, but too bad that I don’t have my hands on them to review for you… :(
How can A Person write a Complete Guide of Making Money Online?
He has a very complete explanation of making money online. It gives a very good guideline about how a newbie who wishes to make money online. I believe everyone of us has to go through this very same initial stage of making money online. After working for a while online, we all hope that we could have save more time and not go through those mistakes if we had read through a book which actually taught us about the dos and don’ts. Well, I am glad that there are a minority of experts who produced those ebooks for us to read and learn from. It is really not easy to write a complete guide, and that’s why there are so many scams out there who gave empty promises just to make money from you.
Reading 21ButRich guide, it is telling me of David’s experiences. Why? That’s because to write a complete Make-Money-Online ebook, it is very likely that he will not be able to be very specific about any certain marketing techniques. And hence through his own experiences, he shortcut the specifics for us by giving his personal recommendations and even templates of setting up the websites, emails, etc. I would say that this book is best recommended for beginners to intermediate.
Is 21ButRich Guide For You?
If you know nothing about making money online and wish to find out how to do it step-by-step. If you are wondering what to sell. If you are wondering how to set up your own mailing list. If you are looking for targeted subscribers and potential buyers. Or if you wonder why to sell online and how to avoid scams. I would give all the credits to David for the creation of his ebook. David has all the patience to sit down and write this ebook in details, and I personally feel that even right now there is a huge market for his product.
From my own experience, this book is giving me a refresher course. They are things that I can implement immediately in my own websites. Some of the things he mentioned are so obvious and yet I have overlooked it. It is just like an almost completed jigsaw puzzle in my internet marketing career which is missing of last few pieces.
For those of you who have built a significant size of your own list and are making a decent few thousand dollars a month, you may not find very new information in this book. However if you wish, this can be a refresher course for you.
Find out about what his ebook can help you to make money online now.
Charles is an online reviewer, focusing himself on writing reviews on the online materials. He focuses on doing browsing reviews using video, and finishes off his review in his own words about it. He can be found at Charles Lau dot Com.
Competing With Yourself
Remember the new Coke? Everyone hated it. Not that it tastes bad…
While watching Joe Cocker’s Woodstock 69′ performance this hot night (Only 30° C my friend), I look around on me ol’ library beside me and this ancient book caught my eye “The end of marketing as we know it” by Sergio Zyman, former chief marketing officer of Coke.
Like what I do on all books that my hand grasps, I browsed the table of contents and ran through the index – tons of topics on the index, positioning, ad agencies, portfolio management, etc. but what got me is this little one line shouting “New coke” and it’s on page 48.
People said it was a big fat mistake
It wasn’t. In fact, it was not REALLY that bad as it won the taste test against the classic Coke. Heck, that’s not really the reason why we buy Coke. Pepsi tastes better right? (Oh sorry bout that Coke lovers)
In Zyman’s own words “I’ll admit that it didn’t play out as I had thought it would, not at all, but in the end, we achieved the destination that we set out for.”
How? Simple. They competed with them selves – because now we have the new Coke, people will compare the new Coke to the classic Coke. Not Coke and Pepsi. New coke and classic Coke.
Spam Spam Spam
Click the image below to zoom in…
The Key To Affiliate Marketing Success
This article is guest posted by Joseph Martin.
Most people think the key to affiliate marketing success is all about referring the most sales, others say it’s all about choosing the right product and while those factors play an important role on whether or not you will succeed in affiliate marketing, most marketers fail to implement the most valuable technique of all into their businesses.
Do you know what it is?
The answer is very simple “Help Others in the Process”. You see most people simply focus on making a quick buck by promoting mediocre products that don’t really work simply because they convert well or the payout is very high and they completely forget about the human element, they forget that the person on the other side of the fence put his trust and money on your hands expecting a solution to his problem. What happens next?
They get disappointed, they get upset and plain and simple they’ll never buy from you ever again. Is this what you really want for your business? Hopefully the answer is no.
This is why is so important to help people in the process of making money with affiliate marketing, you will build trust and you will build a strong and loyal relationship between you and your customers. Once that kind of trust has been established they will buy from you over and over again and your affiliate marketing business will grow bigger and stronger throughout the years.
I have to say that people are becoming wiser and wiser everyday; they know more about scams today than they did two years ago, they are more skeptical and in the very near future the only online businesses that will succeed are the ones who provide their customers with the greatest value possible.
Whether you use your blog or an opt-in list to run your affiliate marketing business, choose wisely the next affiliate program you’re going to promote since there is a fine line between making money and losing your credibility and reputation. You will never see Carlocab or myself promoting products on our websites we’re not proud of and will not deliver the most value to our visitors.
And now I invite you to my site at Flawlessbusiness.com/blog for more tips and techniques on how to start your online business from scratch. You’ve got nothing to lose and a lot to gain, simply Click Here Now.
Making Million Dollars By Being A Social Networker
This post is sponsored by The Social Millionaire and posted by Charles Lau.
This very next review I am going into is giving me a feel of having a very personalized website with a goal of making his first million dollars. With this goal in mind, we have The Social Millionaire who is trying to socialize around with friends around the social network who have their own websites to promote. At a very affordable price of a few bucks, you will get to have this website sending you traffic till 2013 at least.
Charles Video Review
The Founder and His Social Network
Pat Hankinson, the founder of The Social Millionaire, is only 19 years old today when he is now trying to promote his website aggressively through the press. By doing so, he is doing himself two favors:
- Potential advertisers who might be interested to buy a keyword to link to their websites.
- Potential and existing advertisers know his website is going to be well-known if he carries on working hard to market his website.
Using his own social network, he is promoting this website to bring in more traffic from various social networks. Using his analogy of the hundreds of millions of people from all around the social network sites, if he could attract just one million of them to invest just $1, he will become The Social Millionaire. And he is hoping to make friends with these people. And in my opinion, if he could become a millionaire, there is a potential business opportunity out there just by being his friend because of his huge network.
Blogging For More Traffic
While he is socializing around for more traffic, he has not forgotten about his search engine traffic too. He has a Social Millionaire Blog which he blogs about making money online. This is a very smart move as he will attract important keywords from targeted traffic in search engines to take a look at his website, and may buy keywords if it suits their business model. The more contents he has, the more people will be attracted to his website. Some of us might even follow his blog just to find out how he has been progressing already.
Website Structure
This website is quite a simple concept with a clean look. When I took a plunge into my video review for this website, I realized that this video is pretty much easier to do because of the easy navigation of his menu on top. Any visitor who chanced upon his website, shouldn’t have any problem browsing through and to decide whether they should take up the purchase of keywords for their websites.
How It Works?
You just have to buy the keyword that you like and it will appear on the website. And if it happens to be the same keyword as your competitor, the one who pays first or who pays the highest will rank first in the website. There are links on top as well as on individual keywords to allow you to buy from. And currently, the minimum amount to pay is $5.
Link Me At Only A Few Bucks
It takes no brainer for anybody to consider whether he or she should take up this keyword purchase or not. Currently, it can be purchased at only $5 for a duration of 5 years (from 2008 to 2013). And if you are one who frequently invest in text-link-ads from various blogs which last for a duration of only a few months, you might just treat it as a donation since it is going to be there for a few years!
Making Money Out Of A Few Bucks Investment?
An idea came into my mind when I thought of people who spent so much money in Pay-Per-Click advertisements to do direct affiliate marketing. If The Social Millionaire is going to be successful, you could become rich by investing a few dollars to do affiliate marketing! It is like opening a potential tap of income pouring at you whenever it is filled up for the next five years.
Is Pat Going To Make it?
At the rate that he is going, he might take pretty long to achieve since he has only reached 0.2% from his $1mil goal. This website is definitely a win-win situation for him and his online friends. I just hope he will be able to pull through his initial stage of entry barrier where he might need to spend 110% of his time socializing around and to buy more reviews from make-money-online blogs to bring in the traffic untill he gets referral sales from around the world. All the best to you, Pat!
Buy Keywords From The Social Millionaire Now!
Charles is an online reviewer, focusing himself on writing reviews on the online materials. He focuses on doing browsing reviews using video, and finishes off his review in his own words about it. He can be found at Charles Lau dot Com.
Carl Ocab is one of the most successful teenage bloggers on the net. But remarkably, Carl was just 13 years old when he rose to fame with his hugely popular “make money online” website: www.carlocab.com
