Blog Income Online

Another quick update

I finally got the domain I wanted and my site is up and running. Just to review what i have done:

I had a few articles that I had purchased off of rentacoder.com a while ago doing nothing so i decided to use them for the content. They are fairly good quality and I had about 25 of them so we will see what happens.

Getting my site up was easy enough with the 19 pages CMS. Simply upload with a FTP client and log in and you are able to add 19 pages of content plus a front page. (Why 19? I don’t know, but it gets the job done.)

 You can also add adsense to the template. I have two ad spaces per page, one is a text space displaying directly under the heading of the article which shows 4 ads and one at the bottom of the article which is an image ad.

For traffic I have uploaded the 20 articles I have on my site to elance.com and articlebase.com. This is the frustrating part as I have to wait for each article to be reviewed and accepted.

 In the mean time there is not a lot more I can do apart from submitting to other directories but as I want to keep work to a minimum i want to see how much traffic these two directories will get me before I continue.

I know I should stick with minisites until I see results but doing nothing is boring so I may try to create a squidoo lense based around an affiliate product in the mean time. I will keep you updated.

Quick update

Currently I am trying my hand at building a profitable minisite. I have the site built with 20 pages of unique content and adsense running. The only problem I have at the moment is a technical issue that is preventing me to purchase the domain name I want.

Of course without the domain I will be using there is no point in me building backlinks through article marketing. A real pain but I hope to have the situation rectified soon.

In the mean time I have been thinking about where exactly I want internet marketing to take me. On one hand I know I have a long way to go before I make a substantial income on the net but at the same time it’s said that you should have a clearly defined plan to get to where you want to be.

Eventually I want to get into property investing. I think it would be something that I could really enjoy doing. And although I could start by purchasing a house with a regular nine to five job and rent it out, I feel that there are other avenues I should explore that are more entrepreneurial (i.e internet marketing).

My plan is to basically start at the bottom; initially creating small sources of passive income and building on them. As stated above, the first part of my plan is to create a few dollars a day with and adsense minisite and repeating the process. These need to be easily created and promoted, and run with little maintenance.

I will concentrate on these until I am making $100 a day. I figure once I make this amount I will have a firm understanding on the process and be able to focus on learning a new aspect of internet marketing (and of course continuing with minisites).

From there I will be focusing on creating on content blogging in niches I have interest in. With the extra income I earn form my minisites and with monetization of the blog itself, I can have some high quality content created for me, not to mention purchasing advertising to build a mailing list. I can also have a free product created to entice signups to the list.

Once a blog is established I hope to create my own information products based on the blogs niche. With the income from the minisites and blog I believe I will be able to create some extremely good products that I will sell on my already established blog.

If all goes well I will be able to raise a deposit in order to purchase my first investment property and have a stream of passive income to help me pay it off. After that (without going into too much detail) I will purchase more investment properties by borrowing off the equity of my first property.  

It’s a fair way off and it looks simple when written, but at least it’s a plan. I will have to overcome problems when they arise and it won’t happen overnight but its better then not having a go. As always, I will update this blog with my progress.

Quick article writing tips

The following are just a couple of tricks I use that make content creation easier for me and hopefully they will help you out too.

Quick article writing tip #1

I am not the world’s greatest writer. Usually I have to do a couple of edits to my articles to make them coherent so I need all the help I can get.  It’s one thing to read the content to yourself when editing, but I find it much easier when I’m having it read to me by someone else. I’m not suggesting you have someone read all the content you write before you publish it, but definitely have your computer do it.

This is a quick method to ensure the content you write for your blog makes sense. You will need a text to speech program that will read the text you cut and paste into the program. These can be found for free or can be purchased. Even windows vista has one included, which I never figured out how to use. I have only ever used free programs and I find they do the job well.

Currently, I use SpheNet’s free TTS reader. It only comes with one voice (though the full version comes with others) and it can seem clumsy when using it at times, but I haven’t needed to find a better program.

Give this method a try. It can make an average article good and a good article great. It can help you structure the content and cut your editing time in half.

Quick article writing tip #2.

Thinking up topics for content and posts can be tough for some people. Thinking up new subjects day in day out can seem like an impossible task, but funnily enough it is tougher when first beginning a blog rather than when you have been running it for a while.

I find it much easier to think of a whole bunch of topics at once rather than thinking up a single one and writing an article for it. You may be surprised to learn how many topics you can think of by feeding off other ideas. It’s called mind mapping and it can kick start your creative juices when thinking up topics.

For those not familiar with mind mapping, it begins with a main topic (for example, fishing) that branches of with sub-topics that relate to the main (i.e. fishing rod, bait, lures, locations etc). You may then have sub-topics (or sub-sub-topics) under the sub-topics (so for ‘bait’ you may have worms, shrimp, fish etc) and so on.

All these can have an article written for each. Some topics will be better than others but it is a great way to think of ideas and to keep track of everything you’ve written about.

Even better news is that there are some great Mindmapping programs out there that you can use rather than using a pen and paper. There are a fair few programs out there but I use MindMapper professional 2008 from SimTech systems. It’ simple to use and has a great layout, but it does cost a fair bit of money. There are probably other free ones to use, just be wary of programs that claim to be free but only give you a trial version.

This method can be a great way to build content for a blog, whether it is a series of articles or laying out an entire website. It will keep everything nice and neat as you can simply put a line through a topic you’ve already covered but will still be visible if you want to go more in-depth on the subject.

Blog marketing methods I will be trying

Part of this blog is to find out what works for me, and of course pass it on to you. The following is a list of methods I will be trying in terms of blogging. Some I can implement straight away, some I will start now but probably won’t see results in the near future. This is by no means a definitive list of everything I will try in terms of blogging (let alone internet marketing) but it will be a good place to get started. 

Having a number of blogs that earn a few dollars a day each with adsense.

This type will use SEO tactics to drive the majority of its traffic, using long tail keywords and building backlinks etc. The idea is to set up a blog to have a few visitors a day and get them to click on adsense ads to earn revenue then repeat the process a number of times in order to make a substantial daily profit.

It looks simple on paper but it can be difficult if you are just starting out as I have found. For starters, content needs to be of very high quality and relatively timeless as you don’t want to be adding new content daily or even weekly plus you will want the site up for as long as possible. This can be a challenge in itself.

Also, when using wordpress, I will need a database for each blog (I think?) while my web hosting company offers up to 25. I can purchase more, but this adds to the total running cost. This is easily remedied with a script that allows me to build a 19 page minisite without the need for a database, though this is going away from blogging.

And making $1-$10 a day through adsense isn’t as easy as it sounds. You need to put in the work to get the blog established and rating in the search engines. Initially this can be the biggest challenge, but once I have a system (as with any internet marketing venture) it is said to become easier.

Anyway, it’s worth giving it a try, and I will be updating my progress with my “dollar blogs”. 

Have an authority blog or two that are designed to sell affiliate products and ad space.

This method (along with the one following it) involves the most work for the most reward. These blogs when done correctly can make huge profits for years on end once established and with constant maintenance.

Having a list is a necessity as the idea is to convert visitors into regular readers. And once you have a great following that trust you, then you will be able to rake in huge profits by suggesting good affiliate products while offering a caution to your readers about bad ones or charging an increased fee for advertising space.

Creating an authority site on a particular niche is not for everyone when starting. You have to know your niche well and it needs to be profitable. I am in no position to class myself as an expert on the internet marketing niche for example, as I haven’t made much money yet. I will be an expert in the future (fingers crossed) but until then i will blog in this niche about becoming one.

At the moment, I am not focused on creating this blog into an authority blog in the internet marketing niche. Instead, I will think of this as a foundation for an authority blog.

 I have a background in the fitness niche however (a hard one to break into, I know) and I plan to create a few blogs on the subject. I think I will be able to give people valuable information so I will aim to create an authority blog on a narrowed down niche (general fitness or bodybuilding etc).

Have an authority blog built around a niche to sell my own product.

This is similar to the above method and can have huge potential. It is said that you will have a much easier time selling your own products rather than others once you have established your name and have a following. It makes sense to me.

Of course, you will need to have a fair amount of knowledge on your niche in order to get people to keep coming back to your blog, not to mention creating the product worth purchasing. I myself could write a book on internet marketing and fool a few into thinking I was an expert, but I know I would get called out by a lot of people for recycling the same old information or for not knowing what i was talking about and ruining my name before i was established. My advice: - use a penname.

Nah. My real advice, do it properly. Even if you create a site designed to sell other peoples affiliate products until you get the knowledge and know how on your niche, then switching methods or creating a mixture of the two.

As with the above method, I will need to work my way up to building my own product to sell by increasing my education on the internet marketing niche while actually seeing a profit. I think I would be able to create a product in the fitness niche however, but I still need to establish my blog on the subject. I will definitely work towards this.

Build a blog and sell it.

Currently I am unsure if I should build blogs just to sell them. It seems like quick cash, but also a way to lose a long term investment. On one hand you get a year (or two) worth’s profit quickly which you can use for other projects, and on the other you may be able to put in work to create a lot of income over the years (far more then what you would have made from the sale). 

In order to sell your blog it is usually agreed by established bloggers that it needs to be getting traffic and it’s a good idea if it’s already monetized. This gives you a way of evaluating just how much to charge for your blog.

I can see a few instances where selling my blog would be a good investment:-

·         Having too many blogs to maintain

·         Not being interested in the niche associated with that blog

·         Needing capital for another investment

·         Selling adsense revenue websites for quick profit that can be duplicated

But i can also see a number of problem with this method, for example the transfer process may be a bit difficult for people not experienced in the technical aspects of blogging, such as myself. I have trouble with fixing blog crashes and similar things, let alone trying to transfer my database to another, but this comes with experience I guess.

I plan on experimenting with this method as I might have a totally wrong idea on it. I will start by selling sites making a small profit ($1 mini adsense blogs discussed in the first method) and see how I go on the whole process. I could probably hire a freelancer from rentacoder.com to make sure the whole process goes without a hitch. And there is nothing stoping me from keeping tabs on the blog and see what the new owner does with it.

Summery

I am sure there are other methods of blogging for profit, all of which I will try. Until then I will keep updating this blog regularly to create a sort of ‘simulated’ authority blog or at least a well established one, trying to gather a following and becoming more experienced in the internet marketing niche along with getting started in niches I currently have knowledge in. I will also try my hand at low maintenance adsense blogs and website, and I will try to sell one or two for the experience, if nothing else. 

Sign up for the mailing list a let me know what you think by leaving a comment.. talk to you soon.

Blogging to the bank review

Introduction

Rob Benwell, a professional blogger who claims he has made millions through his blogging empire is back with the third version of his eBook “blogging to the bank”. Claiming to have helped thousands of people succeed with blog marketing and having sold over 20,000 copies of versions 1 and 2.0, the third edition is here to give newbie’s right through to veterans his amended “million dollar blueprint”.

Rob’s blogging to the bank system, rather than focusing on a single blog on a subject you a very passionate about and become and expert or authority on the subject, involves creating a number of optimised niche blogs that you ‘manage’ when it gets to a point that you need to outsource the majority of work to others. 

Tips covered in the book

Robs “blogging blueprint” 

In the beginning of the book “The 3 big changes in big money blogging”, rob explains blog advertising is becoming big business and why they will become even more profitable in the future; and why free blogs such as blogger.com should be avoided. But where’s the third? It sure as hell isn’t included in that section. Not the best first impression but oh well; let’s read on.

After reading “The 5 Blogging Commandments For 2009” (yes! There are 5 this time) including personality, maximizing revenue and not giving up, you will get to the “million dollar blueprint” basics section.

This section can be skipped by pro bloggers as it is designed to get the beginner started. Even a person with an intermediate skill level will probably be able to take a fair bit away from it.

It begins with market research based on clickbank products you may want to promote and finding keywords that the potential customers of these products search for. It then continues to setting up your blog by purchasing hosting and a domain and how to use WordPress CMS.

There are tips on optimizing your blog for readers, monetization and the search engines. Tips include such things as adding mailing lists, changing the theme of your WordPress blog for a different look, keeping folders close to the root directory and using taglines efficiently. Nothing ground breaking but definitely things amateurs need to know.

 The monetization section offers some good tips such as the importance of building a mailing list, utilizing paid review sites to earn a bit of extra income while adding content and using the words in your content as advertisements with services such as what Kontera.com offer.

Various ways to gather content are listed, both free and paid. In terms of free traffic, Rob says that it is alright to use other peoples content from article directories, which is contrary to a lot of information out there. Rob says if it is of interest to your readers then use it, which makes sense to me. I just hope Google agrees.

Other tips will require you to pay money for articles. He lists the regular sources for freelance writers such as  Elance.com and Renatcoder.com, and recommends a membership service that will provide you with “440 articles every month split over 11 niche topics”.

He also gives you some decent tips on writing your own content, and using a mixture of all the various types of content such as using free articles and leaving your thoughts about them.

There is a section on building back links which I found informative but also confusing. You have the basic “submit articles to article directories” with a link to a handy little program call “Article Assistant”. Then you have locations where you can buy links and link exchange services, which I thought were dead as people who use them get penalized by the search engines when found (especially in the case of link exchanges) but what do I know?

Up until this point, I took away very little from the content. Most of it was tried and true, but stuff I already had a grasp on. The second half (not really half, maybe quarter) of the eBook got a lot more informative.

  The “advanced SEO” section opened my eyes to the existence of Latent Semantic Indexing which I admit I should have heard of before. Rob uses an example about the keyword “Ferrari F430” relating to other words such as Driven, Lamborghini, Tuned Exhaust and makes sense when explaining it (though it sound like a fancy name for a simple method).

Web 2.0 strategies covered in the eBook include utilising Squidoo lenses (with a decent step by step guide) and tips when using sites like Digg.com, Del.icio.us and Technorati.com. I took away a lot from this section.

Rob gives you tips for outsourcing parts of your blog so you can be the “manager” of your blogging empire. He suggests that you hire writers, posters and promoters when increasing the amount of blogs you have. It is something to aspire to, but not necessary for the newbie’s.

 Selling your blogs “is a new key step to my Blogging to the Bank system”, says rob. There is a list on places where you can sell and also tips on how to do it. He claims that even blogs making $50 a month can be sold. I would have liked to see more on this topic such as making your blog easy to transfer to customers etc, but that will come with experience I guess.

Bonus sections included in the eBook:-

·         “Getting Your Blog Indexed In 24 Hours”

·         “Thousands of Free Links Back To Your Blog”

·         “The Sneaky Theme Sponsor Trick”

·         “Making Money from This EBook”

All 4 of those ‘bonuses’ could be included in the content. They are each one page tips and although informative they are nothing groundbreaking.

 Separate bonuses that come with the eBook include:-

·         Ready Made Blogs

5 topics (Quit smoking, golf, aquarium fish, wedding planning, dog training) with 20 articles for each topic. Includes banners and affiliate links you may wish to use. A simple google search shows a number of these blogs already online (of course), so at best they will be examples on how to get started rather than using them for profit

·         Underground Seminar Blogging PowerPoint Slides

This looks like it’s just an outdated presentation version of the eBook (probably BTTB v2.0). For example, it claims that you should use free blogs, which is contradictory to what the eBook says.

·         Article Assistance

This is a decent article submission program that can help you keep track of your submissions. You are able to choose the sites you wish to submit your content through and it will run you through the process.

·         Blog Announcer Pro

This program isn’t bad either. Similar to Article Assistance, this program will allow you to “announce your blog to the world”.

Positives

·         I don’t need a step by step guide to signing up for a clickbank account or anything similar, and it gets on my nerves when people include these instructions to up the page count. The closest blogging to the bank comes to doing this is with a guide on how to install wordpress with Fantastico, though I believe that’s fair enough (easier to install manually though in my experience, but I digress).

·         No matter what your skill level in terms of blogging, you will find something you can use. Having said that, the lower your skill level the more you will get out of it.

·         I like the 2 bonus programs; Article Assistance and Blog Announcer. Not worth the price tags that the sale letter claims they cost, but they could have scrapped the other so called bonuses (incorporating them in the eBook) and stuck with these 2.

Negatives

·         I would have liked to see more real life examples of the methods covered in his eBook put into action. This shouldn’t be much of a challenge with his experience in the blogging industry and with a legion of successful students from his other two eBooks.

·         The “3 big changes” section with only 2 listed was a mistake that shouldn’t have happened when taking into account that it’s the third volume. It gives the impression that the product was rushed which makes you wonder if it could have been better. I want to know number three!!

·         A pet peeve of mine, the sales letter. Sorry, but the bonuses aren’t worth nearly as much as the letter claims. And they will still be there for months to come regardless of the “next 200 customers only” tags. Just because lies and misleading information flood this industry doesn’t make it right! 

Recommendations  

Beginners looking to break out into the blogging scene won’t go wrong with purchasing blogging to the bank 3.0. It has all the information they need to get started in building decent blogs in an easy to follow format. The key is getting started and this book should get you motivated enough to do so.

People with an intermediate skill level will also get some benefit from this purchase. There are a few addons and improvements on established methods that are very much worth a look, plus the 2 bonus programs can make life a lot easier.

In all, I would give the total product a 7.5/10. Its good, but not great (plus I took away half a point for the sales letter).     

Blogging to the bank review

To get your copy of blogging to the bank, click here.

Getting my blog up and running with wordpress

Setting up this blog using wordpress is very simple when you know what you’re doing. Installing the software is easy enough when everything goes right. All you will need is hosting and a domain and a lot website hosting companies offer a simple option like fantastico that will setup your wordpress blog with just a couple of clicks.

I chose the auto option when I first tried to get my blog going. The install went alright but when it came time to log into the backend I got error messages saying my username was incorrect, which I was sure was right. I fixed this by cancelling the install and doing it again, this time manually.

This was very easy. Upload the files to your hosting server via an ftp client, login to wordpress (this time it worked) create a database, point the install towards the database, and I was all set. I would suggest this method rather than the auto install as it will give you an insight on how wordpress works and also practice in using ftp.

So with the software installed I then concentrated on how I wanted my blog to look. I downloaded a few themes and decided on one I liked. Installing themes, widgets and add-ons is extremely easy; simply upload the zip file via the backend of your blog and it does everything for you.

The theme I chose was easily customizable. I was able to changed the colours of the banners and the included images, and I will add my own logos when I get a program that makes transparent .png images.

I then installed a couple of plugins:- “all in one seo” and a opt-in script for my mailing list. Both are great, but take some getting used to. My mailing list opt-in is a bit of a mess and I will spend a bit of time in the future trying to get it how I want it.

Everything was running smoothly up until the point where my database crashed after I published my first post. It took me a nights work trying to fix it, but it was a fairly simple fix once I realised what was wrong. All I needed to do was run a repair on the post file in my database. I thought it would have been much worse and if it happens again at least i will know what to do.

In summery

I’m still experimenting with wordpress and I am liking to so far. I can see why its so popular. To anyone looking to get started in internet marketing I would strongly suggest wordpress. Don’t be afraid if you don’t have much technical knowhow when it comes to website creating; I sure don’t. Just keep using it. The more you do the better you become at it.

Getting initial traffic to your blog

If you are like me, when you create a brand new blog; get it up and running; make it user friendly and look nice; create some great content and post it; you want traffic and you want it immediately (or quickly, anyway)!

There’s nothing wrong with that. You have put the hard work into it and you want the reward of getting initial traffic to your blog. But wanting initial traffic and getting it are two different things.  Most traffic will be built up over time through increased back links and other SEO techniques, along with building a name for yourself as an authority on your chosen topic.

However there are techniques that will help you get the ball rolling and get you a few click throughs while you’re at it.

Getting initial traffic to your blog #1- Submit to directories

Submitting to blog directories is one way to start getting traffic and building links, but there are many out there and you will not be able to submit to all of them. Some only accept blogs on certain niches or from a particular location (country specific directories etc.) and others still only list proven blogs that have been around for a while and must be reviewed before submission.

Some directories require you to pay for submission. Rates usually vary depending on the page rank of the directory. If you don’t want to pay however, there are plenty of free ones to submit to get you started (a list of these to come in a later article).

Getting initial traffic to your blog #2- Comment on other blogs

Commenting on popular blogs that share a similar niche to yours is a way you can start driving traffic to your blog fairly quickly. A poplar board can get a single link exposed to hundreds of people a day interested in what you have to say.

It’s not enough however, to just write “Nice post. And by the way, check out my blog at www…..”. The point of this method is to build a following and not just backlinks, and if you do spam the blog you won’t be welcome to post for very long. Commenting on others blogs should contribute to the information posted.

Getting initial traffic to your blog #3- Comment on forums

This is very similar to the blog commenting method. By adding informative and helpful posts and threads to a forum that shares your niche, it can build your credibility and add to your following. Spammers will be kicked out quickly so you need to abide to the forums TOS.

Getting initial traffic to your blog #4- Buying traffic

This has to be the fastest and easiest way to get traffic, but of course you need the budget in order to implement this method. Also, you will need to give this type of traffic a reason to stick around or visit again, (which is important for any method but, clicking on an ad is different than clicking through from a source of helpful information i.e. blog comment).

Your blog should have great information on your niche and a mailing list opt-in at the very least. You will want to be able to keep in contact with this type of traffic, because when done right it is very targeted and these people will be more inclined to buy whatever you’re selling. 

Getting initial traffic to your blog #5- Social bookmarking sites

By submit all your posts to sites like digg and del.icio.us people will see your content straight away and if it is good you will have no problem getting a few visitors; the more informative or humorous the content the better.

The aim is to add something that the reader will want to vote for. The more it is voted for the more publicity and views it gets. Ideally it will get to the front page and viewed by everyone who visits it. 

Note:- i will update this list with other methods at a later date.

You aren’t going to see an avalanche of traffic to your blog when you first begin using these methods. Substantial traffic comes with building popularity and authority on your niche, not to mention implementing SEO techniques. These methods give you a launching point for all of these with the added bonus of gaining a few followers. And knowing that you are getting at least a few views is a great way to stay motivated.

Blog Income Online

Welcome to blog income online.

This site is still very young and i would like to thank you for being one of its first visitors. Chances are you fall into one of two categories if you are reading this. You either make money on the net, or you would like to.

Let me explain what this blog is about. First of all I would like to mention I don’t consider myself a full-fledged internet marketer (yet); at most I am a novice internet marketer. 

I have been studying internet marketing for around a year and have a decent amount of theoretical knowledge on such things as SEO, methods of internet marketing (blogs, eBooks, affiliate sites etc), monetization, free traffic, paid traffic among other things. But as every experienced internet marketer will tell you, all the theoretical knowledge in the world won’t get you anywhere unless you put it into practice.

I have put some methods into practice and had very slight success with making money online, promoting clickbank products with cheap forms of advertising (eBay classifieds etc). Although I have seen a slight profit from this method, I think 80% of this small success is due to luck. And although the idea can be implemented almost immediately (Write a sales letter for a clickbank product and advertise it with eBay classifieds) it wasn’t very profitable and I would have had to put a lot of work in to get to the level of income I want ($100 a day).

That is not to say I am lazy. I would much rather start building a foundation for something that will grow over time; something that with hard work could be very profitable, even if it takes a while before I see any substantial income. I have decided to try blogging.

Though this blog will be monetized, its primary reason is not to earn me an income (though it would be a nice secondary reason). I hope this blog grows into something that will help other internet marketing newbie’s get there start in the (not to distant) future. 

I have created this blog for a number of different reasons:

·         To teach myself the finer points of blogging and a way of putting different things that I learn into practice.

·         To share what I learn and communicate with people who share an interest in blogging and internet marketing.

·         To hopefully start profiting through blogs and eventually other forms of internet marketing.

 I hope to receive feedback from you whether it is just ways I can improve this blog or my internet marketing pursuits. Everything I learn and accomplish will be added to this blog and I hope to inspire others to have a go at some form of internet marketing.

So visit often! Sign up to the mailing list and comment on what you would like to see from this blog.

Thanks and I will speak to you soon.