January 7th, 2010
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So far, I’ve talked to you about using Xomba and Infobarrel for backlinks. I like using these sites because they give you some residual income with Adsense. In other words, if your campaigns failed overall, at least you maybe made some money from Adsense. If you need backlinks anyway it really can’t hurt.
Another strategy I use for getting backlinks is to set up a free blog using Blogger. I use two different strategies for this.
- I’ll set up a variety of blogs in general topics like health, cooking, and business. When I make a squidoo lens or start a niche blog that relates, I’ll post a link in the blogroll and post about it.
- Each niche might get a free blog if it seems like the niche has potential.
Right now I am testing out a marketing plan that involves setting up Squidoo lens in a niche. It is modeled after the One Week Marketing system that PotPieGirl created but there are some differences. As the campaign progresses the strategy is to set up a blog on blogger. If the overall campaign does well, I plan on creating a blog with its own domain on the topic.
Why use a free blog for backlinks?
A good backlink campaign is one that is highly diverse. Backlinks should come from things like articles, blogs, websites, social sites, and even blog comments. Yes, it is nice when other people link to your work from their websites. But you can help this process along by starting your own free blogs.
As an extra added bonus you can also put affiliate links and Adsense ads on the site. Now, it probably won’t make much money but it only takes a few minutes to do this so it couldn’t hurt.
January 2nd, 2010
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Now that it’s the New Year I like to sit down and think about last year and move forward with my business goals for 2010. But before I can move forward, I like to reflect on all the things I’ve done well and also things I’d like to work on. Here’s a sample from my list:
- I learned a lot about how to really make a blog successful and how to make it look pretty and pleasing to the eye.
- I didn’t necessarily put all this knowledge into practice. In fact, I did so much research I didn’t let my business develop to its fullest potential.
- I certainly didn’t do nearly enough creative writing. In fact, I hardly did any. For example, I’d like to write a novel someday but barely even wrote anything creative.
- I didn’t have any of my writing published in magazines or journals. In fact, I didn’t even try.
So as you can see, I feel that there is a lot of room for improvement.
Business Goals for 2010
I gave this list some serious thought and I know what I am going to do and how I am going to approach my online business. The thing is, there is a lot I want to accomplish but I’ve learned from experience that I need to forget about the “stuff” and just set smaller goals. The magical thing about these small tasks is that you can grow and expand them to create a network that builds on each other.
- Build up this blog using resources like the Niche Blogger to start out. But never let my desire to build income and traffic interfere with the content.
- Use Squidoo to help build my affiliate income. Focus on finding a problem and solving it through helpful product suggestions and excellent content.
- Work on my fun and creative writing. Write 30 queries or make 30 submissions each month.
- Once affiliate and internet marketing income picks up, start work on a novel and finish it by the end of the year. If November comes around and I’m behind schedule, do NaNo.
And that’s it really. I vow to review this list at least once a month to see if I’m on track. How about you? What are your goals?
December 28th, 2009
12 Comments
I’ve been really obsessed with backlinks lately, huh? Well it’s just because I know how important it is to the success of any website, blog, squidoo lens, hub page, etc. And, it’s a strategy that I haven’t utilized to its potential… yet. I decided to start my backlinking campaign by using these revenue sharing sites. However, I do believe that there is still value to using tradition sites like EzineArticles and GoArticles.
So far, I have only used Xomba for my linking. Well now, I’ve added infobarrel to my strategy. This is also revenue sharing with Adsense and you can also make a little extra from referrals. The site is free to use (I don’t even know if paid article directories even exist, do they?) and I like the site so I’ve provided my affiliate link.
What is the best way to use it? Writ an article then, put one link, preferably on the the bottom of the article, to your site using a keyword for the anchor text. For me, I just choose a good keyword related to the niche. But some people adopt a linking strategy of using the main keyword. This is a good strategy, especially if you are using a niche marketing tactic.
I can’t figure out how to make a tracking channel in Adsense though. I’ve also tried to do that for Xomba and have failed. My adsense income is going up, but I don’t know what it’s from. Once I figure out how to do it I’ll share it with you because I suspect that Infobarrel is playing a big part in this jump in Adsense income.
December 26th, 2009
2 Comments
In my last post I talked about using the niche blogger to make money blogging. Do you like the changes I’ve been making to this blog? Every plugin I have installed, the way I write my posts and choose keywords, and even the way it now looks has been accomplished because of the instruction at Niche Blogger.
But how am I really doing? Well, right now the most noticeable thing is that I’ve been getting more traffic to this blog, especially via the search engines. I’ve also seen an increase in my Adsense earnings, presumably because I’ve been writing short articles at Xomba to generate backlinks. This is an excellent strategy because it is revenue share so the earnings are increasing.
Frankly, I’ve only gone through the first month of the program. I’m in the middle of moving (and it’s a major one!) and I don’t predict that we’ll be settled in to our new home until the beginning of March. If you’ve ever uprooted your household and moved thousands of miles then you know exactly where I’m coming from. It will be fun because we’ll do some sightseeing along the way but my work hours won’t exactly be predictable.
Since I have a bunch of blogs and a bunch of domains waiting to turn into blogs, I’m just going to focus on what exists. I don’t plan on outsourcing for a while so I want to keep the number of blogs I have down, especially since I’m going to lose at least two months due to the move. So, for now I’ll just squeeze in working on my business when I can. I’ll keep you guy posted.
December 23rd, 2009
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It’s almost embarrassing how many internet marketing products I’ve purchased mainly because I have a bad habit of reading them, thinking that they make sense, and then not putting the steps into practice before I move on to the next thing. It’s exhausting and instead of actually reaching my goals, I seem to fall short.
Is this you? Raise your hand if you think that this is finally your year! I feel that way and I’ve decided that in order to get me to where I want to be, I’m going to put forth a serious effort of working through all the different products I have.And I am going to stick with each one until I start making money from them.
The programm du jour is Niche Blogger. I love this resource because it is literary a complete resource to make your blogs successful. I’m using it two ways. The first is to adapt the strategies to vamp up my current blogs. The second is to to start a few niche blogs (and this is very important) in subjects that I find interesting and fun to write about.
My goal is to make $600 a week from blogging. This translates to $120 a day or around $30,000 a year. Remember, I’m replacing my writing outsourcing income with blogging so I need to set my goal pretty low. Would it be nice to make more? Of course – but I’ll set different goals once I reach that milestone.
After I feel like a blog has reached its limit with Niche Blogger, I’ll move on to some of the other resources I have and love like Blogging to the Bank.
December 20th, 2009
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I know that backlinks are important to help boost traffic and page rank to your websites and blogs. However, I learned from Amy Bass, founder of the Niche Blogger member site, that you can take it one step further and use backlinks as an opportunity to build another income stream.
Xomba is a site that offers you the chance to get valuable backlinks going into your site AND you can make some extra money on their Adsense revenue share model. And, if you refer other people (yes that is my referral link!) you get 10% of the adsense revenue that is generated through their account. Note that this percentage doesn’t come out of the writer’s share – it comes out of the site’s share.
Make Your Words Meaningful
In my last post I talked about putting passion intoy our blog posts. Well, I extend this idea into writing articles for backlinks. Too often I search for information on the internet only to find out once I click that the article is basically garbage. Yes, writing a nice, helpful article can be more time consuming. But they need to be entertaining and/or helpful or else they won’t get the job done.
How to Publish on Xomba
There are two ways to publish on Xomba.
- A Xombyte is designed to be a summary of the content that’s on a link you provide and only needs to be 50 words. Do this once for your website URL and once again for each blog post.
- A Xomblurb is a little longer and is designed to be an article. I usually just use the main URL tothe blog or website to get a backlink.
I also only provide the link once in the post or at the end of the article. I feel that leaving the URL for your blog or website more than once is a little tacky.
Do I notice an increase in my earnings? Maybe a little. But I feel that since I am doing article marketing anyway I can perhaps make a little extra money doing so.
December 18th, 2009
3 Comments
I came to a very important conclusion the other day. What good is niche blogging if it isn’t done with passion and personality?These blogs are boring to read and from my writer’s perspective, boring to write.
To illustrate this idea, I want to tell you a little story. I started one of these blogs a few months ago. I chose an arbitrary keyword from a list of “good” keywords. I didn’t know that much about the subject matter and as it turns out, I didn’t care to learn. I managed to write around ten posts and I’ve since abandoned it.
I’ve been reading One Minute Millionaire and I am really struck by one aspect of the book – the idea that your business needs to provide value. Isn’t that what people in IM always say? If you look at the successful ones in this business, they have a clear personality. After all, most of us know who Dosh Dosh is, right?
Our words help brand us.
So what happens if the words are boring and lacking in personality and passion? Everyone falls asleep. I’ve done this kind of writing for clients and I’ve even fallen asleep while writing it – no joke. What’s really wild is when I’m so tired while on deadline that I am awake while dreaming and I’m still writing.
In an effort to provide value, I remain committed to providing my readers with enjoyable content that lets my personality come through. I challenge you to do the same.
Happy Blogging and Writing!
December 15th, 2009
4 Comments
I’ve always admired Bill and Melinda Gates. They have more money than they know what to do with (I’m guessing) and they’ve decided to channel at least some of that money into positive outlets. They’re philanthropist is legendary. I never quite warmed up to Windows Vista and sometimes I feel that their programs are a little buggy but I always comforted myself knowing that Gates and his wife seemed fairly humble and nice…
So how on earth could they let something like this happen?
Now, I only know one side of this drama but I love Plurk but they do present quite a fetching case. What do you think? I think we need to spread the word any way you can! The original post, Microsoft China Rips off Asia’s No. 1 Microblogging Service, is very good. So I’m not going to even try to compete with it. Just read it and take action if you think the argument is fetching.
It boggles the mind when people do things like this. Do they seriously think they won’t be found out? I mean, come on!
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