… from a blog which is not affiliated with the 30 Day Challenge.

This is one of the reasons why I love internet marketing: your blog or website works and earns while you’re not around, even when you sleep. The other reason is that I can work on said blog or website in nothing but my underwear and a T-shirt.

This not only increases my August earnings to over $60, but I’ve hit my minimum payout for this unnamed affiliate program and should be expecting a $120 cheque in the mail in 2-3 weeks! This is my second cheque from online wheeling and dealing and it’s over four times bigger than the last one! I really, really, really, really, really hope that I keep getting cheques (sorry, I’m Canadian) in the mail each month, and I’m not just getting lucky. The thing is, traffic hasn’t increased much in the past few months, but I’m making more money. (Note that my 30DC goal is to make $100 solely from the 30DC, so this doesn’t count towards it.)

I’m earning more money with my other blog projects that I’ve put on the back burner since starting the 30 Day Challenge. It’s too early to say I’m disappointed in the 30 Day Challenge, because we’re just starting to get into the meat and potatoes of it.

But not everybody has been pleased with the way the 30 Day Challenge. Mark at 45n5 criticized the challenge for using parasite SEO and not really working to create something sustainable. I agree with him that what we’ve done so far isn’t really sustainable, but we’ve just started, and Ed has mentioned that there are still more things to do. Mark suggests to “Do what they do, not what they say,” but I think we are building up to what they really do, which is create and sell (or get others to sell) your own info product.

I’m going to chug along with the 30 Day Challenge, and if I don’t end up making anything, I’ve only lost a little time.

Technorati Tags: TDC, 30DC, Thirty Day Challenge, 30 Day Challenge, Parasite SEO, Online Earnings, Internet Income, Making Money Online, Making Money While You Sleep, Tumblr, Tumblelogs, Tumbleweed, Tumblespam,

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So I just woke up and saw that neither of my four tumblelogs were ranked, although one of my posts on Netscape was listed. A little disappointed, even if I would never expect to be listed in less than 24 hours. But this isn’t what I was afraid of.

While using SocialPoster, I noticed something. I noticed a lot of other tumblelogs on all of the social bookmarking sites! It seems the one problem of having a huge turnout for the 30 Day Challenge, aside from the increased bandwidth usage, is that when Ed posted Rob’s Tumblr and SocialPoster videos there would be a huge surge of freshly created Tumblr sites posted on the major social bookmarking sites.

It appears I’m not the only one who noticed this. The funny thing is early yesterday morning, just hours after the SocialPoster video was put up and before I was even finished all my tumblelogs, IndianPad banned Tumblr links from being posted.

The problem is that you have all this tumblespam on Digg, Reddit, Netscape, etc. which is getting very little “love” except from teammates and a few other fellow 30DC’ers. Most tumblelogs don’t have much in the way of content, while there are some that really do a good job of using great, even “sticky” content in just a few posts. Unfortunately most of those get buried in the deluge of other tumblelogs on the social bookmarking sites.

This publicity is also turning Tumblr into the next Squidoo, and may get “slapped” by Google in the future. Although a more likely scenario that could happen before the end of August is Tumblr deleting the blogs with the least valuable content on them. And seeing how almost everyone is posting a couple times and just leaving their tumblelogs alone, that might not bode well for 30 Day challengers. In fact, I think I’ll make another post on my tumblelogs today.

This challenge is going to be especially difficult since I’m working without a team and because my goal is $100. Now that I think about it, I have less than two weeks to make $100.

Technorati Tags: 30DC, TDC, Thirty Day Challenge, 30 Day Challenge, Parasite SEO, Ticks, Tapeworms, Tumbleweeds, Tumblr, Tumblespam, Tumblelogs, Blogs, IndianPad, SocialPoster, Web 2.0, Social Bookmarking, Googleslap, Content

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It appears there is a discussion on the 30DC forum about adult niches and adult marketing in general. I know a thing or two (but not much more than that ) about promoting adult content on the internet. Before I continue I just want to note that everything that isn’t adult is called mainstream in the industry.

The principles of internet marketing apply to both mainstream and adult content, products, and services. Adult can be divided into countless niches, subniches, and microniches, and some of the methods of earning money (affiliate marketing, PPC ads) are the same, but there are some distinct differences…

The strength of Web 2.0 in terms of traffic potential isn’t nearly as high in adult as it is in mainstream. This is because the biggest Web 2.0 sites don’t do adult. But lately there has been a small boom of YouTube-like sites and Digg-like sites designed specifically for adult.

Adult PPC advertising is also “weaker” compared to its mainstream cousin. You can’t use mainstream ads like AdSense, and you generally earn much less per click. We’re talking a few cents or even less per click, depending on the PPC network. That isn’t to say you can’t make a lot of money from it, but you’d need a ton of traffic to make up for decreased click revenues.

Another thing is that it is sometimes harder to convert in adult. If you are participating in the 30 Day Challenge, you might recall Ed using a 1:200 conversion ratio as “bad numbers.” In adult, 1:200 isn’t great, but it isn’t bad at all.

And let’s not forget the potential legal consequences, which vary according to where you live. After all this, it sounds crazy that anyone would even think about promoting adult content, doesn’t it?

But there are many people who make a decent income from it. Although there isn’t a lot of Web 2.0 traffic, it’s growing. Most people get traffic from link exchanges, gallery/link submissions, directories, or search engines. It’s much easier to get consistent traffic in adult than in mainstream, but it’s harder to convert.

And stereotypes aside, it isn’t as sleazy as most people make it sound. These people just want to make a buck, just like all of us online, but in a different market. And what of spamming? Exploitation of children? There are bad apples in every bunch, adult and mainstream. One remarkable thing about the adult industry is that it’s self-regulating. It isn’t uncommon for webmasters to be in a rouse about a dishonest webmaster or sponsor on one of the many of the industry forums.

Want to learn more? Here are some resources and forums I highly recommend. They aren’t linked but with a quick search you should be able to find them. Although these are forums and informational resources, expect to find some content inappropriate for the work environment or children!

YNOT - A great adult webmaster resource site with a message board.

Cozy Academy - Tons of information on adult webmastering. Also part of a “Cozy” network of sites, all of which you should check out.

Cozy Campus - Friendly message board but very small.

Greenguy and Jim - Adult webmaster site run by two guys in the adult business. Has stats for adult sponsors and hosts a message board.

Netpond
- Overall a great message board with a very friendly atmosphere. Also
has a small subforum dedicated to earning money online with mainstream sites.

GFY Webmaster Board - A very
popular adult webmaster board. Not the greatest place for newbies and
those without a thick skin, but home to a lot of very talented
webmasters and others in the adult industry. Expect to see a lot of that “rousing” I mentioned earlier.

Technorati Tags: Adult Industry, Adult Webmaster, Adult, Mainstream, Affiliate Marketing, Censored, Conversion Ratio

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This post is a rant.

I’ve got a lot of crap I want to get off my chest about online schemes to make money. This rant was inspired by a post I read at Cash Quests about making money with AGLOCO. This is just one of a long line of schemes meant to seduce the average surfer and aspiring webpreneur into wasting time and making other people money.

There are too many people who are looking for a quick buck, online and offline. I have been guilty of this myself, but over the past six months I’ve dedicated more and more time to projects with longer-term earning potential. One lesson I’ve learned is if you want to earn money online you need to be in it for the long haul.

But I didn’t always think this way.

I can’t even remember the names of them, but I participated in some of those paid-to-surf and paid survey programs a few years ago. Let me tell you that if you want to earn at most a few dollars for a few hours of work, knock yourself out. Oh, and I never saw a penny out of them, although for one paid-to-surf program I could’ve used my measly $3 and some odd cents toward a purchase from their online store.

You know who loves paid-to-surf and paid survey programs? People who sell paid-to-surf and paid survey programs. 

AGLOCO is the same deal with a pyramid scheme angle. Unless you’ve got a huge network of referrals under your wing, you won’t be making any significant income. That adage, “If it’s too good to be true, it probably isn’t,” always applies to these schemes.

There is one “scheme” that I actually made some decent money with. It’s Amazon Mechanical Turk, or mturk for short.

I’m not sure how many of you participated in the mturk craze of late 2005, but I know plenty of people who made hundreds and a couple who made thousands working on mturk. I pulled in around $150 over a few days, limited only because I had exams. Because I had no US bank account I couldn’t cash it in, but I could use it to purchase things (like textbooks!) on Amazon. Its heyday is over now, and isn’t worth it unless you want to spend 20 minutes on a task that pays 35 cents.

AGLOCO is the same deal. Unless you’ve got a huge network of referrals under your wing, you won’t be making any significant income. The adage, “If it’s too good to be true, it probably isn’t,” always applies to these schemes.

Most of you reading already know this, as most of you reading this are participating in the 30 Day Challenge and have at least some idea about how difficult it is to make anything online. But many of you have also stumbled upon this blog with little experience and plenty of interest in this kind of business. I’m no “guru” but there are a few places you can go to get started.

Check out internet marketing forums such as the Warrior Forum and Digital Point. And while you’re at it, check out the 30 Day Challenge. From blogging to article marketing to pay-per-click arbitrage to eBay to review sites, you will see that there are zillions of legitimate ways to make a buck on the internet.

But hey, I just wanna make a few extra bucks.

Take it from someone who is already making “a few extra bucks.” Set your eyes on free online resources and stay the hell away from paid-to-surf programs and paid surveys. Actually, there’s a whole lot more you should stay away from, but I’ll get to those soon.

What’s the pitch? There is none. I just have some things to get off my chest.

Technorati Tags: Paid Surveys, Paid to Surf, AGLOCO, AllAdvantage, Mechanical Turk, MTurk, Sweatshops, Internet Marketing, Make Money Online, Prophets, Heresy, Rants, Make Money

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All this talk about focusing on multiple niches reminded me of something that I dread as a struggling affiliate: the minimum payout.

For those who don’t know, many (I suppose all) affiliate programs have a minimum amount of money you must accrue before they write you your cheque. This can be a low amount, $10 for ClickBank, or it can be a high amount, generally $100 for many affiliate programs. They will withhold your money until you hit that minimum amount.

Without checking I know I have over $140 spread out among various affiliate programs. That first cheque I received last month for $25.78 USD? About half of that money was earned in February. You know, when the US dollar was worth a hell of a lot more than it is now. Just my luck. Yeah, it’s not much when we’re talking double digit earnings, but still…

The fact of the matter is, in some cases I’ll never hit those minimum payouts (maybe I can ask AdBrite to send me that $3 I earned). This is why I prefer major services like ClickBank, where there’s a whole marketplace of different products, and all earnings go into one account. Another solution? Drive more traffic and improve my click-through rate so I can hit those minimum payouts every month for every affiliate program. In other words, be less of a sucky internet marketer.

So you might be thinking, “If the goal is to earn $10 this month, what’s the point if I can’t hold that $10 in my hand?” The point is that you learn how to earn $10 online. Once you do, you can repeat it and keep repeating it until you hit that minimum payout. Or maybe you’ll sell your own product and won’t have to worry about how many sales to make until you can hold your money. Ed Dale mentioned that the 30 Day Challenge isn’t “just an affiliate program deal.”

Worst case scenario? I don’t hit my minimum payouts this month, but keep earning into next month and the next until I do.

Actually, that’s not even close to being the worst case scenario.

Technorati Tags: Affiliate Marketing, Nightmares, Shaving, Affiliate Programs, ClickBank, USD, Bank Account, Pitiful

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Music is a great motivator. Unless I’m having trouble concentrating, I’m always playing music as I read internet marketing material and work on projects. Maybe that’s why I’ve been working for months with only one $25.78 cheque to show for it… hmm…

But seriously, I love listening to music while I work and it’s almost always something that gets me pumped. Lately I’ve been listening to a lot more rap and hip hop, although I’m definitely not a stranger to it. Specifically, I listen to rap songs with themes of “grinding” and “hustling,” about “getting that money.” As an aspiring (read: struggling) internet marketer, that sort of “grinding” mentality really resonates with me. Suuure, they’re usually talking about popping caps, dealing drugs, and smoking trees but it’s the idea, the underlying theme that resonates with me. Add some lyrics of grandeur to tickle my imagination and stroke my ego and you have something that I’ll repeat on my foobar2000 playlist. Fabolous’ new album From Nothin’ to Somethin’ is the best recent example of the type of rap and hip hop I’m enjoying right now.

For those with less urbanesque tastes, you’ve got classics like Eye of the Tiger (an old favourite) and Live to Win by Paul Stanley. The latter gets me really pumped and I feel like all my farfetched goals and desires are attainable. Even non-lyrical music like techno or trance or whatever similar music can have similar effects. It might not be inspiring or motivating, but if it gets my heart rate up, I’m sure to continue working on my projects with increased vigor. Maybe I should compile a list one of these days.

Time to get that money. Dolla dolla bill y’all.

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My focus has been on my other projects, but I’ve already stated that I intend to use site marketing techniques and perhaps a few cheap tricks, like submitting this blog or particular posts to Digg, Reddit, Del.icio.us, etc. And it will be interesting when a few readers stumble upon this blog through one of these sites and looks back at one of these posts, clearly stating my schemes to lure them into my lair. How will they feel? Will they leave nasty comments? Will they be blogging furiously about how I conned them? I wouldn’t mind. Free backlinks!

What I’m doing with this blog is strange, nay mad. Around the time I begin my promotion of this blog, I will tell you step-by-step what I did. That’s right. Visitors are going to come to an internet marketer’s blog and see me discussing how I brought them here.

One of the secrets of promoting your blog is to not make it obvious that you are promoting your blog. Pose as a surfer who just found a cool site. Oddly enough, sometimes it’s so obvious that they’re the site owner that it’s pathetic. But I will not put up a facade. Yes, I will blatantly self-promote this blog at first, but the point is that they are coming here because some of my content piqued their interest, regardless of where they found the link or who suggested they check it out.

Which leads me to ask this question: who is my audience? Right now it’s just me. But I expect that maybe, possibly, conceivably, feasibly, other internet marketers or people curious about making money online would be interested in reading this blog.

I’m not spamming with gibberish and links with “LOL CLICK HERE” anchors. I’m not selling or promoting anything (yet!) and this isn’t one big sales letter. Since I started this blog I’ve made less than $35 across my various streams of income, but I won’t see a penny of it until I hit my minimum payouts. Nope, making money online isn’t as easy as they say.

I did a few things to prepare myself for my first visitors. First of all, I’ve added AdSense. Yep, finally. It’s the least I can do at this point. Unfortunately at the time of this writing they’re displaying ads for SUVs and World of Warcraft (WoW) gold and power leveling services. This kind of thing is common with contextual ads and should get fixed very soon. I’ve added a hidden StatCounter to this blog to see if I get any search engine or other organic traffic before I make this blog “live.” This new version of Life Conquest is already up on Google but I’ve yet to do any intention SEO so we’ll see how this works out.

I may end up putting “Digg it” or other links so when I do get some visitors, if my superb writing impresses them, they can share my posts with others.

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I’ve mentioned e-books a few times already, and always with contempt. Let me just start off by saying that e-books in general are great. I’ve got tons of e-books, fiction and non-fiction, on my desktop and on my laptop for easy reading.

It’s the e-books you find on ClickBank and similar sites that piss me off. You know, if I had the patience and the knowledge to make an e-book without totally ripping off someone else’s, I would. The thing is, for most of these, you don’t need patience or knowledge. You can pay people to write them for you, you can reiterate a lot of what other people are teaching in their e-books. Or better yet, you can take the oldest tricks in the book, add something small of your own to it that isn’t exactly ingenious, and sell your techniques. A lot of what these e-books do is overpromise and underdeliver. That’s the tired e-book model.

And it’s not just the e-books. It’s the way they’re marketed, too. I’m positive most of you have seen the bold red title, images of these guys’ earnings or “proof” or “endorsement” that their product works, and the highlighted text (I’m not even going to bother highlighting this time). What you’re reading is a sales letter. I am sick of the common internet marketer’s sales letter. They copy off each other, propagating this shit across the internet. The worst part is that they are still making sales. If I ever write an e-book, I’ll skip that format.

Don’t get me wrong, there are a few quality e-books out there, but they are a few out of thousands.

There is one person I know who is also fairly new to the online entrepreneurship game, and he has a site of devoted readers and is marketing e-books directly to them. The thing is, he doesn’t overpromise and underdeliver. He makes mini information products covering very narrow topics and sells them cheap.

Why is this a good model? First of all, he has a group of people to market to, sort of like an e-mail list. He has a site with tons of free information available, so his site is very “sticky” as they say. His site also has an active forum. And this is all in his own fairly tight niche. He has become a trusted source of information, and now he is selling mini products on his website along side his other affiliate product promotions. Making yourself look like an authority alone will boost your sales. Just ask the “gurus.”

So in a nutshell:

1. E-books nowadays are quite shitty for the most part. Only a few gems.
2. The way e-books are marketed is apparently successful, but I don’t know why because looking at the average e-book or other info product sales letter gives me a headache.
3. Making yourself appear as an authority therefore winning the trust of potential customers will boost sales. John Reese, a very well known internet marketing guru, made one million dollars selling his info product “Traffic Secrets” on the first day, back in 2004. I have not checked out this product, but the power of trust and authority is obvious.
4. If you have a user base or some sort of online community, look for unique ways of marketing e-books.

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