Make Money Blogging

Affiliate marketing is a goldmine opportunity, but it’s a tricky business. Those affiliates that setup newsletter campaigns and collect email addresses are small potatoes. The real affiliates are the ones that are making millions upon millions of dollars in the business. How do they do this?

They spend money

Any business can make millions if it has a marketing budget. But affiliate marketers really benefit if they use PPC and CPM campaigns as the tool to achieve that level of success.

My recent activities have me managing Adwords and Facebook campaigns to get millions of dollars in sales for ecommerce websites. Both of these sites I have an ownership stake in that motivates me to do my best.

In the ecommerce business, a successful Adwords or Facebook campaign relies on ones ability to select the appropriate landing pages for the right keywords and the right ads. Take for example an ecommerce site that sells engraved business items like pens or magnets. In this case, a person will want to specify keywords related to a specific product, and send users to the landing page related to that product. That’s how e-commerce websites make their millions. This is called targeted marketing.

In the case of affiliate marketing, the concept is the same. You need to send visitors to the right landing pages. This can be tricky however, if you are using Facebook for advertising.

Facebook hates affiliate marketers

They hate them so much that they do not allow affiliate advertising with squeeze pages. There is a trick to get around that though.

To get around the FB issue, simply create a few facebook ads, then when they go through the approval process, you can see their IP address. You are sending them to a page that you haven’t made available to anyone else.

If you use StatPress or a similar plugin, you can see their IP address. Then you proceed to filter and redirect their IP address to the page you created for them. That’s the page you submitted with your ads.

When the filter works, it shows Facebook IP’s your fake page, but your real visitors will see your squeeze page. That’s how it’s done.

Google is still the boss

Facebook aside, Google will be your biggest traffic source. Utilize their PPC for search, and direct them to your squeeze pages. Make sure you only use relevant keywords, or you can end up wasting hundreds or even thousands on clicks that will never convert to commissions.

Power affiliates start out spending $1,000 per month on PPC ads, and they repurpose their profits towards their PPC costs. The profit will gradually grow, as they make their millions.

It really is that simple. Now get to work!

Are you fat like me?

I know… not very nice. But I am allowed to talk about something that I can relate to. I am 5’8″ and weigh 250 pounds. This means I have a BMI (body mass index) of over 38%, You aren’t supposed to have a BMI over 25%.

I am considered obese right now. Not only that, but I am very much out of shape and can’t do a lot physically without getting tired. I will not be letting this problem continue however. Tomorrow, I am buying a juicer and will only be having one regular food meal per day. Then every time I get hungry afterwards, I will be juicing fruits and veggies.

But that’s sick!

Well, shit happens. I should have thought about that before I let myself get out of shape. Aside from that, juicing doesn’t have to be nasty. You can mix up things for a good flavor. For example, I wouldn’t just juice some broccoli. I would combine it with a green apple to make it go down easier.

I know you may be wondering “what in the hell does this have to do with blogging?”, and my answer would be that it has everything to do with blogging. If you have not noticed, I haven’t been posting here very much. As a matter of fact, it’s been nearly a month since I last posted an article.

My reason for hiatus was not just that I have clients, but that I am too tired and my mind is not as clear as it should be. This has a lot to do with my health. I should feel much better at the age of 30, and I should have a lot more energy than I currently do.

It’s time that I stop using my treadmill as an end-table and start taking care of myself. I want to see my feet again when I’m standing up. More importantly, I don’t want to let my blog turn into an echo chamber.

How To Be An Unhealthy Blogger

If you want to avoid the trap I fell into, then I can give you some suggestions and tips. Hopefully my misery will help you avoid your own. Of course, if you want to be unhealthy, do the opposite of what I tell you below.

• Don’t sit on your ass 24/7 - If you really want to get out of shape, find a way to keep yourself busy on the computer all of the time. I should be getting out for a walk at the park at least every two days, or using my treadmill that much. I should be playing basketball like I did when I was a teenager. I remember what it was like to have some nice abs. Get active right now, and don’t let your blog become your entire life. You will find that you have even more inspiration in your writing because of the events of the day.

• Eat healthy - I am NOT saying to avoid double cheeseburgers from MacDonald’s. Actually, you should eat what you want. But you should also eat healthy fruits and vegetables more often. Even more importantly, eat until you are full…. not until you are stuffed. This probably means that you should avoid buffet restaurants.

• Avoid headaches - Don’t stare are the computer monitor for hours at a time. You can think heavily about what you want to write about. You can even write it down on paper while sitting on your deck getting fresh air. Then when you are ready to publish it, you can type away, do your editing, and post it. Take it from a web designer and coder; headaches will come if you don’t follow my advice. A bad headache or migraine will easily kill your creative side fast.

I know this post will confuse a lot of my readers, because I will be vague for the most part. But I really aim to inspire with this one when you are done reading it.

We all struggle as human beings, to be the greatest. When something in our life happens that takes this drive away from us, we give up. We not only give up on our dreams and goals, but we give up on life in general. Maybe your “something” had to do with a loved one dying. Maybe you received the news from your doctor that you don’t have much time left. Maybe you lost the one you love because they left you. Maybe you lost the will to live.

There are ways out of that lost feeling, but you have to want them. If you fall into the trap of falling in love with the negative feeling, you will have given up completely, and you will have lost the will to live entirely.

I understand that is confusing being on a blog about making money, but I promise I have a reason. Without the drive and passion, you will never go beyond your lowest point. Without your motivation, you might as well crawl under a rock and die. I would be an expert on this, so I am allowed to talk about it.

One of the things I would like to make clear is that you need more than one motivator. If you put a single motivation up front and give it all of the power, what happens if you lose it? I will tell you. You will no longer have that drive, or that will to move forward.

Motivation is key to your success in not only making money, but life in general.

To avoid an end to your career, and possibly your life:

• Avoid any and all negative thoughts.
• Create multiple motivators so you don’t bank on just one.
• Money isn’t everything, so don’t let that be your motivator.
• Suppress all human feelings, and don’t get emotionally attached.

Your motivators should include one to leave behind a great legacy. Something that people will talk about long after you are gone. To do this, you always need to go big. Everything you do should reflect how passionate you are for your activity.

If you are going to blog about something, then stand out and be the best at it. Don’t lose focus and get distracted by negativity. Don’t let that single motivator be the stopping force should something happen to it.

Are you an ecommerce store owner? Provide the best service possible, and make your customers shout your name every time someone is looking for what you sell.

When I think of someone who went big, I think of Michael Jordan. He was the greatest. I remember being a 13 year old boy watching every game. If for some reason I missed a game, then the bulls lost. I was very superstitious about this. I watched both 3-peat championships as they took place. I watched the games like I were in them, and celebrated at every advance.

Watching Michael Jordan was an inspiration for me. He made it seem like it was simple to go big, even though it’s often not that easy.

The many paths to destruction:

I have had many obstacles in my life.

• My sister being the victim of a hit and run driver on my 10th birthday.
• My grandfather dying and I wasn’t allowed to see him in the hospital before he did.
• My first love being stripped from my life.
• The fact that I have a social disorder that doesn’t allow me to keep friends.
• The fact that everyone in my life throughout my life has hated me.
• My inability to care anymore.
• My loss of faith in mankind….

There are too many things to list. When you reach rock bottom, it is no longer of “who can I blame?”, but rather “who cares?”. It’s important that you never reach rock bottom, because you come to love it. When that happens, there is no turning back.

In the end, remember this. Passion comes and passion goes. But if you don’t go big, then nobody knows……

Did I say career? Yes I did. You may have gone into the world of blogging with the idea that you would be the 1 blogger that didn’t care about money. We all do that at some point in our lives when we take blogging seriously. But if you are human, you will most likely come to the conclusion that money can be, and should be made with your blog.

This article isn’t the usual junk about why blogging is good for making money, or any type of motivation article. This article simply talks about how you can make the most out of your blogging career as a whole.

All The Comforts of Home

As I sit here writing this article (or a piece of it, as it is massive), I have a can of mountain dew, a waffle blanket that makes me want to go to sleep, and a nice quiet atmosphere. If I wanted to disturb my quiet, I have a huge television in front of me with a PS3, and a Wii, and both of them have netflix installed for quick entertainment.

You can say…. I’m comfortable. I am not sitting at a desk in an office chair. I am sitting on a fluffy couch with my laptop on my (guess where) lap.

Do you want to stay in the blogging game for awhile? It is vital that you keep yourself comfortable. You will see a bunch of other bloggers tell you that you need to be focused, and not have comforts and distractions. I have seen those people around the blogosphere. I haven’t seen them lately… It seems that their rigid demeaner has failed them in many ways.
Keep in mind that blogging is tough enough without any comforts. You have to worry about blogging topics, marketing tactics, monetization, and whatever else comes your way. Why make it harder on yourself?

Take Your Articles to Another Level

I will admit, I have gone from the small post style, to the long, and back again. I am never consistent with the length of my articles. I have however, been angling more to the longer articles because I can include much more valuable information in them.

Let’s face it, subscribers want content. If you are not giving them what they want, they will eventually leave.

There was a time when I desperately wanted a thousand articles published here, and another thousand there. That was a flawed strategy. A proper strategy would have been to focus even further on the quality of content I published.

I am in no way admitting to publishing low quality content. I am however, saying that it could have been better on a regular basis rather than sometimes. Personally, I wish I wrote a bunch more lengthy articles than I have. While there are some gems on this blog, there will be huge improvements made from here on out as of this article.

The Money is in the Details

There are always improvements to be made to your blog. You may not know it now, but there is “something” on your blog that is lacking. I recently discovered a small item that when fixed, allowed me to gain a bunch more feed subscribers than I was getting before.

My RSS button was going straight to the feed itself. I changed that link to go to my feedburner email subscribe form. Email rss subscribers are very important to me, and to the success of my blog. If I can make it easier to get them, then I have won half the battle.

If you want to start making improvements, do a simple twice-over on your blog. I’m sure you will find something that can be changed and optimized for maximum results.

Never Leave a Man Behind

That’s the motto of our armed forces, so why can’t we seem to follow it ourselves? Sometimes following this rule means helping ourselves when we fall behind on our goals.

• If you get lazy and stop writing articles, then you have fallen behind.
• If you don’t send out newsletters on a regular schedule, you have fallen behind.
• If you fail to write guest posts, then you have fallen behind.
• If you fail to ask others to guest post on your blog, you have fallen behind.
• If you are dragging ass creating your newest ebook, you have fallen behind.

There are so many things that you can be, and should be doing. Something has smacked you off of the train tracks, and it’s a tough job getting back on there. You have to find a way though, otherwise you risk falling behind indefinitely!

While it is important to keep yourself ahead of the game, it is also important to help others stay ahead of the game. If you have networked with a blogger at some point, then you have a responsibility to say something if that blogger falls behind. If YOU notice the issue, then they will want to know that the issue was noticed. That can sometimes be a motivator for that blogger to get back on track.

Is it drafty in here?

Unfortunately, you can’t just close the windows. This is a blog after-all… But you can send your articles to draft long before you publish them.

I have spent a bunch of my blogging career publishing out of the box. This means that I write it, and hit publish. I have eased more to the draft section because it allows me to perfect my articles before I show them to the world.

There have been times where I actually have had to edit a post 5 times because each time I came across typos. It can be extra annoying if you are a perfectionist like myself.

Stubborn Attitudes Will Kill Your Blogging Career

I used to be one of those guys that despised pop-ups on websites, and I have even rallied against them and gotten into heated debates against them. That was before I got wise to the obvious. Pop-up aren’t bad. People that use them can be. It’s the same thing with guns. Guns don’t kill, husbands that come home early do. LOL!

The thing about popups are that they work. They do their job of getting subscribers, and having your ebooks downloaded. If you have read ANY of the articles on my blog for awhile, then you will know that ebooks can be monetized even when they’re free!

Popup plugins can be set to not be annoying. I had one up that only appeared once every 30 days. I switched to a different style of pop-up, and changed the frequency to 7-days. Even with a seven day leeway before it appears for the same person again, it is not annoying. What would be annoying is if it showed up on every single page, every time the page loaded. There are some blogs that actually do that. It makes their blogs impossible to read without going insane.

Even if you are against pop-ups, you can still use them without “selling out”. They can and will help you grow your blog, and your income. Leaving them off the table because you are hard-headed will get you nowhere.

Laziness Can Be Costly

When I speak of laziness here, I am speaking of not backing up your blog. Chances are, your hosting company has a backup option. If not, it isn’t hard to use an ftp program like CoreFTP to download all of your files, and you can easily export your database using phpMyAdmin.

Did you hear about the time that my website got hacked, and I lost everything? Probably not because it only happened to me once when I was a newbie to websites many years ago. Ever since, backups have been a huge part of my internet life.

I backup so much, I would make Microsoft jealous. It’s worth it too. If someone were to hack me, I would be operational again within minutes if I am around; the next day if I wasn’t around.

If you are hosting with Hostgator like I am right now, then there is an option to backup your entire website including the databases, and you will be provided with a link to download them all.

Are you missing your balls?

That might have missed the mark if you happen to be a woman… but the meaning is exactly the same. Blogging for income requires you to be ready to take action. If you are someone that procrastinates on everything, then blogging for income will be tough for you to master.

As you know, I am an advocate for offering a service on your blog. You can be consulting on some topic as soon as today if you wanted. You just have to put your plan into motion by creating a service, and offering it on a page within your blog.

Blogging in 2011-2012 will require some big balls. The competition is stiff (no perverted pun intended), but luckily Google and other traffic sources will still help you out. The problem is that you have to be a decision maker to make the process work for you.

Not only can it be tough to piece a service together, but there are other issues you have to get around such as guest posting. You may not feel that your content is top-notch quality like those you have read, but believe me when I tell you that there are major websites out there helping to promote beginner bloggers.

Guest blogging is a vital step to take if you want to establish yourself, and earn quick traffic in the process. Get over your fears, and get out there. Your name can be plastered all over the place like mine is in no time at all!

Show Your A$$!

Yes, I said ass and balls in the same article. While I await the many complaints from censors across the world, let me tell you about why it’s sometimes important to show your ass.

I remember awhile back, my friend and fellow blogger Alex Whalley was attacked on his blog by someone that simply could not comprehend something he wrote about. The woman called him sexist for no reason, because he used a nice little photo of a hot chick on his article. By the way, he didn’t say “hot chick”, that’s my nice little addition.

When the reader refused to listen to reason, and she became belligerent, he had no choice but to show his ass. There was another time when we first created our joint-blog at ScrewedByLife.com (note: we have been slacking on that blog though ), some joker started talking crap about Alex on his blog. Not Alex’ blog, but the dude’s. We had no choice but to show up on his blog and call out his stupidity. Apparently, the guy did not like the idea of affiliate marketers affiliate marketing (tongue twister, sorry).

If you are being attacked, sometimes it can be wise to go on the offensive. It feels good while it gives your readers your side of the story.

Overbearing Personalities, Lacking Content

Sometimes you come across a blog that is horribly monetized. It is one thing for there to be ads, and links to affiliate products within quality articles. It is another thing to go to a blog that is nothing but affiliate reviews.

Sites that are obviously full of spam will not help your credibility. You need to provide meat and potatoes, not a plate full of mustard.

To avoid falling into the blogger affiliate marketing trap that makes readers want to vomit, I suggest you having a review to article ratio of 1/10. Squeeze out 9 quality articles before writing yet another review to make money from. What this will do is allow you to build up rss subscribers, newsletter subscribers, and traffic which you can then monetize with the 1 review.

In addition, you will be able to get paid ads and paid reviews because your blog has been established with quality control.

Don’t be a cheapskate!

If you are always worrying about the $47 for the new ad management plugin, or some other premium feature that will make your blog stand out, then you will never spend a dime on anything to improve your blog. In the end, you are basically telling your readers that you don’t care about them.

The same goes for learning. If you want to make money now, or build up your reputation as an expert, then get yourself a consultant or coach. These are experts in their field that can save you years by teaching you what works now. Everyone needs help now and then, so don’t be afraid to ask. More importantly, don’t be too cheap to ask.

You will do well

If you follow these invaluable tips, I have no doubt that your blogging career will skyrocket into something that you can share with your grandkids.

Making changes can be easy, but you have to have an open mind. Your blog can be fully developed and raking in money in just days in some cases.

Did you enjoy this article? If so, get more just like it delivered to your inbox by subscribing!

It’s that time of the month again when I get to give my readers a brand spankin’ new coupon code for OIOPublisher, only the greatest ad manager available.

Remember, OIO Publisher can be used as a WordPress plugin, as well as a standalone script which you can install on any website.

Your OIOPublisher coupon code for June 2011 is JUNO-LATTE

Make sure you use this coupon code when purchasing OIOPublisher so that you get $10 off of the total price.

After you purchase the script, make sure you add yourself to the marketplace so that potential ad space buyers can find you.

I wasn’t planning to update this series quite yet, but thanks to an early advance in an unforeseen google result, I felt it necessary.

Firstly, let me tell you that my wordpress.com site is still up and running. I have only did some basic directory submissions to maybe 20 or so free directories. I have not did any article marketing yet, or any other kind of marketing except for maybe one or two blog comments.

See the screenshot…

You will notice that the site is now on the 3rd page of Google for “free blackberry stuff” without the quotes. This is a 20 million result keyphrase. The search volume is around 1,000 per month which is not huge, but it’s a start.

My goals for this site is to get 1st page rankings for “free blackberry applications” and “free blackberry themes” which has a good 40,000+ in search volume, and very low competition.

Free blackberry stuff is a good start for hardly any marketing at all. Imagine if I were to put out a few ezinearticles, and go crazy with blog hopping. Well, that’s what I am going to do.

Keyword research isn’t the only thing I have been doing. I have also been working on my strategy for product selection.

Selecting Products

I have spent some time locating other CPA Networks, and in my research, I came across Lazy Profits. This is my new favorite CPA Network because they have a great selection of offers to promote. It seems like they have a wider selection than MaxBounty does.

I am going after products with great demand. There are tons of Blackberry users, but there are even more people who want to lose weight, or take care of another problem that they are willing to give information for or spend money on.

Keep watching for another update. In the meantime, I suggest signing up with Lazy Profits because they will give you instant verification and you can start browsing offers right away. Go to LazyProfits.com to get on that.

As you know, I posted my first article about the new CPA series I am doing, and having readers follow along with me. The goal? To make $1,000 per month with CPA (Cost Per Action) using MaxBounty as the network.

I started by creating a WordPress.com account (although that one will probably be shut down before you know it for their strict TOS crap. But luckily, this series will be using a bunch of different free hosts, and WordPress the actual script. So my advice to you is to search google for “free php hosting” and find a good few hosts that allow WordPress script, and provide ftp and free databases. There are a bunch of them. I am leaving my WordPress.com site up for now though, and not a huge deal if it goes down. I will update the original post if it does.

I setup the site, and it’s got all the basics up there. I downloaded the banners for the CPA offers that I will be promoting, and created ninja links pointing to their contextual destinations. This got around one of the restrictions on WordPress.com and allowed me to get the CPA offer link to actually work.

Part 2: Search Engine Optimization

As you know, search engine optimization is vital for CPA campaigns to make good money. It is not the only method of traffic however, so don’t stress.

For the seo part of this campaign, I will be using a program called SEO Elite, which is a great little cheap seo tool that will help you get top 10 rankings.

SEO Elite allows you to analyze the competition, and build some serious backlinks. This thing is guaranteed to get you many top 10 rankings in a short period of time.

I am not really trying to sell this software. I don’t have to as it will hold it’s own. If you don’t have it, I advise you to get it while it’s still cheap. If not, then you hopefully have some basic seo knowledge under your belt. If you need some seo primer, check out these seo articles I have written right here on my blog:

• Using SEO for Practical Online Marketing
• How Important Is Your Traffic From Google?
• Killer SEO: Not Having It Will Destroy Your Blog!

To start this off, I am going to create a new project using SEO Elite.

Notice that it has different options based on your goals.

I am going after the keyphrase “free blackberry apps” and other relevant phrases like “blackberry app reviews”. One of these has around 10.5 million results in Google which is rather small compared to the hundred million results in some searches where brandonconnell.com actually ranks on top. Suffice it to say, I am not worried about the competition.

To reach my goal, I am going to analyze backlinks for a major competitor. I can go after some of those links and get my own on the sites that link to it. The site I am analyzing is Crackberry.com. I am checking the PR, Alexa Traffic Rank, age of the sites linking, and other factors.

Notice the screenshot on the left. This is the backlink analysis in action. This will give you a lot of information to sort through, and kind of puts you in the direction of how to reach the success that your competition has.

When you want to get somewhere, you can always get there by copying the techniques of someone that has done it before.

I will be using information like this, and my own knowledge to gain top 10 rankings for each of the CPA websites that I setup. Blackberry is just one of the ones I am going after. You will notice in your MaxBounty account, that there are lots of different offers to choose from. I will also be setting up sites for weight loss, vacations, etc.

You have seen the saying, “the money is in the list”, many times and on many blogs I am sure. But what does that mean exactly? A newsletter is a great thing to have on your blog. As a matter of fact, your newsletter can bring in some serious traffic and sales when you want them. But I am here to tell you that your newsletter list is nothing compared to another important list.

The RSS Feed Email Subscribers

Your most important list is the one that tells you how many people get your rss feeds. The most important of which are the ones that receive your feeds by email. I use Feedburner with my blog, and I keep an eye on the subscriber count.

My feed list tells me how many people are truly dedicated to reading my blog, and looking out for valuable information I am trying to provide here.

The major benefits I know of with rss subscribers are:

• They get emailed whenever you add an article to your blog.
• Your article links remain in-tact and can turn into affiliate sales, or drive traffic to websites.
• RSS Subscribers are more dedicated to your blog than any other type of subscriber.

I love the fact that whenever I add a new article to my blog, someone will be delivered an email notifying them about it. It tells me that these readers are likely to visit the new blog post and comment on it expressing their opinion.

With links staying in-tact, it means I can write a review post and generate some affiliate sales if I wanted. It also means that I can drive lots of traffic to a new blog or business website of mine.

If a reader subscribes to your feeds by email, it tells you that they loved your content and they want to receive more of it. You can also grow this list faster than the others because it is a more trusted medium. I can’t tell you how many times I have subscribed to a great blog’s newsletter only to be spammed to death afterwards. I know that if I subscribe to their feeds however, I will continue to get that great content delivered straight to my inbox.

Your Traffic is What Matters

When you are reading the occasional Yahoo news article about how stay at home moms are making money blogging, it’s always telling you about how they get 150,000 visits a month or more. Understand that traffic is where the money is at. I see a bunch of bloggers saying that “traffic isn’t the driving force”, but that would be inaccurate to say the least.

Traffic is the largest factor when attempting to make money blogging, or even through some other online money-making venture. Without traffic, you have nobody to use sales techniques or ad placements on.

To read up on getting traffic, I will share the love with some links to great articles on blogs that I frequent, or have come across recently. Traffic is what you need in order to build your subscriber base.

• Operation: Facebook Traffic – Been meaning to build your traffic from Facebook? This is the article for you!
• Alexa Have I Upset You? – An article detailing a bloggers experience with Alexa, and traffic issues. Alexa is something I actually take seriously.
• Hellobar or Viperbar – Want to build your list quickly? This article tells you about two great plugins that can do the job.
• Increase Conversions With Less Traffic – In case you haven’t got a ton of traffic quite yet, and still want to make some good money.
• Link Building Strategies – Links are what get you visitors, and top 10 rankings. Check out this article if you want to build up both of these things.

Of course, you can find many articles on traffic generation right here on my blog. Once you have the traffic, you can build your list quickly, and over time. When you reach a high number of subscribers, you generate lots of return traffic because of the regular updates they receive from you.

Do you see why your rss list is extremely important now?

I have a friend right now attempting to make $1,000 per month with cpa (cost per action) using MaxBounty and I thought it was a good idea for me to create a series tutorial showing you how to do this.

For reference, I am going to be doing this using absolutely no money for the site development, hosting, or marketing. I will be doing this in my spare time as well, which will show you that it can be done even if you have a full time job.

To start out the series, I created a free blog on WordPress.com and inserted some CPA ads, and a small starting article review. You can see the first CPA site at http://freeblackberrystuff.wordpress.com/ (note: wordpress.com is touchy and your website may not be there for long because of their dumb TOS, but you can use other free hosts. Do a google search for “free php hosting” and you will find lots of them that will even give you free ftp access and a sub-domain).

The CPA I am using on this site ranges from $1.60 to $2.80. These are not huge conversions, but with traffic and numbers, the goal is to make a little under $40 per day using only CPA. This is equal to an 8 hour a day job for 5 days a week making below minimum wage.

If you want to follow along, you will need to get yourself a MaxBounty account. I just ask that you write your own articles and don’t rip mine. I don’t care if you go after the same ads or whatever. Just don’t steal my text.

First, check out my site that I mentioned above. See how I set it up with a basic theme that was there when I signed up for an account with WordPress. Notice I placed some cpa ads in widgets in the sidebar and footer. There is absolutely nothing complicated about this.

I will be updating this site here and there until I get it how I want it. I will start marketing it tonight via blog hopping and article marketing. I will also submit it to tons of directories. I have a list that I use, but for this project, you can use a good list I found at http://addurl.nu/ (this link goes to the wayback machine version because the domain was down the day after I wrote this).

Once I get the basic edits done to the website, and get some marketing done, I will post here again with an update and my next plan of action. If you are joining me, I wish you luck.

It’s been forever since I have done any interviews, or even written anything about myself personally. I thought it would be a good idea to introduce myself to any new readers, and perhaps provide an insight into new information for my loyal older readers and subscribers.

If you have any questions after reading, feel free to ask with a comment. You can also contact me using my contact form.

I am going to present this in a Q&A format for easy reading.

Q: Where have you been? You haven’t been posting much lately.

A: I have been working on new service-based business. One of my more successful recent ones would be http://leads2localsearch.com which gets 300-1,000% new business for clients.

Q: How are you making money online, and how much do you make?

A: I never disclose my actual earnings. I DO work entirely from home though. My money comes from various sources including my services, adsense, maxbounty (CPA), affiliate marketing, and direct ad sales on this blog and other websites that I own. Income I will be producing soon will come from different self-managing websites that I am in the process of setting up.

Q: Do you have a home office?

A: I do, but I rarely can be found in there. I am more productive with my laptop on the couch with netflix or music running in the background. I can also sometimes be seen sitting in my chair on the deck with my laptop in tow.

Q: What do you recommend for someone looking to make money online? What kind of business venture?

A: My biggest source of income for years has been the services that I offer. This is mostly because my services vary in price. They can range anywhere from $200 to $20,000 in a single transaction. After services, my 2nd biggest income would be from affiliate marketing. I would recommend offering a service first. You can really crank out an income within the first week if you wanted to.

Q: Can you teach me how to make money?

A: Yes I can! Aside from the fact that I present a lot of information here for free on my blog, I also offer coaching and consulting services that can be found on this page. Your coaching or consulting service will be presented in a way that is unique for your personal situation and goals. Once I know your goals and situation, I will make the best recommendation for how to get started, and how to take the fastest route to reaching your goals.

Q: What do you like to do when you aren’t messing with all of this internet stuff?

A: I used to be a songwriter, producer, and recording artist. I even have big credits. I haven’t messed with the music business for some time now. I like to invest in real estate and stocks. I especially love real estate though, and I know the game very well. I use creative financing methods whenever I work a deal.

Q: As an affiliate marketer, can you be trusted? Or do you only work for the dollar?

A: I take my recommendations very seriously. Aside from the affiliate marketing, I also take paid reviews occasionally. I charge $500 for a paid review because it keeps away the not-so-serious companies and products. I also reserve the option to not review a product if it does not hold up to my standards. I don’t always take the money when offered. To me, that’s the kind of affiliate marketer you can trust. This is not a blog that shoots out reviews left and right for a quick commission. Go find your SPLOG (spam-blog) elsewhere!

Q: How do you market your blog?

A: I have spent lots of time with guest posts, article marketing, blog-hopping, directory submissions by hand, forum participation, and building my list which can turn into a huge influx of traffic when I need it. These days, I haven’t been doing much of any of those things. I still get lots of traffic though thanks to my past efforts. I have recently started these things back up though, and my first set of guest posts on other blogs will be published very soon.

Q: What is your favorite social network?

A: I can be found religiously on Facebook. I stay connected to it, even when I am away from home. Feel free to add me. I always update my twitter as well, so follow me there. I like Facebook more than any other because there are so many things to do on there, and many ways to network and communicate with others. My blog updates are always posted on my wall as well, just like my Twitter stream. Facebook is my biggest social networking traffic source for this blog, and any other website that I create and manage.

Q: How do you get customers for your services?

A: Lots of them are from word of mouth, past clients that return, craigslist, merchantcircle and other websites, and through the various internet marketing methods that I do (and teach on this website).

Q: Would you be teaching your money-making methods by video?

A: I would like to eventually. I plan on starting a YouTube channel for it, but I don’t know when I will take on that kind of project.

Q: Will you partner with me on a project?

A: I am always open to offers. I can’t make any promises though. I don’t jump on “ideas” where a person has an idea and wants me to develop it. If you want to partner with me, you have to be backing it financially or at least have serious skill behind making the venture successful. I avoid projects where it “smells” like I will end up doing everything. I see these situations a mile away, and avoid even discussing a project that looks like it may go in that direction.

Q: What kind of projects will you partner on?

A: Again, I am open to offers. I will do online ventures, real estate investing, brick & mortar business, you name it. If the project is right, I will consider it. I have always wanted to start a dvd and video game rental store. I just don’t want to spend the $300,000 to set it up and open for business.

Q: What would you like to see for your blog in the near-future?

A: I would like to get more guest posts here on this blog. I like to provide lots of free info, but it is hard to do daily like I used to with all of my ventures. I am spread pretty thin. If anyone wants to guest post, let me know and I will setup a contributor account for you. I also have a guest posting contest going on right now, and will again in the future, so it may be beneficial for you in more ways than one.

Q: What is your favorite thing to barter for?

A: I am bartering all the time. I love to barter for weekly vacations at timeshares, and I also like bartering for vehicles. Those things stand out for me when I think about the hundreds of things I have bartered for in the past.

I hope these questions and answers will give you an insight into me, and what I like to do. I look forward to seeing more questions below, and in my email inbox.