Focus On Quality - Not Quantity

There has been an alarming trend of bloggers lately, who complain about all the rehashed crap that is being blogged about worldwide. I have to agree with this and a sure proof of this is my shrinking RSS feed reader. Bloggers who posted like 5 blog entries about how their ebook performed after being released have been eradicated as well as those who simply blog to sell me their rubbish.

These days I hardly read MMO (make money online) blogs and it looks like I’m not missing out on much anyway. What is it with bloggers who think they should blog everyday but don’t manage to put out one meaningful post during the week – yet they are treated like the gods and goddesses of the blogosphere.

Have we really become suckers who simply hang out at a blog because the RSS feed reads in the thousands, even though the blogger doesn’t have anything of value to share?

Where has the focus on quality gone?

What do I mean with quality anyway? I guess I’m talking about meaningful posts that either educate, help, provoke or make people really think.

When I first started blogging I also blogged daily for many months. But I soon realized that I was going down the same road many of today’s bloggers travel on and that is the road of “overdoing it with unmeaningfull content” that only serves one purpose…to bring them more traffic.

It was actually Maki of Dosh Dosh who got me thinking when he announced that he would cut back his posting frequency in the middle of last year.

I thought, I rather do this myself than write rehashed stuff just because…

Since then I have cut back severely and in my eyes this has been the best thing I could have done. My traffic hasn’t suffered at all. Actually quite the contrary and unless I have something of quality (see above) to share with my readers, I won’t post.

To be fair, one man’s/woman’s quality could be another’s trash. I know that but I also think you would agree with me when I say there is far too much rehashed stuff floating around online. Just to blog because you ought to is simply like sticking a knife in your throat as your readers will notice eventually if there is a lack of quality.

Instead of trying to sell every affiliate program under the sun and blog about it when the next “wonder” hits the Internet, why not blog about a topic which is your forte and allows you to help educate others instead?

What would be your favourite:

Blogger A: who blogs about this and that affiliate program, posts every day, talks all the time about how they don’t really know anything about the make money industry and yet tries to flog an ebook (free or paid) to their readers in order to make money on the back end. Plus they pretend they are the next A-lister because they have enough readers to fill a small stadium (OR NOT).

Blogger B: who doesn’t claim to be something special, but makes money in a particular niche and uses his/her knowledge to help their reader with lots of informative and free info. This blogger hasn’t got a huge following because he/she doesn’t rub shoulders with the A-team, sucking up to whatever they say.

Mmmhh… it is a hard choice, isn’t it? Would you forfeit a minute in the limelight for a minute of true learning that can actually help you make money? I guess it comes down to two things:

1. how gullible you really are
2. how serious to succeed you really are

Anyway, do you focus on quantity, quality or both?

How Not To Ask For A Link Exchange

Last week I got what I considered to be a hilarious request for a blogroll link exchange. In case you want to know how NOT to ask me for a link exchange, here is the email I was sent the other day (name of said person and sites have been removed):

Hi {find name of blogger and put here},

I am writing on behalf of the blog team at xxxxxxx, which runs the popular xxxxxxx Marketing blog.

We are hand picking a few really great blogs to add to our blog roll. If you’re interested in having your blog recommended on xxxxxx blog, please consider adding our blog to yours.

The name of our blog is xxxxxxxx.

Thanks!

I often get requests for links that I think are form letters. However, in this case it was an obvious form letter. I was laughing out loud when I read the line:

“We are hand picking a few really great blogs”

Really??? Hand picking???

If you ever handpick a blog to exchange links with, don’t start your email with:

Hi {find name of blogger and put here},

It kind of gives the impression that you weren’t exactly handpicking my blog.

P.S. My name is George.

5 Advantages Of Becoming A Guest Blogger

Guest Post by Matthew Tutt

You have just created one of the best blogs that the Internet has ever seen. But now what?

How do you expect to get anyone to notice this site?

It may well be the best site ever created, or it may contain the meaning of life somewhere on the page, but can you expect anyone to notice it in the first place?

This is one of the trickiest obstacles to overcome when you first set up your own website or blog. You can’t expect instant search engine traffic or get good SERPS for your site because it is still brand new. Unless your domain name is one which is randomly typed by Internet users, you can’t really expect to get any kind of traffic at all.

One of the best and easiest ways of getting your site (and yourself) noticed on the Internet is by becoming a guest blogger. This is simply when you have some kind of a deal in place with another already well-established blog and you agree to write interesting, related articles in return for a link back to your own blog or website. The blog owner is getting free (hopefully) unique content and you are receiving free publicity for your own blog. Everyone is happy.

Here Are Some Of The Many Advantages Of Becoming A Guest Blogger:

1. You Can Get Your Website/Blog Noticed For Free Nearly Instantly
   It costs you nothing to write an article, but will obviously involve a little bit of your time. This should be time well spent though, and guest blogging probably gives more advantages to your site/blog then by paying for some kind of advertisements. Also once you have written the article and have submitted it to the blog it is ready to go live on the site (might take a few hours for the blog owner to check it through and then submit it). This means that you can get almost instant traffic to your own site/blog.
2. You Can Tap Into Related Markets
   Say you had a blog which contained dog training advice. You wouldn’t then find a blog about financial advice and ask to become a guest blogger. Why would the readers of the financial advice blog want to read your articles about teaching your dog how to stop biting people? You should find a blog which is in the same niche as your own blog/site, and then ask to become a guest blogger. Then the articles that you create will be of interest to the blog readers, who in turn will be much more likely to visit your website as it is related to the same subject, which is obviously of interest to the reader.
3. Show Off Your Skills And Mark Your Authority On A Subject
   Perhaps you feel you are highly talented at writing on your blog, or perhaps you are highly knowledgeable of a specific topic. This is all very well, but if no-one goes to your site then no-one will ever notice you. This is why guest blogging is an excellent way of showing off your skills or your authority on a subject. As a guest blogger you are instantly in touch with the readers of a blog, so you now have a direct chance of impressing the readers of that blog – who should appreciate your work, and may in turn feel inclined to visit your own blog/site.
4. Free Backlinks For SEO Purposes
   If you are guest blogging on a site which as a good PageRank and which has good SERPS, you will be gaining some powerful backlinks to your own site. As a guest blogger you should be allowed to place a few links back to your site/blog from within the blog-post you have written, and the search engines will see these links and this will hopefully improve your search engine position. A higher position in the search engines will obviously result in more visitors to your pages.
5. Improve Your Writing Skills
   Although many people may not really care about their own writing skills, it is still an important aspect of guest blogging. As a guest blogger you will get (hopefully) a few chances of impressing the visitors of that blog, so you have to make your blog posts interesting and exciting. If your writing is poorly constructed or boring to read then chances are no-one is going to bother taking a look at your blog/site. You should adapt and improve your writing when it comes to guest blogging as you will only have a limited space in which to show off your skills, and if you don’t impress then you won’t gain much from becoming a guest blogger.

The 10 Best Ways To Increase Blog Traffic

I wrote a list of 101 ways to get traffic to your blog a while back. I decided to narrow that list down to the ten best ways I have found to get traffic to my blogs.

The 10 Best Ways To Increase Blog Traffic:

1. SEO
   Without a doubt SEO has been my favorite way to get traffic to my blogs. The Google algorithm loves blogs, which makes SEO a very good way to get traffic to your blog.


2. Commenting
   Leaving comments on blogs in related niches is a great way to get new targeted traffic to your blog. It is also an excellent way to build relationships with other bloggers which leads me to number 3…


3. Networking
   Networking is possibly the single most important skill for making big money online. It is also a great way to build traffic to your blog.


4. Word Of Mouth
   Simply tell your friends and family about your blog and/or specific posts on your blog. You will be surprised by how much traffic that can generate.


5. Linkbait
   Create posts that are designed to grab people’s attention. Controversial posts are often associated with linkbait, but there are plenty of other ways to create linkbait. 101 lists make for good linkbait and so do posts that are out of the ordinary in some way.


6. Link Out
   Link liberally to other blogs in your posts. Many bloggers keep track of incoming links to their blog and will come check out your blog when you link to them. This can also help you get comments.


7. Stumbleupon
   I am a big fan of using stumbleupon for getting traffic to your blog. If you haven’t signed up for it you should. Stumbleupon is this blogs third best traffic source, behind retuning visitors, and Google.


8. List Posts
   I have found that posts with lists (like this one) generate more traffic to your blog. They tend to get bookmarked and voted on more on social sites. The more list posts you write the more traffic you will get.


9. Blog Memes
   Create a blog meme and tag other bloggers. Participating in blog memes has definitely increased my blog traffic. One blog meme in particular really helped this blog out and I never even participated in it.


10. Quality Content
    Quality content is the key to keep people coming back for more. If you write posts that people enjoy reading, they will come back regularly to read your posts. Having regular readers is a great way to increase blog traffic.

Those are the ten best ways I have found to get traffic to my blogs. What are your favorite ways to get traffic to your blog?

Use StumbleUpon For Quick And Easy Traffic

I have experimented with a LOT of social networking sites and Stumbleupon is my absolute favorite social networking site for driving traffic to my blog.

Stumbling articles is pretty easy when you install the toolbar on your browser. It takes a lot less effort to get more traffic than other social networking sites. You don’t have to be a “top” stumbler to get tons of traffic from it and it doesn’t take a lot of time to be involved in the community.

So as not to re-invent the wheel I thought I would share some of the better guides I have read about using Stumbleupon for driving traffic to your blog or site.

My friend Maki wrote a really nice guide about using Stumbleupon. I recommend you check it out by clicking here.

Another friend of mine, John Wesley became a top stumbler early on and wrote about how he managed to do it. I think that you can follow his advice and become a top poster for quite a few social networking sites. In fact, I have friends using similar tactics to become top members of other social networking sites.

Search Engine Land wrote a good basic guide on getting traffic with StumbleUpon called 5 Tactics For Driving Traffic From StumbleUpon.

Terry Dean did some experiments with Stumbleupon traffic that you might be interested in and wrote a nice 7 step guide on using StumbleUpon for traffic.

I am sure you can find other information on how great StumbleUpon is for driving traffic to your site. If you aren’t already using StumbleUpon for traffic, then I strongly suggest you go try it out. You can even check out my profile and add me as a friend, by clicking here.

How Web 2.0 Can Ruin Your Life And What To Do About It

Ok, so web 2.0 can’t, in and of itself, ruin your life but…

Web 2.0 has created an online environment that is designed to make us spend more and more time online, which in turn can ruin your life.

Spending A Majority Of Your Free Time Online Is Not Healthy

Errr… isn’t this a blog about making money ONLINE?

Well, yes but…

You can’t spend all your time online and then find time to exercise. You can’t spend all your time online AND cultivate a relationship with your kids. You can’t spend all your time online AND strengthen the relationship with your spouse and/or find a spouse. You can’t spend all your time online AND have a relationship with God. You can’t spend all your time online AND …. (you fill in the blanks)....

You need to have balance and spending too much time making “friends” online can make you unbalanced.

That said, Web 2.0 has it’s good points. As an Internet marketer, leveraging web 2.0 sites can be a great way to make money online, but it does have a cost.

What I Learned In 2007 About Marketing With Web 2.0

I spent a great deal of time in 2007 building online relationships using web 2.0. I would never want to give up the friendships I have made, BUT…

It hurt my off-line relationships with God, with my wife, with my kids, and it also hurt my health. It wasn’t just spending time with Web 2.0 that hurt me but also spending time reading email 10+ times a day. In 2007 I spent WAY too much time checking email. In 2008 I am going to significantly decrease the amount of time I spend experimenting with web 2.0 sites and on other activities like reading email. It’s just not worth it!

But Isn’t Web 2.0 The Best Way To Get Traffic Online?

Yes and No…

Leveraging Web 2.0 is one way to get good traffic to your site, however it is not the only way to get good traffic online. There are many other ways to increase your website traffic that can be just as effective as Web 2.0. In fact, you NEVER want to rely on only ONE form of traffic generation for ALL of your website traffic!. This is so important I am going to say it again:

You NEVER want to rely on ONE form of traffic generation for ALL of your website traffic!

Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that you should give up on Web 2.0. What I am saying is that Web 2.0 and other advancements in technology are making it increasingly easier to lose focus on what is important. What I am saying is that spending too much time on surfing the web, making web 2.0 connections, voting on your favorite sites, etc. can ruin your life.

So, what can you do to keep Web 2.0 From Ruining Your Life?

Here are three ways to prevent Web 2.0 from adversely affecting your life:

1. Schedule Your Online Time
   Make sure you always have enough time for the most important things in your life by setting aside a certain amount of time each day that you can be online. First set aside time for the most important things in your life, like spending time with your spouse, kids, etc. Then with the remaining time set a schedule for your online time. Doing this will make you realize just how much time you are wasting on tasks that have no bearing to your emotional, financial, mental, and spiritual well being.

   As Internet marketers, it is important that we schedule our time wisely. There is something called the 80/20 rule that you need to keep in mind when you make a schedule. The 80-20 rule (also known as the Pareto principle, the principle of factor sparsity, and the law of the vital few) basically says that, for most events, 80% of the effects comes from 20% of the causes. In online business this translates to statements like “80 percent of your profits comes from 20 percent of your customers”, and “20 percent of your efforts results in 80 percent of your profits”. Your goal is to schedule as much of your time as possible on that “20 percent” that creates the real profits in your business. Scheduling time to work on the things that actually make you more money is crucial to your success. With Web 2.0 it is easy to focus on the “social” aspects of being online and spend VERY little time actually working on things that make you money.

2. Focus, Focus, Focus
   Web 2.0 is not all bad. After experimenting with social networks, you should find 1 or 2 (maybe 3 or 4) that you really want to focus on and forget about the other ones. When you focus on 1 or 2 social sites for marketing purposes you can become an expert at using those 1 or 2 sites for getting traffic to your sites. If you don’t focus on 1 or 2 sites, you will wind up spreading yourself too thin and not being able to make a big impact using any of them. Not focusing on 1 or 2 Web 2.0 sites for marketing purposes can be a total waste of your time.
3. Step Away From The Computer
   Like I mentioned in step 1 you need to schedule time to spend off the computer. Just like you should schedule your online time, you should schedule time to do the things that are important to you. Otherwise you might rationalize spending more and more time online.

   Take a step away from the computer and live your life. Do the things you enjoy, spend time with your family and friends. Don’t sacrifice a REAL life for an online one.

Final Thoughts

Would you rather have the most friends on MySpace or have a good marriage? Would you rather have the largest community on MyBlogLog or have a great relationship with your kids? Would you prefer to be a top rated Digger or have an online business that pays your bills?

If you spend too much time experimenting with all of the latest and greatest social networks you will find yourself spending WAY more time online in 2008 while making less money than you did in 2007. I don’t know about you, but I want to make more money online while working less, not less money online while working more.

Spending time using Web 2.0 to promote your business, make friends, and have fun can be very good, but spending TOO MUCH time in the Web 2.0 world can ruin your life and be bad for your business.

What You Must Remember About Making Money Online

Guest Post by Trent Brownrigg

In the beginning of your quest to make money online you will most likely find yourself more frustrated and lost than you ever have any other time in your life. You will spend all your spare time doing everything you can to start making money with very little results. You might even come to hate yourself for ever getting started, but you decide to try just a while longer.

Something you must remember about making money online is to…

...NEVER GIVE UP!

Why is that?

For most people trying to make money online there is a very steep curve and you should not expect yours to be any different. Your internet income will probably be very little or maybe even non-existent for many months, then it might increase slowly for a while. Then, seemingly out of nowhere it can take a sharp turn upward and continue to increase rapidly.

When it all comes together and all your hard work has finally paid off, the frustration you once felt will seem like nothing more than a bad dream.

That’s when it starts to get really exciting! You can now build on your experience and knowledge to find even more ways to make money. Your business will continue to grow and your income will increase. At this point you will probably be making enough money online to quit your day job.

It’s tough to start making money online; there is no doubt about that. However, most people give up without actually giving it a true effort.

In order to find success online you need to:

1) Always Keep Learning.
The internet changes so fast it’s almost impossible to keep up. What works today may not work tomorrow. You must keep learning.

2) Continue to Work Hard.
Just because you work for yourself does not mean you don’t have to work hard.

3) Develop Your Skills.
Keep ahead of the curve by continually developing your skills to make money online.

4) Ask Questions.
No matter how long you have been around there will always be things you don’t know. Don’t be afraid to ask.

5) Apply Your Knowledge.
There are countless people with all the knowledge they need to make money online but they don’t apply it. Knowing is only part of the battle. You have to take action as well.

Also, keep in mind that there is no such thing as a get rich quick opportunity! You must put in a lot of time and hard work to make money online. But it sure beats working for someone else, doesn’t it?

So, what was the one thing you must remember?

...NEVER GIVE UP!

It won’t be easy but you will get there. Many people fail only because they didn’t realize how close they were to success when they decided to give up. This will never happen to you if you keep at it!

Internet Marketing Tips From The Web 11/30/2007

It’s been a few weeks since I have done a post like this. I have been swamped trying to balance family life, work, business, etc. Anyway, these are some of the more interesting posts I read this week:

It’s not what you know, it’s who you know
I started realizing this at the end of last year. The more quality connections you make in your niche, the easier it is to succeed. I have made some real quality connections over the past year, and I am very glad I did. Not only because of how it can help my business, but also because I have met some really good people in the process.

Are You Using the Right Content Development Strategy for Your Website?
This is an excellent post about developing content that grabs people’s attention. Maki has done a great job of that and it’s one of the main reasons he has had such phenomenal success in a short period of time.

Read it Later Firefox Plugin
Chris wrote about an excellent new plug-in for firefox. It is something that will come in handy.

Best 101 Lists
Very interesting list of 101 lists. She included my 101 FREE Ways To Increase Your Blog Traffic. It must have taken a long time to get through them all.

Lastly, I wanted to mention a very interesting post from Wendy.

The Home Business Industry Needs to Realize it’s Not 1999 Anymore
Wendy’s article really made me think. I am not on the same page as Wendy because I am not getting rid of my Adsense ads. However, I am considering it. Does having adsense on your site, imply that you endorse the products that are listed in the ad units? I don’t think so, but do my visitors?

I do agree with her and I only promote affiliates products that I believe will really help. What do you think, do you agree with her?

Anyway, that’s it for now…

Your Offline Skills Make Great Ebooks

Have an offline business? Then you have knowledge and skills that someone else would pay to know. And an ebook is an excellent way to get someone to pay you for them. Even if you don’t want to take your business online (or can’t), it doesn’t mean you can’t create ebooks, training packages, or other materials you can sell online. These spin-offs can help you increase your income with comparatively less overhead and expense than your offline efforts currently cost you.

What can you sell with an ebook?

• Traditional text: It still sells well, especially when you pair it up with useful and interesting illustrations that help make your point.


• Videos: These are growing in popularity. Instead of just writing an ebook, you can make videos that your customers can download or watch over the Net. But, if you want a video product, produce it to a higher quality than you find on YouTube. People are paying you for it after all.


• Audio: You can make audio training you can listen to over the Internet. However, if your skills are best taught with some demonstration, use video instead.

You already know what you know, so why not make extra money from it? Even if you don’t want to sell proprietary information that could rob you of a competitive advantage, there’s still plenty of market for the basics. So if you want to add to your bottom line, consider spinning off a profitable training product.

Six Ways to Make Money Blogging

Guest Post by Trent Brownrigg

Blogging has become a huge craze in the past couple years and with it’s increasing popularity has also come an increase in people wondering how they can make money with their blogs. I see questions on internet marketing forums all the time asking how to make money blogging. I also get frequent emails from people wondering the same thing. Therefore, I decided to write up this post discussing a few ways that I make money from my blogs.

So, here are a six ways I make money with my blogs on a regular basis and you can too:

1) Sell links in the sidebar or blogroll.

Charge a certain amount per month for a link in your blogs sidebar under “favorite links” or in the “blogroll” if that’s where you put your links. This is a very good way to make recurring income from your blog. Set up a monthly subscription for each advertiser that automatically bills them each month until they cancel. Most people will keep their links for many months, or even years. If you have a high traffic blog people will pay big bucks to get a link from you.

You might want to be careful with this one though because Google has recently cracked down on blogs selling text links. They have lowered the PR and in some cases the rankings of blogs doing this. However, it seems that most blog owners are not too worried about this because traffic comes from so many different sources that Google doesn’t make much of a difference. Plus, the PR of your blog really doesn’t matter. If you are only selling links based on your PR then you need to change your strategy anyway.

2) Charge for postings on your blog.

You can have an advertising option where businesses and website owners can pay a certain amount for a post on your blog. You can have them write up a review, article, press release, advertisement, or any other type of post. Or you can write it for them. Limit it to maybe 250 words or less to ensure they don’t make it too long. This method is great because you are adding content to your blog and getting paid for it.

3) Adsense.

By now pretty much every blog owner knows what Adsense is so this one is basically self-explanatory. Just sign up for Google Adsense and put the code on your blog. You make money every time someone clicks on an ad.

4) Affiliate reviews.

Every once in a while you can write up a review for a product or service that you are an affiliate of. If anyone buys it from your affiliate link then you will earn commissions. This is a really good way to make money from your blog. However, don’t get in the habit of posting lots of affiliate reviews. I like to do maybe two per month or so.

5) Get paid to blog sites.

There are sites such as PayPerPost.com and ReviewMe.com where you can sign up and get paid for blogging about other people’s sites. How much you get paid depends on a number of factors but if you have a popular blog you can make quite a bit per post.

6) The news cash method.

This one is very simple. All you have to do is go to http://www.thenewsroom.com and sign up for free. Then find some news related to the topic of your blog. You will see a little “embed” button next to all the news articles and videos. Click that button and copy the code to put it on your blog. You will then get paid every single time someone visits the page it’s posted on. You only make a very small amount of money per visit, but it adds up over time and you can post these news articles as much as you want.

There you have it. Six ways to make money blogging. I’m sure there are more ways that you can make money with your blog but these are some of the more popular methods, and they are the ones I have been successful with.

Dedicated to your success,
Trent Brownrigg
Home Based Business Opportunities

Poll Results - How Much Money Would You Sell Your Blog For?

A few weeks ago, I ran a poll asking you,

How Much Money Would You Be Willing To Sell Your Blog For?

48 of you answered the poll and here are the interesting results:

1-10,000 dollars (23%)
10,001-20,000 dollars (2%)
20,001-30,000 dollars (19%)
30,001-40,000 dollars (4%)
40,001-50,000 dollars (0%)
Over 50,000 dollars (38%)
I Would Never Sell It (15%)

The most popular option was 50,000 dollars or more. I have to be honest with you, from a pure business standpoint most blogs aren’t worth over 50,000 dollars. In fact, most are worth under 15,000 dollars. Over half of you (53%) said you would either sell your blog for over 50,000 or not sell it at all. Wow! I think that just shows how personal blogs are and how attached we as bloggers are to our blogs. I was a bit surprised by the 15% of you who said you would never sell your blog… never??? If someone gave you a million dollars you wouldn’t sell it?

Does anything from the poll results surprise you?

7 Ways To Keep Your Blog Going When Time Is Hard To Find?

Chris Garrett asked a great question today:

Are You Ready For the Unexpected?

The unexpected has been common place for me lately. I have been having car problems, colds, Dr. appointments, back problems, other projects, people asking to buy my blog, etc…

Here are 7 ways that you can keep your blog going when you just don’t have the time to keep it going:

1. Store Up Reserve Posts In Your Drafts Folder
If you have some timeless posts stored up in your drafts folder, you can always publish them when you don’t have much time to write a new post.

2. Answer A Question From Someone Else’s Post On Your Blog
Instead of leaving a comment on someones blog, write a post on your blog to respond to their post. I find this to be an excellent way to come up with a quick post. That’s what this post is!

3. Answer Someone’s Comment With A New Post
Instead of answering a comment in the comments of your post, you can answer it in a new post. I also find this to be a very quick way to generate new content.

4. Rewrite An Old Post
You can rewrite an old post or newsletter from a different perspective or with more up to date information. This can be yet another really quick and easy way to create new content on your blog.

5. A Month In Review Post
Some blogs publish a month in review post. A month in review post highlights some of your more popular posts from the previous month. It is very easy to create a post like this.

6. Invite Guest Bloggers To Write Your Content
More and more blogs (mine included) allow guest bloggers to submit posts for use on their blog. If something unexpected arises you can ask your guest bloggers to take up the slack.

7. Create A Poll
My favorite way to write quick and easy content is to take a poll. Polls usually get a good read response rate and they don’t take long at all to write.

The above methods have been working for me and I recommend them to you as well.

Later this week I plan on revealing another solution to this problem. It is something I was going to announce at the end of this week anyway.

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