Adsense for Idiots

The Ad Budget that is Reborn on New Years Morning

2008-12-31T11:36:00.001-05:00

We focus all of our attention on optimizing our sites, but sometimes it is not our sites performance that results in missing our Adsense earnings goals. If you are looking at December results and thinking that you didn’t quite earn as much as you expected, don’t rush to change anything that you hadn’t already identified as broken.

Many advertisers have budgets that run out before the month of December ends. Furthermore, those budgets are often not renewed until a few days into January. To compound this type of thing, two other market activities kick in that can decrease your earnings. Many advertisers simply stop spending ad money from about the 25th through about January 2nd. If they have nothing to sell to holiday consumers, their money might get more bang for its buck when people that they are targeting come back online AFTER the holidays.

Plus, many companies and advertisers that do have consumers to target can move into the vacancies mentioned above and pay far less in Adsense money to run their own advertisements. The supply of ads shrink and the bargain hunters move in. Its classic economics, and it can account for decreases in Adsense earnings during December.

Google Crisis?

2008-12-22T20:40:00.002-05:00

I found a very interesting article over on WebsiteMagazine.com today regarding Google's latest crisis. The new crisis involves Google Search users visiting parallel sites (non-Google affiliated ones at that). You see, it is great to have a search engine that delivers users to your own sites, but it can be worrisome if after they use your search engine they leave your sphere of influence and spend time and money on someone else's site.

Apparently Google is having the most difficulty with price comparison and shopping sites. Sites like BizRate, Shopzilla and PriceGrabber make up the top three traffic and sales hacks that Google is concerned with at this point.

It will be interesting to see what Google will do in response to this crisis. I feel like they have been kind of ignoring their search engine for the last few months and instead focusing on spamming the hell out of YouTube. Granted, I cold be wrong, but this just seems like something they should have been ready for. Oh well, I'm sure Google will figure this out in time for Valentines Day.

Source: WebsiteMagazine.com

Adsense Tips

2008-12-17T19:59:00.002-05:00

There are a lot of folks out there who do their best to spread the word about Adsense optimization as well give tutorials in order to help users out. I recently surfed through YouTube to find some tips to share here and came across a great video made by the Australian Adsense team and posted on their YouTube channel "InsideAdsense".

In addition to offering great tips ranging from creating custom channels to tracking and measuring your results, the Adsense team delves into nearly every aspect in this video and others in their collection. I highly recommend checking out their channel over on YouTube to learn more tips and tricks in order to put an exclamation point on your earnings.

Keeping Tabs

2008-12-17T19:13:00.002-05:00

I can't stress how important it is to keep tabs on your Adsense statistics, especially when you implement new SEO strategies, networks or anything for that matter. I recently began utilizing FeedBurners Buzzboost feature to better help publicize my blogs and have really enjoyed watching my traffic increase over the last couple of weeks.

In addition to keeping tabs on your Adsense statistics, I highly recommend that when you implement a new strategy or tactic that you drop an email or comment to the Adsense tracking service to make them aware of any irregularities that might occur with clicks or page impressions. If you search the Blogosphere enough, you will find many horror stories about folks who have skipped that step and had accounts suspended for suspicious activity.

Personally, I suspect that Adsense tracking is tired of hearing from me, but I really don't want to risk my hard work earning clicks and impressions to go down the drain. In the end, it is up to you to keep track of your statistics (but that isn't going to keep me from lecturing you all to do so).

YouTube and Adsense

2008-12-17T14:37:00.003-05:00

Whether you frequent YouTube or not, you may have noticed (heard) that Google now owns (actually since 2006) the popular user-upload site and has begun uploading their advertisements all over it. In addition to running a variety of Adsense advertisements, Google has offered users the ability to apply to become "partners".

I am not terribly sure as to what becoming a YouTube "partner" entails, but I have seen that "partners" have videos ads placed on their videos as well as scattered across their channel and pages.

Personally, I don't think that it is necessarily a bad thing. I think that it is a good opportunity for users and content producers to earn a bit of extra revenue for their hard work, but am curious as to how Google will view certain content on YouTube. I have heard that their will be a few search options for filtered and unfiltered content as well as some sort of re-rating for videos other than the 1-5 star format we are all so familiar with.

There are many popular YouTube channels that feature a variety of filterable material, but are quite popular and may suffer due to this new increase in homogeneity. Here is a quick video of a popular YouTube channel "thunderf00t". His channel deals in a variety of controversial issues and may be affected greatly by the new Google-run YouTube.

I don't know if I agree wholeheartedly with his "YouTube is dead" philosophy, but I think he makes a few good points about censorship and free speech. What are your opinions about this?

All Inclusive Vacations

2008-12-17T13:59:00.002-05:00

Here we are again, another holiday with the airports jammed with weary travelers carrying fruitcakes and presents for loved ones. I don't know how many years it has been since I took a real vacation this time of year. Not that a trip to Mom and Dads or the in-laws isn't a "vacation", but I'm talking about an exotic location, exciting activities and just getting away from "it all". Having said that, I've been exploring some of the unique, all inclusive, SuperClubs vacation packages and am really liking what I am seeing.

Imagine being able to choose from a series of romantic vacations and packages at a Jamaica all inclusive resort. I would love to take my wife to a peaceful exotic locale and sip drinks oceanside watching the waves drift in lazily. One of my favorite aspects of the SuperClubs resort packages is the fact that you would never be troubled to find anything as the packages are all inclusive. Talk about being able to focus on having a great time with the family or special loved one!

In addition to great vacation packages, SuperClubs offers a variety of other packages including Caribbean weddings. These wedding packages include some incredible amenities as well as unbelievably gorgeous locations for that special day. If you have been considering taking a tropical vacation this holiday season or over the winter months, why not make it an all inclusive SuperClubs vacation? I think you will really like what you see!

FeedBurner BuzzBoost

2008-12-08T19:34:00.003-05:00

Having spent a bit of time lately link building in order to raise traffic as well as Adsense clicks and page impressions, I wanted to take an opportunity to talk briefly about a great FeedBurner feature that can help your blog or site a number of ways; BuzzBost. BuzzBoost is a tool by FeedBurner which allows you to create a HTML code to share with other blogs and websites that, once embedded, will not only link your blog and posts, but hopefully drive traffic between sites stimulating your Adsense statistics.

I recently became aware of this program through a friend of mine and have begun putting the feature to use. I hope to see a nice traffic spike in the coming weeks, which will hopefully mean increased Adsense revenue generation (got to pay for that hosting service).

In the meantime, I would definitely suggest checking out the program which can be found under your FeedBurner feed account under the tab of "Publicize". The HTML code is easy to set up, you just have to select a couple of boxes to determine what information you would like displayed once the code is embedded. Once you save you will be given the code which can then be embedded onto a blog or website. If you get a chance, definitely check this one out!

Competitive Ad Filter

2008-12-08T18:06:00.004-05:00

Google's Adsense program offers decent rewards to anyone who is dedicated enough to explore its intricacies (dashboard) and apply the knowledge of the sages (Adsense bloggers) in order to reap the benefits. Having said that, I wanted to take a minute or two today to mention the Competitive Ad Filter in the Setup menu.

The Competitive Ad feature will enable an Adsense user to determine which ads they will run on their page. Granted, this sounds like the simplest of tasks, but it is actually quite involved, so hold on.

The best way to explain this whole "process" is to suggest you look at it first-hand from your Adsense account. Basically, log-in, select account setup and then competitive ad filter. Once you select the competitive ad filter you will be greeted by some text as well as a few examples of how to filter ads for your blogs.

In addition to that tool, Adsense now offers an Ad Review Center where you can review the ads before they run on your page. Personally, I believe that the ad filter works well enough, but if you aren't in the mood o run the research and block domains on your own then the new review feature might be right up your alley. Either way, you are bound to have the ads you would prefer running about 90% of the time.

Reporting Traffic Spikes to Big Brother

2008-12-04T14:53:00.002-05:00

Many people and businesses who use the Adsense program successfully utilize many of the setup and reporting options instead of just simply embedding code and hoping for the best. Having said that, I want to discuss, in brief, the importance of reporting traffic increases (spikes) to Google in order to not be reported as being a baron of suspicious activity. There are countless stories across the Blogosphere about people having their accounts suspended or given warnings for suspicious Adsense clicks and impressions.

The best way to combat the aforementioned pitfalls is simple. All one has to do is file a quick report via your Adsense dashboard informing Google that you have done something (added directories, networks or links) that will likely increase your page impressions and clicks. By filing this simple report, you can rest assured that your Adsense account will not be flagged as suspicious or given a warning.

After putting in all the work of increasing your blogs traffic, the least you could do for yourself is submit this two second report to keep your account open and profitable.

BlogMad Purchased

2008-12-02T16:42:00.002-05:00

Having mentioned sometime last week that BlogMad, a popular traffic generator, was put up for sale, I wanted to provide an update. Apparently, sometime in the last few days, BlogMad was sold to Today.com. For those of you unfamiliar with Today.com, they are a pay-per-post site not all that dissimilar than Associated Content.

In addition to purchasing the domain from BlogMad, it would appear that current members of the purchased site will have the ability to sign-up at Today.com just as anyone else. Unfortunately there aren't any special perks for former BlogMad members.

I suppose in the grand scheme of things, it isn't too much of a surprise that the traffic generation sites are beginning their death throes. I mean, its all about organic traffic nowadays and site recognition. Besides, organizations like Google don't particularly like these types of sites and have been known to penalize users whose sole traffic generation efforts stem from sites like BlogMad.

Anyway, the site was purchased by Today.com and the transfer will go down sometime on December 12th. BlogMad users have about 10 or so days to burn through their credits and find alternatives before the domain swap occurs.

Traffic Generators Dying Off

2008-11-25T17:45:00.003-05:00

Recently, BlogMad announced that they will be closing their "doors" on Dec. 12, 2008 unless they are sold by that date. Apparently the traffic generation business just isn't what it used to be. For those of you unfamiliar with BlogMad, they are one of the better known traffic exchanges in the market and have been in business for several years. The traffic exchange offers their members views in exchange for viewing other blogs in their database. The system is a good source for instant traffic on blogs that are in development or looking to find niche traffic.

Many people aren't very large fans of traffic exchanges due to the lack of organic and focused traffic, but I would have to agree to disagree. I believe that traffic exchanges like BlogMad are great tools for unveiling a blog to a mass/global audience. I tend to roll-out my blogs on those networks to see if my design and content are able to catch a few "fish". After the "beta test", I will then focus on directories, networks, link exchanges and the like if I deem the site/blog viable.

In regards to Adsense, well, Adsense doesn't car for traffic exchanges as they are not truly viable page impressions. If you have used a traffic exchange you know exactly what I mean by that. In addition, I have heard that Adsense has penalized users of traffic exchanges in the past due to that same factor.

Personally, I really enjoy BlogMad for the social networking aspect via the Shout Box and email functions. I have actually been able to generate a lot of traffic for my blog "Increasing My Blogs Traffic" via tips and techniques to get the most out of that service as well as similar services and other networks.

Having used a number of different traffic generators and exchanges, I am sad to see that they are dying off slowly. I guess it is just the next stage of the Blogosphere's evolution.

Intensive Keyword Focus

2008-11-25T14:16:00.003-05:00

Having spoken a bit about different ways to strategize your Adsense program, I wanted to take a minute today to stress the importance of targeting your keywords to ensure "clickable" Adsense ads. As I've mentioned in the past, nobody is going to click on an advertisement for Sea World when they are reading articles on a blog about Adsense. I can't stress enough that it is important to stay on task when writing an article for your blog. In fact, if you don't have a particular keyword focus for your article (or your blog), you probably should back away from the keyboard and plan out a strategy.

In addition to crafting a keyword focus, it is important to update your Adsense preferences and setup from time to time to ensure that your ads are up to date and also working with your blog and not against it. I mean, the ad may be relevant but if its color or size is off a strong keyword focus won't really matter. Who wants to click on an eyesore of an advertisement anyway? I know I wouldn't click on it and I doubt you would either.

In conclusion, if you are writing a blog article and are hoping to employ Adsense to earn some dough you may want to consider honing your keyword focus so you will have relevant advertisements on your page. Remember, relevant ads equal clicks and more revenue via the Adsense program.

Adsense Targeting Keywords

2008-11-07T22:11:00.002-05:00

In our last post I mentioned a technique on keyword focusing strategies to implement on your blog that will help keep your Adsense making sense. I also mentioned last week a few instances where sometimes keyword targeting will backfire and place an ad on your blog that speaks opposite of your focus. The ad that I used as an example I found on a friends blog who wrote a post regarding his support of Barack Obama for President. Unfortunately (for his blog), the ad that he wound up with was an ad about a documentary that was anti-Obama. Personally, I thought that it was kind of funny, but I could see where it might make him and his blog look strange.

Sometimes a keyword focus isn't enough and you have to explore your Adsense menu and filter through the menus to find the "appropriate ads" link. I recommend doing this as soon as you select Adsense for your account, it can help keep awkward ads from popping up and making your readers say, "huh?" With any luck you might be able to grab some extra clicks this way too!

Google AdWords - Writing Effective Ads (Part 3)

2008-11-04T14:25:00.001-05:00

In Part 1, I mentioned that Google only allows one exclamation point per ad. This is but one of many rules Google has, not to make it difficult for advertisers, but to protect the experience of the the user. I will use this post to summarize more of the AdWords Editorial Policies.

The first few policies I am going to hit concern the appearance of your ads. There must be correct spacing between words and words must be spelled correctly. Also, no “text speak” such as substituting “U” for “you.” ALL CAPS is also not allowed though you can capitalize the first letter of each word. Another no-no is repeating words for emphasis. Obviously, inappropriate language either in the ad or in the Display URL will get your ad rejected too.

The next few policies deal the content of your ads. First, don’t lie. If you are advertising a special offer, make sure it can be found on your site. Next, if you claim to be the best or #1, you have to back it up in the ad with third party verification. You can say “Voted #1 By ….” but you can’t say “Best Ice Cream in the World” Finally, if you claim to be better that your competition, you have to specifically back up your claim on your landing page. This can be done with a table, a chart, or simply bullet points showing how you are better.

If you simply keep in mind that the content of your add should be honest and should be what draws attention, you’ll do well.

Mary Jo

Internet Marketing Blog

600 Boyson Road, Suite 200

Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52402

Other topics of interest:

Cedar Rapids Website Design

webdesign's Mobile post sent by brettbum using Utterli. Replies.

Vertical Banner Ads

2008-10-28T16:51:00.003-05:00

After retooling some of my other blogs this week, I wanted to mention how much better (I think) large vertical banner ads work in place of smaller rectangle ads. Granted, you're never going to get rich via Adsense, there is no reason you shouldn't be able to cover your hosting fees. I just feel like people are more likely to click an attractive and colorful image as opposed to a random text link about diet pills or something.

After working with some other folks on their Adsense ads, I have found that not only do they change often, two people can be looking at the same ad and have something entirely different on each of their screens. For example, I was viewing a large vertical banner image ad of Barack Obama while my friend was viewing the same page but a different ad in the banner in question. Personally, I thought that was pretty strange, I always thought (hoped) it was streamlined.

Here is the advertisement in question on the blog Sanktastic;

BillQuick For Your Business

2008-10-28T12:34:00.003-05:00

If you have been running a small business, you know the difficulty in utilizing countless applications to manage your business. Well, BQE Software Inc. has released their streamlining software BillQuick that will allow users to access multiple applications, including time management, billing and multiple management functions, from one application. Imagine being able to access nearly every aspect of your business via one application. That means, one password, one window instead of accessing multiple programs with multiple passwords to run your business.

In addition to all of the great aforementioned applications, BillQuick currently has a 30-Day Free Trial offer. If that isn't enough for you to give BillQuick a try, the developers even offer a free ROI Calculator to measure your business or personal investments to gauge how they are working for you/your business. In addition to streamlining your business, BillQuick also functions seamlessly with other popular applications and tools such as Intuit, QuickBooks and Palm Pilots etc. If you have been considering streamlining your business applications you should give BillQuick a look.

Firefox Extensions

2008-10-27T00:28:00.003-05:00

Seeing as though Google Chrome has yet to release the inevitable mass of extensions, users ought to consider utilizing the stockpile that Firefox has available. In addition to their great Web Developer Toolbar, Firefox has a lot of other great extensions Chrome users might like to use in the meantime (and who know maybe even continue using long afterward).

Here is the extension information posted by Website Magazine;

YSlow: With over 8,500 downloads each week, YSlow is an immensely popular tool to help developers (and designers) analyze web page load times, letting them know why they are slow based on Yahoo's rules for high performance websites. Those using the extension can see a performance overview, HTTP/HTML summary, a list of components on the page and includes tools such as JSLint.

Server Switcher: An excellent extension for developers, Server Switcher is a navigational help tool. That means users can switch between sites on their development (platform hosting the temporary version you are currently working on) and live servers, so that changes can be immediately seen. I use this tool regularly at home. Features include support for subdirectories (as well as different ports and local files), multiple projects can be created, and the whole app can be launched with a keyboard shortcut.

SQL Injection: With all the fear surrounding SQL attacks the past few months, this extension might help to allay some fears. The component transforms checkboxes, radio buttons, and select elements in form fields to an input text, providing the ability to disable elements from the forms. This makes it much easier to test and identify SQL injection vulnerabilities.

Bugg.gd Error Search: bug.gd is the global error search engine. Everyone helps grow the database by providing their solutions to unsolved errors they run into. The goal is to ensure that no human ever has to research an error that has already been solved. Simply copy an error message and click a couple of buttons to start searching for a solution - you can't get much easier than that. Drastically reduced the number of network calls required, using the new XML-based bug.gd API.

Firebug 1.2.1: Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page.

Poster: A developer tool for interacting with web services and other web resources, Poster lets users make HTTP requests, set the entity body, and content type so you can interact with web services and inspect the results. Features include the ability to set request parameters, and save preferences for an individual session or permanently.

Shout Boxes

2008-10-26T16:10:00.002-05:00

If you've been utilizing social networking sites, you are undoubtedly familiar with the shout box or chat-room style formats that many social networking sites offer. These tools can be a great way to advertise your blogs and websites via conversation. The reason I say conversation is due to the fact that many people spam the chat rooms and shout boxes via copying and pasting their link into the text. This is spammy, do not do it!

If you are taking advantage of these tools you can sell your site to people vis good conversation and content to back it up. I mean, do you really want to generate traffic for a website that has bad content? No, you probably don't. Besides if that is the case you will likely tarnish the image of your site via the network.

There are a lot of great social networking tools out there and you can increase your traffic and social networking skills via these sites and tools, just remember not to be spammy.

URL Submission

2008-10-17T13:43:00.002-05:00

A common mistake when beginning to market a blog is failure to submit your blog to a variety of search engines. Oftentimes, bloggers obsess over Google and Google Page Rank that they forget about the other major search engines that employ spiders that would be just as happy to crawl your blog or site.

As I mentioned, Google is only one of the main search engines that would love to index your site and send traffic in your general direction. The other two that I would highly recommend submitting your URL to are Yahoo and MSN.

The submission process is quite simple and will only take a moment or two. You will not see instant results, but if you are generating good content, link exchanges and are taking quality care of your blog or site then the results will come in time.

Remember, Google might be the big fish in the pond, but they aren't the only tasty one.

How To Blog Effectively Utilizing Keywords

2008-10-10T14:00:00.003-05:00

Have you ever found yourself pondering how to go about creating a strong blog entry heavily focused on a keyword. There are many different ways to go about creating a quality blog entry doing so. Oftentimes we begin creating an article with a basic premise on mind, but can oftentimes wind up on a tangent that sends a keyword focus spiraling out of control. There are a handful of simple ways to stay on target and turn those tangents into other posts you may wish to link your current post to in the future.

If you are focusing on a broad topic, select a few keywords you would like to remain focused on and generate a strategy to work them in. This process can be as simple as writing the words on a sticky note and placing it up on your monitor to remind you just where you should be heading. Think of it as a GPS for your blog post. I know, this is feeling like English 101, but hey we need to stay on topic, that is a key to better blogging.

Another tip to staying on topic regarding keyword focus is to say to yourself, "Does this blog post maintain the overall focus of my blog, or am I getting off topic?"

If you find yourself consistently running off topic then it might be time to create a different blog for that topic. There is nothing wrong with expanding and taking o new direction, but just don't do it on one blog. If you are concerned with keywords then you should understand the importance of that quite well.

Lastly, if you are just writing to write, then there is a good chance that your content isn't generating much interest. If you can write in an engaging style that brings in organic traffic who leave comments and feedback then you know your target is on. If your blog is a barren wasteland of copious amounts of text then it might be time to change your blogs focus and direction.

Increase Traffic and Visibility

2008-10-08T16:38:00.002-05:00

Lately there has been an increased onus on generating additional traffic through conventional means (not through auto-surf services). There are several ways to generate additional traffic for your blog or website via a strong focus on keywords and alternative services.

Focusing on keywords is a no-brainer. If you are creating a new blog or website and haven't done some keyword research through Google, I strongly recommend you do so before moving any further with your blog or site. Remember, you and your site are at the mercy of Google so run a few searches on targeted keywords to see their availability as well as their frequency. If you are able to find a good keyword that relates to your overall topic, it is time to implement that word into your posts and saturate the search engine with it. This will improve your overall visibility as well as generate organic traffic toward your site.

In addition to keyword targeting, there are a variety of cool services and directories that will help to generate additional interest and traffic. Personally, I enjoy utilizing blog carnivals and a variety of directories due to their saturation of like-minded bloggers and sites. These resources are also a great way to network and utilize blogroll exchanges to help steer and funnel traffic between similar sites.

Remember to always utilize social networking as well, word of mouth is a powerful tool and social networks like FaceBook, Myspace and Uterli are designed to do just that. Anyway, don't forget to have fun, because if you aren't enjoying yourself then you aren't a blogger.

Building Page Impressions

2008-10-08T15:27:00.003-05:00

Page Impressions are one of the determining factors (aside from clicks) that determine revenue on Google's Adsense program. We all know that page impressions are only worth pennies on the dollar a day unless you have about a million or so. There are a few ways to improve your page impression numbers though and potentially increase your revenue ten-fold.

One of the best techniques is to utilize the Adsense Setup menu/tab and generate your own advertisements to place in your blog posts or sidebar. This way you have control to place better related as well as more "click-able" ads onto your page.

Another decent technique is to increase your posts per page and then add different Adsense advertisements to the bottom of our sidebar thus increasing page impressions and earning a few more pennies.

Granted, nobody ever got rich off of page impressions through Google Adsense, but there is no reason not to try to get enough to buy a coffee.

Building Links, Building Networks

2008-10-02T16:41:00.003-05:00

It is no secret that the more social you are in the blogosphere, the more success you should have with page impressions and back links. Seeing as though Google Page Rank is nearly dead and buried, it is still important to build your networks via links to relevant sites.

One of the most important aspects of building links is to generate additional traffic therefore generating more ad clicks and page impressions. One of my favorite ways to build up back links is to use different blog surfing services as well as blog carnivals.

Blog surfing networks like BlogExplosion and BlogMad are great for seeing different blogsites and gathering ideas and exploring potential solutions for questions you may have. In addition to offering ideas and solutions, surfing through these networks gives you the ability to network by leaving comments and links. If you have a niche blog, this is a great way to drum up business as well due to entry into a mass market. Remember, your blog will receive page impressions as well as clicks on these surfing networks from people who are like-minded and looking to build their networks as well.

As for blog carnivals, a lot of people are still not too familiar with the concept. Basically, you submit your blog to a "carnival" and they feature an article/post of your choosing and funnel traffic toward it. The carnivals are specialized in terms of content, so if you have a gaming site and submit it to the gaming carnival you are going to receive a lot of traffic. Once again, this increase of traffic will help generate interest in your site as well as more page impressions and clicks.

With both of these network building solutions, it is important to notify Google Adsense that you are expecting a hike in traffic due to the following reasons. It might not be the best idea to inform Google that you are taking part in auto-surfs, but you definitely should if you are featuring your blog in a blog carnival.

Blogspot Sitemap Code For Google

2008-09-30T23:53:00.004-05:00

If you are like me and have utilized Blogger's free templates, you may have had (or be having) difficulty formatting your blogspot blogs feed into a Google friendly sitemap. There is good news, it can be done, but not to the same level that a Wordpress template can be.

When trying to create a sitemap using Google Webmaster Tools, you can actually use your Feedburner feed, however only 25 or 26 of the pages will be indexed. I know that is a bummer, but short of moving your blog over to Wordpress it is the best option I am aware of at this time.

In order to format your sitemap correctly, you will have to add the code "atom.xml?orderby=updated" (without the "") after the given url. You may be tempted to add "rss.xml" assuming that the entire feed will be indexed. I assure you by adding "rss.xml" the script will cause an error message every time.

Save yourself the trouble and utilize the "atom.xml?orderby=updated" code, you'll be glad that you did.

Build Up Your Links Enhance SEO

2008-09-30T18:28:00.002-05:00

Search Engine Optimization is still a hot button issue and many new bloggers are sacrificing time spent on quality writing for time spent networking. Granted, networking is essential for any blogger, but so is producing quality content. What good is great visibility if your message is garbled?

Anyway, there are many ways to enhance your blog or websites standing quickly and easily. If you've spent a good deal of time surfing through various blog directories, you've no doubt seen a "blogroll" and quite possibly considered listed some blogs on one of your own. Well, not so fast. It is a great idea to have a blogroll featuring your favorite blogs and websites, but it is wise not to just link everyone and everything and here is why.

Anyone who reads your blog for content (and that is most people who stay longer than 25-30 seconds) might be interested in visiting similar blogs and seeing what they have to offer. If I'm visiting this blog for Adsense Tips, I'm not going to want to visit a greeting card building blog. Although you might be social networking buddies with that sites owner, you owe your readers more than a dud link.

Secondly, social networking with similar blogs through comments and blogroll exchanges can create a solid flow of traffic for both sites and improve their rankings quickly. It is important to make sure a blogroll exchange is working for both parties. I can't stress how important it is to update your content and and keep in touch through comments with others to whom you link. Not only is it just good manners, it can create a stronger more viable network and lead to future successes.

Without harping on Page Rank (which has almost gone the way of Alexa ranking), if you are looking for a quick PR boost, exchanging blogrolls with higher ranked blogs can increase your ranking overnight (it helps to use googles webmaster tools and create sitemaps etc).

Adsense; Text VS Image Links

2008-09-28T14:31:00.002-05:00

Following the current theme of Adsense Setup tips, I'd like to offer tips on selecting image ad units versus link ad units. Setting up either unit is quite easy and can be reached via the Adsense Setup tab followed by selecting the Adsense For Content icon.

After selecting the Content icon, you are taken to a screen where you can choose from either an ad unit or a link unit. Personally, I prefer the ad unit (image ad only). You can select either of the three options, but you must keep in mind how a text or image ad will look on your blog. If you have a tech blog, you may want to run text whereas a sports blog may be more effective to pitch image ads on. Honestly though, it all depends on your layout.

Once again, the ad is very easy to set up, just don't overlook customization of your color palette so the ad can flow seamlessly onto your page.

Adsense Setup

2008-09-27T17:29:00.004-05:00

Earlier today we briefly discussed the importance of creating coordinated text advertisements that compliment your blog page. After taking a look at the Adsense Setup tab and the features therein, I though it might be beneficial to introduce readers to the Video Units feature which can be placed on your blog page and possibly earn additional revenue through a series of related videos.

Clicking on the Adsense Setup tab, you'll be given a series of additional tabs as well as 5 different options for text links and the like. At this point, we are going to develop Video Units (the fourth link from the top).

Once you select the Video Units link, you'll see a series of boxes on the right hand side of the page that focus on the content of the videos as well as a design/skin setup menu. If you remember our chat earlier, you understand the importance of selecting a complimentary palette to supplement your blog page with. Moving on, after selecting a skin it is time to find some related content.

Lets face it, if someone who regularly reads your sports blog see an advertisement for Cooking with Emeril or info on Delta faucets all your credibility is going to fly out the window. Instead, take your time and use the filters to specify which channels are going to be placed on your blog and the content that they will contain.

It is also very important to consider what type of parameters your blog has. After all, you don't want half of your videos un-viewable due to your margins and such. Personally, I recommend the vertical columns or small rectangular players. Currently I am using the column players in one of my blogs and am having decent success with it. Feel free to experiment and mix it up to see what works for your blog.

Utilize Your Adsense Color Palettes

2008-09-27T17:04:00.003-05:00

Having surfed the blogosphere for ideas on Adsense placement and earnings potential, I was truly amazed to see how many bloggers who don't utilize the customizable color palettes offered by Adsense. Sometimes contrasting advertisements stand out and actually compliment the page, but sometimes they just look silly.

For those who are unfamiliar with the color palette options, you should take this time to refresh yourself with a visit to the Adsense page and also the Adsense Setup Tab in the menu. From there, select Color Palettes and get to work. Oftentimes, when you create an advertisement, a complimentary palette will form and allow you to make edits.

DON"T ASSUME THEIR PALETTE IS ACCURATE FOR YOUR BLOG!

More often than not, their generated advertisements will not match very well and will look poorly placed. Instead, tweak the ads to match precisely. Not only will the ad look less hack, but if your readers enjoy your content they are likely to click the ad earning you additional revenue.

Get That Adsense Out of There! When is it Time to Remove Adsense?

2008-09-27T14:40:00.001-05:00

There are times, when you will want to remove Adsense from a page or site, because you have a better converting advertisement on your site.

Say you are writing reviews about Dragon Naturally Speaking 10, the voice recognition software. You run adsense for a while just to get a little extra money, whenever people click an adsense button to get related info or products.

But eventually, your site is performing well enough where you can convert people directly to the product via affiliate links or direct sales. At this point adsense is taking away your more profitable sales, so you have to get rid of it and quick!

If you are using WordPress templates you can customize your pages to remove adsense on an individual page as opposed to removing it from all posts. From my experience this is more likely to take place with products or subscriptions than it is to happen with topics like commercial collection agencies.

WordPress Templates Driving Google Search Page

2008-09-27T14:32:00.001-05:00

I just heard a great monetization suggestion at the Birmingham WordCamp. If you use WordPress, the software, you can establish a template (not a theme but a 'page template'). In that template you can re-code how that page looks and feels.

In part you can re-code that to perform Google Search results on that page, keeping the results inline with your theme. Google Search also shares some ad revenue with you for using their search and the ads that come up with them from Google.

Go do a Google search on the term orovo and you will see paid listings at the top of Google's search result.

Its a very interesting concept for using templates, a relatively new tool in WordPress that is rapidly turning WordPress into a full fledged CMS.

Adsense Tips For Better Blogging

2008-09-24T20:13:00.006-05:00

We all know that creating great content is the key to successful blogging, but what about creating great Adsense revenue? Well, it is important to develop a plan derived from market data in order to successfully implement any campaign (especially Adsense).

There are a number of

">bloggers and organizations who have determined different ways to enhance your revenue earnings, so this info isn't exactly the reinvention of the wheel, but if implemented correctly could mean all the difference in the world.

The first, is a basic "Heat Map", the darkest shading indicates the best place for Adsense ads versus the lighter shades which indicate the least effective.

The second image, focuses almost specifically on Blogger style blogs and sites and works on the same principle.

My suggestion (take with a grain of salt), is not to go overly aggressive with spamming your blog with Adsense ads. Sure you can scrape up some decent revenue, but readers are not there to click on your ads, they are there for content. Always remember to write good articles, everything else should be secondary.

Adsense Tipsters

2008-09-17T18:54:00.003-05:00

I'm pretty fascinated with all of the Adsense tippers out there who take their time to offer sound advice to both bloggers and entrepreneurs alike. Having watched several Adsense optimization videos over the course of the last couple of weeks, I can honestly say that the system works if you work it. I'm still fairly new to the system myself, but can see that hard work and dedication will be rewarded to those who earn it.

Having said that, I still find it hard to believe that some folks are raking in tens of thousands of dollars utilizing this simple free system. In fact, I've watched a number of videos at Youtube where people don't hesitate to throw out these bloated figures and wave money around like a cheesey cliched rap video. I'm really waiting to see someone with a gold chain around there neck with the Adsense or Google logo on it "all iced out".

Youtube should be taken with a grain of salt, but some of the videos are actually quite useful and can be used as excellent educational tools. I had mentioned Chris Pirillo's site as one of them in an earlier post, definitely give his site a look if you are interested in different tips and techniques to maximizing your Adsense bottom line.

High Energy Only 70 Calories

2008-09-17T15:55:00.002-05:00

For well over ten years, Promax has been a pioneer and innovator in the nutritional supplement and energy bar industry. In addition to a number of popular powdered supplements and protein shakes, Promax has developed an amazing energy bar that combines great taste with incredible nutritional value at only 70 calories! The all natural energy bar comes in a variety of tasty flavors to satisfy all of your health conscious cravings.

Whether you are looking for a quick pick-me-up after a workout or an in between meals snack, these high protein bars will not only energize you, but will leave you feeling satisfied. In fact, Promax's 70 calorie bars contain 5 grams of protein compared to half of that in other energy bars. In addition to being a great way to supplement your health conscious lifestyle, Promax's healthy snack bars fit nicely into a lunchbox. These high protein energy bars are just another tasty way to ensure your children are getting a healthy snack at school or during the bus ride home.

Adsense Optimization Tips

2008-09-17T15:43:00.002-05:00

I've been running some searches on Adsense optimization and came across Chris Pirillo's site Chris.Pirillo.com. The site is a really great resource for those interested in Adsense tips, I also found this video on Youtube where Chris discusses different tips and interacts with a number of bloggers who are posing a variety of questions.

I found the video pretty interesting and also as I mentioned earlier, a great resource site for new bloggers and those trying to optimize their Adsense revenue.

Adsense Via Western Union

2008-09-14T12:29:00.002-05:00

Google Adsense payments are now available via Western Union... in Panama.

Cuurently, many Central and South American countries are still limited to paypal as the only method of payment. Google has been is currently devising new payment methods for the aforementioned country and looking for more solutions. Acknowledging the difficulty in maintaining compliance with local laws and tax regulation implemented by foreign governments, Google is jumping through the hoops as quickly as they can to speed up the process for "off-shore" Adsense earners.

Google Adsense Blog maintains a forum for all those who have questions or concerns regarding payment questions and comments.

Adsense and Google Analytics

2008-09-12T21:00:00.005-05:00

There are rumors floating around that Google Analytics may be in line to offer detailed statistics for Adsense Publishers. The detailed statistics will better explain how revenue was created as opposed to the crapshoot that is Adsense right now. Don't get me wrong, Adsense is a decent tool, but it can be incredibly and frustratingly vague at times.

The new stats page will show how users interact with Google's Ads and how well they have performed over a fixed period.

Source: Digital Inspirations.

BlogOxy.com

2008-09-12T20:12:00.001-05:00

For Blogger users, here is a blog marketing service that could be very useful. (For WordPress users, you may have some better options in plugins and coding).

BlogOxy.com provides a blog marketing service that could help you generate more traffic.

What Does BlogOxy.com do?

So you write an article about on a health blog about diet pill reviews
You run the script for this service on your site just below your posts.
A reader then reads your article, comes to the end of the article and clicks a link to see similar posts.
This opens a new window, and takes your reader to a blog article on diet pill reviews on a different blog running this same BlogOxy.com script (from the semantic text review of your article).
Other readers on other blogs follow the same process and end up on your site looking at articles that relate to your own.

So basically, the service helps people find related articles to further explore topics. WordPress users often use plugins to achieve a similar result, but typically only with articles in their own site. That's good for keeping sites sticky, but not for bringing in fresh traffic.

There is definitely a trade off to consider with this service, but there could be some useful benefits to bringing in brand new readers and traffic.

Value of the Dollar Increasing Adsense Results

2008-09-12T19:57:00.001-05:00

We mentioned the draught that could hit Adsense funds after the election this year in 2008. Well there is an economic trend that might also make the Bump Up in Adsense earnings even better for people. The value of the US dollar is increasing right now as oil prices decline and the US Federal government attempts to demonstrate security and confidence in financial markets.

With the value of the dollar increasing, that means that the proceeds from Adsense earnings can purchase more. For website owners around the world outside of the United States that can mean an important increase in spending power resulting from Adsense earnings. For Adsense recipients in the US, that change is not going to mean more spending power to buy more gas, or food or Amazon books, but if you are a webmaster in the Philippines or China it can be important for sure.

PayPerPost Loses Pagerank the Old Fahsioned Way - Updates, Schmupdates

2008-09-09T12:24:00.001-05:00

For months if not a year or so PayPerPost has been talking about finally migrating away from a Google Pagerank based system. They liked the idea so much that they start a brand new division and website around the concept called SocialSpark that has more whiz bang features and feel good, do good requirements to even get Matt Cutt's blessing at Google.

PayPerPost, itself, never stopped using Pagerank. There were just some customers that used this functionality too much and wouldn't migrate away. I'm not passing judgment on the need for the necessity to keeping making a buck or two, just saying . . .

Anyway this week when one of PayPerPost's partners ran an update on their own ranking system, PayPerPost's ability to track and monitor pagerank went invisible.

That's probably unfortunate timing as this also happens to be the week that PayPerPost is working to kick off PostieCon or Izeafest or whatever they are calling it this year. I went to Postiecon last year and learned a great deal about the company, its people, and where they want to go. Most of it was very very positive.

So anyway, this is likely putting a big monkey wrench into the cash cow that is/was PayPerPost. It will likely be fixed soon, but nonetheless, it is somewhat ironic that it took a break in the system for them to actually get away from (even if for just a short break) PageRank.

The Adsense Draught Will Hit After the Election

2008-09-08T00:55:00.001-05:00

We've talked in the past about the opportune time for Adsense campaigns heading into the November 2008 election. The next two months with the excellent opportunities for people to earn money through ads and advertising campaigns, but don't expect that money to last forever. Past local elections have seen major spikes in advertising online, this election is definitely following that path. That said the time period following the election is often times marked with a slowdown in Adsense conversions.

The election will take place the first week of November, and that will be followed like Christmas sales which do bring their own relative advertising Spike. Typically Adsense is not see as much of a spike during the Christmas season as you might expect with the exception of some keywords promoting the hottest new Christmas items. But once the shopping season is over sometime around the first to second week of December you can definitely expect a lull in Adsense advertising revenue. So before you go spending all of your Adsense earnings from October and November, consider banking a little bit for the slow days after the election and Christmas are over.

Once the election is over, and all the lawyers are paid off and sent home, all of those political hacks and junkies and organizers will all be trying to find new work and gainful employment. So you might consider optimizing for job boards covering different areas and especially big cities. If Barack Obama loses, I have a suspicion that there will be a lot of people looking for jobs in Chicago, and if he wins, there will probably be lots of people looking for jobs in DC...

Take Advantage of the Adsense Political Bonanza

2008-09-08T00:53:00.001-05:00

This is a great time to ensure that you are optimizing your Adsense sites for politics. As you write your titles, your articles, or even create your pages, there is no better time to capitalize on Adsense earnings than right now when it comes to politics. In the United States, both political parties are exercising budgets larger than any campaign in the history of the country.

This campaign is likely to be the first political campaign that will cost well over $1 billion and much of that money is going into advertising. A significant amount of advertising is being spent through AdWords campaigns. That means if your site has anything to do with politics or as any tangent related to politics, you can likely benefit from some of those campaign dollars as people seek out more information, look for additional sites related to politics, and much more.

It's not too difficult, even for a person with extra thick eyeglasses to see the writing on the wall. That said, we definitely like to help bring this obvious thing into your consciousness that you can take advantage of the situation and earn a little extra money over the next couple of months. Now that the political conventions are over, we are in the home stretch when the most money will be spent overall.

Twitter Not Dead Yet

2008-09-03T17:21:00.003-05:00

Recently, I posted about the uncertain future of the social networking website Twitter. Well, Twitter made news last week by being added to Mixx groups. Now Mixx users will now be able to import Twitter feeds into their group management page. What does all this mean, well in my eyes, it looks like Twitter might still be kicking even though it is in the final throes of death.

Personally, I think Twitter is a decent social networking tool, but it could definitely use a "refresh". As for Mixx, I'm not a member, but am interested in taking a look at features offered as well as this new feed option via Twitter.

Reflective Thoughts on Subvert and Profit - 3 Months of Profits

2008-08-30T11:22:00.001-05:00

It has been at least 3 months since I signed up for Subvert and Profit, a nice little social media marketing company that takes payments from advertisers looking to promote articles on Digg and StumbleUpon. They then in turn pay users of Digg and StumbleUpon to vote for the articles that are to be advertised.

They actually have users vote on multiple articles so that the services targeted can not determine which articles are being promoted for paid reasons.

This is truly a subversion of Digg and StumbleUpon.

That said, I find Digg to be utterly without any merit or value. I find no useful information on Digg and find even fewer useful conversations there, unless you find value in reading nasty snarky fan boy comments about the glories of Apple and the evil of everything else in the world.

StumbleUpon is a bit different. I do find a slightly bit larger amount of potential in StumbleUpon, but again that potential is typically only realized by people that 'work' the system professionally, building up cliques of readers and followers, who get nothing for their effort of supporting someone on a pedestal.

The fallacy of social media is that it is socialism first, media second and added value primarily for the people at the top and never those people in the middle or the bottom.

To find benefit in too many social media platforms, you have to essentially get favors for nothing from your friends, readers and followers.

So when a company like Subvert and Profit comes along helping people essentially reward the people in the middle and the bottom with a little fundage, I do not mind the application of capitalism to a socialist system. I do not see very many spammy topics float through Subvert and Profit. Typically the articles promoted are actually very good, and the article creators are literally putting their money where there mouth is. I've never seen spammy topics on goji juice or acne cure alls or one of those nasty survey links or made for affiliate landing pages.

Show Me the Money?

This is where Subvert and Profit is a little weak. Their growth or maybe their advertisers sales may be a little low to keep up with their network of Subverters.

After 3 months or so, I've seen a bit more than $8 come in.

That's not a lot of money, and I have heard of people making a lot more.

The issue in the system, actually seems to be that when they send you an assignment, you have to jump on it with inhuman lightening speed, before the job disappears before you have had a chance to do the thing.

More often than not, when I see an assignment in email, when I look on the site seconds later, it is already gone or filled.

Its not a lot of effort at all, so I continue and I usually use my funds to pay for my own advertising through the same system, but that's what I see so far. I'm looking forward to watching the network continue to grow, but I think they need to lock down the assignments for people for just a little bit more time otherwise people will get too disgruntled.

Last Minute Steps to Meet Your EOM Adsense Quota

2008-08-30T10:51:00.001-05:00

It happens to everyone now and then. The end of the month is two days away and you check your Adsense account only to learn that you're a few dollars short of meeting your goals such that you can be paid by Google. To make matters worse, it's a Saturday, a Saturday like today just before the end of the month when people typically don't read or visit websites quite as much as they do during the week.

So what do you do to bring in traffic to your website, & Generate conversions on Adsense to meet your quota?

The answer is relatively simple, it's all about content. If you need more light, you turn on more lights or put more light bulbs in your light fixtures. If you need more traffic, you have to create more content!

You need to publish additional content, and you need to do it fast. If you've got some great articles banked or sandbagged now is the time to roll them out and publish. You need to publish them as soon as you can, and if you need to publish multiple articles, you need to publish them in a batch all at once.

The reason for the batch publishing, is that it will give Google enough time to index all the articles and give you the traffic juice that you need in order to convert to meet your goals. Don't trickle out articles all weekend long on blog, right up until the end deadline. That just confuses Google as it comes to look at your homepage and finds that the articles on the homepage continue to change and roll off the end. Blast them all up there at the beginning and then let them sit there until the month's end.

Once they're published, then you need to do a little additional work to give your article some juice.

You need to promote a couple of those articles, preferably those articles that have good captions or pictures to go with them, and if they have video that would be even better.

Go visit your most reliable and regular social media hangouts such as digg.com, Utterz.com your favorite forums, publish a couple articles on your Facebook page, and get out there and start talking to some of your other bloggers and friends. Comments on their blogs, you don't have to mention your articles, just remind them that you're out there and leave really good comments so that their readers will find you interesting and possibly research you a little bit more by visiting your site.

If you're a member of the blog surfing exchange, get out on those networks and start networking. Again visit some sites that you know invisible to sites that you don't only of some comments. It's not good enough to go to blog surfing exchange and just rack up points, the real points are in the comments you leave. That will generate you more contacts, and more visitors of substance that are more likely to convert can earn you some money then any of the points you get from the actual exchange. The poison exchange can't hurt, but the substances in the networking and a valuable context that you meet and pick up while you are out there looking around talking to people.

Advanced Users Tip

If you have experience with Google Adwords, you can also boost your incoming traffic, by kicking off a short and inexpensive Adwords campaign on some keywords, pushing people to your site or to a couple of you better, more recent and relative articles.

This isn't for the faint of heart, inexperienced or people with cheap budgets. However, it does work and it is allowed by Google, even encouraged by Google!

What You Shouldn't Do to increase your Adsense earnings to meet your goal!

NEVER EVER DO THESE THINGS

Never break the Google Adsense TOS
Never ask a friend or someone to click on an ad to boost you over the top
Don't pay for traffic to your site
Don't change your site layout, your adsense layout
Don't change your blog theme
Don't do anything major to your site that might upset its indexed positions.

Blogworld 2008 - 1 Month and Counting!

2008-08-23T14:38:00.001-05:00

If you are a blogger, you need to prepare to go to Blogworld in Las Vegas next month in Las Vegas. It costs about $100 to get an exhibit hall pass, which is all you need if you have been before.

If this is your first time going, then you may want to spend some more money to attend the sessions. That can cost a few hundred dollars, but if you have never been to one of these new media conferences or have never been to a WordCamp or PodCamp, then this can be a great investment in yourself, your site(s) and your future as a successful and profitable blogger.

Last year, I attended Blogworld during its first year, and I will be attending again this year as well. I just got back last week from the New Media Expo in Vegas which focuses more on video and audio casting or podcasting. There are some areas where these two conferences are redundant, but Blogworld is definitely for bloggers. I'm not trying to airbrush over the value of this show, but it is focused on bloggers and if you are a blogger this is one show that you can't miss out on.

I won't miss it and hope to see you there!

The Adsense Lottery Ticket for Affiliate Marketers

2008-08-23T14:20:00.001-05:00

Here's a great little video from Shawn Collins, founder of Affiliate Summit, describing among other things how he uses Adsense and how checking his Adsense account every day can feel like checking for the winning lottery ticket and more often than not finding it!

Adwords and Adsense can be a great tool for internet marketers whether they are working in affiliate marketing arbitrage covering everything from video games to real estate to car insurance and back again.

Could this be it for Twitter

2008-08-22T11:25:00.002-05:00

There has been some speculation recently as to whether or not Twitter, a social networking engine, is on their way out. Fueling the speculation website magazine admin. who claims that Twitter is being "taken advantage of by spammers and others who have been able to leverage the network".

Apparently, there are people out there who have been utilizing Adjix (a url shortener) which wraps the linked page with your tweets and thus frames in advertising. Unfortunately services such as this will be the downfall of this legitimate networking tool. Currently Twitter is taking steps to ramp up spam security as well as suspending accounts. Unfortunately for Twitter, they are shifting resources from developing their service to protecting it which may ultimately be the downfall of the network.

Using Adwords for MLM Programs

2008-08-20T17:48:00.001-05:00

The other day a friend of mine asked me for some advice about marketing their 'new website'. The site was essentially one of these subdomain landing pages pushing the promotion of a multi level marketing program.

The site in question offered $500 in gas rebates to be paid in $25 increments for the sign up of new referred members.

A new member must pay $199 to get this great benefit of $500 in rebates. (ergo that's $200 paid out to have the opportunity of earning $25 commissions for referring people to also pay $200).

Now, this is one of those things that typically requires that you refer all your friends and family, who will likely not consider you as their favorite person after they shell out $200. These things are always pitched by people who have recently become rich, bought a yacht and a second house in Vale and spent a lot of money on Vegas vacations, European vacations and any other vacation you can think of. They rarely showcase the people that just lost $200 or more and wasted a bunch of time.

So when my friend asked for advice on marketing the site, my first response was that this looked like a pyramid scheme (although likely within the letter of the law) and that I wouldn't recommend investing any more money in it, and definitely wouldn't recommend trying to convince friends and family to jump on board either.

Anything short of that, I stated that if he really believed in this program, that he might consider using Adwords to market the site. Who knows maybe my first impression was off and this is the greatest money making program since door to door bread loaf slicers. At least advertising through adwords, would not upset all of his friends and family.

Adsense for Summer Slow Down Over

2008-08-14T19:34:00.001-05:00

Well, fortunately with back to school and politics, the adsense slow down that typically happens every summer was very short and sweet this year. Its over and many sites are back up to normal numbers.

Many more, even experienced no slow down at all this summer, hitting record months only to hit record months once again. Its possible that the golden years of adsense for publishers might be on a temporary upswing. Who knows maybe we'll be in publisher heaven soon like house cats provided new cat trees to lounge in, publishers might be able to once again swim in the adsense revenues.

Scrolling Adsense Ads, Does Anyone Scroll

2008-08-09T21:47:00.001-05:00

So its been a few months now since Google Adsense added those silly little scroll buttons on their ads. I have no idea who would ever look at an ad for say diet pills and think to themself,

"That's just not what I'm looking for in an advertisement. Maybe I need to look further by scrolling for more ads!"

The concept just doesn't seem to make much sense. That said, Google hasn't yanked the things. Probably considers it to be something along the lines of 'no harm, no foul'. I just can't understand why they even go to the energy of using them. Plus, I have not found a metric or tool that can track whether or not anyone actually does click on the scroll button.

MacSpeech

2008-08-06T16:55:00.003-05:00

I recently made the move over to an iMac from a P.C. and am amazed at all the differences. Granted, transferring from Windows OS to Leopard is "interesting" enough, I've found that numerous applications that I took for granted are either lacking the same punch or are absent. However, I find blogging to be much simpler on the Mac due to all the editing programs and accessibility of keyboard shortcuts and command options. It has been a process trying to locate a satisfactory dictation program.

I had been considering picking up Dragon Naturally Speaking for my P.C. due to all the great reviews I've read over the last few months, but I was upset to see that it is unavailable for my new OS. After doing a bit of research, I was able to find a couple of great programs out there that are compatible for my new OS. Out of the two, I found one from Nuance, the developers of Dragon Naturally Speaking, entitled MacSpeech.

MacSpeech looks to be the frontrunner right now, so I'm going to take it for a test drive in the near future.

Adsense Makes Sense

2008-08-05T18:00:00.002-05:00

By now we are all familiar with Google Adsense, but the question that continuously crops up is how does Adsense determine what advertisements make it onto your blog or website. Well, as of the moment, Adsense ads are selected primarily based upon text from your websites.

Google has been working on many ways to improve their targeting technology to better place ads with sites. One of the main obstacles arises when a site maintains a heavy focus on pictures and videos. It is extremely important to include enough text in your site so that Google can place pertinent ads to your page.

Other ways to improve your ad targeting include, titling images correctly by providing ALT tags and utilizing captions for images and video.

Blog Surfing Networks and Adsense

2008-07-27T19:56:00.001-05:00

In general it is a no no (against the Adsense TOS) to utilize a Blog surfing network to generate traffic to your website that also happens to run adsense advertising on it.

Its not against the rules however to pay Google Adwords to sport advertising that will bring traffic to your website running Adsense advertising.

So while it may be be cheap and easy to start generating traffic to your site through one of the many Blog Surfing Exchanges, if that traffic in number is significantly higher than traffic to your site from all other sources the Adsense team will probably send you an email warning and maybe threaten to close or even close your Adsense account.

So if you receive a decent Adsense pay out on pages about your vacation to Disney world, you might consider running Adwords ads paying other sites a lower amount per click than what you earn on relative keywords like Orlando vacations.

So make sure your traffic levels are high, don't fear advertising with Google Adwords (just make sure you pay less than you earn) and consider dropping adsense advertising if you are running a traffic promotion to your sites. When the promotion is over, then turn off the advertising on the surf exchanges (or turn it way down) and turn Adsense back on.

Those Deceiving Little Link Units from Adsense

2008-07-25T15:47:00.001-05:00

Adsense offers up one product that really seems to have very few applications on a website other than possibly deceiving a web site viewer when Link Units are put in place.

Link units are a type of ad units that use contextual targeting to display a list of topics that are relevant to your page. Each topic, when clicked, brings the user to a page of related advertisements. You'll earn revenue for each valid user click on the ads on this resulting page. Link units come in a variety of unusual ad formats
Google Adsense

I have attempted to utilize these links from time to time acting in good faith that Google would not offer up a deceptive advertising product, but I have seen no situations where these particular products offer up a useful function.

The product at best lists several words in quasi menu form contextually related to the page they appear on.

As they are advertisements and not menus, this seems to be the first deception and results in their general lack of utility.

So if you have a site selling Nautica watches and you offer up one of these link units, someone clicking on the link might presumably find useful information but to throw up contextual words really rarely serves a purpose.

This is likely why Adsense pushes their text and image ad units (the box looking ads) which have the option of including short phrases to explain why the contextual word should be clicked upon by a visitor.

So whenever you are considering putting link units in place, you are probably better off skipping this practice and either going instead with either other adsense ad units, nothing at all, or possibly some other advertising device.

Blogging for Gas Money!

2008-07-16T13:03:00.001-05:00

Today I am on the road blogging my way through three states and using my blogging revenues to pay for my gas money as I go. So far, I have spent about $56 in gas, and have earned close to $40 in the last hour blogging.

I have about 80 miles and another 90 minutes to go. The big questions are whether or not my air card cellular connection will hold out when I need it, and whether or not I will have to unplug the kids portable DVD player from the cigarette lighter so that I can recharge my laptop.

When I arrive at my destination, I will shut down the computer for a couple days, while I pack up my old house, load it into a moving truck and move it back across state lines. During that trip, I'm not going to blog as much while I drive, but I will be able to bank some articles using my digital recorder and Dragon Naturally Speaking.

The real question will be, how tired will I be?

We have to pack up everything, load it up and do some repairs on the house to prep it for sale including installing carpet, vessel sinks, and maybe residing the house or getting it painted.

That's not going to leave me feeling terribly energized about writing, and so that's just one more good reason to get the writing done now!

Adsense – A Revenue Option for Small Clubs and Charitable Organizations

2008-07-16T12:55:00.001-05:00

This week I have been doing some volunteer work for the Parent Teacher Organization that represents the school my children attend. I am setting up a website for the PTA, and I have been counseling them on their options of the setup including new revenue and fundraising options that will be available with their website.

This includes running adsense advertising on their site. As the website will likely generate a focused group of parents and possibly students looking for information, it is definitely possible that Adsense revenue could help them meet some of their budget and fundraising goals.

The trick is to balance out the types of advertising that might appear. Maintaining a tight filter for competitive advertising to screen out advertisements that are not appropriate for a PTA website would be very important for example. While ads for school supplies could be great, other ads for Orovo detox or diet pills may not be at all.

EmailCashPro - Getting Paid to Read Emails

2008-07-13T14:33:00.001-05:00

Here is a new service I learned about this week. It seems to be designed so that users from Asia (as opposed to only Americans or English speaking countries) can engage in being paid to read emails that include advertisements in them.

EmailCashPro - This particular program is open to Asian bloggers and writers as well as those in the US!

This type of service is not necessarily one of my preferred ways of earning money, I prefer blogging, but it can be useful to study the method a bit and learn how marketers are using email these days.

If nothing else this can help improve your own copywriting skills also by studying the good and the bad.

This is not the first such service, there are others here if you are interested.

If you are a student or have lots of spare time, this could give you some extra money for textbooks or gas, but even then I still recommend blogging for earning a second or first income.

Search Google as if You are Located Somewhere Else

2008-07-13T13:57:00.001-05:00

Here's a tool that could be useful from time to time. Say you live in Canada, but you want to see what search results for the keyword 'ipods' would look like for a person that lives in the United States in Atlanta or in Australia or in Thailand for that matter.

The Google Global Firefox Extension, enables you to quickly set up locations so that you can see the Google Search Engine result listings for many different areas based on the following items:

View paid and organic search results as they appear in different cities.

View paid and organic search results as they appear in different regions.

Open all results from countries, cities and regions in multiple tabs for easy comparison.

View paid and organic search results from a specific IP address.

View paid and organic search results from any US ZIP code.

View paid and organic search results from different language results pages.

Custom advanced saved searches.

Adsense Referrals Ending through Adsense - Will they be back under Double Click?

2008-07-05T16:20:00.001-05:00

This week most Adsense and Adwords users received an email indicating that Google would no longer run product referrals through their own systems.

The question now becomes one of 'Will Google start a new product referral program through their newly acquired DoubleClick advertising company or will they just give up on referring people into their own advertising platform?'

I've got a feeling that this may be the temporary end of this program for Google, but it might be something that pops back up with their competition from Microsoft. In the meantime, I suspect there are going to be a lot of people trashing their pages and sites dedicated to educating new users to Adsense and Adwords like cheesy company logo shirts getting tossed out after you leave a company for a better job.

Hello,
Thank you for participating in the AdSense Referrals program.
We’re writing to let you know that we will be retiring the AdSense Referrals program during the last week of August. We appreciate your patience during this transition and here are some alternative options to consider:
    * Google Affiliate Network: As part of the integration of DoubleClick, the DoubleClick Performics Affiliate Network will now operate as the Google Affiliate Network for advertisers targeting users located in the United States. Similar to the AdSense Referrals program, the Google Affiliate Network enables publishers to apply for advertiser programs and get paid based on advertiser-defined actions instead of clicks or impressions. For further details, please visit:
www.google.com/ads/affiliatenetwork.
    * AdSense for content ads: If you have less than three AdSense for content ad units on a page, you may wish to replace the referral ad units with standard AFC ad units.
If you currently use referral ads, either to promote Google products or offerings from AdWords advertisers, AdSense Referrals code will no longer display ads beginning the last week of August.
We encourage you to take the following steps before the product is
retired:
    * Remove the referral code from your site(s): Please take a moment to remove all referral code from your sites before the last week of August, so you can continue to effectively monetize your ad space.
    * Run and save all referrals reports on your desktop: Create and save all reports related to the referrals program on your desktop, so you continue to have access to your valuable campaign information
Why is this happening?
We're constantly looking for ways to improve AdSense by developing and supporting features which drive the best monetization results for our publishers. Sometimes, this requires retiring existing features so we can focus our efforts on the ones that will be most effective in the long term. For this reason, we will be retiring the AdSense Referrals program. If you have any additional questions, please visit our Help Center:
http://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/topic.py?topic=14882
Sincerely.
The Google AdSense Team

The Summer Adsense Earnings Dip is Here

2008-06-30T17:51:00.001-05:00

Every year internet advertising across the board takes a bit of a dip in the summer time and this is no different with Adsense.

Things usually are their worst in July when people are on vacation, outside and spending less time online looking (or clicking) on advertisements.

I have seen the slow down first hand come in over the last week or two and it probably will not relent until the back to school sales kick in towards the end of the summer.

In the meantime, you would almost think that I was offering up bodystockings advertisements on a religious site. The ad revenues have dissipated significantly, but they will be back, and usually come back stronger than ever.

The Internet is About to Get Less Crowded

2008-06-26T19:38:00.001-05:00

Space has been a bit of an issue on the internet lately as domain names fill up, especially in the .com and .net areas, but even in .org.

The ICANN agency agreed today to finally open up a number of new domain suffixes and ease the process for approving others that might enable new extensions such as .bank or .post for industries like banks and postal services to sell postage tape online with their own domain extension (like the existing ones don't work already!)

Similarly, there could be area based domains like .nyc that might soon be on the internet.

One big change will include the entrance of domain names that are not written with any english words at all. This last item is probably where the real substance of this decision rests as many non-english speaking countries have sought this ability for sometime and it has definitely held back development of the internet in some areas.

Blog Yourself Around the World

2008-06-25T23:13:00.001-05:00

When I first started blogging, I really didn't know what I was getting myself into. I thought I'd just experiment around, do a little writing and maybe learn something about web design and the internet along the way. I even thought I might make some money from Adsense too!

Well, I have accomplished all of those things and then some, but it is starting to look like I could pick up an assignment that will actually take me out of this country, blogging in foreign lands. I'm not sure if that will happen yet, but it does look more and more likely.

So as I prepare to become and international blogger, I guess I'll have to figure out how to blog abroad. I'll need lots of electric and wireless adapters, a passport, and who knows what else.

Probably have to brush up on my foreign language skills as well. My Korean and French are both very rusty. I might even try and boost my Spanish and Italian while I'm at it. Anyway, will see what happens next!

Connection Interrupted Error with Firefox 3.0

2008-06-18T13:29:00.001-05:00

I have noticed that since upgrading to Firefox 3.0 I continue to get this particular error. This is not like a time out error, but seems to be Firefox getting genuinely confused. It happens sometimes opening up pages, sometimes when I upload information, files, etc. I will receive the same confusing error.

The nasty thing about this error, is that hitting the back button doesn't necessarily fix things. I should also point out that I am not losing any internet connectivity. The browser's other tabs and sites work just fine. I'm curious if anyone else has run into this problem in recent memory or if they have found either a cause or a cure for the problem.

Google Adsense Notifier Works with FireFox 3.0

2008-06-18T13:23:00.001-05:00

If you utilize the Firefox add-on called Google Adsense notifier, it is now compatible with Firefox 3.0. Plus Google just updated the Google toolbar and it is now also compatible with Firefox 3.0.

For me these are two of the three primary Firefox add-ons that I use on a regular basis, and I was starting to mess the ability to rapidly check my Adsense statistics as well as I definitely miss the ability to check Google News at the push of a button. (I also rely heavily on a webmaster analysis add on and sometimes on a best buy tracking add on that helps me keep track of the latest deals.)

You can find the Adsense Notifier add-on for firefox at Mozilla.

Google Protects Self and Opens the Door for Blog Advertising

2008-06-18T13:14:00.001-05:00

I recently read an article with an interview from Matt Cutts famous for being put in charge of search engine publicity for Google.

In the article Matt Cutts commends the folks at PayPerPost, today known as Izea, for making their advertising system more compliant with Google Webmasters terms of service.

Essentially, Google has forced this company to adopt the standards that Google requires in order to keep its search engine monopoly running. They took this action after receiving many shots across the Bow from Google and ultimately after Google nuked a number of websites around the United States and around the world, compliance became very important.

Now that the advertising companies have stepped up to protect Google, Google is taken a couple steps off of its self-righteous horse to accept the advertising methodologies that once attacked thus proving that Google was mostly just trying to protect its own search engine and didn't really care about people that read websites or blogs.

So now that the monopoly challenge has ended it could be saved for many webmasters to enter back into the world of this type of Internet advertising.

So while the rest of the world gets back to what was already business as normal, Google can now smugly sit back and continue to gleam profits from the search engine pump without any threat to its core business, internet advertising via search. The lesson to be learned here is that the 800 lb gorilla does not like to have its stock, its cash flow and probably not even the wine in its office wine refrigerators threatened by start ups or small content publishers.

Benchmarking Your Blog - What Are Readers Complaining About on the Other Side of the Fence

2008-06-01T12:59:00.001-05:00

There is nothing wrong with benchmarking your blog to compare it against other blogs or even websites that cover similar topics or categories. You may already read some of your competitors material, and I'm not suggesting that you should copy or steal anything. That's not the point at all.

However, you can look at their designs and layouts and get a better understanding of what works, how it works, why it works and how you might be able to improve your site with that knowledge.

In fact don't forget to consider what does not work, and what people are complaining about in comments or forums! That might point the way to an easy opportunity for you, and something that your competition can't even tackle or prioritize.

We all get caught up in day to day issues and that includes your competitor. They might have their readers wishes somewhere on their plans for improvement, but if you see that readers are looking for something, maybe you have some spare time and you can deploy that solution now!

For example, maybe their site is running a little slow and people are complaining. They might respond to those complaints saying that their host is to blame as they are using processors that are maxxing out or maybe the ram on their servers is peaking at certain times. You can then seize the opportunity to insure that your site is running on the fastest machine you can afford (hopefully faster than the competition) then encourage people to test it for themselves. Offer up the comparison. "We're faster than the other guy! See for yourself."

Seize their nuggets of opportunity and run with it and you might be able to leap frog ahead. It might not keep you in front, so be prepared to do more later, but it can help you build momentum.

Increasing Advertiser Competition on Your Site with the Ban Option

2008-06-01T12:50:00.001-05:00

Creating more compelling content and improving the convertibility of your website are key actions that you can take to control the growth and success of your website.

There is another step you can take as well, which is more defensive. You can block and ban advertisers from your site. Advertisers will jockey for position on your website, and some advertisers will attempt to use your site for arbitrage purposes. They will attempt to get fire sale rate placements of their ads on your site.

Sometimes these ads will run next to better paying ads, and the fire sale rated ads might even convert better.

Essentially, you will be giving more converting traffic to lower paying advertisers at the expense of your better paying advertisers. You can tackle this problem by reviewing the ads on your site on a regular basis and blocking or banning some of the domains that are using your site for arbitrage.

You can then monitor, and improve the results of your sites and their monetary performance, as your Adsense earnings improve and your savings account grow.

Got Video? Convert Video and Image Ads better with Video

2008-06-01T12:28:00.001-05:00

The title pretty much says it all, but there is a point to this statement. Consumers have been conditioned through the likes of YouTube to click the play button and trust the result.

If you are looking to establish a site that converts traffic into ad clickers legitimately, you should aim to focus on including a large number of embedded video players regularly throughout your site. Plus, your site should be designed to place ads of a similar nature (video or image ads, possibly with images that look like players) in a relatively close area.

This design is not about tricking people into click, but in capturing their attention in a medium and format that they have grown to trust and use regularly. When you deploy it, your results will definitely improve.

If you run a video showing a tour of Napa valley and a wine tasting session, you might try and structure your ad placements to include a video ad of a wine racks or even of a champagne cork popping and shooting through your site, just to capture attention.

Getting Advertisers to Fight over Adsense Placement on Your Site

2008-06-01T12:21:00.001-05:00

There was a time in the past when one of the keys to making money through Adsense was to work like the dickens (never seen a dickens work, but I hear they work very hard) to increase your traffic. Way back when, Adsense content placements used to pay on a CPM basis more than on a CPC basis.

This inspired a large number content site owners to travel a path of least resistance and generate traffic through unsavory methods, while simultaneously running Adsense ads below the fold or out of site on a website.

Over the last couple of years the times have changed. Advertisers first stopped paying for non-converting content sites ad traffic and then Google changed the rules a bit to place the incentive with PPC sites that truly convert people to click.

That meant that sites focusing on Adsense revenues had to learn how to structure their sites to convert visitors as opposed to bringing in thousands of non-converting visitors.

Now today advertisers are even starting to duke it out with sites that are designed well to convert. I'm not talking about tricking someone into clicking, I'm talking about attracting people to the site and convincing them to take an action and actually even buy.

For this solution or result advertisers will and do engage in something akin to a bidding war for top placement on adsense positions within a site. This may not happen on every site out there that wants to sell the latest supplement or coffee tables and other furniture but for top converting competitive words on sites that convert well, there can be money to be made and the beauty of this is that the ecosystem is improving in a way that rewards people that actually ad value to the transaction.

When Your Site is Converting - Prime The Adsense Pump!

2008-05-22T18:11:00.001-05:00

From time to time, you will see your performance pick up significantly on your websites. If you monitor your Adsense earnings throughout the day and happen to notice that your site is running hot, defined as a higher than proportional number of clicks, or also defined as a higher paying click than what you normally see, then you need to prime the Adsense Pump.

What is going on here is that there is something on your site that IS working! You need to go with the flow and promote traffic to your site to take advantage of the situation. I'm not talking about click fraud, I'm just talking about those times when a particular ad happens to be running on your site maybe with a topical article and people are clicking it more than what you see with other ads and other articles.

How can you Prime the Adsense Pump?

The easy answer to prime the Adsense pump is to do what Google wants you to do and go buy some relevant PPC advertising of your own, sending traffic to your site so that it can then convert. You should not pay more than what you are being paid. This is sometimes referred to as PPC arbitrage.

Alternatively, if you are a heavy social networker, this would be a very good time to pick up some traffic from Digg.com, stumbleupon or even from Blogexplosion or other blog surfing networks.

You do not have to be a clinical laboratory service technician to figure out when things are running well, just check in on your Adsense numbers a few times throughout the day, and be prepared to act when they are higher than normal.

Search Engine Strategies Conference this Summer

2008-05-12T02:11:00.001-05:00

There are two search engine strategies conferences coming up this summer.

They are both part of the search engine strategies 2003 conference and Expo. The first one is in Toronto in the middle of June and the second one is in San Jose, California in the middle of August.

The Toronto Expo runs from June 16 through June 18. The San Jose Expo runs from August 17 through August 21. If you register for the Toronto Expo before May 30 you will save $150 and if you register for the San Jose Expo before August 1 two can save up to $200.

In addition you can use the website magazine priority code which is 10WEBM can save up to 10%. There's never a better time than now to start learning new things to improve your skills, boost your business and generate more effective results. Besides either of these events would probably be a great networking opportunity and even a chance to bring home a couple novelty marketing toys for the kids.

Pay Per Click Campaign Help from Ezanga

2008-05-12T01:13:00.001-05:00

Are you looking to create a pay per click advertising campaign but don't know how to do it?

Here's a service offering a free $101 campaign credit when you start. The company is called Ezanga. They are offering a promotion code of WSM101.

If you use that promo code when you go to the Ezanga.com/wsm you will receive $101 in free clicks.

They offer among other things click fraud protection and traffic advisers plus they offer dedicated account managers and fully managed pay per click accounts. They promote an easy-to-use interface and you can run multiple campaigns and work with their keywords and tools.

So if you are looking to run a promotion for the keywords 'drug rehab', you could test out the service and see what results, advice and guidance you might get. If nothing else, you could invest $101 of your own money and get $202 worth of PPC clicks to generate more business, learn something along the way, and rule in or out whether this is a useful service and company for you.

Ebay the new Domain Marketplace

2008-05-12T01:02:00.001-05:00

Many people these days go to eBay to buy and sell domains. If you are looking to buy a domain or sell a domain, you might try checking on eBay.

Some companies such as Sedo.com are even plugged in to eBay such that if you bid on a domain within their website it could trigger an auction on eBay.

Essentially you might place an order that is below the minimum required to sell on Sedo.com and that triggers an automatic auction. If your offer is not outbid on Ebay, then you win the domain and are able to purchase it at your bid amount. You can also increase your bid through eBay while it's going through the auction process.

Buying domains on Ebay is not like buying a used CD, a boat or even wood blinds. A domain is a non-real product. It has no physical existence and so I do advise that if you can consider going through Sedo.com first as they offer a very good escrow service for web domains to insure that you get what you paid for and do not get ripped off.

Top 10 Registrars

2008-05-12T00:56:00.001-05:00

When you go to register a new domain, odds are that you are using a hosting company that is plugged into a registrar. Sometimes you might use a hosting company that is a registrar such as Godaddy.com.

Website magazine offers up a list of the top 50 registrars, and we will share with you the top 10 in that list.

Godaddy.com
Networksolutions.com
Sedo.com
Netfirms.com
Tucows.com
DreamHost.com
Web.com
Enom.com
DomainsBot.com
Register.com

So there you have it, if you want to see the others in the top 50 list, checkout Website Magazine at websitemagazine.com. It even makes good reading while you are on vacation at the beach, just curl up in a hammock at a Hilton Head rental and learn how to make your fortune this year.

Months Over Did You Make Your Adsense Numbers to Get Paid?

2008-05-01T17:15:00.001-05:00

Well another month just closed yesterday and if you run Adsense on your site(s), you are probably checking to see if you made your numbers.

For some people that will include asking the question, whether or not you earned enough to generate a payment from this last month. Did your month go over $99.99 or did your cumulative since your last payment go over $99.99. If yes then in about 40 days you should be able to expect the receipt of a payment.

For other people the question is 'Did my Adsense earnings go up, increase, or top last months numbers or even last years numbers for the same month?'

Adsense for many users has been going up over the last few months, and so if you are producing regular content or producing regular viewers, you should have seen a sloping increase in your Adsense earnings over the last few months. Start watching and you can use this as just one benchmark of your website's success. Its not everything and some sites do not work well with Adsense at all, but it can be a good gauge once you have figured out if its right for you. Typically, unless there is fraud involved Adsense levels do not fluctuate much if your content levels are the same or balanced. We're not talking about something like Las Vegas real estate or even Wilmington real estate for that matter. Adsense tends to be a steady ride up unless you see a major spike up in traffic.

Networking with Promotional Products

2008-04-29T16:43:00.001-05:00

I just returned from yet another trip. This time it was a 5 day trip to an entertainment event in Nevada. Throughout the course of the trip I met with many public relations officers of different companies, talent managers and just your every day people. I was working in tandem with another blogger and podcaster that has a couple years on me in this genre and I was struck by how much play he received off of offering promotional items in the form of stickers for his online video show.

When we think of promotional items, we often think of corporate gifts that have no function like a retirement watch or something. But if you can come up with cool promotional products they can take on a life of their own and help remind people to check out your site, your show, or your company products and services many times over. Plus, they might even regift it and get you more attention virally from other people in the future.

Now for me, I run many different sites, and I have to determine the best way to proceed with this. I can't carry around a different promo product for every site I have. Maybe the right call is to centrally brand things under Softduit Media and just offer up something focused on that site itself. I'll let you know how that proceeds as I continue to mull it over.

Blog Articles with Video and Pictures Generate Adsense dollars

2008-04-27T15:29:00.001-05:00

If you are writing a blog and monetizing the site with Adsense you need to insure that you are including pictures and video as often as possible with your post. If you can include pictures in every post that is ideal. If you can mix in videos embedded from sources like YouTube or even Revver, you will engage the people that view your site and pages. These days you can embed videos that other people have posted or you can even upload your own videos individually or in a batch file.

When they click on videos to start playing them on your site, they are already breaking past the passive role of just viewing and moving into the realm of clicking. Then if they get an idea while watching the video, they may connect that idea with an Adsense ad and explore that adsense ad earning you money!

Google Adsense Secret Scam Fixed with Apology

2008-04-20T23:00:00.001-05:00

If you have been following the recent controversy over the new AdSense secrets 4.0, you may have heard about the automatic subscription charge of $29.99 that was triggered if you signed up for it.

Well apparently that was a mistake and Joel Comm has fessed up to that mistake with an apology. From what I can tell it's difficult to determine whether or not this marketing tactic was done on purpose or not, however all future profits will now be given to a charity.

All that said, it's difficult to tell if the actual product, AdSense secrets 4.0, was really worthwhile or not because most of the buzz is about the hidden $29 charge as opposed to the usefulness of the content. If you've tried it or read it, I'd be happy or what you think if it's worth the effort are not.

In the meantime you might consider some of the ways to improve your business with business performance management software tools and metrics analysis systems.

Google Stock is Up and So Are Adsense Earnings

2008-04-20T22:53:00.001-05:00

Google stock price lurched up last week after Google came in with some great results for the quarter. In a way this is unsurprising for any of us that have been experiencing a lurch upwards of our Google ad sense earnings. AdSense clicking activity seems to be on the rise across the board.

It's still too early to tell however whether or not this has anything to do with some of the new AdSense units that are being offered by Google these days. The stock market may be happy with Google, but that could be more of a function of Google's competitors Microsoft and Yahoo failing to execute while Google draws water. So before you pop a cork of Riedel wine and celebrate your Adsense and Google Stock earnings, make sure that you are diversified enough in both areas to deal with a changing market this year.

Google's Stock Price Rebounds

2008-04-17T21:48:00.001-05:00

As the value of the US Dollar (the currency that Adsense is paid out in the US) plummets, and as oil went over $115 a barrel with expectations of hitting $120 soon, Google's stock price bounced back a little today.

Many people saw their 4th quarter as disappointing, but Google's first quarter showed results that surprised analysts in a good way and people jumped back on the band wagon. Google's still in a hot business, the business of internet marketing and marketing the flow of information so that is keeping the stock hot. With no signs of any competitor capable of keeping up with Google's lock on the market, that won't change unless their results take a long term turn for the worse. So as long as companies want to market directly to internet searchers and as long as those searchers click on ads for things like the best acne treatment and purple pill information and mesothelioma and everything in between, this industry will be safe. If consumers change their ways, then all bets will be off.

Google Adsense left and right scroll buttons Now Present

2008-04-06T11:24:00.001-05:00

Early in the week we talked about Google's new scroll buttons and provided a quick 18 second video example of how they work.

Well here is yet another format. Its a left and right scroll button for use with Adsense ads.

We first saw them on a 728 x 90 advertisement on a Solar Energy website, but it is just as likely that these will fly well with the 468 wide google adsense ads also.

Still no word from anyone on how well these ads are actually working for anyone, and the conventional wisdom does seem to be skeptical. Let's hope that the Google geniuses aren't just shooting blanks into the wind hoping to pull their stock price and market capitalization back up so that a Google millionaire somewhere can redesign their garden this spring with some fancy garden gnomes and other frivolous garden decor.

18 Second Video Example of Scrolling Adsense Ads

2008-04-03T17:45:00.001-05:00

Shortly after I wrote the article, Experimenting with Adsense Continues - Now Google Offers Scrolling Adsense Ads , I found this example video showing Google Adsense ads with the scroll down buttons (and the scroll back up after you scroll down).

This just gives you an idea of how they function, nothing spectacular. It would seem that clicking on the arrow to scroll does not constitute an actual PPC click btw.

Experimenting with Adsense Continues - Now Google Offers Scrolling Adsense Ads

2008-04-03T12:53:00.001-05:00

For several months Google has been experimenting with new ad concepts that automatically display in the areas set aside and accepted by publishers for Adsense. Most webmasters are not aware that they are participating in Google's experiments and this latest one seems extra peculiar.

Google has added one of the web's most annoying features built into the Adsense block. The Scroll down bar/button.

That's right your readers can now scroll through adsense ads looking for the ad they are looking for!

Wait a second, how in the world is that useful?

What web visitors want to scroll through and look for more ads?

Trying to play devil's advocate in favor of Google, I suppose that if a reader was some what interested in an ad about bedding, they might see something close to what they are looking for and then scroll down looking for a better fit.

The problem however is in Google's own success.

Most internet browsers typically will rapidly jump to a Google Search box to get an answer as opposed to interacting with a scrollable advertisement.

Google's Racing to Get Out of Search Engine Marketing

2008-04-03T12:32:00.001-05:00

Google is racing to get out of the Search Engine Marketing business after acquiring DoubleClick, which ran a Search Engine Marketing business to help companies get placed higher within Google's Search Engine listings.

The online search and advertising leader is looking to spin off its Chicago-based search marketing business, Performics, which employs 200 of DoubleClick's 1,500 staff.
Tom Phillips, director of DoubleClick's integration efforts with Google, said the company wants to dispose of the search marketing business to eliminate the perception Google might favor the unit in its search results and other efforts.
"It's clear to us that we do not want to be in the search engine marketing business," Phillips wrote. "Maintaining objectivity in both search and advertising is paramount to Google's mission and core to the trust we ask from our users."
Reuters

As a pseudo monopoly of search Google has been fighting an up hill battle to defend its reputation and maintain the perception of integrity as it relates to Search Engine listings.

So the staff of 200 that are losing their jobs (technically being spun out of Google) will have to go and promote keywords for their customers like 'hotel deals' and 'mesotheliomoa' somewhere else.

The 250 x 250 Adsense ad is out

2008-03-31T21:51:00.001-05:00

For a couple years now people have been saying that the Adsense 250 x 250 or 300 x 250 ad placed at the top or floating to one side or another of an article is the sweet spot for Adsense click through conversions.

These days, I think that ad placement is history. I am seeing much better conversions on 728 x 90 placements, not at the top but at the bottom of an article.

Some people would say that you have to put it at the top otherwise they may click away before they get to your ad. That may be true, but if your content is so crappy that they click away before they get to the bottom then you are probably not doing something right anyway.

Now, I haven't gotten around to updating all of my websites to act on my findings, but I am beginning the process. I have found that many of Google's new ad types work very well in the widest available format and that seems to be key.

On a different note, I have also seen that relevancy for Google ads are more hit and miss than they ever have been. Some of my sites are dead on for the topic and other sites are not picking up anything relevant at all. I had a tech site the other day picking up ads for walk in tubs, and then one of my heaviest traffic sites with the most subscriptions was running PSA (hurricane spots) all day one day. This might just be the reason why Google is seeing flat click throughs, they are losing control of Adsense relevancy.

Google's Stock is Sucking Wind While Smaller Users Adsense Revenues are Up?

2008-03-31T21:43:00.001-05:00

Something is cooking with Google these days. Overall their click through revenue this year was flat as compared to last year and that has their stock sucking wind.

However, many smaller websites are seeing an increases in Adsense revenues and click through rates. This could potentially have something to do with lower click through rates on the larger websites that Google courts, typically at the expense of smaller websites like fluorescent ceiling lights outshine wall sconces.

Have you noticed a difference yourself? Are you seeing increased Adsense click through rates or are your sites experiencing flat growth like Google's?

Is ContactThem.ws a scam?

2008-03-26T08:14:00.001-05:00

If you have not yet seen this email hit your inbox, its probably just a matter of time. Either way, you will need to know whether or not it is a scam.

Hi,
We've seen your website at http://www.superawesomedomain.com
and we love it!
We see that your traffic rank is 377354 and your link popularity is 20.
Also, you have been online since 7/10/2004.
With that kind of traffic, we will pay you up to $4,800/month to advertise our links on your website.
If you're interested, read our terms from this page:
http://www.contactthem.ws/hit.php?s=10&p=2&w=102040
Sincerely,
Crystal Weckerly
The ContactThem Network

So I like anyone that receives this email automatically thinks, $4,800 a month for my site? Where do I sign up.

Then about 2 seconds later you think, its got to be a scam.

No one is going to pay $4,800 to advertise on a site with that kind of traffic (Alexa metric by the way, which kind of shows the worthlessness of the valuation).

Now I own dozens of sites with similar amounts of traffic, links and age. If this were legit, I could be making a couple hundred thousand dollars a month by the end of the month.

So what is going on with ContactThem.ws or ContactThem.tv or Contactthem.com?

Note they have lots of domains themselves, which is kind of odd.

They are running a Multi Level Marketing (MLM) scheme or program(think Amway). They pay you when people sign up and get you to send out emails to people you know and people you do not know. They then get the people you know to send out emails as well and get more sign ups and you get a chunk.

It costs money to sign up and essentially this is like a manual way to harvest email addresses. Combine a spammer and a virus and someone could harvest all your email contacts out of your computer, and then turn around and spam those people.

This method essentially turns you into the virus.

Now, that is an emotionally loaded statement so let me step back from my analogy a bit. You basically are referring people. If they end up buying something worthwhile, well then there may be no harm in the referral. If they get junk, something worthless or worse yet they get ripped off, well then that would be a problem for you.

MLM programs are definitely not new to the internet. Some affiliate programs are essentially MLM programs. MLM programs are more famous probably for pyramid schemes where there is absolutely nothing of value exchanged and people are paid with the money from new sign ups until the thing blows up and people can no longer be paid.

So what's my final word on this one?

It smells to good to be true and I suspect that if its not a blatant scam then its probably an unsustainable pyramid scheme.

Shy of that it could also get people in trouble with the canned spam act. That could get you thrown in jail and or have your domain or website taken away from you.

You might run the ad on your site, but I would think long and hard about sending out emails to people you know if you are not following the canned spam act laws. The email that I received DEFINITELY did not follow the law.

For what its worth, the person that sent the email was not the name listed in the signature, even though the person listed in the signature does appear to be associated with the program or company.

So before you quit your job, and put a down payment on a new mansion replete with home theater seating, consider whether or not your actions are lawful. If you can make $4800 a month without breaking the law or screwing over everyone you know, more power to you.

Create Easy Video Ads with EZ Show

2008-03-21T12:46:00.001-05:00

Maybe you do or do not know how to create video ads for the internet, but if you work with EZ Show it can be as easy as point and click using their stock video clips, audio clips and even still pictures and images.

If you have a specific product that is not covered in their stock footage, maybe your company offers ellipticals training or elliptical machines, EZ Show can come to your location and film additional footage at your place of business or location of choice.

The cost is fairly affordable given the learning curve that EZ Show enables you to overcome. $49.95 per month enables you to make as many different video ads as you like. You can find more information on EZ Show at EZShow.com or EZShowStudio.com.

Are You Linked on the Top 50 Sites on the Web?

2008-03-21T12:38:00.001-05:00

As you work to build up your website and bring in more traffic, consider whether or not you are connected to the top 50 websites on the Web. It is definitely important to build up links naturally from relative sites, but it also makes sense to bring in links from the top of the top.

There was a time when many of these sites were locked down and shut out smaller sites, but today in an age of growing social media it is now easier than ever to build up links from many if not most of these sites. So go out there, do a self assessment on your backlinks and consider whether or not you are hitting with these top sites and if you are not, create a short list of the top sites that have yet to link to you in some form, shape or fashion. Then check back maybe on a quarterly basis and try again if you do not make it in on the first try.

Here's the list of the top 50 websites according to traffic:

Google.com
MSN.com
Yahoo.com
Live.com
YouTube.com
Microsoft.com
AOL.com
eBay.com
MySpace.com
Google.co.uk
Passport.com
Wikipedia.org
Ask.com
Comcast.net
bbc.co.uk
Google.ca
BellSouth.net
Facebook.com
Amazon.com
Google.co.in
CNN.com
Blogspot.com
Pogo.com
MSN.ca
About.com
Mapquest.com
eBay.co.uk
AIM.com
rr.com
Weather.com
download.com
Adobe.com
Craiglist.org
NetZero.net
RuneScape.com
Freeze.com
Broadcaster.com
cartoonnetwork.com
miniclip.com
walmart.com
geocities.com
imdb.com
google.com.au
rediff.com
dell.com
verizon.net
hi5.com
netscape.com
careerbuilder.com
apple.com

Google Selling Impressions through Feedburner

2008-03-17T17:37:00.001-05:00

You may have missed it last fall, but Google bought Feedburner, the most popular and successful feed management company on the internet. Now Google has found and interesting way to generate revenue through that company, they are selling impressions to people that want to advertise their feed.

If you want to build traffic to your site, you could look at advertising through Feedburner. To do this, you must first have a website that runs on a feed. Then you must set it up with Feedburner.

Once you have that done, you can set up a headline animator and combine that with a more traditional advertisement which Google will then market across thousands of channels to bring your add thousands of impressions (example $25 for 1 week on computer and technology bringing about 4k impressions or about $7 CPM.

Its not the cheapest and its not the most expensive way to get some attention, but if you are good at creating catchy and timely headlines and if you are decent at putting together banner ads, this type of advertising could generate some real results for you. It may not be attractive for a Pennsylvania personal injury lawyer, but could do very well for a blogger, business blogger or internet marketer.

Google Adwords Keyword Tool

2008-03-14T13:07:00.001-05:00

Here's a quick tip and free tool that can help you in choosing keywords for your meta tags or descriptions.

This one if from Google and its called the Google Adwords Keyword Tool.

Its definitely a handy tool. You just type in your general term like auto insurance quote or something that you think a site is about and Google will list all related terms. You can then sort by the terms that get the most searches. If you click the add button for each term, you can then add it to a list, which can later be exported to a text or .csv file.

With that you can then drop the keywords into your meta keyword section and you are off to the SEO races.

MoneyBookers.com Sending and Receiving Money

2008-03-14T11:41:00.001-05:00

I love PayPal to death, but its not the only game in town. Last night I was finishing up a project for a client and they asked me, if I could accept payment via MoneyBookers.com.

Now, I didn't have a MoneyBookers account, but as a consultant I want to make things as easy as possible for my customers. So I spent about 3 minutes setting up a quick account and rapidly (easier than PayPal) linking it to one of my bank accounts so that I could direct deposit funds once received.

Once I was set up, I sent my client my MoneyBooker email account and I was off to the races with yet another way to accept payments for my online business.

Lesson Learned from MoneyBookers

Maybe once a year or more often, maybe right now, you should spend about an hour (no more) taking just a little effort to get setup with the latest in tools that enable you to accept payment from your customers, advertisers, whom ever.

If you are operating an internet business, you want to be accessible. You do not want to make it difficult for people to pay you. MoneyBooker's is a service that is very easy to use for people, especially outside of the United States where they offer very low fees. From a customer service perspective the last thing you want to do is give your customers the tedious job of having to transfer money around to pay you.

Whether you are selling MP3 players on Ebay or working as an internet publisher or serving people in web design or consulting, make your business easy and accessible and save your customers some time and trouble so that they walk away with a positive impression even when they pay you.

del.icio.us tags: moneybookers, online payment services, online business tip

Technorati tags: moneybookers, online payment services, online business tip

Crazy Adsense Ads get Attention

2008-03-03T01:42:00.001-05:00

I saw this crazy Google Adsense ad on Whois.org tonight. I didn't click on it and I'm not sure I really want insurance from a company that insures for this type of accident, but then again I have been hit by two deer at the same time . . .

Regardless it makes a great point that image ads get a lot of attention and the right image ad will get you people to your site and get you clicks if you are a publisher. There might as well be an Adwords hall of fame for advertisers and they should line that hall with fiberglass columns with images hanging from those columns of all the great ad campaigns that have ever been . . .

What's the craziest Adsense/ Adwords campaign you have ever seen?

If you are familiar with the 'fart button' campaign put on by Spencer's Gifts that actually has won some advertising awards believe it or not.

Technorati tags: adwords hall of fame, adsense hall of fame

del.icio.us tags: adwords hall of fame, adsense hall of fame

Adsense Stats Plugin is Not Evil

2008-02-29T17:06:00.001-05:00

This struck me as funny. Lots of people talk about Google as being an evil company. So when my Adsense stat tracker plugin for Firefox gave me the number of the beast I had to chuckle.

Regardless on what your take on Google or the Beast is for that matter, this plugin is definitely not evil. Its probably one of the most useful plugins that I have from Firefox not counting various SEO plugin tools.

If you are not yet using it, you can pick it up over at mozilla, or go directly to the Mozilla page for adsense notifier here.

Now, that I'm done joking around, I have to try and get some bugs out of my mobile router, that has been up and down all day today. Routers are definitely evil!

What is Google Gadget Ads on the Gmodule.com domain?

2008-02-26T21:51:00.001-05:00

This evening I was reviewing a site that had Office Depot ads in a location that should have been Adsense.

What is this I asked? They have a number of links to click and it looks nothing like Adsense.

It raised a number of Questions in my mind.

Did someone hack my site?
Did someone hack google adsense
Will I get paid for these
Are they paid CPM, CPC, or are these some odd Affiliate referral buttons from google

When I hovered over the ads, I could see the domain resolving to a domain called gmodule.com. If you type that domain into a browser it redirects to Google.com!

So I did some digging and found some information in Adsense. It wasn't easy to find and wasn't displayed well, so I went to a little effort to make this easy for you to understand and get the answers to the questions I was looking for!

The flash file below is about 1mb and may take a couple seconds to load into your browser. Those seconds will save you a lot of time that would have been spent searching aimlessly through Google's website.