FREE STUFF N COOL THINGS is a great blog run by Zach.
It showcases a awsome collection of free stuff on the web. If you’re into freebies, this is a blog you must go to.
Zach uses a nice clean blog design which is not too distracting and his blog name says it all. If there’s anything to suggest to Zach, it is to include some cheesy stuff as well!
Anyway, he’s having a blog contest to give away an iPod Touch!
Full contest details here.
Contest ends at the end of June. Good luck!
Affiliate Confession is running a contest together with their sponsors, Market Leverage and Vat19.com.
You can win a Nintendo DS Lite with two games!
There is also a Flip Mino Camera and some interesting prizes like a USB missile launcher and a banana bunker up for grabs.
Contest runs till 25th June.
See details at their contest post.
BLOGGIN-ADS is running a great Contest consisting of MAC AIRS and $1000!Bloggin-Ads was created by Mike and Michelle(his wife) helps out.
They like to do blog reviews!Here's different things you can do for entries:
Subscribe to Feed ( 1 ticket )
Participate In Forums ( 1-10 ticket per day )
Participate On Bloggin-Ads ( 1 ticket per comment / 5 limit a day )
Write About It ( 10 tickets )Stumble / Digg / Propel ( 3 tickets )
Find out more details at Bloggin-Adsends: June 15th
Written by Garry Conn
My readership is packed full of talent. I know this more than ever after investing many hours last night speaking with many of my students in my make money online newsletter. One huge problem I faced when first getting started in this business of making money online was the fact that I felt like I could do it all by myself. I felt like I didn't need help from others and I felt like I could handle all the elements in creating a money making machine by myself without bringing in people who obviously had greater skills than me in varying elements.
Here are my observations of my readership. I have readers who are very skilled in web design but suck at writing. I have readers who are very skilled in writing but suck at marketing and promoting. I have readers who are very skilled in programming but aren't very sociable or personable. All these great qualities in people are amazing. On the other hand, everyone has weaknesses or characteristics that aren't up to par compared to others. All in all, no one is perfect and its rare to find an individual who is well rounded in having an expert level of experience in all the elements needed towards creating a money making machine on the Internet.
I have mentioned this many times in the past. However, since I do have quite a few new readers within the last few months, I want to remind people again of how important it is to network, make friends and discover the strengths as well as the weaknesses in other people you surround yourself in. Overall, this is what I see in my readership. I see hundreds of people who have the same goals, the same motivations and the same drive to achieve winning and finding success in the business of blogging and making money online. However, another very common element I see is that not many people are successful in this attempt to make money online.
The reason being is the fact that you're not coming to terms with the fact that you can't do it alone and you can't do it all by yourself. Believe me, you are not the only one who reads my blog who has the goals and the desires to learn how to make money online and take your piece of the pie that all these other successful guys are doing daily.
My suggestion for you is to bite the bullet and recognize that bad breath is better than no breath at all and come to terms with the fact that you can't do this by yourself. However, also come to terms knowing that most of everyone else reading this blog are also in the same boat. I believe that it is simply a matter of you investing some time into contacting other people and presenting your thoughts and ideas to them. You would be amazed with the results. You would also be amazed to discover how much the other person you contact would appreciate you for making an attempt to establish a connection with them.
People are desperate in this business and everyone wants the same freaking thing... yet, everyone wants to fly solo and not seek the help from others. If people in this niche could simply learn to take their guard down and remove the protective walls that surround their ideas and thoughts, then collaborating with others will become so much easier.
What can you bring to the table in a MMO project? Are you a graphic designer but don't have a clue about search engines? Well, everyone knows that a killer looking blog will go far in the niche. But also, everyone knows that a blog dead in the water with no traffic isn't good either. A graphic designer can easily pair up with an SEO and together they can make a very successful business.
Do you see where I am coming from yet? You're not going to win in this business if you keep things to yourself. You're not going to win if you keep spinning your wheels in the mud. You need someone to help you with a good push out of the mud, preferably someone who is also stuck in the mud works well. Finding a mutual partner in this business is very comforting. Two heads are so much better than one. Three heads are better than two. The more people that you can find in starting a make money online venture the better.
What are your thoughts? Drop me a comment and let me know more about how you feel about finding partners in the business. Do you think tag teaming in an online venture is for the birds? Or do you feel like it could help you? Speak your mind.
Win An Apple iPod Nano
One of the newest and most attractive programs that I use to make money online is with a program called Market Leverage. How would you like to win an Apple iPod Nano for free?
- Simply download this article that you just read and publish it on your blog.
- Then drop me a comment here so I'll have your name in the entry pool.
- Up for grabs is a Apple iPod Nano, a 2GB USB Pen, a flip video camera and even a $50 dollar preloaded American Express Rewards Card. All complimnents of Market Leverage!
Written by Garry Conn
Many bloggers often wonder some of the best niche marketing strategies are. That can be somewhat of a challenge to answer as your strategies can vary on the niche you are marketing. Here are some simple and universal thoughts that will help and guide with you through your ventures in niche marketing. These are general strategies that will help you overall. More or less, just some common sense things that I think many people including myself tend to neglect. These strategies all work very well for me with making money using Market Leverage. So here goes:
Branding: So many blogs that I find are spreading the products or things that they are trying to sell way too thin. I can visit just many niche blogs that are marketing many products and it gets overwhelming. Many months ago, I stated that new niche sites that are trying to market products and services should really pick just a few and roll with them. Even though these products aren't your own, you should act as if they were. The product that you're marketing is your brand, in essence you become an extension of the product your support and promote.
Timing: In the world of niche marketing and developing strategies, timing is everything. I focus on seasonal niche marketing. I have quite a few blogs that take full advantage of the deals market and I promote heavily holiday based products. Most profitable for me have been Black Friday, CyberModay and The Day After Christmas.
Awareness of Demand: Another reason why I work in the seasonal niche market is because I know in advanced when spikes in business will occur. People don't shop for Christmas items in July and these same people don't buy fireworks in October. I am always aware of supply and demand.
Effective Marketing: You need a channel to promote your business, product or service. I use WordPress primarily. Why? Because WordPress is a glorified web based version of FrontPage. It is well designed and produces web pages that are of very high quality in code. WordPress is very search engine friendly and with a few minor tweaks and modifications, a WordPress blog opens up a huge pipeline with many of the major search engine web crawlers. Effective marketing means everything in your niche marketing strategies. I also use online video syndication services such as YouTube, AOL Video, Revver, MySpace Video, etc. to promote my niche blog. Additionally, I use Digg, StumbleUpon, Sphinn and Propeller to thrust out mass awareness of anything I am trying to flood and promote into the blogosphere and Internet.
Micro Management / Bean Counter: Give me a blog with 100 daily visits and I'll produce a golden brick. I am very particular with things and I micro manage my traffic. When I get a visitors to my blog(s) I act as if they are physical people entering into my brick and mortar storefront. I closely control where my visitors go and what they see. My job is making sure their actions on my sites create revenue in my pocket or converts into regular readers. I closely control my outgoing links and provide very useful information.
Win An Apple iPod Nano
One of the newest and most attractive programs that I use to make money online is with a program called Market Leverage. How would you like to win an Apple iPod Nano for free?
- Simply download this article that you just read and publish it on your blog.
- Then drop me a comment here so I'll have your name in the entry pool.
- Up for grabs is a Apple iPod Nano, a 2GB USB Pen, a flip video camera and even a $50 dollar preloaded American Express Rewards Card. All complimnents of Market Leverage!
Written by Garry Conn
What would you think of your blog if it were the first time visiting it? Often, this is a question you should ask yourself, but I know all to well that it's really hard to make a good decision about what you think and be consistent with what others think. From time to time, there is nothing wrong with asking your readers what they think about your current blog design.
You can even go so far as to create a poll that has a serious of questions that allows users to offer their opinions by choosing answers from multiple choice questions. Another idea is to simply write a post on your blog asking readers for their direct opinions in the comments.
Whatever method you use, encourage your readers to speak freely and also be prepared to grow some thick skin. Bloggers are usually very open with their thoughts and tend to not sugar coat things. Also, it's a great idea to ask your readers to expand on their thoughts. While you'll receive quite a huge share of comments or responses that say, "yeah, it's a cool blog dude" or, "man your blog sucks!" it would benefit you to reply back and ask them to explain more.
The important part is even though the information isn't very detailed, you did make a connection with that reader and asking them to expand further will more likely result in them doing so. With that being said here are a few blogs that I think have some really cool blog designs.
RyanShamus.com
Visit http://www.ryanshamus.com/
CourtneyTuttle.com
visit: http://www.courtneytuttle.com/
FullTiltBlogging.com
Visit: http://www.fulltiltblogging.com/
Why Do I Like These Blog Designs
Look at it this way. None of these are going to win prizes for being the most well designed. Well, Court's may... but that's besides the point. My focus here really isn't in cosmetics. While that is defiantly something of importance, I believe that there is something even more important. That is presenting the information that you feel is most important to your readers. All three of these designs do that.
With RyanShamus.com, within just a few seconds of visiting the site, you know exactly what he is about and what he can do for you and what you need to do to become part of his blog. With CourtneyTuttle.com, same thing... it is clear as day what Courtney is about and what action I need to do to get involved with being in kept in the loop. Lastly, FullTiltBlogging.com, I have actually used this same theme before successfully in the past. It's a very clean, simple and well designed theme.
For Aaron, it fits his needed perfectly. There isn't anything flashy and shiny that interferes with what Aaron values as being important to showcase to his readers. Aaron is recruiting and wants to build an empire of followers - which I might add he is doing very well with that - so that he can teach them what it is he wants to teach. His blog does a great job displaying what he does and how to get involved.
Whatever your objective may be with your blog, whether you're trying to get people to sign up for a subscription form, click an advertisement or buy a product. You have to showcase the items or sections that are important to you.
One thing that you should not do is overwhelm your readers with too many options. If you have too many options you'll spread your blog traffic too thin and create a situation that will be hard for you to analyse. Make your designs pretty but also keep it simple.
Win An Apple iPod Nano
One of the newest and most attractive programs that I use to make money online is with a program called Market Leverage. How would you like to win an Apple iPod Nano for free?
- Simply download this article that you just read and publish it on your blog.
- Then drop me a comment here so I'll have your name in the entry pool.
- Up for grabs is a Apple iPod Nano, a 2GB USB Pen, a flip video camera and even a $50 dollar preloaded American Express Rewards Card. All complimnents of Market Leverage!
Written by Garry Conn
Time and time again people insist on trying to convince me that StumbleUpon traffic is useless traffic. While I'll agree to some extent, it can be useless if you're not properly taking advantage of the exposure. So here's the deal. The common complaint about StumbleUpon traffic is that it doesn't convert into money. Typically, bloggers will write something cool or interesting and have it submitted into StumbleUpon resulting in thousands and thousands of visits in a very clustered and quick time frame.
The problem that people face is that the content or the theme of the story being submitted into StumbleUpon isn't something that generates sales, leads or even Google AdSense clicks. Many people feel like it is utterly useless traffic that does nothing but waste bandwidth. While I'll agree with you on one side, I am also going to disagree on the other and here's why.
StumbleUpon Traffic Eventually Leads to PageRank
Of all the things that I have had submitted into StumbleUpon, very commonly I see multiple people turn right around and write a post about what I stumbled on their own blogs. These are backlinks. Backlinks are important towards building up PageRank. The more PageRank an individual page has the more authority and power they have in delivering their own backlinks to other pages that are more important to you (e.g. pages that make you money). You may recall an article I wrote about how you can make money online by editing your old posts? Well there you go, that is the key to the topic in this article.
How To Make Money From StumbleUpon Traffic?
First off you need to get it out of your head that the ACTUAL StumbleUpon traffic will make you money. On that aspect, you are right. StumbleUpon traffic does not convert into leads, sales or even Google AdSense clicks. However, its in the actions of other Stumblers that will eventually lead to you making money. I agree with you, who cares about the "Burst Fire" flood of traffic that you get from StumbleUpon. Only thing that traffic does is suck your server system resources and eats up your bandwidth. However, when you stumble upon a box do you think inside it of outside of it?
Stumbling Upon A Box and Thinking Outside of It!
Thinking out of the box here... If you want to make money, you have to consider the value of StumbleUpon traffic. While it is obvious that many already know that the actual traffic doesn't convert, its in the upcoming weeks and months that you should be concerned with.
The strategy is in creatively writing content that is geared towards a high concentration among Stumblers while also balancing another strategy in future link building to pages that will make you money. While on the surface most people quickly balk at using StumbleUpon as a means for making money online, I am here to tell you that it can be the best thing since the invention of the wheel.
Write Content For Stumble With A Trojan Horse Inside For Google
When you write content for the purpose of getting Stumbled, write your content in a way that carefully uses keywords and phrases that you can eventually use to link to relevant pages that will make you money. The Stumble traffic wave typically only lasts a few days. By then Google will have already crawled and indexed you page. A day or two later, Google will have also crawled all the pages from the other bloggers who have pointed links to your post that was submitted into Stumble upon.
If you carefully wrote your post to include targetable keywords, after a week when the Stumble traffic dies down to nothing, you can simply go back and plug those few selected keywords with links to other pages that you have created for the purpose of making money. In due time, because so many people pointed links to the original post you submitted into StumbleUpon, that page will eventually earn PageRank.
Pages Submitted To Stumble Are Very Likely To Establish PageRank
Pages that earn PageRank establish authority. Pages that are linked from other pages with PageRank also too will earn PageRank. So when you submit your post into StumbleUpon, do so in a way where you know that in about 7 days you'll be going back to plug in links that point to the pages that really count in making money. Because you linked to those money making pages from a page that is soon to be established with PageRank, those additional money making pages will go for the ride as well.
The result will be in having pages built for making money online that end up ranking very well in the search engines. Search engine traffic in many ways is perfect traffic for the fact that if you get traffic from a search engine, it is more likely that they are interested in buying what you have to offer for the fact that they came to your page as a result of searching for it.
Win An Apple iPod Nano
One of the newest and most attractive programs that I use to make money online is with a program called Market Leverage. How would you like to win an Apple iPod Nano for free?
- Simply download this article that you just read and publish it on your blog.
- Then drop me a comment here so I'll have your name in the entry pool.
- Up for grabs is a Apple iPod Nano, a 2GB USB Pen, a flip video camera and even a $50 dollar preloaded American Express Rewards Card. All complimnents of Market Leverage!
Written by Garry Conn
Many people have blogs for a multitude of reasons. Some people enjoy blogging about their family and kids so that other family members out of state can easily view pictures, videos and read about the things going on with immediate family. Other folks really enjoy writing and want to show off their stuff to the world. All in all, there are many reasons why people have blogs.
Really only a small percentage of people have blogs because they want to make money from them. Consequently, even though the percentage of people who want to make money from their blogs is small, it still happens to be one of the most difficult challenges an individual can face.
I see so many amazing and popular blogs in the blogosphere that I know for a fact get tons of traffic, even more than blogs like John Chow dot Com or ShoeMoney.com. Yet, they don't make a dime. The reason being, is that making money online isn't really their focus. Their focus is basically expressing their thoughts and views on things without any care if people read their blog or not. These folks would be happy if only their grandmother read their blog or if a million people read their blog.
These folks are in many ways is what I call natural bloggers. Their minds haven't been tainted by the whole concept of making money online and they don't worry about keyword packing, proper HTML, or optimized post titles. Amazingly, these natural bloggers defeat the odds that search engine optimization expects preach.
A prefabricated blogger is an individual who has come to the realization that there is a ton of potential to make a lot of money with a blog. That individual then sets out to start a blog strictly for the purpose of making money online.
With that being said, there is nothing wrong with being a prefab blogger; however, in doing so or in being on, you still have to run and maintain your blog as if you were a natural blogger. If you don't then you're not going to get very far in your ventures of making money online with a blog.
How do I know this? Simple. I have quite a few blogs myself. I won't lie, other than this blog, www.garryconn.com, I am a totally full blown prefab blogger. I'll make a blog out of any niche topic that I think will yield me the most amount of money with the least amount of effort.
However, in my experience, some of my better performing blogs are on topics that aren't really so "PreFab". If you take www.opticalblog.com or www.airplaneblog.com for examples. Both of these blogs don't really look or feel much different than other of my other "PreFab" blogs; however, there is one HUGE difference between these two blogs compared to my million and one other blogs. That difference is the topic.
I have over 10 years experience with eyeglasses and twice as much involvement with airplanes. I know these topics both very well and writing on this blogs comes very natural for me. Same goes with www.garryconn.com.
People who read blogs, don't like "Prefab" stuff. Blog readers enjoy natural flowing content that is written from the heart. Blog readers enjoy getting to know the author of the blog in slow chunks and also enjoy having the author tie in their content with their personal lives.
So, when you go and seek out a niche topic to create a blog in, consider that people may get turned off if you build a blog that looks like nothing more than a spam house full of ads and links. I am soon discovering that you can do much better with having less on your niche blog rather than having more.
Just because Google AdSense allows you to put up to three ad units on each page, try running only one.
Just because you have found an abundance in affiliate programs that match your niche, try campaigning and promoting only one.
If you place more focus on capturing your readers and place more focus on converting your passer by traffic and converting them into people who will bookmark or save your site to their favorites, you might find that your blog will start to grow quickly.
There is much debate about whether or not a new blog should start out of the gate monetized. I'd say it's ok to monetize your blog from the start; however, I also suggest that you always keep your readers best interest in mind. People read your content because they like you as the author and like your content.
I am learning that people place much more value in what you say rather than what your blog advertises. Consider that when you're building and maintaining your blog.
For over a year, I have launched and maintained a ton of blogs that were built for the purpose of making money online with Google AdSense. However, now I am realizing that that might not actually be the best option for me. I am now discovering the power of running and maintaining a mailing list.
A mailing list has an amazing amount of power. Imagine having the ability to send out an email to thousands of people who actually want to receive your email and want to read what you write. This is huge.
So for me, being a AdSense Guru and a "PreFab" blogger, I am now starting to come around and remap all my blogs and do less article publication designed to capture traffic and then send them away through a Google AdSense click. Instead I am now starting to self promote my mailing list forms.
It is to the point of realization now, that I would much rather NOT have a visitor leave my blog off an AdSense click. Instead I would much rather that that visitor just the click towards signing up to my mailing list.
My ultimate suggestion to you would to be more of a natural blogger who blogs regardless of how many people visit or don't visit your blog. It is very likely that your topic that you blog about also is a shared interest among many other people as well. It is just a matter of time before these people find your blog.
The question you need to ask yourself is this:
When someone does find your blog, what are you going to do with them? How are you going to utilize their visit?
Are you going to:
A.) Make some pocket change off them via an AdSense Click, or...
B.) Are you going to get them to sign up for your RSS Feed or Mailing List so that they can come back to your blog again and again?
My focus is now being more of a natural blogger and less of a "PreFabricated" blogger. I suggest that you do the same. :)
You still have to promote and market your blog. You still have to make sure that your blog is search engine friendly. You still have to do all the things that you have been doing; however, the only difference is that you now need to take advantage of the traffic that you do have. In doing so, your traffic will begin to increase and expand.
Win An Apple iPod Nano
One of the newest and most attractive programs that I use to make money online is with a program called Market Leverage. How would you like to win an Apple iPod Nano for free?
- Simply download this article that you just read and publish it on your blog.
- Then drop me a comment here so I'll have your name in the entry pool.
- Up for grabs is a Apple iPod Nano, a 2GB USB Pen, a flip video camera and even a $50 dollar preloaded American Express Rewards Card. All complimnents of Market Leverage!
CDF Networks is presently organizing a contest. Prizes were donated by Market Leverage. Here’s the list of prizes that you can win.
· $200 ML Amex Rewards Card - Preloaded with $200 to spend on whatever you want.
· USB Pen - Superslick pen with a built in 2 GB USB drive.
· Flip Ultra Video Camera - Perfect camera for video blogging.
· Ipod Nano - Engraved with CDF Networks and MarketLeverage on the back.
This is open for everybody. Winners will be selected on June 18.
