Today I’m launching an ebay auction for sponsorship of the 50 Bloggers in 50 States Roadtrip. I am going to be travelling a huge distance for this project. I figure might as well sell ads on the van, right?

You can view the auction here: Roadtrip – 50 Blogs in 50 States – Extreme Ad Package!

The starting price is $497. Which in my opinion is way under-priced, I can see this going as high as $2000 or more.

What you receive:

• 1 ad on my van in the back window for everyone to see. I will be travelling more than 5000 miles over the span of this roadtrip – it will definitely get a lot of eyes.
• You will be one of my featured sponsors and be listed on ALL posts relating to the Roadtrip.
• You will also receive a link on my blogroll.
• A 125×125 pixel banner ad.
• A 468×60 pixel banner ad. In the top header by the search bar.
• Vocal mentioning on EVERY Video / Podcast relating to the Roadtrip.
• I will be taking a picture of each blogger we interview holding up a poster with the logo’s of my Featured sponsors.
• I will also be stopping by any radio stations / tv stations / etc who will let me.

So far my site gets 1000 hits per day. IF that were the only feature it would be a steal – that’s 365,000 banner views spread out over a year. 1 banner for one month alone currently runs $30.

Imagine the exposure your website, blog, product will get. This is huge.

Each interview will not only be featured on my blog -but each blogger will also be writing a blog post about the event linking back to my site. I currently get 1000 hits a day – I’m expecting this roadtrip to bring raise that to 20,000/day – and you will have a 1 year banner. Not to mention your 1 year of van-side advertising.

This is the surest way to explode your business. If you want to take your business to the next height you need to place a bid TODAY the Auction ends in 10 days. Don’t wait. Don’t get left out in the cold!

BY THE WAY IF YOU HAVEN’T SUBMITTED YOUR BLOG TO THE DIRECTORY - You better do so now – it’s the ONLY way to get a chance to be interviewed!

Submit your Blog to the American Blogger Directory

What if you could make twice the money from an ebay store?

You can make the initial money for the sale of whatever product it is that you’re offering, but as a double whammy you can also make an affiliate commission for referring people to ebay.

Just think about that – you can make as much as $25+ per person who signs up for ebay. Plus if your site is targeted strictly to your product, add some other related affiliate banners, good seo, maybe a lot of tutorials relating to your items, and some ppc advertising, and you’ve got a guaranteed income online.

Here’s an example: Say you’re selling products that help people train their pets. Now say you put up a wordpress blog with a ton of tutorials and post an ebay feed with all of your products to your site, using your affiliate link. Now if anyone buys from you – you not only get the sale but the affiliate commission. Add PPC and a newsletter and you’ll explode your business!

Stay tuned – I’m working on an ebook about Niche Affiliate Marketing, and will be launching it in a few weeks.

Today, I’ve decided i’m going to try my hand at podcasting.

This is my introduction to the world of podcasting. I will be delving deep and revealing my results as to how well podcasting can help improve a blog’s reach.

Feel free to subscribe to my podcast.

Hey,

I’m not really a hotshot blogger, in fact I’m quite the opposite.

I don’t believe I have all the answers, or that I’m all that special. I do have confidence though in what I’m saying, and I know it works.

I believe humility is an important characteristic to encompass, and I know I’m not the perfect person yet. Which is why I am asking you, my readers the following questions:

What would you like to see on this blog?
What would you change about this blog?
What suggestions do you have for this blog?
Ultimately do you enjoy this blog, or do you think I’m full of fluff?

I have been told that the ads are a little excessive – but right now I’m just testing a bunch to see which ones I’m going to keep, then I’ll dial it down a lot.

I’m probably opening a can of worms here, but I know I have a lot of room to grow – and I’m not one to think I’m better than anyone.

One other question: Do you think I should start a podcast – and blog about the results of using podcasts on blogs?

I’d like to thank all of you who comment on this post, in advance – you are really what makes blogging such a fun / important part of my life.

You should notice the add above under the search button.

It basically tells anyone who has IE to get a better browser aka firefox.

For each of those who download firefox I receive a buck. But why waste the space if a viewer already has firefox? Obviously they’re not going to download it again, right?

You can do this easily if you follow these steps:

1. Download and install “Who Sees Ads”
2. Add this code to your header file for your theme:

<?php function ae_detect_ie() { if (isset($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']) && (strpos($_SERVER
['HTTP_USER_AGENT'], ‘MSIE’) !== false)) return true; else return false; } ?>
</head>

3. Next you will need to configure an ad context in Who See’s Ads. Go to the admin panel for the Who Sees Ads plugin.

    – Choose a name for your ad context. I chose ‘firefox’.
    – Now go down to second option from the bottom it should say:
                    X if (<scroll box>) {<display>}
    – You will want it to look like:  
                    X if (<(ae_detect_ie())>) {<display>}
    – Now drag and drop that row below where it says Active Rules.
    – Put your ad for firefox in the form that says: Ad code.
    – Click Save Context.
    – Now go back and create another context and call it -  ifhasfirefox.
    – Find the rule:  if Any condition  then

    – Move this to Active Rules and Put your adsense code in the Ad code area and save.
    – Now go back to the first context you made and put the following rule under the previous rule in active rules.                   if Previous conditions fail, try context   

 

 

Basically this will tell the script that if the first condition is not met which would show the firefox ad, then show the second ad which is the ‘ifhasfirefox’ ad.

You can see this script in action on my site – just load my page in firefox and internet explorer. Let me know if you have any questions or need help with this.

 Please note in order to promote firefox and earn money you will need to be a member of adsense you can sign up here:


 

 

 

 
 

This is just too good.. Seriously, what will they think of next?

Etsy has started selling a Cat5 style his / hers wedding band set for geeky couples. My wife would kill me if I bought her one, she knows I’m a geek, and she’s pretty geeky herself – but in total denial.

I could also see making some sort of necklace like this, as well.

Watch out though -they retail for $175!

More…(Gizmodo, Gadgetell, DVICE)

 

 

Hirosito is an interesting word. Why am I blogging about Hirosito?

Tonight I was searching for niche keywords. I’m a big fan of the tv sitcom heroes,  so I put heroes into my webceo, under the ‘get suggestions’ tab. What I’m looking for are good niches with a high KEI.

Heroes yeilded Nada. After heroes, I tried the word “hero”. Still nothing. My favorite character on the sitcom is Hiro Nakamura. So the next term I put in was Hiro with an “i”.

I was flabbergasted when it pulled up the term: Hirosito.

I had no clue what Hirosito means but the kei is: 9,501,221.183. This is huge it’s the largest find I’ve ever found. Of course my blogging about Hirosito may create an influx of competition for this word, but I’m curious to see what may happen if I can rank in the top 10 for Hirosito.

According to webceo there are about 234,215 searches for Hirosito daily, however there’s only 5,770 competing websites.

I’m not the first to capitalize on this term obviously. According to hirosito.info – hirosito means internet marketing or seo. Someone who practices hirosito is an expert internet marketer.  Because I found it while using “Niche Marketing”, I personally am going to use it to mean Niche Marketing.

In the spirit of that, I am going to replace ‘niche marketing’ with the term hirosito, in future blog posts,  as an experiment in seo. Of course some believe hirosito, may actually mean HI, Rosito, which is definitely a possibility. Anyway you look at it, it is a cool word.

What are your opinions on Hirosito? Do you know any other meaning for Hirosito?

Want to help my hirosito experiment be a success? Blog about it, and link to this post.

One side note, my wife says Hirosito is a name, and that could certainly be the case, but it is a cool niche search anomaly.

Here is a little secret: .com’s only matter to major business sites, and big time blogs. The key to successful Niche building, is BULK SITES. The more the better.

If you have the money – by all means go and buy up 100 .com websites for $800.

If you’re poor like the rest of us - or a bit frugal – you might want to try .info names instead.

Godaddy.com is running a special right now where you can actually buy .info domains for $.99! No, that is not a typo. You could buy 100 domains for $100.

I recommend going and buying at least 10 domains right now. Of course before you buy your domains you should definitely research some profitable niches, I highly recommend using webceo to do this.

My suggestion for creating and choosing the domains is to research your chosen niche, find the 3 keywords that appear the most, 4 keywords max, and choose a domain like: keyword1-keyword2-keyword3.info – I’m not a super expert at this though, I’m still experimenting myself – have you had any experience using dashes vs no-dashes in domain names? Let us know!

Stay tuned, as I am building a couple Profitable Niche Sites myself and will be running a contest and actually giving away my most productive niche blog. You don’t want to miss this! Subscribe now and stay up-to-date!

You can view the previous posts in the series here:

• Vic the Jackass, and the BANS(Build a Niche Store) SCAM. Get a FREE Niche Store NOW!
• Vic The JAckass + BANS(Build a Niche Scam) Part 2!

 

Image by premasagar via Flickr

As I mentioned in my post earlier today about “16 Ways To bring your Blog Back To Life“, one of my tips was to comment as often as possible.

Commenting on other blogs needs to be a huge part of your daily blogging career. Here are some power tips to make the most of your commenting, in the least amount of time.

1. Download and install Comment Kahuna, this software is amazing. It lets you search for blog posts with certain keywords, you can choose which platform, and you can also search blogs that have ‘nofollow’ removed, which means that each comment you submit will carry some good SEO juice.

2. Make sure you have at least 5 pillar posts. Many people make the big mistake of linking to their main page when submitting comments, this does bring traffic and seo power, but there’s an even better way.

3. Create a profile for each pillar article in Comment Kahuna. For your blog link – link directly to that post. For your name – instead of using your name, use some keywords relating to the blog post.

4. Do a search for the major keywords relating to your blog, I usually like to find blogs with at least a pr2 or above, comment kahuna has the option to let you refine your search as such.

5. Read or scan each post that you submit comments on, find 1-2 things that you can: expand on, ask questions about, answer questions on etc.. In other words provide a unique comment that contributes to the bloggers community. Make sure it’s relevant, and pertinent to the topic at hand.

6. Schedule time daily to do your commenting, if you do it everyday for just least 20 minutes a day you will see a huge improvement in just a few months.  You will see more search engine traffic, and higher search engine rankings.Â

Now, you might ask the question, is this spamming?

My answer is: No.

First off you’re providing a response / comment that relates to the blog post. Secondly, each comment is unique and not submitted automatically by a bot.

This is just smart marketing and to be successful online you need to work smarter, not harder!

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Image via CrunchBase

I launched this blog a year ago this month, and when I first launched it my primary focus was to make money. I’ve learned a lot in that year, and made many mistakes. I actually gave up on this blog for about 7 months.

I came back to it on March 15th of this year. In fact I had lost all the previous posts, I’d done and had to start anew. (Roughly 130+ posts gone). My original theme was using the law of attraction to bring $1 Million into my life by the age of 30, which I believe was perhaps a bit over zealous.

My new goal – apply what I’ve learned in my year of blogging, and help other’s become successful. I’d also like to launch a few social related businesses eventually, that are currently in the ‘idea’ stages.

My 50 States Roadtrip / American Blogger Directory is just part of gaining an keeping an audience.

You’ll notice the most successful blogs out there aren’t just individual people talking while everyone listens. The most successful blogs are communities, where people interact with what the blogger is writing.

You’ll notice almost every post they write gets tons of comments, trackbacks, pingbacks, etc… It’s no coincidence – without this community atmosphere on your blog it is nearly impossible to keep your blogging growing.

Without interaction from your readers your blog will die. Just as a flower needs sunlight to live, a blog needs comments / reactions from the community at large.

Here are some tips to build your Community.

1. Tweet ALL posts to Twitter. There are some good wordpress plugins for this like Twitter Tools or Twitter Tools for Tweetburner. I highly recommend tweetburner because of it’s statistics and shorter urls.

2. Build your Social Presence. Many might call it spamming, but if you look at Robert Scoble, and Jason Calacanis this is how they got huge. They built up the max number of friends on facebook, and they have 15000+ followers, a lot of those were gained by initiating the follow, ie following first.

3. Comment Frequently on other blogs. There is a secret power method for this which I will mention in another upcoming post, I will show you how to build hundred of incoming links extremely fast and easy.

4. Respond to your Audience. If someone sends you an email, drops a comment, replies to a twitter comment you made, etc.. Take the time to respond. Now when you have 10,000 hits daily it can get hard, and you might miss a few here and there – in blogging you don’t need to be perfect, just do your best.

People like to know they’re being listened to, this will go along way towards building a large following.

5. Ask a lot of questions. People like to be heard, and asking your readers questions via blog posts is a great way to give them this opportunity to voice their opinions. This makes it more fun to visit your blog, and increases the interactivity of your blog.

A lot of times I will ask a specific question at the end of my blog posts, and it will usually garner a lot of comments.

6. Be kind to those who are kind to you.  When someone takes the time to follow you or add you on a social networking site – reciprocate. Also when someone takes the time to link to your site – go to the post and leave a thankyou comment.

7. Stumble incoming links. If you stumble all of your own links, you’ll eventually end up getting banned. One secret is stumbling any and all incoming links. If someone is kind enough to link to you in a post, go ahead and stumble or digg it, and you will get a lot of traffic, plus you’ll help them get traffic. It’s a win-win scenario.

8. Link to other blogs often. I’ve talked about this a lot – but linking to other blogs will get you on their radar as it shows in the dashboard on wordpress, and secondly you’ll get a pingback / trackback from their site.

9. Start a meme. My Twitter Meme: Feed the Twitter Monster, has taken off hugely and gained a ton of incoming links and traffic, be creative though, and make it your own idea. Do something unique.

10. Start a resource for bloggers or website owners. I’ve just launched my American Blogger Directory, but it has already received a ton of hits and results. This of course is also part of my 50 state roadtrip, which is looking to be getting a lot of acclaim online as well.

11. Network with other bloggers. Friends will always give you more attention, and having more blogger friends never hurt anyone.

You can use some tips from my article on becoming friends with A-listers, many of the tips relate to networking in general.

12. Build your subscriber feeds. Market it anyway possible. The simple fact is you need subscribers, if you haven’t read it – here’s 39 great ways to get more RSS Subscribers.

13. Make your posts simple to follow and you’ll have mass appeal. Make sure the text doesn’t run together, as most people have low-attention spans and can’t be bothered with reading whole paragraphs anymore. Lists are huge in fact I try to write 1 list every week, as they tend to bring me a lot of traffic just because they’re lists. – I know it’s crazy!

14. Get active in Forums. If you have the time, you might want to try being active in popular forums, or just answering questions on the different answer sites like yahoo answers, this will help build credibility, and lead to more traffic.

15. Share and share alike, then share some more! When you launch a new resource, pillar article, etc you definitely need to tweet / send it to your social networks. However, you should also retweet it, if it is bringing in traffic, and subscribers.

I generally send my rss feed link to twitter once every 3-4 days asking for more subscribers. Especially when I get close to the next big number like 200 – asking people to help you ‘break’ a number is a great way to get them to actually subscribe, it might be tricky but it works.

I also send my best links, resources, and posts to my followers on twitter and ask them to digg or stumble the posts. This usually brings in a huge amount of traffic. When doing this make it extremely simple, though. Send them the actual link to digg or stumbleupon, so they don’t have to work. People are lazy and want instant gratification.

Another good tip is to help out other bloggers by forwarding their promotions to your followers, they may do the same for you some day. This can lead to some very interesting viral marketing.

16. Write your damn content, already! Last and foremost the #1 method to building a community blog is frequent posts. The more the better, I’ve said it a hundred times the more content you have,  the more traffic, comments, and interactive your site will become.

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In Phase 1 of this project we had people submit their top 3 Pillar Articles. I’ve chosen my favorites out of what was submitted.

This is Phase 2. In Phase 2 we will create a blog post – linking to ALL of the top pillar articles.

Rules:

1. You must write a blog post that somehow uses all the keywords and makes sense – the most creative blog posts will be featured in phase 3. Be creative – and remember it can be a story, an anecdote, a true story, a false story, it can be a sci-fi story, a horror story, etc etc etc…
2. You MUST choose 2-3 keywords to link to that relate to each of the chosen pillar posts.
3. You MUST link EVERY pillar blog post on the list.
4. You MUST link back to this post, saying something similar to: “This post is part of Patrick’s April Blogging Project” – Please use your own wording for this link to really make an effect on SEO.
5. You must submit a link to your post in the comments section of this post.

The Most Creative and Interesting Posts will be part of phase 3.

If you can’t tell this is an experiment in DEEP Linking, for seo purposes.

ALL who participate will benefit with increased traffic, and search engine rankings – when I release Phase 3 of this experiment.

All Submissions must be submitted by May 1st.

Here are the Posts to link to:

• http://www.fuelinteractive.com/blog/2008/04/11-coolest-googletwitter-combo.cfm
• http://www.ultrarob.com/blog/2008/03/7-mountain-biking-confidence-killers.php
• http://jobmob.co.il/blog/beautiful-resume-ideas-that-work/
• http://jobmob.co.il/blog/funniest-short-job-descriptions-ever/
• http://successfool.com/creating-multiple-streams-of-income/
• http://successfool.com/what-is-twitter/
• http://wingdom1.blogspot.com/2008/04/will-you-make-up-your-mind.html
• http://homeofficewarrior.com/2008/04/04/if-a-blog-falls-in-the-forestwill-anyone-give-a-care/
• http://truthintaylor.blogspot.com/2007/09/its-content-stupid.html
• http://red66.com/2007/11/5-observations-on-the-state-of-digital-media/
• http://ninjakai.com/generic/the-war-of-the-friend-counts
• http://blog.uprinting.com/whats-new/the-happiest-brand-on-earth/
• http://evantravers.com/2008/04/what-is-flickr.html

I’d like to take a moment and say thanks to all those who submitted their pillar articles, if I didn’t choose your article it isn’t personal, these are just the ones that stood out the most. I am greatful that you took the time to view this site and follow my meanderings.

LAUNCHING TODAY: The American Blogger Directory – find great bloggers in your state now!

I swear I’m not being anti-world, or anything – But today I have launched an American Blogger Directory – in order to organize the blogosphere by U.S. States. This will of course help me immensely in making my decision for who to visit in each state, during my 50 Bloggers, 50 States, in 50 Days Road Trip.

If you would like to be interviewed via text, audio, and video – and have your blog mentioned on all the top video, and podcasting sites please feel free to add your link to the American Blogger Directory.

In order to grow the American Blogger Directory as well as the traffic to this site – I will be requiring a reciprocal link somewhere on your site – it could be in a blog post, blogroll, etc.. This will of course in the end – benefit everyone who signs up as it will increase the pagerank and seo power of the American Blogger Directory.

The bottom line is: The more traffic this site gets, and higher it ranks – the more traffic you will get if I choose to visit and interview you.

Go to the American Blogger Directory and submit your blog now!

Before adding your site please be sure to link to: http://www.theresabloginmysoup.com/directory/

 

Building a FREE NICHE Money Making Website Part 2: Choose your Niche!

As I said earlier in my post about the dumbass Vic over at BloggerUnleashed.com and his BANS affiliate program (Build a Niche SCAM) is a waste of Money. It can be done for free, with better results.

We all know building a profitable Niche Site is a huge and exciting way to earn money online, and it does work – but I’m here to set the record straight on how to do this without getting taken to the cleaners.

Today’s Focus: Choosing your Niche.

There are a number of great tools online for comparing keywords and niches to find a profitable keyword. I have a personal favorite, but before I give you my favorite I will give you a run down of some of the popular programs:

Free Programs:

• SeoDigger – Shows what keywords are ranking for the top 20 spots in google for a given domain. This one comes highly recommended however it was giving me an error, I recommend you try it yourself and see.
• Google Adwords Keyword Tool – This is google’s tool for adwords users, it’s also a great tool for finding keywords.
• SeoBook’s SEO Tools – This is a bunch of cool tools courteousy of SEOBook.

Paid Programs:

• Wordtracker – This is one of the best tools on the web for researching keywords and they also offer a free trial.
• Keyword Country – is a great site for finding high paying adsense keywords, but this can also help finding a good Niche for an Ebay Affiliate Niche Store as well.
• Keyword Discovery – is also one of the top Keyword Research Tools online, and a product I highly recommend if its in your budget.

Now for the program I mentioned earlier, my ultimate favorite keyword research tool:

 

 Web CEO is a great free program and has a ton of features, the free version has a ton of features, and I highly recommend starting out with the free version and working your way upto the paid version.

One thing to look for on Web Ceo is the KEI the bigger the number the better, this is a ratio between the amount of searches a term gets and the competition for that term.

First off I call BANS a scam because it’s easy for just about anybody to do this for FREE, if you know how.

Stay tuned and I will show you how..

But first…

Have you heard of this guy(Dumbass) Vic over at Blogger Unleashed? (Apparently GarryConn isn’t too fond of him either)? Apparently a BlackHat SEO’er who had a breakdown running 12 companies…blah blah… crying a tear…

Have you seen this guy? Watch this video where he disses Caroline Middlebrook, be forewarned this guy doesn’t know how to use full sentences, his profanity is off the wall, and all around he’s probably the biggest jerk I’ve seen in the Blogosphere, oh yeah and he has a major stuttering problem or something.

You should definitely learn to speak if you’re going to do audio/video, perhaps write a script so you don’t have to say ‘uh’ ever other word…

Seeing this guy’s video makes me think he’s really blogging from his grandma’s basement where he and his girlfriend(mail-order bride, or possibly a blow up doll) live rent free.

Can he say ‘uh…duh…um…uh..’ anymore? He stuttered so much and used so many profanities I couldn’t even keep watching – it was putting me to sleep.

He makes it his goal to slam and smear every a-lister out there including: Darren Rowse, John Chow, Shoemoney, etc….

His SEO tactics are pretty easy to spot. Every post he writes he bolds his main keyword like 50 times in hopes of ranking high for that keyword. In this case Caroline Middlebrook.

Now back to BANS (Build a Niche Store). If you haven’t heard of BANS (Build a Niche Store) – It’s basically a ‘Made for Adsense Site’ only instead of Adsense – it’s the Ebay Affiliate Program.

He has written – many, many posts on using the Bans (Build A Niche Store) program. In fact he may have created the product for all I know – I was unable to find the owner’s name / info.

My point though, as one of the top marketers of this program, I could see his BANS money coming more from recommending the BANS program than actually building the sites himself.

Check out Vic’s NUMEROUS Search Engine Spam on BANS(Build a Niche Store):

• BANS Step By Step Video Tutorial
• 100 BANS SItes
• I Love Bans!!!
• BANS Ebay Changes and Comments
• Build a Niche Store BANS Review and Tutorial
• Promoting BANS and Niches The A-lister way
• BANS Domains Tips and Tricks

The scam is that BANS can be easily created using wordpress for free. They are charging $97 for the product. I’m going to set the record straight, and show you how to create your own BANS-like site for FREE.

If you can’t wait for my installment and/or want to help the environment – Feel free to click that link and signup for BANS. There are many, many people claiming to make a ton of money using the system and if you can’t wait for part 2 of this series, then by all means – go ahead and sign up using my affiliate link(I’ll be giving away 30% of all commissions to a Green(Environmental Friendly) Charity.

Stay tuned, and subscribe to this blog, and I’ll be revealing how you can Build your own BANS-style site for FREE using Wordpress. It’s extremely easy, and I will also be starting a brand new Free Niche Store of my own and detail it’s successes and failures.

Mylot is a knowledge sharing portal that pays you to post new information, questions, etc – the more comments you get the more money you make, and basically the more active you are on the site the more money you make – plus you earn a nice referral fee of 25% of what your referrals earn.

I’m currently working on a 1 week project to see how profitable MyLot can be.

To participate all you need to do is signup here, and then send me comments to this post / or  tweets @patrickcurl regarding your success, opinions, results, of using the service as much as possible for one week.

Let me know how much money you make, how many referrals you get, etc…I’m interested in seeing if this is a viable method for making money online.

 

As part of my Summer Road TRip – I need bloggers from Delaware, Florida, Georgia, and Hawaii!

To submit your blog just submit a comment to this post, which a link to your blog and why you think I should interview you!

We also still need Sponsors / Donations: Our sponsors will be featured in every blog post about this project, and that could transform into some major publicity!

Current Sponsor(s):

• That Tall Dude

Submit your blog to other states:

• Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas
• California, Canada, Colorado, Connecticut

Send all donations via paypal to: yourstruly AT patrickcurl.com

 

This sounds like something out of a spy movie or something.

According to ( Marketing Pilgrim via Mercury News) a 29-year-old UC Berkeley journalism student got out jail using Twitter.

Apparently, while in Egypt, he was arrested for taking a picture. Upon being arrested he quickly notified his ‘Network’ with the word ‘Arrested’, those who new his business and where he was immediately notified the right people, and before morning was up he had UC Berkley hired lawyer, and the American Embassy knocking on the door of the Jail.

From the Donkey’s Mouth:

Buck, 29, a former Oakland Tribune multimedia intern, used the ubiquitous short messaging service to tap out a single word on his cellular phone: ARRESTED. The message went out to the cell phones and computers of a wide circle of friends in the United States and to the mostly leftist, anti-government bloggers in Egypt who are the subject of his graduate journalism project.

The next day, he walked out a free man with an Egyptian attorney hired by UC Berkeley at his side and the U.S. Embassy on the phone.

I always knew Twitter could take you places, but now it can actually get you out of Jail!

How sweet is that?

I heard this story on the radio today, and thought it was quite funny.

Some guy named Bernie Peng, spent an entire month reprogramming his girlfriend’s favorite game (Bejewelled). When she reached a certain point level it showed a special wedding proposal screen and a ring.

Awestruck at what he’d done she of course said yes.

Popcap the makers of the game were impressed by this love story and as a wedding present flew the lovebirds to Seattle, for their honeymoon, where I’m betting there was quite a bit of Dungeons and Dragons to be had.

Not only that Popcap also gave away 250 free games to those at the Wedding Reception, pretty nice huh?!

Read More About it:

http://www.dorkroyalty.com/2008/04/dork-royalty-bernie-peng.html
http://www.neatorama.com/2008/04/15/a-bejeweled-wedding-proposal/

 

I’m starting a group blogging project.

First I need 10 blogs / 30 Pillar Articles, these articles can be on anything under the sun, not just making money, it could be on twitter, social networks, movies, music, insects, whatever.

To be considered please post a link to your blog, and your top 3 posts in the comments of this post.

We will choose the top 10 blogs to be part of a group blogging project, these 10 blogs will receive a huge traffic surge, as they will be featured on many many blogs that join this writing project.

Further details will come soon, but first I need 10 Blogs.

I will choose my 10 favorites, based on design, pictures, layout, content, and just overall quality.

If you do not have 3 pillar posts – you can still participate in phase 2 of this writing project – please subscribe to our feed and stay tuned, this is going to be an awesome Project!

ALSO – Phase two cannot start until this blog reaches 300 subscribers – Please do me a favor and send the following mini url to your twitter friends and ask them to subscribe. http://twurl.nl/r1jewd

First off, I love twitter, it is definitely my pick as far as social networks go, but I cannot discount the power and reach of facebook.

My current goal is to get as many facebook friends as possible, facebook has built in protections for adding a ton of friends so I would just like to ask you, my readers to take a moment and add me to your facebook friend’s list. Let’s see if I can get to 5000 by the end of April, 2008.

Just go here to add me.

Apparently the four biggest internet companies are at it again, everyone would love to be google, of course google would love to acquire everyone else.

Microsoft wants yahoo to be their love child, but Yahoo is like, I dunno Aol is kinda cute, and I might be crushin’ on google too.. I think we could make cute babies.

Here’s a short overview from Mashable:

Here’s a very short recap of the internet love rectangle story so far. Microsoft bids for Yahoo; Yahoo wants more money; Google doesn’t want the deal to happen; Microsoft reiterates their bid; Yahoo still wants more money; Yahoo considers closing an advertising deal with Google; AOL and Yahoo consider merging.

While the community at large is thinking what does Yahoo see in Aol, and for that matter why does Microsoft want Yahoo? It’s all one big convoluted love triangle.

The winner though in this menage tois, in my opinion is probably Google, they’re not in “love” with anyone, and stand less likely a chance of getting their heart broken.

The problem one blogger noted was that everyone wants to be google, but they are trying to do it using big business practices, when Google is google, because they are different, they do things differently and that’s how they came to be where they are. Until the old business mindset is lifted, none of the other internet giants will be able to rise to the level of Google. Plain and Simple.

Read more here:

• Yahoo and Aol might Combine
• The Big Four Fight: Everyone Else Wins
• Can Yahoo, Microsoft, Google, Aol, and Newscorp sit down, and  just Divvy up the internet already?

 

I recently joked on April Fools Day, about Problogger Darren Rowse going bankrupt.

The reason I picked that topic is because I admire Darren Rowse immensely.

I’ve been reading and following his blog for about 2 years now. I don’t think my own blog would be nearly where it is today, without all those great blog posts that he’s written.

To me – a fan of Darren, the most unthinkable thing that could happen is for him to go Bankrupt. If THE Problogger himself went bankrupt – what would that say about the industry? If he was really ‘faking’ it all those years, and all those blog posts. It’s unthinkable and unbelievable.

That’s why I used it as a joke, apparently someone thought it would be even funnier to add it to his Wikipedia page, which I agree may have been overstepping the line just a bit.

Mostly the post was an experiment to see which joke would get more interest, one about microsoft, one about Darren, one about Shoemoney, or one about John Chow (which I accidently forgot to post anyhow..lol).

Apparently, Darren is more popular and famous than microsoft.

To Darren: I do apologize if this has caused any hurt feelings, I do have a ton of respect for the work that you do, and I’ve used your blog postings to bring my current blog to 150 subscribers in less than 30 days, and 1200 hits per day.

I first found out about this via twitter – you can read another blog post on the subject here.

The original post which can be found here, will soon be edited to remove the main content and announce that it was indeed a joke.

Fact: “Blogging”, “Making Money Blogging”, or just “Making Money” in general is the toughest market to tap into.

Reasons Why Bloggers Fail in this Niche:

1. Too much hype.  Most people looking to make money have tried just about everything possible, including: MLM, Network Marketing, Real Estate Programs, Ponzi Schemes(HYIPs), Surfing Programs, Egold Scams, etc etc…It could be compared to the Diet industry as most people have tried every potion, powder, exercise program etc, with no real lasting results.

   The people are looking for real solutions to their problems, and skepticism has been bred by years of failed claims and promises.

2. Extreme Competition.  Everybody wants to make money, they’re even passionate about making money, seriously who isn’t?Even the Filthy Rich still want more of it.

   The more competition the harder it is to succeed, in the given Niche.

   Personally, I chose this Niche, because I have been at this since 2000, and believe I have something unique to share.

   I also have some good ideas to make the topic fun and exciting (E.G. My Summer Roadtrip to Interview 50 Bloggers in 50 States.)

   I actually believe this blog has a good chance of making it to the level of John Chow(Read why he says: “The Majority of Bloggers Will Fail“), Shoemoney(Read what he has to say about “The Pursuit of Happyness“, or Steve Pavlina(He wrote a really good article on How to Make money Blogging.

   A good example of a blog that came up out of no-where and made it in a competitive topic would be Dosh Dosh(Circa Jan, 2007). Read what Maki at Dosh Dosh had to say on “reaching 10,000 subscribers“.

   So it is still possible to make money in this topic, it’s only harder, and takes a lot more dedication.

3. It’s all been said before….45n5 Wrote a good post about how everything on how to make money blogging has already been said before on one blog or another…

   Most newbie bloggers to the ‘Make Money Niche’ are imitators, or rehashers of info.

   Rehashing info might get you some notice, but to really make it, and be the next big blogger, you absolutely MUST be original, you cannot re-hash information and expect to make it anymore.

With all of that said, if you’re still gunghoe about going for the “Make Money” Niche. Here are Some tips to succeed in this Niche. (Heck these are good tips for any blog really, but especially one on Making money and Internet Marketing):

1. Web 2.0 was the Blog and Social Networks. Web 3.0 will be Audio/Video. Use Video / Audio often. Change it up, and be different.
2. Network, Network, Network! Be sure to build up your network(I can’t say enough about using Twitter to this end.)
3. Get them to subscribe. I’d reckon to say each subscriber to your feed is worth a good $1 per month, if not much more. Read more about finding Subscribers here.
4. Do you Tweet? Did I mention how wonderful Twitter is?When I write a good post, I usually will send it out 3-4 times to my twitter followers. I will send out the link to digg it, the original link, and the link to stumble it. This get’s me huge exposure and a ton of traffic.
5. Don’t be afraid of A-list bloggers. If you have a good product, or idea you can’t be afraid to approach the A-list bloggers. My suggestion, though, is not to just go for one, but go for 3-4 at a time, a lot of times some of them may not like your idea, but if one does – you win!
6. Create meme’s. A good is example is my ‘Feed the Twitter Monster‘ meme…
7. Make Lists and Lot of Them! The best bloggers use tons of lists with bullets, pics, good formatting, and the whole nine yards. People like easy, concise information. Give your readers what they want.
8. Use your Blogroll Wisely. A blogroll is very important. All of the A-list bloggers usually link to one another via the blogroll.If you want to be an A-list blogger it’s a good idea to put links up to them asap, whether or not they return the favor. The point is that some day they will return the favor. But you have to start the linklove.
9. Go fishin’ with Linkbait. You need to write as many high quality blog posts as you possibly can, then you need to have your network of friends and twitter followers stumble, digg, and bookmark them.If you do this, you will get a storm of traffic and many will even link to your posts if they’re good enough and this will give you some good Search Engine Juice.
10. Paid advertising. This is not an option. This is a MUST! John Chow got popular by branding himself all over google, and websites with the keywords ‘make money online’.Did you know – as popular as John Chow is, he STILL uses google adwords to promote JohnChow.com?

    What does that say to the importance of using payperclick? I even saw an ad for JohnChow on this site, and I must say it threw me off a second. That’s when I realized it must work.

11. Post a post or five every single day. You absolutely have to keep content coming, the more the merrier. If you miss a day or two, you will have to work that much harder to bring people back to your site.Also for every 5 posts, at least one should be a really big post.
12. Comment Often. Be sure to be a good commenter on other people’s websites. Especially if someone links to you – go to their blog and leave a comment, trust me. It builds trust and they will come back to your site often.

    Along with good commenting, is being a good responder – responding to your readers will create trust and rapport, and bring them back for more(Wow, I’m a poet and didn’t know it!).

13. A good design can make or break you. You must also have a good site design, and it must highlight the top posts on your site, and any flagship content that you have. Also the design is paramount to getting revenue with adsense or any other advertiser. If your ads fit in nicely you will see much better results, and your private advertisers will be more ready to dish out the money.

Conclusion:

If you cannot do ALL these things, then get the hell out of this Niche. There are many more things I may have missed that could be added. 

If you can’t do these 13 simple things - you are in the wrong Niche, and as harsh as it sounds you most likely will never make more than $5 – $10 a month blogging. With the cost of gas and other life expenses now a days that won’t get you very far.

If you can’t do all these things religiously -  go blog about Butterflies, or Roach control, or something else unique like that. You will receive a lot more money in a less competitive Niche, but that is another blog post entirely.

 

I’d like to give a shout out to Shawn over at ThatTallDude.com, He was kind enough to give us a donation, and we definitely need all the donations we can get to be able to go on our 50 state roadtrip.

You can donate and get a shoutout, by clicking the link on the sidebar.

Shawn blogs about Technology, Religion, Sports, and anything else he deems important, go on over and check out some of his blog posts, I personally liked a video he posted called: “Deuce Meditation“.

This is an update to Our Summer Roadtrip – we need the best of the blogs from Canada, California, Colorado,  Connecticut. Canada is a state, right? Just KIDDING!

We are also planning on visiting a blogger in Canada, if possible.

If you are from any of these states(or Canada) and blog. Or know somebody from there who blogs, please submit their blog to us in the comments of this post, and we will consider visiting them, and doing a blog interview.

Please note we are looking for people who are serious bloggers, with a good following, although smaller blogs may be considered in some states. All bloggers will be interviewed in text, audio, and video. We will be posting each blog post in text, as a podcast, and in video via youtube.

You can read all about it here: Summer Roadtrip: 50 States, 50 Bloggers, 50 Days!

If you’re in Canada, California, Colorado, or Connecticut, just submit your blog in the comments area, you can also let me know why you think the blog you’re submitting is worth being interviewed.

If you’re in Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas you can enter your blog here to signup.

PLEASE NOTE WE’re ALSO in Need of Donations, in order to see this through. If you donate you will get some free advertising on this site, you can see the whole list of what you get here. If you donate $5 or more during the month of April, you will get a link on our blogroll.(We currently get 500+ hits per day!)