The Internet Miner

Steve Jobs Resigns as CEO of Apple

2011-08-26T03:29:00.001-07:00

TIM COOK NAMED CEO AND JOBS ELECTED CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD

CUPERTINO, California—August 24, 2011—Apple’s Board of Directors today announced that Steve Jobs has resigned as Chief Executive Officer, and the Board has namedTim Cook, previously Apple’s Chief Operating Officer, as the company’s new CEO. Jobs has been elected Chairman of the Board and Cook will join the Board, effective immediately.

“Steve’s extraordinary vision and leadership saved Apple and guided it to its position as the world’s most innovative and valuable technology company,” said Art Levinson, Chairman of Genentech, on behalf of Apple's Board. “Steve has made countless contributions to Apple’s success, and he has attracted and inspired Apple’s immensely creative employees and world class executive team. In his new role as Chairman of the Board, Steve will continue to serve Apple with his unique insights, creativity and inspiration.”

“The Board has complete confidence that Tim is the right person to be our next CEO,” added Levinson. “Tim’s 13 years of service to Apple have been marked by outstanding performance, and he has demonstrated remarkable talent and sound judgment in everything he does.”

Jobs submitted his resignation to the Board today and strongly recommended that the Board implement its succession plan and name Tim Cook as CEO.

As COO, Cook was previously responsible for all of the company’s worldwide sales and operations, including end-to-end management of Apple’s supply chain, sales activities, and service and support in all markets and countries. He also headed Apple’s Macintosh division and played a key role in the continued development of strategic reseller and supplier relationships, ensuring flexibility in response to an increasingly demanding marketplace.

Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple has reinvented the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and has recently introduced iPad 2 which is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices.

His resignation letter:

“To the Apple Board of Directors and the Apple Community:
I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s C.E.O., I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come.
I hereby resign as C.E.O. of Apple. I would like to serve, if the Board sees fit, as Chairman of the Board, director and Apple employee.
As far as my successor goes, I strongly recommend that we execute our succession plan and name Tim Cook as C.E.O. of Apple.
I believe Apple’s brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role.
I have made some of the best friends of my life at Apple, and I thank you all for the many years of being able to work alongside you.

Steve”

Source

9 Tricks I Used To Triple My AdSense Earnings In 30 Days

2011-08-11T10:32:00.001-07:00

I have been using Google AdSense to monetize my blogs and websites for as long as I remember. In fact it was the first method I ever tried (I made a whooping $15 on my first month… back in 2005). Over the years I migrated to other methods (e.g., direct sponsors and affiliate marketing), which made AdSense become merely an inventory filler. I was still making around $1,000 monthly from it, but whenever I could I would use other methods over it.

Then some months ago I started noticing an upward trend on the CPC of my sites, and I figured that I should give AdSense another try. I started applying some tricks here and there, and the next month I made over $3,000 with it (that is combining all my sites). I was pleasantly surprised, and I decided to keep using it actively on some sites.

In this article I want to share with you the tips and tricks I used to triple my AdSense earnings in one month.

1. I added units to my Big Websites

Daily Blog Tips and Daily Writing Tips are my largest websites in terms of traffic. They are getting close to one million monthly page views (combined). Despite that I was not using AdSense on them, mainly because the direct sponsorship model was working relatively well.

Some months ago I decided to load some AdSense units on the sites, however, and the results were very positive. Around 70% of the boost I generated to my earnings came from these two sites. At the same time I managed to keep the other monetization methods working fine, and no reader ever complained about the new ads (more on that later).

Even if your blog is already making money with direct sponsors and affiliate marketing, therefore, you could still manage to increment your earnings by strategically adding some AdSense units.

2. I added units to my Small Websites

As many webmasters do, I have a bunch of small websites scattered around the web. Some are on free hosted platforms like Blogger, and others are self hosted sites that I abandoned along the way. Most of these sites still get traffic, however. Not much, but combined the numbers get decent.

I figured that adding AdSense units to all these sites could yield some money, and I was right. The main reason is that, since these are abandoned sites and don’t have loyal visitors, I can place the units very aggressively. The result was a very high CTR (Click-through rate), which compensates the small traffic levels.

Don’t underestimate the earning potential of small websites, especially if you are willing to place AdSense units aggressively.

3. I used the Large Units

If you want to make money with AdSense you’ll inevitably need to use one of these units: the 336×280 large rectangle, the 300×250 rectangle, the 120×600 large skyscraper or the 728×90 leaderboard.

Whenever I tried to use smaller units the results were disappointing. Even if I positioned them aggressively the CTR was just too low.

All four units mentioned above can produce good results, but the best performing one is by far the 336×280 large rectangle, and that is the one I used to boost my earnings.

4. I placed the Units above the Fold

My first trial was to place the 336×280 large rectangle between the post and the comments section of my blogs. The results were OK. I then decided to try placing them below the post titles for one week, and the CTR skyrocketed. In fact I still need to find a placement/unit combination that will beat placing a 336×280 unit below post titles.

I knew this rule, but I guess I needed to test and get confirmation. The rule is: if you want to make money with Google AdSense, you must place your units above the fold.

5. I Focused on Organic Traffic

My main concern with adding a large AdSense unit right below my post titles was that some of the loyal readers could get annoyed with it. At the same time I knew that loyal readers become ad blind quite fast, and that the bulk of my money would come from organic visitors (i.e., people coming via search engines to my posts).

To solve this problem I decided to display the large rectangle only on posts older than seven days (using the Why Do Work WordPress plugin). It worked like a charm, as loyal readers don’t even notice the ad units when they are browsing through my recent posts, and organic visitors almost always see the ads because they usually land on posts older than seven days.

6. I started using AdSense for Search

I was not sure how much money I would be able to make with AdSense for Search, but I was not happy with the search results provided by WordPress, so I decided to give it a shot anyway.

Currently I am making around $60 monthly with AdSense for Search. It is not much, but if you sum it over one year we are talking about $720. On top of that the search results are as relevant as you’ll get, so it is a win win situation.

7. I started using AdSense for Feeds

Another AdSense product I decided to try was the AdSense for Feeds one. I opted to display the ads below my feed items (you can also place them on top, but this would be too intrusive in my opinion). The results here were pretty good, both in terms of CTR and earnings.

You obviously need a large RSS subscriber base to make this work, but I am guessing that even with a couple thousand subscribers you could already make $100 monthly from feed ads.

8. I played around with section targeting

Section targeting is an AdSense feature that allows you to suggest specific sections of your site that should be used when matching ads. You can read more about it here.

I found that on niche and small websites section targeting can help a lot. Often times Google was displaying unrelated ads on these sites because there weren’t enough pages. After using section targeting I managed to increase the relevancy of the ads and consequently the CTRs.

9. I tested with Different Colors and Fonts

If you enabled both image and text ads on your units you should be able to customize the colors and fonts. I did some testing with both of these factors, and it helped to increase the numbers. Nothing dramatic, but it was definitely worth my time.

You just need to track your CTR for a couple of weeks. Then change the color or font and track it for another week, seeing if you can beat the original CTR. If you can, keep the new format. If you the performance decreased, try a new color or font and track the CTR for another week, until you find the optimal combination.

On my sites the best results came from making the ad units merge with the look of the site, but on some sites contrasting colors perform better, so testing is a must.

Daniel is the owner of Daily Blog Tips. He is also the author of the Make Money Blogging ebook, which you can download for free by signing up to his newsletter.

How to Turn Your Blog Traffic into Money

2011-08-11T10:28:00.000-07:00

Over the last three years as an online publisher, my business has undergone a complete transformation in its approach.

Whereas I previously slapped some code from a couple of ad networks into my blogs’ templates and relied upon people clicking those ads to generate income, I’ve increasingly focused my energy upon creating my own products (largely ebooks) to sell.

The change in approach has been gradual and it has been a lot of work, but the results have made it worth doing. Last week the total of ebooks that we’ve sold moved past 62,000 units, with a combined revenue of around $1.1 million (note: that’s not all profit).

The cornerstone of my new approach

Numerous factors have contributed to these results, but one that I’ve recently been focusing on more and more is that of “landing pages.”

A landing page is a page on your site to which you direct traffic with the goal of converting those who land on it to take a specific action. This action can be many things, but might include:

convince your reader to buy your ebook (or other product)
get your reader to opt in to your email newsletter list
convince advertisers to advertise on your blog
convince your reader to buy an affiliate product that you’re promoting
welcome anyone arriving from a social media account, and convince them to follow you
introduce your blog and give new readers a tour of content that’s especially relevant for them
thank people for subscribing, and encourage them to confirm their opt in to your list.

The list could go on and on, but the common thing is that these are pages to which you drive traffic, and on which you call readers to take a specific action.

Landing pages have been key in my own approach. I’ve used them in all of these ways, however, using them as sales pages has been the most effective tactic in selling ebooks.

Specifically designed landing pages work better

One of the key progressions in my own use of landing pages was to transition from using the default layout in my WordPress theme, to using specifically designed landing pages.

Previously, I used the default page that came with the theme that my blog used. As a result, landing pages looked pretty much the same as any other page on my blog. The result was good, but not great.

The problem I faced was that readers not only had a call to action to buy my ebook, but also numerous distractions in my sidebars and navigation areas (calls to subscribe, advertising, calls to visit other parts of the site, etc).

Readers were distracted from the main call to action on the page—to buy my ebook. A change of approach was needed, so we designed a landing page that had one single focus, and one call to action only.

You can see an example of this page on our latest product page at Digital Photography School—Going Pro (an ebook for helping photography enthusiasts to make money from their photography).

While the page is consistent in design with our normal dPS theme (in terms of color and branding), it doesn’t have any of the distracting elements of a normal page on the site.

There’s none of the normal navigation to other parts of the site in the header area, and there’s no sidebar. All people can do when they arrive is to read about the product—there are no other options to click or read.

When we switched from using default pages to a specifically designed landing page for the sale of our ebooks, we saw a significant leap in conversions. I don’t have the specific figures but it was in the order of a 30-40% increase—which in time has lead us to many thousands of dollars in extra revenue.

These landing pages were something I knew I should institute for a long time before I actually did it. The reason why it took me so long was simply that, as a technologically-challenged blogger, I consistently put it in the “too-hard basket”. In the end I only did it when we redesigned the blogs and I had my designer create a template specifically for the job. That was a couple of years ago, and about a year after I should have done it.

As a result of that inertia, I lost considerable sales, and I still kick myself about that regularly. That was two years ago—today it would have been a lot less difficult.

Landing pages made easy with Premise

Earlier this year, the team at Copyblogger released software for WordPress that’s all about creating landing pages that convert—it’s called Premise.

I can safely say that if I’d had this plugin when I first started selling my ebooks, my sales numbers would have been a lot higher. It takes the “too hard” part of landing pages, and completely eliminates it.

The idea with Premise is that instead of having to have a designer create a template specifically for each type of landing page for your blog (or having to learn to do it yourself), this plugin helps you create those landing pages yourself.

Premise focuses on three areas:

Creating pages: they let you choose from seven types of landing page styles, and then add graphics and copy to them to create clutter-free and beautifully designed pages.
Creating compelling copy: the design of your page is one thing, but the real magic happens in the copy that you create for the page to convince readers to take the action you’re suggesting. Premise gives advice on how to craft the type of landing page you’re creating, right in the WordPress interface. You also get access to some great copywriting seminars (keep in mind that this is from Copyblogger—the masters of creating compelling content and copy).
Optimization: improve your conversion rate and search rankings with more tools and guidance, including easy split testing and SEO features.

One of the most amazing features of Premise is the graphics library. You could easily pay more than Premise costs just for a set of graphics like this, and it ensures that every landing page you create is unique.

Check out Premise for yourself. Just like I learned, the extra income you earn from quality landing pages will make Premise pay for itself many times over.

REPOST FROM Darren Rowse

Credit Ratings by S&P, Moody’s, and Fitch Ratings

2011-08-11T10:04:00.000-07:00

What are Credit Ratings?

Credit Ratings are a measure of the credit worthiness of an organization such as a government or a public or private corporation. It is also an assessment of the quality of debt (loan) instruments issued by these institutions. In layman’s terms, a credit rating is a score that shows the capacity of the borrowing entity to meet its financial obligations to investors.

Who are the major credit rating agencies in the world?

There are several credit rating agencies but the three major players in the world, accounting for at least 90% of the market, are Moody’s, Standard and Poor’s (S&P) and Fitch Ratings. Moody’s and S&P are based in the United States while Fitch Ratings has two headquarters, one in London and another in New York. The “Big Three” issue short-term and long-term ratings of debt papers of governments and companies worldwide and also an outlook on the assessed entity, such as positive, negative or stable.

How are credit ratings useful?

Credit ratings help assess the risk associated with a financial instrument. It thus gives investors an idea on the fair price of a financial asset. A ratings “upgrade” generally means the entity is improving in terms of credit standing while a “downgrade” means the opposite. Such action has tremendous effects on the financial markets as it can fuel jitters and panic in the market, specially during a ratings downgrade when the assessed entity is considered riskier than before, causing an increase in its cost of borrowing.

What are the types of credit ratings?

The Big Three ratings agencies typically have two major types of long-term credit ratings: Investment Grade and Non-Investment Grade (also called “Speculative” or “Junk”).

Investment Grade

Moody’s — Aaa; Aa (Aa1, Aa2, Aa3); A (A1, A2, A3); Baa1, Baa2, Baa3
S&P – AAA; AA (AA+, AA, AA-); A (A+, A); BBB
Fitch – AAA; AA; A; BBB

Speculative/Junk (Non-Investment Grade)

Moody’s — Ba1, Ba2, Ba3; B1, B2, B3; Caa1, Caa2, Caa3; C
S&P — BB; B; CCC; CC; C; CI; R; SD; D
Fitch –BB; B; CCC; CC; C; D

What exactly do the credit ratings mean?

The table below summaries the meanings of the comparative ratings of the three major credit rating companies.

Moody's	S&P	Fitch	Meaning
Aaa	AAA	AAA	(Highest quality; EXTREMELY STRONG capacity to meet financial obligations.)
Aa1	AA+	AA+	(High quality; VERY STRONG capacity
Aa2	AA	AA	to meet financial obligations. It differs from
Aa3	AA-	AA-	the top-line rating only in small degree.)
A1	A+	A+	(High quality; STRONG capacity to meet financial obligations
A2	A	A	but is somewhat more susceptible to the adverse effects
A3	A-	A-	of changes in circumstances and economic conditions.)
Baa1	BBB+	BBB+	(Medium grade; ADEQUATE capacity to meet financial obligations
Baa2	BBB	BBB	but adverse conditions or changing circumstances are more
Baa3	BBB-	BBB-	likely to lead to a weakened capacity to meet financial commitments.)
Ba1	BB+	BB+	(Lower medium grade; LESS VULNERABLE but faces major
Ba2	BB	BB	ongoing uncertainties and exposure to adverse conditions which
Ba3	BB-	BB-	could lead to inadequate capacity to meet financial commitments.)
B1	B+	B+	(Low grade; MORE VULNERABLE and adverse business,
B2	B	B	financial, or economic conditions will likely impair its capacity
B3	B-	B-	or willingness to meet financial commitments.)
Caa	CCC	CCC	(Poor quality; CURRENTLY VULNERABLE and dependent upon favourable conditions to meet commitments.
Ca	CC	CC	(Poor quality; CURRENTLY HIGHLY-VULNERABLE.)
	C	C	(CURRENTLY HIGHLY-VULNERABLE to nonpayment.)
C	D	D	(FAILED to pay one or more of its financial obligations.)

(JobStreet) JobGantic Career Fair – August 12-13, 2011

2011-06-27T15:08:00.000-07:00

Are you hunting for a job or looking to advance to a new position? Then join JobStreet’s JobGantic Career Fair in August 2011.

Touted as the biggest job fair in the Philippines with over 250 companies participating, this may very well be the opportunity that can lead you to that job you’re looking for.

Sponsored by the online job site JobStreet.com, the JobGantic Career Fair will be on August 12 and 13, from 10am to 7 pm, at the SMX Convention Center in Pasay City.

Companies expected to join the Job Fair to recruit applicants for their vacancies include:

PLDT
SM Department Store
Banco de Oro (BDO)
Robinsons Corp.
Cebu Pacific
Pru Life UK
PhilamLife
Resorts World Manila
Accenture
Sykes
Teletech
JP Morgan Chase

Pre-register now so you won’t have to line up during the Job Fair registration: JobStreet’s JobGantic Career Fair

You can also start searching for jobs right now: Search Jobs

List of Filipino billionaires

2011-06-27T15:07:00.000-07:00

And now there are eleven.

From five (5) Pinoy billionaires in last year’s list of the 40 Richest People in the Philippines, the 2011 Forbes magazine’s list of Filipino billionaires now has a total of eleven (11).

The five billionaires from last year are still there: shopping mall magnate Henry Sy is still No 1.Lucio Tan of PAL, Fortune Tobacco and Eton Properties remains at No. 2 while John Gokongwei Jr. of JG Summit Holdings, Cebu Pacific and Robinsons Land is also unchanged at No. 3.

Last year’s 4th Filipino billionaire, Jaime Zobel de Ayala of the Ayala Group of Companies, is down two spots to No. 6.Andrew Tan of Alliance Global and Resorts World Manila, has claimed Ayala’s No. 4 spot.

The six new Filipino billionaires are:

#5 – David Consunji of real estate firm DMCI Homes
#7 – Enrique Razon Jr. of port operator International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI)
#8 – Eduardo Cojuangco Jr. of conglomerate San Miguel Corporation (SMC)
#9 – Roberto Ongpin, former Finance Minister of Ferdinand Marcos, recently acquired Atok-Big Wedge Company
#10 – George Ty of Metrobank
#11 – Tony Tan Caktiong of Jollibee Foods Corporation

List of 11 Filipino Billionaires – 2011

1. Henry Sy

2010 Rank: #1 (unchanged)
Networth: $7.2 billion
Age: 86
Marital Status: Married, 6 children

Started with small shoe store in Manila, which he built into one of country’s largest retail groups. SM Prime, the Philippines’ largest shopping mall developer, run by son Hans, plans to list its China operations. Shares in SM Investments, family’s largest asset, up nearly 40%. Banco de Oro Unibank, country’s largest bank, run by daughter Teresita Sy-Coson. Listed property developer Belle Corp., expected to open its first casino in Manila in 2012.

2. Lucio Tan

2010 Rank: #2 (unchanged)
Networth: $2.8 billion
Age: 77
Marital Status: Married, 6 children

His biggest asset, Hong Kong-based Eton Properties, is enjoying a big boost in property values. Has stake in PAL Holdings, which controls flagship carrier Philippine Airlines. Fortune Tobacco, the country’s largest tobacco company, is fighting Department of Health in court on an order to put graphic warnings on cigarette packs about health dangers of smoking.

3. John Gokongwei Jr.

2010 Rank: #3 (unchanged)
Networth: $2.4 billion
Age: 83
Marital Status: Married, 6 children

JG Summit, conglomerate he founded, has interests in airlines, telecoms, real estate, banking, hotels and power generation. Group’s budget carrier Cebu Air listed last October, raising $623 million. Brother James Go chairs JG Summit, son Lance is president.

4. Andrew Tan

2010 Rank: #5 (+1)
Networth: $2.0 billion
Age: 58
Marital Status: Married, 4 children

Son of factory worker, his holding company, Alliance Global, has interests in food and beverage, real estate, gaming. His new power-generation venture FDC Utilities plans to raise funds for renewable energy projects. Wife Katherine is treasurer and sits on board.

5. David Consunji

2010 Rank: #12 (+7)
Networth: $1.8 billion
Age: 90
Marital Status: Married, 8 children

Big jump for former concrete inspector who founded construction company in 1954 and later expanded into infrastructure, real estate, mining and power. He moved into top 5 as shares of his DMCI Holdings more than doubled in past year. Value of Semirara Mining nearly tripled. Son Isidro is DMCI Holdings’ president. Children share fortune.

6. Jaime Zobel de Ayala

2010 Rank: #4 (-2)
Networth: $1.7 billion
Age: 77
Marital Status: Married, 7 children

Chairman emeritus of Ayala Corp., country’s largest conglomerate by market capitalization. Interests include real estate, hotels, financial services, telecom, utilities. Plans to invest $1.8 billion in power generation, infrastructure. Stake held by his 7 children. Jaime II, eldest, is chairman; Ferdinando is vice chairman.

7. Enrique Razon Jr.

2010 Rank: #7 (unchanged)
Networth: $1.6 billion
Age: 51
Marital Status: Married, 2 children

Port operator who controls listed International Container Terminal Services is the Philippines’ youngest billionaire.

8. Eduardo Cojuangco Jr.

2010 Rank: #10 (+3)
Networth: $1.4 billion
Age: 76
Marital Status: Married, 4 children

Controls San Miguel, food and beverage conglomerate with interests in power. Last year sold option to group of investors to buy him out for undisclosed sum. Share price of company, which completed $370 million secondary offering in May, has nearly doubled since. Former Marcos crony; country’s Supreme Court recently ruled that his stake in San Miguel, which the Presidential Commission on Good Government had alleged he got because of his links with the former dictator, wasn’t ill-gotten.

9. Roberto Ongpin

2010 Rank: #21 (+12)
Networth: $1.3 billion
Age: 74
Marital Status: Married, 4 children

Former minister of trade who studied at Harvard Business School, has investments in property, mining, telecom. Top Frontier, investment firm he has holding in, has been buying up stakes in San Miguel. He also upped stake in mining firm Atok-Big Wedge, reaping big gain. Ongpin says his net worth is no more than $500 million, based on his debt and the share price of Atok-Big Wedge overstating the company’s value.

10. George Ty

2010 Rank: #9 (-1)
Networth: $1.1 billion
Age: 78
Marital Status: Married, 5 children

His Metrobank, country’s second-largest lender, posted record profits of $195 million in 2010. Self-starter founded bank in his 20s, stepped down as chairman in 2006 in favor of son Arthur. Group’s power unit began operating new coal-fired power plant in April. Real estate arm Federal Land plans to build $300 million hotel in Manila.

11. Tony Tan Caktiong

2010 Rank: #6 (-5)
Networth: $1.0 million
Age: 58
Marital Status: Married, 3 children

Founder of Jollibee Foods, country’s largest fast-food company, joins billionaire ranks for first time. Expanded Jollibee from single ice cream parlor to network of 7 fast-food brands, with 2,300 outlets worldwide. Plans to open 300 new stores this year. Building a new factory in China to supply to its outlets there. Bought Mang Inasal, a rival fast-food chain from Edgar Sia II (No. 40).

Source: Forbes

How Long Should You Keep Your Receipts?

2011-05-10T15:00:00.000-07:00

Determining the importance of the receipt will help you decide how long you should keep it. Certain receipts, such as those for grocery and clothing purchases might not be as important as receipts for bills and taxes.

Income-Tax Receipts
- Any receipt relating to your incomes taxes is especially important and should be kept at least three years, since the IRS can audit you for up to three years. Save all income-tax receipts associated with deductions and credits claimed on your tax return.
Bill Receipts
- Even after an account has been paid in full, it's a good idea to keep your bill receipts for at least a year. Bill receipts can include those for utilities, credit cards, rent and loans. Mortgage receipts should be kept forever.
Minor Purchase Receipts
- Some minor purchase receipts, like those for clothing and groceries, don't have to be kept for too long. For clothing purchases, receipts should be kept until after you wear the clothing, because you typically can't return clothing that has been worn. And after consuming the groceries, it's safe to throw out the receipt.
Major Purchase Receipts
- Major purchase receipts should be kept longer. Major purchases include items like televisions, large appliances, tires and furniture. Typically these come with warranties, so keep your receipt for the life of the warranty.
Policy
- Most businesses have policies in place on how long they'll accept receipts for refunds and exchanges. Some businesses only allow 15 to 30 days to get a refund or make an exchange with or without a receipt.

Read more: How Long Should One Keep Receipts

Wealth Is What You Save, Not What You Spend

2011-04-18T04:26:00.000-07:00

Want to be a millionaire? Don't overspend and use debt wisely.
We all may not be millionaires but there are plenty of financial and life-planning secrets we can learn from the well-heeled.
Most people know that wealth in the U.S. is in the hands of a small percentage of the total population. And, today, most of those folks with a net worth of $1 million or more have earned it themselves.
They're mostly entrepreneurs who create everything from high-speed networks to garbage haulers. They dig ditches and build houses and grow corn and make jewelry. They deal stamps or coins or artwork and control pests and cut lawns. They also cure people and give them new teeth. Others will defend their neighbors or even feed them.

And they're not big spenders. In fact, most of those with big bucks live well under their means -- think about Warren Buffett still living in that modest Omaha home -- and they put their money instead toward investments that help them stockpile more wealth.

"Wealth is what you accumulate, not what you spend," according to Thomas Stanley and William Danko, the authors of the seminal tome on America's wealthy "The Millionaire Next Door," first published in 1996.
"It is seldom luck or inheritance or advanced degrees or even intelligence that enables people to amass fortunes," the authors wrote. "Wealth is more often the result of a lifestyle of hard work, perseverance, planning, and, most of all, self discipline."
Wealth is defined in many ways, though it's generally determined as the value of everything you own minus debts. But there's a difference between marketable assets -- things you own that could be liquidated rather quickly, like stocks, bonds, real estate -- and possessions like cars, clothing and household items that you use regularly and aren't likely to sell.
Income alone does not make one rich. It helps, of course, to build wealth, but the financially independent look to their salaries as a means to an end, which is that pile of cash.

"The wealthy don't spend their wealth on discretionary purchases," said Pam Danziger, founder of Unity Marketing, a consumer market-research firm specializing in luxury goods and experiences. "They get rich by maximizing the value of their investments."

That doesn't mean they don't pay big bucks for pretty shoes or outfits, but that most choose those items carefully and shop for value and quality. "They truly evaluate the purchase as an investment, not an expense," Danziger said.
What they do though is diversify those investments, which gives them more flexibility to ride out difficult times. "The wealthiest clients have very, very diversified portfolios that go way beyond just stocks and bonds into hedge funds, currencies, commodities and emerging markets," said Leslie Lassiter, managing director of the JPMorgan Private Wealth Management.
"There are many, many mutual funds out there that will allow you to get exposure to those types of asset classes," Lassiter said.
Among the biggest differences between those flush with cash and those wishing they were is in how they pay for things. Millionaires tend to use cash for most of their purchases, including cars, homes and boats.
For the average wage earner, of course, that's not always an option but it still holds this lesson: Don't look to debt to fund your lifestyle.
Most wealthy people use debt for investment purposes and are careful not to over-leverage themselves. "A prudent use of debt is an appropriate thing for anyone," Lassiter said.
They also plan very well and spend a lot of time at it. Many are compulsive savers and investors who often say the journey to riches was far more fun than the reaching the goal.
And they're patient, willing to invest in the long term and wait it out. "They stick with their investments and are more likely to have a financial plan," said Sanjiv Mirchandani, president of National Financial, a subsidiary of Fidelity Investments.
Many take the long-term approach to investing because they're working at being financial independent. When they retire, for example, many will know exactly how much they need to live on, to give away and to leave as a legacy.
"The best ones really understand how much liquidity they need to cover their expenses and make sure they have that much cash on hand," Lassiter said. "That's something the average person should do as well."
At the same time, she said most are very careful about leveraging debt. "The wealthy tend to balance between the two," she said.
Recommendations for accumulating wealth:
Live below your means: People with high incomes who spend all that money are not rich; they're just stupid.

Plan: That means plan for today, tomorrow and 30 years after retirement. Take time doing it too and spend time monitoring it every day. Use budgets and stick to them.

Diversify: As Lassiter said, look for mutual funds that allow you exposure to asset classes that aren't related to each other.
Reduce use of credit and turn to cash: It's easier, of course, for a prosperous person to pay for a house in cash than it might be for most folks, but credit-card debt for luxury purchases or extravagant vacations will never pave a road to riches.
Have access to cash: While the rich keep much of their wealth invested, they can get cash when they need it. "Have some kind of line of credit available, like a HELOC (home-equity line of credit) that you never use," Lassiter said. "It's a safety valve." She suggests a year's worth of cash to cover expenses; Danziger thinks three years worth is a better bet.
Spread cash around: When the wealthy pulled money out of the equities markets two and three years ago, they opened a bevy of bank accounts, all guaranteed up to $250,000 of deposits by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
Bring your children into the mix, and remember the importance of estate planning: The affluent can go to great lengths to teach their children about money and how to manage it -- something every family should do. Though talking about money with children consistently ranks as one of the most dreaded conversations, it's important that your heirs know where all the bank accounts and safe-deposit boxes are -- even that their names are on them, too -- who the attorney is, where the will and trusts are filed.

This article is part of a series related to being Financially Fit

How to Make Money Blogging: 7 Strategies to Help you Get Started Immediately

2010-07-18T15:31:00.000-07:00

You can make money from blogging. It can pay for your bills. It does work for everyone. There’s no secret and you’ll just really need to know how to get started and which blogging framework to follow.

It’s not a difficult process at all and this post will provide 7 distinct methodsyou can use to generate substantial income from blogging. These seven methods are strategies you can adopt right from the beginning, preferably before you set up your first blog.

You can think of them as guidelines which point out the different options you have, if you’re serious about using blogging as a method of making money online.

1. The “Flagship” or Big Blog Route

This is simultaneously the most profitable and most time-consuming blog venture. The flagship method directs all your focus on a few blogs in order to make them incredibly popular in their niche. Flagship blogs should have a large audience as well as high daily visitor traffic numbers.

These type of big blogs have a wide variety of monetization options with direct advertising sales being a big part of it. Know that not everyone can successfully create a big blog so attempt this route only if you absolutely believe that you have the networking skills, niche knowledge and marketing know-how that’s needed.

Benefits: Fame as well as more monetization options/potential for your blogs, alongside personal satisfaction. Another advantage is that big blogs usually market or promote themselves automatically once a certain level of fame has been achieved.

Disadvantages: Very time-consuming especially if you are not outsourcing the content creation or marketing duties. Expect a lot of work and experiment with creative promotional ideas if you decide to go this route.

2. The “Pay per Post” or Get Paid to Blog Route

This is rather simple. Set up multiple niche blogs on either your own domains or free blog hosts like Blogger. Maintain them over a period of time and focus on writing content and building up their Google PageRank, link profile and Alexa Rank.

Submit all of your blogs to multiple get paid to blog websites like Blogitive, Blogsvertise,Review Me, Sponsored Reviews, PayperPost, LoudLaunch and then start writing sponsored posts. I highly recommending using PayperPost as they simply have the largest amount of paid offers available.

Benefits: The greatest strength of this method is that you don’t even need a large audience to make money. 20 people could be visiting and reading your blogs everyday and you’ll still be able to make at least $15 a day from each blog. If skillfully done over multiple blogs, this method can allow you to easily make over $1.5 K a month.

Disadvantages: No passive income. You’ll need to spend time writing multiple sponsored blog posts, which can be boring and time consuming. Work will also be needed to maintain your multiple blogs, although that will be minimal after they have been optimized and running for some time.

3. The Automated Blogging or Splog Route

Automated blogging involves the setting up of blogs which automatically pull content from RSS feeds, search engines and news sources to serve as content on your website.

Some bloggers set this to pull partial excerpts of RSS feeds, which does go against some copyrights and one can choose to only include excerpts with a link back to the site in question. Monetization for automated sites is usually done through contextual ads like Google Adsense or affiliate programs.

Benefits: Very little work needed to maintain these blogs as they do not need you to actively generate or write content. You might need to do a little SEO and regular maintenance now and then. Try if you are adventurous.

Disadvantage: A weak potential for profit unless you understand the entire process perfectly and if you have quite a large number of blogs.I estimate that a fully automated blog will make you around $5 a month although the actual value depends on the niche and your skills. Assuming that this is so, you’ll need 1,000 blogs to make around $5000 a month. Splogs dwell in ethically gray areas as well.

4. The Text Link Selling Blog Route

The main bulk of your income through this method comes from selling text links to various webmasters and businesses who want to improve their site ranking in Google. While text link selling works for the flagship or other blog models as well, sites can be primarily built for text link sales as well.

The overwhelming emphasis here is on Google PageRank and niche relevancy so you’ll need to focus on these two factors. You can either convert a domain into a text link and sponsored post selling blog or you can purchase a domain with existing PageRank to sell text links for a quick buck. I suggest looking for link buyers directly through webmaster forums.

Benefits: Selling text links or contextual text links is rather easy and doesn’t involve much work. Potential for profit will correspond to your Google Page Rank and niche. A site with a high PageRank and a profitable niche (mortgages, credit cards) will be very attractive to link buyers. Like paid review blogs, traffic is not a factor in these blogs as well.

Disadvantages: Over Reliance on the Google PageRank algorithm means that your income may rise or fall depending on your actual Page Rank. There may also be a limit to the number of links you can sell which leads to an income ceiling.

5. The Made-for-Adsense or Made-for-Affiliate-Program Route

This involves setting up a blog around a specific topic with moderately high priced keywords (e.g. teeth whitening, car loans). You’ll only need to create around 25 keyword rich articles on the topic, optimize it for search, set up Adsense or affiliate programs and then leave them alone.

The main emphasis is on building links to the specific webpages, according to the long tail keywords you want to target. Search engine visitors will then find your blog and either click on the ads or convert on a product.

Benefits: Not a lot of time involved as you can usually contract an experienced writer to develop the keyword rich articles. Not much time is needed to update the blogs as well and new material can be added on a bi-weekly or even monthly basis.

Disadvantages: There might be a lot of competition in a profitable niche and search traffic might not lead to sufficient income, unless you go for volume and set up dozens of similar websites in other niches as well.

6. The Blog Network or Contract Blogging Route

This involves joining a blog network and getting paid to maintain and create content for blogs. You’ll get paid according to the amount of pageviews, possibly receive a token base fee in the hundreds or a share of the blog’s ad revenue.

Benefits. Relatively stable monthly income because of the base fee. Contract work usually leads to more freelance blogging or writing assignments because of your proven ability or association with a specific organization.

Disadvantages: Why bother? If you’re that good at creating and promoting a blog, set up your own website and keep all the profits. However, it is useful to note that a lot depends on the type of network or contract agreement you receive.

7. The Blog-as-Marketing or Branding Route

This method will only apply if you own an online business or provide a freelance service like web design, copy writing or marketing consultation. A blog can be used to help promote your personal or business brand and attract more customers.

This is an indirect method of making money. Ideally, this sort of a blog shouldn’t be plastered with ads or paid reviews because it can tarnish the image of the brand.

Benefits. A blog can help your brand or business to develop much more search visibility because it allows you to easily create more fresh content that caters to specific demographics as well.

Disadvantages. Your blog will only be as useful as the quality of the service or product you are pushing. The amount of money you earn doesn’t entirely depend on the quality of the blog but the value of your service/product as well. Income is therefore indirect and can be inconsistent.

Conclusion

As you can see, there are several strategies you can choose if you’re interesting in making money from blogs. You can experiment with several of these methods in order to develop a better grasp of how blogs work or you can zero in on a strategy that appeals to you the most. Whatever path you choose, it is important to know that success will usually come when one is willing to invest time and effort in not only working as blogger but constantly learning how to better monetize or grow your blog.

Improving your skill-set and knowledge levels is especially essential if you’re planning to own blogs that make a steady income every month, and not just write for other blogs or use them as addons for your core business. As always, be sure to pick one that suits your personal schedule and interests. Good luck!

Blogging for Income – A Passive Income?

2010-07-18T15:24:00.000-07:00

The idea of passive income is obviously one that many people strive for – and it’s a term that I’ve heard used many times to describe online income streams – including blogging.

Unfortunately I wouldn’t use the term passive income to describe blogging for income.

While there are a few aspects which could be described as passive – the overall experience that I’ve had is anything but passive.

Where is Blogging for Income ‘Passive’?

Archives – Perhaps the main area of where blogging has an element of ‘passivity’ to it in how it can earn an income is when it comes to your archives.

I’ve been blogging now for close to 4 years and in that time would have published over 20,000 posts across my own blogs. While the writing of these posts is anything but passive (more on that later) the great thing about it is that even after those posts drop off the front page of a blog they continue to have earning potential.

In fact as I look at the most popular pages of my blogs (and the ones that earn the most) – the vast majority of my income comes from my archives – posts I’ve not thought twice about for months, if not years.

In that regard – that income has a passive element to it – old posts are like an investment that continues to earn an income into the future.

Set and Forget Income Streams - One of the great advances from the last few years in generating an online income has come from the improvement of advertising networks like AdSense which allow publishers to add a snippet of code to their blogs that will automatically run ads on the blog over time.

While you can (and should) definitely work on your ad optimization – many bloggers get to a point with their ads that they are able to largely set and forget them. The ads will earn an income and the cheques (or direct deposits) will appear each month. There is no searching for or negotiation with advertisers – the system handles it all for you. This takes a load off many publishers minds and allows them to concentrate on other activities of running a good blog.

Put the idea of Archives and set and forget income streams together and there is an element of passivity to blogging for income. Add to it that money made from blogging doesn’t depend upon you being ‘open for business’ to make money (ie I make more money during the hours that I’m asleep than when I’m awake due to my time zone) and I can understand why people might describe it as a passive income.

However in my mind – that’s where the passivity in blogging as an income generator ends (feel free to suggest more ways if you can).

Where is Blogging for Income ‘Active’?

While there are these elements of passivity in blogging for income – there is also a lot of hard work.

Running a successful and profitable blog (or blogs) takes a consistent amount of work over the long term. This work needs to happen throughout the life of a blog – from the early days when you’re trying to establish yourself in a niche – through to those times when your blog ‘matures’ and you’re hit with a whole load of new responsibilities and pressures.

Some of the many tasks bloggers need to engage in include:

Writing Content - 20,000 posts in 4 years = 13 posts a day (7 days a week). My posting frequency isn’t that high these days and I do have others working for me these days to help out – but there’s a lot of work in those archives and producing quality, useful, well thought out and stimulating content takes time.

Monitoring Conversations – As your archives build so too does the number of potential conversations happening on your blog. Many of these conversations happen with little need for your involvement (although good bloggers are active in the conversations on their own blogs) but as a blog gets older the need for moderation of spam comments can increase.

Engaging in your Niche – Conversations happen outside of your blog also and most successful bloggers have systems in place to monitor what is happening in their wider niches. This lets them know what is being said about them elsewhere but also helps raise their profile and become valued members of the wider community. Monitoring the niche via RSS and news alert services are half of this equation – engaging in the conversations on other’s blogs is the other half. It all takes time.

Design – Different bloggers will put a different emphasis on the design of their blogs – but over time it will be one of the areas that you either need to invest time of your own into or to pay for someone else to look after for you.

Managing Others – Many bloggers eventually move their blogs to a multi-author environment to help them spread the load of running their blogs. This striving for a little more passivity brings it’s own work. Recruiting, motivating, paying, inspiring and setting boundaries for those that you engage the services of takes time also – sometimes more than it is worth!

Negotiating Private Ad Deals – once a blog gets to a certain size it’s fairly normal to be approached by advertisers wanting to buy space on your blog. This might be anything from a text link through to a larger banner ad campaign. This can be a very time consuming proces.

Other Tasks
I could go on about the other tasks that bloggers engage in in a lot of details – but here’s a list of other tasks that many good bloggers get into:

Search Engine Optimization - many bloggers spend a lot of time on this
Ad Optimization – while it can eventually be passive – to really get the most out of it you need to track results and keep tweaking
Multiple Blogs – many successful bloggers expand into new niches
Researching Blog Tools/Platforms - the industry is constantly changing and there are so many potential things to add to a blog
Researching Ad Programs – there are an ever increasing number of ad networks being launched.
Email Correspondence – answering reader questions, fielding interviews, responding to partnership inquiries
Monitoring Metrics – keeping a track on what people are reading, where they come from, where they go, what they click on etc

Of course not all bloggers do all of these things – and some have their own routines and tasks that they would probably add to the list. But all in all I’ve found that while there are some bloggers who make good money from blogging that the majority of them do so as a result of a fair bit of work.

Can Blogging Become More Passive over Time?

Lastly – I’ve heard a number of newer bloggers hypothesizing that they’ll work hard in the short term of their blogging and then be able to slow down and live off the ongoing earnings from their archives.

It’s a nice image isn’t it – sort of going off to work hard in the ‘blog mines’ for big money for a few years and then retiring to the Bahamas to allow the investment you’ve made by building up your archives to keep earning you an income.

Unfortunately there’s a problem with the theory. Blogs that become inactive will usually have a decreasing income level over time. I’ve seen this happen to a number of blogs over the last year (including a few of my own).

For archives to earn an ongoing income they need to rank well in search engines. The problem is that one of the factors that Google (and other SE’s) use to work out how highly to rank a blog is how often they update. If your site is constantly changing and being updated they tend to rank you more highly. They also seem to look at freshness of content. The older a piece is the more competition it will have for it’s keywords and the more out of date it will be seen as.

So – what generally happens is that a few months after the ending of a blog search engine traffic will begin to slide. It may never completely disappear – but over time the income will diminish significantly.

The key to maintaining a good level of SE traffic is ongoing frequent posting – keep putting deposits in your archives over time and you should maintain (and even grow) your ranking. Stop posting and you’ll start to see a drop off.

The only way that the ‘blog mines’ analogy really works with regards to passive income is if you work hard to build up a blog and then sell it to invest what you earn in a truly passive income.

How To Make Money From Micro Stock Photography

2009-05-13T21:36:00.000-07:00

Your pictures are worth money. I have recently learned, that in the Internet age, and with the help of some stock photography agencies, getting this money is easier then ever.

In this Article we will share some of the tips he has learned, with the hope to help you realize your commercial potential. I doubt you will be millionaires from this trying this, but it can help you recover the "lost money" you spend on your hobby, and get some new gadgets.

Stock photography agents are companies that represent photographers and sell their photographs "right of use" graphic artists, news papers and advertising companies. One of the evolving domains in stock photography is called "micro stock". A micro stock agency, as the name implies, is a stock agency that deals with low (micro) price - about a dollar - photographs. Usually the micro stock agencies will restrict the uses allowed for a photograph. The interface is usually web based, allowing the photographer to quickly upload, and the customer, an easy selection and download mechanism. The micro stock agencies have a quantity favored policy.

Filtering and Choosing Photographs

When you are choosing your portfolio, consider the following point: does your photograph has a value as an illustration or as a concept or idea that a customer can benefit from? For example, a photograph of a businessman in a suit climbing a mountain will sell better that a macro shot of a mosquito on a pinhead. A lady holding a disk in one hand and a handful of dollar notes on the other hand, will sell better the a photograph of a hippopotamus chasing a koala bear. This has nothing to do with the quality of the photographs. The micro stock agencies and their customers are looking for clear ideas and concepts that their clients can use.

Preparing the Photograph

Before uploading your photographs to a micro stock agency site, you need to make sure you comply with the following guide lines:

The picture should be uploaded in JPEG format with minimal compression (some sites allow for RAW image upload as well)
Most sites require that you upload your photographs in their original resolution. Do not resize the image.
The guys who verify the images you have submitted are very sensitive to noise and granularity. Try looking at your photo in a 100% magnification to verify you do not "suffer" from noise. If in doubt use tools to remove the noise such as Noise Ninja or Neat Image
The photograph must not have any copyright material or trade marks. This includes bottle labels, T-shirts with logo, or any other product that has a trademark. Remove those logos using Photoshop.
For any picture that contains persons that can be identified, you must enclose a Model Release Form - this form shows the consent of your object to be photographed. If you photographed yourself, include a Model Release Form signed by you. Here are shutterstock’s model release forms, and here are dreamstime's model release forms, there are also some generic Model Release Forms on the web.

Choosing Keywords

If you will not index your photographs with good keywords, you will never get good exposure on the micro stock site. You are competing against some 1,000,000 (yes that is more than one million) pictures and about 25,000 photographs added weekly.

Getting Paid

Once you have accumulated a fixed amount of money you can get paid. Usually this amount is between 75$-100$. You can get a check or use paypal.

Recommended Sites

There are many micro stock sites, some better. Since most contracts are not exclusive, I recommend using several micro stock agencies in parallel. Here are some recommended sites

Fotolia

- Fotolia is a rising star in the field of stock photography. They
usually pay more then 50% of the commission to the photographer, and
allow you to set your own price. They are one of the fastest to approve
photographs. Another nice thing is the way you can get your money. They
will allow you to make a paypal cashout once you've hit the 2 dollar
mark.

123rf.com - 123rf is a relatively new agency which is doing well. They are still small, so if you are good standing out is easy. They pay 50% of each sale to the photographer - nice. Another nice feature is email notification once your images has been approved or rejected.

Bigstockphoto - Yet another great site for photographers. They pay 50c or 1$ per image downloaded. And they allow to get paid after only 30$ has accumulated. They will approve photos in about three days. They allow FTP upload.

A peek into recent AdWords developments

2008-07-21T18:49:00.000-07:00

If you're an avid Inside AdSense reader, you know that we frequently post about the latest developments in AdSense and new features you can take advantage of. However, we've heard from some publishers that they want to know more about what's happening in AdWords, and what we're doing to bring more relevant, targeted ads to AdSense sites like yours.

With that, we'd like to take a moment to give you insight into a few recent AdWords developments, and what they mean for you as an AdSense publisher. One of the main changes is the ability for advertisers to be more specific with their ad targeting through a combination of contextual targeting and placement targeting. As you may know, contextually targeted ads will appear on your pages if an advertiser's keywords match your content, while placement-targeted ads will appear if an advertiser has specifically selected your ad placement or site.

Now, advertisers can target your site or placements, but can also specify keywords for them so that their ads only appear in the most relevant pages. These ads will still need to compete with the available inventory of ads for a particular placement, and so only the highest-paying, most relevant ads will appear on your pages. At the same time, you'll still be able to use your Competitive Ad Filter to prevent ads from specific URLs from appearing.

What does this mean for you, as an AdSense publisher?

Your users may see more relevant ads on your pages, and advertisers who become more confident that their ads are reaching the right audience may increase their ad spend -- both of these can result in higher monetization for you. In addition, while advertisers previously could only change their bids for all ads running across multiple sites, they can now adjust their bids for individual sites. This means that advertisers can spend more of their budgets on the specific AdSense sites which perform well and generate high-quality leads for the advertiser.

With these recent improvements, we're looking forward to expanding the number of advertisers who use the AdSense content network and increasing the relevance of their ads on your sites.

Not only will this increase your earnings potential through the AdSense program, but it will also strengthen the ads ecosystem that benefits publishers, advertisers, and users.

Practical Tips for Creating AdSense Websites to Make Money Online

2008-07-10T18:40:00.000-07:00

Google Adsense is still one of the most reliable and efficient pay-per-click advertising programs for web publishers to make money on the web. This is because Google has continuously created new features for AdSense and changed the AdSense program policies to ensure the quality and effectiveness of the program.

The web publishers will be able to display content-targeted AdSense ads consistently on their websites and earn a steady income from the ads. The good thing about AdSense is that almost all the technical work is done by Google; the webmasters only need to plan and optimize carefully in order to make their sites compatible with the Google AdSense contextual ads.

Below are some of the tips for building a niche site to effectively make money with Google AdSense ads:

Focus on Publishing Quality Content
Plain content wouldn’t do any good for your niche Adsense site. You need to provide quality and unique content. The kind that your visitors are looking for.

The content will help your readers or entertain your readers and attract other site owners to link to you. The key factors to quality content are relevancy and value.

Setting up a niche website with some content only isn’t enough. Your site has to publish good and helpful content consistently. So, it is necessary to polish up your writing skill and do research on other articles to get good content ideas. This way you will be able to write and post useful content on an on going basis.

Structure Your Website Well
Besides quality content, the way your construct your website is also important. Both your website navigation menu and internal linking structure need to be designed properly. The site’s navigation menu or links should be easy to use so that your visitors can reach the content they want to read quickly and reliably. If your site have sub-topics, you should provide a list of links to all your sub-topics so that the visitors can easily find the information they want.

A well-structured AdSense website can ensure your visitors enjoy a good experience on the site and therefore they will want to stay longer on your site or bookmark it to come back next time.

Comply with Google Adsense Policies
Google keeps on making changes to their AdSense program policies in order to provide the best value to their advertisers. So, there is a need to re-read their program policies in every 1 or 2 months to make sure your site isn’t against any new rule. You may visit AdSense office blog to get the latest update on AdSense program development and policy change.

If you don't meet certain rules, your AdSense account may be suspended by Google and if that happens, all your hard work will be wasted.

Optimize Your Website for AdSense Ads
Seriously, if you don’t know how to effectively optimize your website, you wouldn’t earn much AdSense revenue even your site get massive amount of traffic. You will need to find the good locations of your website for placing AdSense ads. Placing your AdSense ads on the right locations will increase your AdSense Ads click-through rate (CTR) and improve your AdSense earning.

Google’s AdSense Help Center has explained a lot about AdSense optimization, ad placement and implementation. So, it is probably the best place for you to start learning how to maximize your AdSense earning.

Drive in Targeted Traffic
Quality content plus well website optimization and plus massive amount of targeted traffic will equal to AdSense success. Thus, you will need to drive as many targeted visitors as possible to your website in order to make the most out of AdSense. Your targeted visitors will read your quality content then part of them will click on your relevant AdSense ads and you will earn AdSense revenue.

Source

The Basics of Starting a Business on eBay

2008-07-10T18:12:00.000-07:00

Here is a good article that provides the basics for those who want to start up an eBay business.

...

This article outlines some of the tools that you will required if you want to make money online by selling products on eBay.

Computer and Internet
The most basic tools that you need are obviously a computer with a fast speed Internet access. You probably possess them already. But you should make sure that your computer and internet connection are reliable for your eBay business.

Business Phone and Fax Line
Selling on eBay means that you will have to communicate with your buyers and send some documents. It is therefore crucial that you have your own business phone line and fax machine set up.

Business Cards
Business cards are also important to your eBay business. If you include your business card with the shipments, you'll make your customers feel that you are a professional seller. It also means that your customers have got your contact information. Whenever they want to buy anything from you again, they know how to contact you.

Initial Capital
Starting an eBay business doesn’t require a lot of money. But, you do need to have some start-up fund ($300 - $400). You'll need to purchase some of the tools discussed in this article.

Website as a Marketing Tool
Building a website will help make your eBay business grow faster. By creating a website with your own domain name, you can market your products to more potential buyers. The topic and content of your website should be directly relevant to what you are selling on eBay. With links to your eBay auctions and eBay store included to your content pages, you will direct your website visitors to your auctions to view the products your are selling. This will mean more people will view your auctions. The more exposure your auctions get, the more sales will probably generate.

Digital Camera
You definitely require a digital camera for taking photos of your physical products. eBay buyers generally want to see how the product looks like before placing a bid. So, you should include at least two product pictures for each auction. Good and quality photos that show different angle of your products can trigger the viewers' buying interest.

With these tools prepared and ready, you will be able to start and run your eBay business smoothly; and ensure that you wouldn’t face any eBay selling problem due to lacking of one or two essential business tools.

Source

A Beginners Guide To Link Building

2008-07-08T20:53:00.000-07:00

Link building is an essential ingredient in ranking your website highly on the major search engines.

There, now that we've got that brilliant grasp of the obvious out of the way let's move on to what you can do to actually create them. Before we launch into the nitty-gritty of link building, no beginners guide would be complete without a brief explanation as to why links are important and the different elements of them. Being a beginners guide this won't be an entirely complete list but it will be enough to get you going on the right path. Understanding what you're trying to do will help you do it better and more importantly, understanding the “why” of the situation will help you stretch your tactics outside of this and other articles on link building.

Why Are Links Important?

To put it simply: a link is a vote. Every link pointing to your site from another website tells the search engines that the other site finds your resource valuable and thus, the engines read this as a vote for your site. So it must be about getting tons of links and you're done right? Wrong. This is incorrect as ...

Not All Votes Are Created Equal

Unlike your own vote in an election, some votes are worth more than others and some votes are worth SIGNIFICANTLY more than yours (unless of course you're a content writer for the Google.com domain in which case you obviously have the top vote). The basic factors that affect a link's value to your website are:

The site strength – the strength of the site that is pointing to yours is a significant (and historically abused) factor in the valuation of links. In the absence of other easily-visible criteria let's look at PageRank as a key valuation of a site's strength. If a site with a PageRank 8 links to your site, this vote is worth significantly more than a link from a PageRank 3 site. This is because a PageRank 8 site is, in Google's eyes, a more important site than the PageRank 3 site.

Relevance – the relevance of a site linking to you is, if anything, more important than a site's strength. If you run a bed a breakfast in Utah a link from a PageRank 3 bed and breakfast will be worth more than a link from a PageRank 5 web design site. This area is a bit grey in that it relies on the engine's ability to determine what is relevant and what is not however we've seen evidence that this area is strong at this stage in the game and is only becoming more important over time.

Anchor text – the actual text used to link to your site is extremely important. I've seen extremely strong sites get beaten out by weak ones simply due to the poor use of anchor test. If you're building links to your site be sure to include your keywords in the text that links back and, if possible, the exact phrase you are trying to rank for. At the same time, you can't make all your anchor text exactly the same – how can that possibly look natural?

Position – the position of a link on a page and the number of other links on that page impacts the value of a link. A link in the footer of a page is given less weight than a link near the top, a link in the content of a page is given more weight than a link in a list of links and a link on a page with 50 other links is given less weight than a link on a page with only a few other links. If we think about it – this makes sense. All of these things indicate whether the site with the outbound links actually intends for one of their visitors to click the link or not. From an engine's perspective – the more it appears that a site wants a link to be clicked on, the higher the weight that link (or vote) is given.

Admittedly there are a number of other factors but this is a beginners guide. Following the considerations above will insure that as you make each link decision – you're odds of making the right choices will be significantly higher than if you ignore them. Ignoring them may not get you penalized or banned but it will make your task far more time consuming as you secure less valuable links and thus need to build far more than following he right methods.

So far we've covered briefly the why of link building, now let's get into the real-life, here's-how-to-do-it side of things. Below I'm going to cover three of my favorite link building tactics. These are tactics that apply to virtually every scenario. The number of ways to build links is only limited by your imagination however and this should not be viewed as a comprehensive list. This is, after all, a beginners guide and I'm trying to list the tactics that apply to virtually every scenario.

Side Note: Reciprocal Link Building

I'm not going to count this as one of my favorite and so it won't count as one of the three noted above and I'll only touch on it briefly. There have been a number of assertions that reciprocal link building is dead. This is simply not the case. I have seen and competed against sites that were very successful with reciprocal links as their primary link source.

The problem with reciprocal links isn't so much in their value which does seem to be a bit lower than non-reciprocal links however often more easily attained. No, my problem with reciprocal links is in the management. Unethical webmasters' removing links after you've put the link up to them, sites expiring and not being renewed, sites getting penalties of their own due to their bad tactics are all inconveniences the reciprocal link manager must deal with.

As an SEO company, a huge issue we faced was leaving our clients with this task after a campaign was over if they decided not to go on a maintenance package. Non-reciprocal links may be a bit harder to attain in some cases however that issue is much easier to overcome than the sum of all these issues.

And now on to the top three ...

Articles

If you're paying attention as you read this you'll probably have guessed that I'm a fan of article writing as a link building method. If you look to the “about the author” section you'll notice a link to the Beanstalk site (and if you don't, well ... let me know as somebody's stealing it without permission). While I genuinely enjoy writing and sharing my experiences with others – the purpose of getting the article distributed is primarily as a link building tactic, secondarily as a great source of qualified traffic and thirdly for my own enjoyment.

You are an expert in your field. Who knows more about your business than you? So share. Writing an article may not be easy but it is rewarding. If you can't think of a topic, think of what you get asked. If you're asked common questions repeatedly then chances are, it's a good topic for an article. I often get asked about link building, and you're reading the result.

Once the article is completed you need to get it syndicated. Using an article submission service is a simple way to get your article out to a large number of publishers quickly. On top of this you'd do well to seek out specific sites in your field using one or all of the major search engines to find highly relevant sites that accept articles and submit to them.

And oh, don't forget an “about the author” section. :)

Directory Submissions

Directory submissions are likely the most painful of the link building tactics you'll employ. Why? Because it's tedious and time-consuming work.

To be done right directory submissions must be done manually, the titles and descriptions must be tailored to the specifications of the directory in question and often, you'll have to decide if a review fee is worth it.

While there are a good many directories that accept free submissions there are also a large number that's require a review fee. The fee can range from a few dollars to a few hundred. If you see that a directory has a low PageRank, is general in it's nature (i.e. it isn't about your specific field) then it likely isn't worth more than a couple dollars if that. If the site is strong, and strongly related to your site then it's obviously worth more.

There is no hard-and-fast set of rules for how much a listing is worth. I'd recommend to start your hunt for directories (don't forget the topic and/or region specific ones), submit to all the free ones and make a list of all the ones that require a fee. After you've gotten a solid number in you “needs to be paid list” you can get a general idea as to what's out there and what you can get and for how much. This will enable you to make solid choices knowing what all your options are.

Forum Posting

I just know I'm going to get a couple comments and/or emails for listing this as a link building tactic but if it's done right there's nothing wrong with it. Forum and blog posting got a bad reputation as a link building tactic when it came under huge abuse by unethical webmasters spamming forums with useless garbage just for a link. They even went so far (and still do) as sending out spiders to automatically submit posts. To this end, I have to agree that it's a bad tactic however ...

If you're seeking out forums related to your site, reading the threads and responding with solid advice or with questions and not just firing off some sales-pitch then you're doing what you're supposed to be. Another perk to this is that, like articles, if you do this right you're gong to see traffic as well and what more can you ask from a link building tactic than traffic as well as links.

Conclusion

Above we've covered the basics of link building. As I've noted repeatedly, once you're done reading this and applying some of what you've read you'd do well to read other articles, forums and blogs. This isn't a complete breakdown of everything link-related (that would be a full book) but it will keep you out of trouble and save you countless hours of wasted time getting poor links that haven't held value since 2003.

By Dave Davies

Report: 2011's Online Ad Market To Be Worth $106B

2008-07-08T20:43:00.000-07:00

By Doug Caverly
The worldwide Internet ad market will be an exciting place for the next few years, according to a new report from IDC. By the time 2011 rolls around, online advertising still won't have replaced traditional methods, but a whole lot more money will be involved than what we see today.

IDC believes around $65 billion is going to be spent this year. In three years' time, a little over $106 billion should change hands. John Gantz, IDC's chief research officer, observed in a statement, "Compared to more mature types of advertising, Internet advertising is growing at a phenomenal rate.

IDC Predicts Online Ad Growth
Come 2011, the U.S. will continue to hold the lead in online ad spending. Central and Eastern Europe are expected to achieve the biggest objective increases. And the most impressive catching-up in relation to traditional ads should take place in Western Europe.

Gantz then noted, "But Internet advertising is still relatively new and growing from a much smaller base. By the end of the forecast period, spending for Internet advertising will trail direct mail - the third largest form of advertising - by more than $30 billion, while spending on TV and print ads will each be nearly twice as great as for online ads."

So we're still not near a point at which every advertising dollar will go into online efforts. It doesn't look like the recession will put much of a damper on the industry, though.

Earning from Adsense and Youtube

2008-07-07T19:41:00.000-07:00

Finally, new sources of revenue from Youtube!

Here's what's posted on the adsense blog:

We'd like to let you know about two recent improvements to video units that make them more easy and appealing to place on your sites. First, we've partnered with some new content providers that we'd like to highlight. These partners have signed on to let AdSense publishers embed their videos and share in the ad revenue.

Broadbandtv: "Broadbandtv is partnering with YouTube to bring the very best video program lineup to a growing and engaged online audience. Broadbandtv shows include hits from Fashion, Celebrity News, Sports, Technology, Comedy and Travel to top notch Spanish-language TV series like Somos Tu y Yo."

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation: "CBC/Radio-Canada is Canada's national public broadcaster and one of its largest cultural institutions. CBC/Radio-Canada is available how, where, and when Canadians want it."

The Orchard: "A global leader in digital music, video, new media and brand services, The Orchard offers family content like Gumby, Mr. Bill, My Favorite Martian, and other categories of content like music and comedy."To give you a better idea of the videos that are available for syndication to your site, we've also created a gallery of some featured video units content partners. Note that to choose any of these content providers for your video unit, you should get their YouTube username by visiting their YouTube channel, and then put this username into the "Channel" field when choosing content for your unit.

.... You'll generate earnings for valid clicks or impressions on the ads which appear. To use the new formats, you'll need to create new video units by visiting your AdSense Setup tab. To choose the new content for your video units, you can edit any of your players or set up new video units dedicated to this new content. Please keep in mind that video units are currently only supported for English or Japanese-language accounts in the following regions:
Australia, Canada, France, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, Spain, United Kingdom, United StatesFinally, if you haven't edited or made a new video unit recently, you may not have noticed that you can now preview the kinds of video that will show up in the unit, based on the filtering choices you've made. We heard that you wanted more insight into the types of content that would display, and we think this will help.While you can use video units like any other ad, they're also a great addition to the content of your page. So we encourage you to use video units as you may have used embedded YouTube videos in the past - to add variety and interest for your users.

Read the entire article here:

Quick EBook Writing - 8 Steps to Advance in EBook Writing

2008-07-06T18:30:00.000-07:00

Writing and selling eBooks online are no easy tasks. But they can be very rewarding and downright profitable. That is why electronic book writers are multiplying by the minute. If you would like to get ahead of the pack, these 8 steps to advance in eBook writing are for you:

1. Be original. Don't just copy or rehash other writer's eBook. Come up with something that is truly yours. Put your unique ideas to writing and offer your readers with fresh ideas and information.

2. Strike a good balance between your content and your ads. Sure you can sell ad space on your eBook but don't overdo it. Ensure that your electronic book has more content than advertisements.

3. Make your eBook "meaty". Ensure that your readers will get quality content that they can use. Make your book as informative and useful as possible so it will worth every penny.

4. Proofread. Make sure that your eBook is coherent and it must flow well. In addition, to give your readers great reading experience, it must also free from any grammar, spelling, punctuation, and factual errors.

5. Make it visually appealing. Use great font, attractive color combination, and attention-grabbing images to make your eBook look more enticing.

6. Use the most effective writing format. Based on survey, online users prefer Question and Answer format as it effectively connects them to the content of the eBook. It is also proven a no nonsense way in delivering targeted responses in written form.

7. Make your eBook scannable. Aside from segmenting your content by using sub-topics, you can also use bullet or numbered list when presenting tips, techniques, and step by step guide.

8. Learn how to promote your eBook. To augment your sales potential, utilize all marketing techniques such as PPC advertising, article marketing, forum posting, affiliate marketing, and e-mail marketing.

Sean Mize is a full time internet marketer who has written over 1574 articles in print and 11 published ebooks.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sean_R_Mize

The end to Google Adsense Referals

2008-07-03T21:52:00.000-07:00

And now, the end is really here.

Back in January, Google announced that its Adsense Referrals program will be retired in all regions except North America, Latin America, and Japan. Two weeks later, it backtracked and offered the program again although with new conditions.

Today, Google posted and announced in its blog that the program will soon be terminated:

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 during the last week of August.

Publishers are advised to immediately remove the Adsense Referral codes from their sites because starting August, Referral ads will no longer be displayed.

Will you miss the Adsense Referrals program once it’s totally gone?

Make Money Through Stock Photography

2008-07-02T21:45:00.000-07:00

Are you one of those enthusiastic photographers who enjoy taking pictures for fun or for artistic ambitions but never considered making money with it through the internet? Well, think again!

Your favourite pastime activity could earn you to finance your next holiday, the renovation bills of your home, pay the mortage, get a new car, or just have a couple of extra thousand dollars in your bank account. How is it possible?

First of all, you don't need to be a professional photographer to receive a check for taking pictures. In fact, tens of thousands of 'amateur' photographers use very simple methods to financially benefit from their hobby. Neither will you need to possess expensive photography equipment.

Explore our site and find out about the different ways how you can make money with digital photography on the internet. Get inspired by our tips and start monetizing your hobby.

The easiest way to make money with digital photography as non-professional photographer is to submit your images to stock photo sites. Quite a of them are willing to accept pictures taken by hobby photographers, as well.

Of course, it doesn't automatically mean that your images will be featured in their photo bank. Usually there is a short process of approval but after that, whenever a customer buys your pictures from that stock photo site you are entitled to a high commission.

What is stock photography:

Stock photography is when existing photographs are licensed for specific use. Magazines, advertising agencies, publishers and webdesigners like to use stock photos because it saves both time and money as opposed to hiring a photographer for an assignment. Stock photos can usually be found in searchable databases of photo banks, photo archives or photo libraries. Most stock photo agencies have an online database on their websites where customers can directly download images in exchange of money.

What is microstock photography:

With the evolution of the internet a new model of stock photography agencies have entered the market. They are called microstock photography agencies. The rise of microstock photography started in the 2000s with iStockPhoto and later Shutterstock, who allowed amateur photographers to upload and sell images on these stock photo websites. Microstock images are sold almost exlusively through the internet and pictures are very low priced starting from $1.

Not Getting Enough Traffic Love from Google?

2008-07-02T04:34:00.000-07:00

Search engines are probably the single most effective way to generate traffic to your web page. Because of this, web owners will inevitably complete with each other in order to get a higher ranking. But how would then do this? Well, a lot of e-books, blogs, websites, podcasts, and other kinds of content are dedicated to this topic. But there will always be web masters who complain that they are not getting visitors from search engines. This can be due to different factors but some of the most common reasons I know of include:

New Website – when your site is new, you should expect that it will not perform that well with search engines. Take note that there are over 30 billion pages on the internet and a lot of these can be categorized as “spam”. Before search engines start to give your site a good ranking, they need to achieve a certain level of trust with you and this will grow over time as you build your content, traffic, and one way links.
Black Hat SEO Techniques – very few people want to be called a black hat marketer; or in layman’s term, a spammer. But no one can deny that being a black hat marketer does have its own appeal because of its immediate results. If you decide to take this route, you should realize that you can be hit by a penalty or in some cases, banned altogether.
Useless Content – even if you invest a lot in creating your website, it would not matter if you don’t have good content. Searchers are exactly that, they search for information that is relevant to their needs over the internet. In addition, good content will generate a lot of links which are “votes” for your website.
Duplicate Content – some people debate on the impact of using duplicate content on their websites. But as far as I’m concerned, search engines love fresh content and it will reward websites and blogs that frequently posts new and original articles.