To Blog or Not To Blog: While Making Money Online

By Matthew Bredel

One of the biggest crazes associated with making money online these days centers around blogs. Only in the last year or so has web-logging or “blogging” (a fancy way of referring to an internet diary which can be make public) really been a major way of communication on the world wide web. Its initial intensions were to provide internet users a place to share their feelings, opinions and ideas. Of course, everything in the world these days that starts out simple with good intensions becomes tarnished by the desire to make money. I hate to admit it, but I am not an exception to this rule, either.

I became an internet marketer about 7 months ago and like most affiliate marketers, my roots began through reading eBooks. Many of the recent “updates” to these money-making programs focuses on using blogs as a means of an inexpensive (free) place to create landing pages (pages which you link your potential customers to in order to promote your product).

There are three main ways to promote products:

1) Promote products by directly linking to the seller’s website. This is fairly competitive these days.

2) Create your own landing page by having your own website.

3) Create your own landing page by having a blog or using a free website.

I have tried direct promotion with little luck in the past. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is irrelevant and Pay-Per-Click (PPC) services (like Yahoo Overture and Google Adwords) is very competitive. This is because services like Adwords will only allow one sponsored URL per search. High niche keywords and unique keywords are required to even compete (and be seen) if you plan on having a modest advertising budget. A landing page is much more successful and easy to promote, in my opinion.

Do you create your own website or use a free website, like a blog? Let’s review the pros and cons of creating a blog (versus your own site).

Blog Benefits:

1) Cheap: They are free! Creating your own website requires you to pay for domain names and monthly hosting fees.

2) Little to no web design experience required. Excellent templates and designs already available. Creating your own website requires some technical expertise or additional fees in paying someone to do it for you.

3) Flexibility to create your own unique, content and ad-copy. Same with creating your own website, just broader.

4) Excellent for Search Engine Optimization. Blog sites such as Blogspot are linked with Google, which improves your probability of high, free search results.

Blog Cons:

1) Lack of flexibility of design. You are usually constrained to the templates and designs that are offered by the site.

2) Possible sponsored ads on your site that you do not get paid for. Blogspot allows you to add your own advertising, such as Adwords, but most require that they place their own ads.

3) Some free sites and blogs disallow your own domain name. This creates ugly, non-memorable website URL names. The free sites that allow unique domains names usually delay its activation by months.

4) Not professional looking. This may not be a bad thing, depending on the type of product you are promoting.

5) Lack of vistor track-ability. Being able to trace links, clicks and visitor statistics can be very critical to a successful campaign. Blog and free sites may not provide the accessibility to install tracking code.

The Verdict:

I have done both free blog and creating my own website in the past and I have found much more success with your own website versus a blog or free website. Being able to track my visitors can be extremely useful. I spent the time to learn web design and now, adding new content to my site can take LESS time now than with a blog. Price-wise, a domain and host can cost less than $10 per month. While I was able to make money through my blog, sales almost TRIPLED with my own site.

While I promote making your own website, there are definitely benefits to having a commercial blog. Specifically, the SEO of a blog can be rather powerful! Ideally, my best suggestion is to create your own website that sells your product while creating and maintaining a good-content blog that links two-way links to your site.

Matthew is a 31 year old online entrepreneur and engineer currently living in San Diego, CA.

Visit http://www.TheWebReviewer.com for more money making articles, resources and reviews on today’s hottest online money making ventures.

Copyright 2006

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

Fast Money Making Online: What Is The Fastest Way?

By Jack Silver

Newcomers to internet marketing inevitably have one burning question: "What is the fastest way to make money online?" In this article, I shall attempt to answer that question.

There are many different methods of making money online, but only a couple of methods are truly fast. Building websites designed for Adsense or affiliate revenue take time, but are more likely to guarantee a solid future passive income. Likewise, creating one's own product can be a lengthy process but, if marketed correctly, stands to make a small fortune in a small time once completed.

The fastest way to make money online for a newcomer was, is and probably will remain through the use of Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising. Using this method, the marketer signs up for a popular PPC service such as Google Adwords or Yahoo Overture and simply writes a small ad which is loaded with keywords. Every time the advert gets clicked by a search engine visitor, the marketer will have to pay an undetermined amount of money (although it is possible to set a daily spend limit).

The marketer should aim to create a landing page which promotes an affiliate product for a good commission. If the commission for the product is, say, $40, and your landing page can convert 2% of visitors to purchase the affiliate product, then you are looking at $80 per 100 visitors. Therefore, if you can pay under 80c per click, you have turned a profit.

It's far from an easy game, and requires intense focus, discipline, testing and tracking. But there is absolutely no doubt it is the fastest way to make money online in the clustered world of internet marketing.

Jack Silver is an internet marketer based in the U.K. Jack quit his office job in 2006 to go into internet marketing full-time, and firmly believes it was the most empowering decision he will ever make. Jack talks about how he went from office bod, to internet newbie, to self-employed marketer in his blog which can be located at http://www.moneyinpyjamas.wordpress.com

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

AdSense Money Maker through Blog Niche Marketing

By Michael Kralj

You too can build a money making site from home, that will earn you extra money for that vacation you want to take, for that car you need to purchase or those inflating credit card bills.

First step: you need to pick a Niche market. What is a Niche market you may ask? It is a topic that is more focused, and does not take the general aspect of a topic. You want to pick something that is out there, but is focused so you can get up there in search engines and build traffic to your site.

Want an example of a Blog with Niche Marketing?

Mesothelioma Info and Updates at http://mesotheliomainfoupdates.blogspot.com. This site taylors to Mesothelioma, a rare disease caused by Asbestos, and the site goes in depth about the Niche Market of "Peritoneal Mesothelioma". Asbestos would be more of a General Blog without Niche marketing, while drilling down to "Peritoneal Mesothelioma" is a niche market.

Another example of a blog that is not Niche Marketing is the Domain Names and Web Design Info blog at http://domainnamesatretail.blogspot.com. This blog is maintained in a general sense that it discusses topics from Web Design, Web Hosting and Domain Names to Money Making strategies. It is not focused to one single topic.

Once you have picked your Niche market, you have to find out if it pays well through advertising, and has actual advertisers willing to pay you to advertise the site!

The Overture bidding tool will tell you just that! Go to: http://uv.bidtool.overture.com/d/search/tools/bidtool/

Type in your niche market term, and it will tell you how much people on overture are willing to pay for each term. If it pays well, and is worth your while, then that will be your niche market you want to pursue.

Now you need to find the keywords you want to target and rank high for in Google. The suggestion tool located at will help you find just that: http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion/

Type in a keyword and it will show you what people search for and how many times per day. Pick a keyword that has a good daily search, but does not have too high of a number. This will allow you to have a fighting chance to cracking the top position for this search term. For example you may want something with about 100 searches per day.

Once you pick one, go to http://www.google.com, and search for that term and see how many results show up. If you have less than 1 million results, then that is ideal. Now take a look at the current #1 spot. See their page rank and how many links they have. If you think you can outrank them, then you are good to go. Target that keyword with your Niche market, and your site research is done.

Once you have the research complete, you set up a blog or web site.

To Set up a blog, go to one that I use Blogger at http://www.blogger.com. Set up your blog and begin posting in no time. This is a good and quick setup for getting your site started and getting searched by Google. However, your own site with its own domain name and hosting, tends to come up higher in search rankings. Also, having your own unique Blog Design as opposed to using a Blogger template, will help your site stand out from the rest. Emenki Web Solutions can provide you with such a custom template.

To set up your web site, purchase a domain name and web hosting. Download the Web Site Startup Handbook Ebook to learn more at http://www.domainsatretail.com/DomainsAtRetail.pdf. Then get free Blogging software and begin to run your site. Search on http://www.hotscripts.com to find Blogging software that you can use for Free.

Run your said Blog for about two weeks with at least 1-2 posts per day to develop enough content for search engines to consider placing you site in its rankings and for you to build traffic.

Once you have done this, set your site up for Google Adsense (http://adsense.google.com). Remember to follow the Google Adsense Terms of Service.

Once your site is approved for Google Adsense, place the AdSense code and begin to market your site through SEO software like Traffic Blazer and One way Link Building Strategies!

Read up on SEO techniques to get your site to the top! Once you are there, you will generate traffic and if you have enough click through on your ads, you will make money!

Thanks for coming out and learning how to become an AdSense money maker!

Purchase your Blog Domain Name and Web Hosting at Domains at Retail (http://www.domainsatretail.com).

Learn what else you may need to start up your Adsense Money Making Web Site in the Web Site Startup Handbook (http://www.domainsatretail.com/DomainsAtRetail.pdf)

Need a custom Blog Template for your Money Making Site? Contact the professionals at Emenki Web Solutions (http://www.emenki.com)

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