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Make Money With Your Blog

Someone asked on LinkedIn: “If I wanted to have a successful blog that potentially made money, what would I do?”

First thing’s first, after figuring out what it is you’re going to write about and designing the blog and hosting it somewhere (I would suggest purchasing a keyword-rich domain name rather than hosting it free on Blogger or some other blog site), the most valuable thing you can do is add buttons and links to your blog to allow users to subscribe to it in as many different ways as possible. Some people use services like Bloglines, some people use an RSS app, some people use Firefox live bookmarks, but not all of these people are savvy enough to know how to subscribe to a blog without a specific sub-to-this-blog link for their preferred RSS reader. A great resource to help you make these different links is Feedburner.com. Feedburner also allows you to design email signatures with animated headlines from your blog, and many other different ways to publicize and monetize your blog. Plus, it lets you watch the traffic and subscription trends for your blog’s feed.

Next, you want to research keywords to find a keyword that relates to your subject matter that people actually search for, so that if you find yourself in the top ten rankings on Google for said keyword, you will actually get traffic from it. An awesome tool to help you figure this out is Wordtracker GTrends which is here: http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com/gtrends/

Once you find your keyword or key phrase, you want to make sure your blog’s code is search engine friendly. You want to make sure your meta tags are within search engine guidelines, that your keyword density is appropriate for your subject matter, and that all of your titles have your keyword or key phrase in it. A good way to get a head start on this is to have your blog’s backend hosted by Blogger, while the blog itself is published on your own domain. I say this because Google owns blogger and as such, the new version of blogger features extremely Google-friendly code.

After this, you need to get some links pointing to your site from good, Google recognized sites that relate to your subject matter. The best way to do this is to search on Google for your keywords or key phrase and ask the top ten ranking web sites to link to your blog. You may have to be creative about this, using what we like to call link bait. This can be anything that entices another web site owner to link to your site. Because your site will be new and most top ten ranking sites know a thing or two about search engine optimization, you probably won’t be able to just get a link exchange – no one wants to link to a brand new blog for two reasons, one is that new bloggers have a tendency to lose interest after a while and you find yourself linking to a blog that never gets updated, and two is because the site has no Google PageRank. If you offer your potential linkers something else, you may have more success. For example, I once ran a campaign for a client that swapped links for a discount on my client’s products. Whatever it is you swap for a link is up to you, be creative.

You want to add your web site to blog directories and blog resources such as Technorati. If you haven’t spent literally a week straight doing this, you haven’t found nearly all of them. There are so many! Your best bet is to search Google for a list of blog directories.

Ask your friends or colleagues to Digg each of your blog posts using digg.com

Add links to the bottom of every post that will allow readers to add to delicious, post to facebook, myspace, stumble upon, etc. Use as much 2.0 power as you possibly can. Get a Twitter account and tweet as much as you can, follow as many users as you can. Make sure every profile you’ve ever made for yourself or your business on any site, has a link to your blog. Make sure your blog address is everywhere, when you comment on others’ blogs, when you talk in forums, etc.

You want to make sure you have an advertising policy available on your web site for potential advertisers to read, and as many different ways for them to contact you.

When all of this is set up and ready, it’s time to send out a Press Release. Make sure it is enticing and boldly underlines how this blog is different and why people will want to read it. Submit your press release to as many press release distributors as possible. Again, just search on Google and you’ll find a ton. Some cost money, some are free.

Now it’s time to post. Make sure your posts have personality. No one wants to read a dry technical blog. You want to make sure your own personality comes out in each and every post. Also, the more controversy, the better. A controversial post will entice readers to send the link to their friends and family in either horror or pride – both are equally as good! It will also encourage comments and repeat visits when something heated has been posted to the comments and the poster wants to come back to check the responses. It will also encourage repeat commenters and some will be compelled to subscribe to your blog. Make it controversial enough and you may even hit the mainstream news, such as Michelle Malkin did recently when she objected to the scarf Rachael Ray was wearing in a Dunkin’ Donuts ad.

Submit all of your article length posts to article databases utilizing the author’s bio as a spot for a link back to your blog. Hopefully people will syndicate these on their own sites keeping the bio in tact and thus, creating more links to your blog.

Some people use traffic exchanges such as BlogExplosion or Blog Soldiers and while it does actually increase your traffic, most of that traffic is useless. The only one I have ever found that actually results in real readers, is BlogExplosion.com. These sites are not entirely useless, however, as they do have directories that your blog is submitted to when you join. And there are no obligations after joining, so I would suggest doing so just to get into the directories as they are even more links to your blog.

Make sure you blog regularly, but not too much. Many people subscribe to RSS feeds as a much faster way to get their daily reading in. Blogs with a lot of daily headlines, generally get skimmed and sometimes just deleted when there’s no time. But blogs that only have a post a week, can tend to be forgotten about. My suggestion is to keep it to once daily, and at the very least, 3 or 4 times per week. If you are going to be unable to post for a period of time, vacation or something, post and let your readers know so that they don’t think it’s just another blog gone stale.

In the meantime, add Google Adsense to your blog, perhaps Amazon a-store and any high-quality affiliate programs that can relate to your blog’s subject matter.

If you keep all of this up, you will have advertising revenue. The key though, is patience. Keep at it and don’t get discouraged. Publicizing any web site can take months upon months before you see results. But once you do, it’s highly worth it. You may even want to design and sell your own merchandise for further revenue.

Seo Writter asked:


There are lots of different blog platforms out there. Some platforms are free and some are not of course, you need to pay for it.

The different blog platforms that I know are blogger.com, wordpress.org, wordpress.com, Movable type, LiveJournal, Bloglines, tripod, squareplace, and typepad.

As what I said, some of those platforms are free like blogger.com, wordpress.org and bloglines. Typepad and squareplace are some of the platform that need some money. It is up for the blogger which platforms are they going to use.

Most of the bloggers will choose to have their own domain rather than having your blog on a free hosted site. But, for those who don’t have that much budget they rather used the free platforms.

There are some factors that you need to consider when it comes in choosing the right blog platform for you. Through this factors you can answer lots of question that is in your mind.

First is, your Goals. As a blogger you need to know what is your main purpose. Do you see yourself blogging for a long period of time? Do you want to earn money through blogging or you just want to have fun writing different stuff? Those are some questions that you need to think about. Next is the Budget. Do you have enough budget to start a blog on your own domain or you will stick to those platforms that are free?. Finally, how technologically knowledgable are you when it comes to blogging? Do you have any backgrounds when it comes to blogging and designing a blog? I suggest choose the platforms where you are comfortable enough of using it. You need to have some knowledge when it comes to coding either HTML or CSS.

Blogger.com and WordPress.org are the two of the most popular blog platforms. Blogger.com has its different function that are easy to use while WordPress comes with the search function that are already installed. Just like blogger, wordpress also has thousands of template where a blogger can choose from.

There are lots to choose from just make sure you choose the right blog platforms that fits your needs and capabilities.

Those are some of the factors that a blogger should know before starting his/her blog. Enjoy blogging!

Daniel Trainor asked:


There are several things you can do to strengthen your internet marketing business and link building is certainly one of them. Although it can be a difficult method for search engine optimization, it can also be one of the most valuable pieces to your success. When done correctly, you will receive more traffic to your site than you know what to do with.

Link building consists of getting other sites to place your web site link on their site. In return, you usually have to place their link on your site. Sometimes you can find one way links, which are by far the best for you. This consists of a site putting your link on their site without you having to do so in return. Typically this is done because you have done a good deed for them in some manner.

The key to link building is finding quality internet marketing businesses to exchange links with. To benefit from link trades you typically will want to exchange with sites that have a Google page rank equal to or greater than your site.

Trading links with other sites, however, is not the only method to link building. If you have the money to spend, buying links can be beneficial to your business because you can purchase according to quality. Obviously it will cost you more for better quality links, but you will know exactly what you are getting. You just have to determine if it is worth it to you to spend money when there are so many free methods available.

Another option is through article writing. You may not have realized it yet, but writing articles is a great way to build links and get backlinks pointing to your site. By writing an article with a resource box included, you will have your web site link within the resource box. This gives people an opportunity to easily be directed to your site if they like your article. After writing an article, submit it to as many article directories as you can and watch the traffic flow in.

Lastly, writing testimonials can be a way of getting your name and link out on the web as well. By writing testimonials for your web hosting company, article writer, program coordinator, or anybody else that has helped you, you are benefiting them as well as yourself. This is a great way to potentially get linked with a large web site.

Link building is a vital piece to having success with your internet marketing business. It can drastically increase your traffic volume in a short period of time. The more methods you use, the better opportunity you have of people seeing your link on the web.

Barney Garcia asked:


Well now you know what makes a good link, so let’s go over the methods available for getting links to your site that you have been instructed to promote. There are many, and each comes with its own positive and negative attributes. Generally speaking, the more links you get to the sites you are promoting, and the higher the quality of the links, the more benefit to you.

[] Homepage/Subpage Links: A link featured on a website: The best way of getting this type of link is email submission. It is extremely hard to get a website to give you a link without getting something in return….such as money or a reciprocal or three-way link. mentioned above.

[] Articles: This option is only available to Advanced linkbuilders. It is basically writing a “fresh” chunk of content on a topic that relates to the site you are trying to promote. The article is between 250-500 words long and is submitted to 1 or more article syndicated websites

[] Link Directories: This type of link is obtained by searching for a relevant “link directory” browsing the topics and submitting the link of the site you are promoting for approval. This typically takes 3 days to 3 months to actually get the link accepted and displayed. It is also one of the easiest types of link building. You don’t get any points if your submission is rejected, so power of numbers is the way to make sure you make money. The point system is outlined below.

[] Forums: Find a forum related to the topic of the website you are promoting. Sign up and edit your signature in your profile. Edit it to any of the sites you wish to promote. (You can put up to 4 links in your signature) Now you go back to the forum and post a question or answer some one else’s question. When you post your signature will create a link. You can also place a link directly in your context.

[] Misc:

-MSN Myspace -Newsgroups -Others

[] Blogs:

[] Guestbooks:

–

Things to remember: Not every site will give you a link, often sites are a waste of time, it will take some time and experience to become efficient, but it is important to remember that the power of numbers is on your side.

Lets set up an example:

You are given a list of 10 websites to promote: You are given a list of everything you need except page urls. You should now go visit each of the websites you were instructed to promote and gather 20 deep-page urls and start a list for yourself. Beside each url you should come up with around 5 anchor texts or titles to use. This shouldn’t take you more than a hour. Now you have a list of 200 pages you need to link to, and enough anchor texts to link to each page 5 times. So basically you have 10 000 links. This is more than enough to get you started. You now break up each group of urls into sites and than further group them into general categories. So for instance you had a hair removal site, a acne site, a air purifier site and a cancer site, you could group those into a Health Category. Once you have all of this laid out you can start. Use the keywords given for each site to search all three search engines to find either forums, link directories and blogs. By putting the word “directory” or “blog” or “forum” beside the keyword when you search it will help you find the right type of sites. Start now by manually browsing through each site, one by one, and quickly decide if you can submit a link for free, if you can comment for free or if you can sign up and post for free. Check to see if the sites have any features that might result in a negative point by linking on them. Check to see if it is even possible to have a link on the site…as Some sites wont accept free submission, they might not allow comments, or they might not allow links in your forum posts. Every site you determine to be a potential – copy the url down into a text and move on. This is call the initial reviewing process. You want to review a few hundred sites at least…and Before you stop you want at least 50 potential sites you can add a link to for each main “category” that you grouped your sites into earlier. This will probably take a few days. especially if you follow the figures correctly. So after probably 25 hours of work you should have 10 000 links ready to be “builded to” and around 250-500 “potential” sites. You will be provided with a rough draft list of potential websites to build on.

Now start submitting your links to appropriate categories, start signing up on forums, and keeping track of every place you submitted to, what you submitted to it, and any other helpful info. Keep track of the type of forums and topics they discuss. Keep track of high page rank sites, or sites that accept free link submissions very fast. basically organize yourself so that you are most efficient. By time you have visited and submitted a link and posted some posts on all 250-500 “potential” sites you found…you Should have at least 75 backlinks…if Not 250…depending On how well you did your initial review. Whats even better….you Have a list of 75 or 250 sites that accepted your link submission or allowed you to place a link on there site or in your comments.

Adrian Adams asked:


With any online business, generating traffic to view the products or services you have to offer is essential. Since the World Wide Web is a huge arena, you can bet there is plenty of competition out there. It doesn’t matter how great of an item you have to offer if people don’t find out about it. To get your business the recognition it deserves, it is vital that you understand the various techniques for building links to your site.

If you want to rank well on the search engines, you have to have quality backlinks from other websites. Without quality backlinks to your site, you will not be able to rank well on the search engines. The good news is that there are lots of ways to build links to your site. Some of the ways to building these links are going to cost you money, but some of the most successful ways really won’t cost you anything more than your time.

One of first places you want to start is with submitting your website to the various web directories. There are 100′s of web directories that will give you a free listing for your website. The most important thing to do when submitting your site to web directories is to read the instructions. If you don’t follow the instructions, your listing will likely be denied.

There are also many places on the internet where you can submit articles for free. The articles can be informational in nature but they can’t be a direct advertisement for your business. However, at the bottom of the articles you can add a section that provides information about yourself and a link to your website if they want more information. Article marketing is one of the best ways to get quality one way links to your site.

When it comes to building links to your site, there are a couple of areas you want to pay special attention to.

Be careful with link exchanges. Link exchanging is the process of you placing someone else’s link on your web pages in exchange for them doing the same for you. Be careful of what sites you link to – you don’t want your site to be linking to a bunch of low quality or unethical sites.

Be especially wary of automated link exchange programs. These systems may save you time, but they are frowned upon by the search engines and may cause you problems. Google, Yahoo, and MSN may penalize your site for using automated link exchange programs (often called link farms), or they may even ban your site.

If you decide to engage in link exchanges, be very selective about who you do it with and how many you have. Make sure the ads you do place there aren’t a direct competition to what you have to offer. They should be for a product or service that is related to what you have to offer though. Try to do link exchanges with sites that will link to you from a semi-prominent page on their site.

When building links, be sure that you include your site’s keywords in the anchor text of the link. For example, if your site’s main keywords are buy widgets and blue widgets, you might use the anchor text buy blue widgets.

Don’t get caught up in the process of placing numerous ads for other sites on your own web pages. Not only is it distracting to the customers who visit your site, but it can cost you business. When a visitor clicks a link to somewhere else there is a very high risk that they won’t be returning to yours.

Building links is time consuming, but with hard work and some ingenuity, you can gain good search engine rankings.

Adrian Adams asked:


With any online business, generating traffic to view the products or services you have to offer is essential. Since the World Wide Web is a huge arena, you can bet there is plenty of competition out there. It doesn’t matter how great of an item you have to offer if people don’t find out about it. To get your business the recognition it deserves, it is vital that you understand the various techniques for building links to your site.

If you want to rank well on the search engines, you have to have quality backlinks from other websites. Without quality backlinks to your site, you will not be able to rank well on the search engines. The good news is that there are lots of ways to build links to your site. Some of the ways to building these links are going to cost you money, but some of the most successful ways really won’t cost you anything more than your time.

One of first places you want to start is with submitting your website to the various web directories. There are 100′s of web directories that will give you a free listing for your website. The most important thing to do when submitting your site to web directories is to read the instructions. If you don’t follow the instructions, your listing will likely be denied.

There are also many places on the internet where you can submit articles for free. The articles can be informational in nature but they can’t be a direct advertisement for your business. However, at the bottom of the articles you can add a section that provides information about yourself and a link to your website if they want more information. Article marketing is one of the best ways to get quality one way links to your site.