NetBusinessBlogWork from Home, Business Opportunities, Websites for Sale - Run an Online Business

When I first tried to make money online, I wondered how online business would compare to offline business. I felt that because the online business people wouldn’t be working face to face with each other, there might be a drop off in quality service and treatment. However, I have been pleasantly surprised.

Online business people seem more or as generous as their offline business counterparts. I just worked two months as a blogger for an SEO tools site. The owner of the blog recently sold his site. Then, he gave me a bonus worth two months salary. He didn’t have to do that but I’m glad he did. :) Adie, the owner of this blog, also gave me a bonus a couple days ago.

What positive experiences have you had in online business? How do your online business experiences compare with your offline ones?

Popularity: 3% [?]

Popularity: 3% [?]

It’s sad when bloggers have to resort to deception to make themselves look better.

Check out the code of this guy’s feed count.

<a href=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/InternetMarketingSucks”>
<img src=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~fc/NetBusinessBlog?bg=0066FF&fg=
FFFFFF&anim=0″ height=”26″ width=”88″ style=”border:0″ alt=”" /></a></li>

Even if you don’t know HTML, you can see that “NetBusinessBlog” shouldn’t be there.

I looked at his website. He’s got some good information. But why copy a feed count to look better? Anyone can look at his Alexa ranking (238,000) and subscriber count (1,600) and see that something is fishy.

Blogging is about authenticity and reputation. Don’t wreck your reputation with lame shortcuts.

Thanks to Matt for notifying us of this.

Want to learn how he stole our feed count? Check out this post, How I Got 283k Feed Subscribers in 1 Day.

Popularity: 6% [?]

Popularity: 6% [?]

It’s been 6 months since you started your site. You look at your analytics program and your search engine traffic has plateaued in the last 2 months. You can’t seem to grow your search engine traffic anymore.

You’ve submitted to all the quality directories you can think of. You’ve exchanged links with relevant sites. You’ve written articles for article directories. Link building has become tedious even boring. It seems like no one wants to link to you.

What’s your next move? What can you do to get more search engine traffic?

Rand Fishkin wrote an article that has been very helpful for me. He says the secret to getting more search engine traffic is to produce content that appeals to the link-savvy audience in your niche. He called this audience the Linkerati.

The Tale Of Two Audiences

To have long-term SEO success, you need to write for two audiences. Many online business people understand the importance of writing for your prospective customer audience. This audience makes up most of your visitors. However, the bulk of this audience doesn’t give out links. Most of the customer base don’t have websites and blogs where they can link to your site.

Herein lies the problem. SEO is 90% about building quality links. And who controls the links? The Linkerati. They are a much smaller group compared to the customer base, but they control most of the links. Check out this graphic I found on SEO Moz.

If you don’t write for the Linkerati, your link building efforts will be much harder. You’ll be building links one by one. You’ll have to break your budget with paid links. Instead, you should target the Linkerati by producing content they would like and then marketing it to them.

By writing with them in mind, you’ll have a steady stream of inbound links. The Linkerati will become repeat visitors because they like your content. And they will link to you as long as you continue producing content that appeals to them.

What kind of content does the Linkerati like?

Visit their sites and see what they’re linking to. Then, produce similar content and promote it to them.

Source: The Secret to Ranking at the Search Engines (that’s really no secret at all)

Popularity: 9% [?]

Popularity: 9% [?]

Last month, I wrote about writing more in less time. I blogged about a writing principle from copywriter, Andrew Cavanagh. Basically, Andrew’s principle is to separate the writing process from the editing process. If you write and edit at the same time, you’ll get bogged down and experience writer’s block.

The Affluent Blogger linked to my blog post and added 5 super practical tips. Here are some of those tips.

1. Write keywords down as soon as you think of the idea.

If you’re watching TV or reading when you think of a topic you want to use, grab the nearest scrap of paper and jot down all of the crucial phrases, ideas and your opinions on them right away.

…a few choice words scratched on a Post-it Note can expand into an entire essay…

3. Don’t edit. Don’t stop. Don’t even look at the screen.

When I read what I have written, it slows me down and forces me to stop and edit. Close your eyes if you can write in a straight line or type without looking at the keys. Prop up a book or a clipboard to block your screen.

Read the whole post: 5 Tips for Writing Through Blogger’s Block

Popularity: 4% [?]

Popularity: 4% [?]

Guess who got a new blog theme yesterday?

Unique Blog Designs (UBD) landed Shoemoney as a new client. Shoemoney found out about UBD through John Chow. And Shoemoney has even more RSS subscribers than John Chow.

• Shoemoney: 10,000 subscribers
• John Chow: 8,000 subscribers

With these two clients, do you think UBD will have trouble getting more clients in the near future?

Target Popular Blogs

Go after blogs because bloggers are more likely to link out than non-blogging webmasters. Target popular blogs, because, well, they’re popular. You’ll get much traffic and link juice. Here are 2 practical ways to get your site linked to on a popular blog.

1. Paid Reviews

This is lazy webmaster route. The problem is most lazy webmasters don’t have the money to pay for reviews. But if you do have the money and have a quality site, paid reviews are an easy way to get presold, targeted traffic to your site.

2. Give Something Away

When UBD first approached John Chow about creating a new theme, John asked them to do a preliminary rough. If he liked UBD’s rough, then he would have them create his new theme.

What can you do for free to convince a popular blogger to help you?

A couple months ago, Aaron Wall gave John Chow a free copy of his $79 SEO ebook to review. Last month, Rob Benwell gave Yaro Starak a free copy of his $47 blogging ebook to review.

If you’re web developer, create a useful plugin and give it away to popular bloggers.

If you’re a good writer or blogger, offer to guest blog. Juuso wrote an informative article on Digital Point forums. Then, he emailed John Chow and asked if he would be interested in having a unique version of the article on his blog. John Chow said yes. Here is Juuso’s guest blog post with over 70 comments.

Just a couple of things about guest posts. They’re gold. You get to show off your writing skills which improves your branding, mindshare, and reputation. Also, you get traffic and a quality link with your anchor text. And one more thing, they’re free. Look out for these marketing opportunities.

Conclusion

So, do what you need to do to get on a popular blog. It will often take more work, but the rewards will be worth it.

What other ways can you think of to get mentioned on a popular blog?

Popularity: 5% [?]

Popularity: 5% [?]

Yesterday I wrote about how good packaging and formatting raises the value of your site. Today I planned on going through specific ways you can better package your site. However, as I was writing, I realized there was a lot of information to cover. Therefore, I’m breaking the information down into a couple of blog posts. Today we’ll talk about site design.

Don’t Underestimate Design

In the past, I underestimated the importance of site design. I started sites and used free designs. However, as I learned more about branding, link building, and monetization, I realized design plays a big part in any commercially-oriented site. Here are two things to think about in site design.

1. Unique

You may not have the budget to buy a unique design. However, if you’re serious about making it big in the online business arena, you should start saving money to buy a unique design. It greatly affects your branding. If your site looks like other sites, it’s hard to stand out. Many people will perceive that you have an average site rather than a remarkable one.

A good design is a one-time expense that leads to good branding. And good branding leads to long-term profits. Just ask Nike about their swoosh logo.

Recommendations

By the way, if you have a blog, I recommend Unique Blog Designs. They have good looking designs and very cheap prices compared to other reputable designers.

If you want to modify an existing free theme, I recommend Connor Wilson. He modified his Wordpress theme based on the famous Cutline theme. As you can see below, his theme looks nothing like Cutline. He doesn’t have his prices posted, but you can email him for a quote.

2. Maximized for Monetization

Your design should help you make money. Some people advise that you shouldn’t monetize your blog until you have X amount of daily visitors. I think it’s better to monetize from the very beginning. If you monetize in the beginning, your visitors will know what they’re getting into.

Most new sites won’t be able to get direct advertising. So, if you have a new site, use affiliate links and/or AdSense as placeholders until you’re able to attract direct advertisers.

I like what John Chow says about monetization:

…don’t be scare to push the envelope when it comes to blog monetization. The key is to monetize as much as possible while still preserving the user experience. Your traffic will tell you when you reach the tipping point.

Another point about monetization. Go with wider designs. Unless you have reason to believe a big chunk of your audience uses 800 x 600 resolution, you should design for the much more common 1024 x 768 resolution. The wider design gives you more monetization opportunities above the fold. Big players like New York Magazine, CNN, and Forbes are already using 1000px fixed width layouts (source: innoshare).

More to Come

I know there’s a lot more to talk about in blog design. I’ll cover more of those things later when I talk about site architecture, usability, and navigation. These three areas are directly related to blog design. Until then, feel free to subscribe so you won’t miss any of the future posts about improve the packaging your site.

Popularity: 7% [?]

Popularity: 7% [?]

Which cereal do you think makes more money?

If the cereals were websites, Cheerios would probably get more links, traffic, and revenue. Toasted Oats looks old with its bland coloring, out-of-date font, and boring design while Cheerios looks more up-to-date with its bright colors and unique design.

Increase Your Site’s Value Through Better Packaging

Aaron Wall has an interesting blog post where he talks about using formatting and packaging to increase the quality and value of your content (read the last couple of paragraphs of the post).

Unique packaging helps sites differentiate themselves. This can lead to links and repeat visitors. However, copycat packaging (read: John Chow’s old theme) is boring. And being boring doesn’t get you a lot of links or repeat visitors.

Smart packaging can directly increase your profits. For example, many webmasters have earned more profits with the same traffic volume by simply optimizing their AdSense ads. Also, remember John Chow’s new blog design? He used that design to get more advertisers and move more ads and affiliate offers above the fold.

Site design is a good place to start if you want to improve your packaging. An improved design is a one-time expense unlike content, which should be updated consistently to improve branding and increase mindshare.

Feedback and More Info Tomorrow

As an online publisher, what else can you do improve your content through packaging and formatting? How can you format your content so that internet users will want to come back to your site?

Tomorrow we’ll talk more specifically about ways to improve your site through good packaging and formatting. We’ll talk about specific tips including site design, usability, and content formatting.

Popularity: 4% [?]

Popularity: 4% [?]