NetBusinessBlog

October Recap – Paid Content, Google PageRank, and More

Posted on 31. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

It’s that time again. At the end of each month, I pick some of my favorite posts. Here are some highlights from October.

Paid Content

The free content model has its limitations. Here are two posts where I talk about the viability of paid content even for bloggers.

• If You Want to Make Money with Content, Charge For It.
• 5 Reasons to Sell Some of Your Content

Google PageRank

The Google PageRank (PR) finally updated. Our blog went down from PR5 to PR3, but we don’t care. Find out why by reading these two articles.

• Promote Your Site As Though Google Didn?t Exist
• Stop Crying?I really don?t give a S#$! about PageRank!

Miscellaneous

The Secret Blogging Weapon
The weapon is you.

Good Online Business is Art
Don’t forget the creative side of business. It will help you get noticed from the crowd of sites in your niche.

Underrated but Effective: Forum Marketing
Here are a couple tips for marketing effectively on forums.

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Pay Per Click (PPC) Is Not Just For Affiliate Marketing

Posted on 30. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

I haven?t written much about pay per click (PPC) in my four months of blogging here at Net Business Blog. In fact, this is the only post I’ve written on the subject. Also, I don?t have a lot of experience with pay per click. But over the last couple days, I’ve been thinking of adding it to my arsenal of traffic methods.

One of the things I’ve realized is that PPC is not just for affiliate marketing. If you’ve read many internet marketing ebooks or blogs, you probably connect PPC closely to affiliate marketing. You’ve read stuff telling you to set up an AdWords campaign, create landing pages, and wait for cash to hit your bank account. While both PPC and affiliate marketing do work well together, PPC can also work well for other purposes.

Here are three ways to use PPC more creatively but still effectively.

1. Use PPC as a link building tool.

I got this idea from this excellent link building article, 101 Link Building Tips to Market Your Website. The 9th tip suggested using PPC as a link building tool. Basically, create a PPC campaign with relevant keywords (don’t forget keyword research!) so you can get relevant traffic. As traffic from PPC comes to your site, your brand exposure will increase. If you have great content, you’ll often get links from the PPC visitors.

2. Use PPC to test and increase your non-sales conversion rates.

If you have a call to action on a page, it may be worth it to send PPC traffic to that page. This will allow you to quickly test the conversion rate for that page. Let’s look at some examples.

• If you have a mailing list, set up a landing page to collect email addresses and use PPC to drive traffic.
• If you have a blog and want more RSS subscriptions, write a really good article. At the end of the article, ask the readers to subscribe. Again, use PPC to drive traffic.
• Another call to action might be the passing on of viral content. You can send PPC traffic to viral content like a funny video. At the end of the page, include a form where visitors can easily email the video to their friends.

3. Use PPC to get valuable consumer feedback.

PPC is a great way to obtain feedback for your business. Tim Ferriss, the author of the popular book 4-Hour Workweek, said before he published his book, he had to choose from multiple book titles. Instead, of going with his gut, he ran a PPC campaign. He sent the traffic to a landing page with the multiple titles and asked the visitors to vote for their favorite title. “4-Hour Workweek” was the most popular title.

You can test pretty much anything with PPC. Choosing between multiple site designs? Send PPC traffic to a landing page where people can vote for their favorite design. Not sure what your prospective customers want? Use PPC to drive traffic to a landing page where visitors can answer questions about their wants and needs.

Sometimes people won?t vote or answer questions. That’s where you need to have an incentive. In exchange for their time and feedback, give them something free – a short report, a link (if you’re targeting webmasters), video, or audio file. Also, you can get their email address and promise to send them your upcoming product for free once you finish producing it.

One last thing about pay per click and the testing process. If you do it right, you can get a lot of visitors in a short amount of time. This makes the testing process much faster because you get a good amount of information quickly.

Feedback

Have you used pay per click? If you have, how did you use it?

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The Secret to Getting Motivated

Posted on 28. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

Whenever I talk to people trying to reach certain goals, this excuse often seems to come up: “I can’t reach my goals because I don’t have the motivation. Some days I’m motivated and I get a lot done. But other days I feel lazy and I get nothing done.” Can you relate to this? I certainly can.

How can you stay motivated in reaching your goals especially in online business – where there seems to be many things to do and not enough time to do them?

I think the secret to getting motivated is doing the hard work of getting started. I’ve found if I wait for motivation to strike me like lightning I won’t get much done. However, if I just get moving and doing something to move me forward to reaching my goals, I’ll begin to get motivated.

Sometimes when I’m feeling lazy, I make myself do something productive. Afterwards, I feel better about myself. I don’t feel lazy anymore. Not only that, but I feel productive because of what I just accomplished. This oftentimes leads to more productive work.

Have you noticed this? Let’s say you’re a blogger and your goal is to post something today. You have a vague idea of the post you want to write, but you’re feeling lazy and don’t really want to do it. It’s just one of those days. You’re not motivated. What should you do?

You should force yourself to sit down in front of the computer and start typing. Yes, it won’t feel too good for the first couple of minutes. But as you type, you’ll gain some motivation to type more. In fact, the more words you write, the more you’ll be motivated to finish your post. Pretty soon, you’ll finish your post. You’ll feel productive. You’ll feel good about yourself. And you’ll probably have the motivation to write another post.

You’re in the zone. You’re in that creative workflow where you’re actually getting things done and being productive instead of just being lazy and distracted.

Action leads to motivation. And motivation leads to more action. Momentum = motivation. So, the most important thing is to get started.

Just do it.

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Stop Crying…I really don’t give a S#$! about PageRank!

Posted on 28. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

Ok, so we are all writing about the BIG G giving PR drops. WHO CARES! well I don’t and I’ll explain why.

Granted this is a very selfish reason, but I do not make money by using my PageRank to show my overall standings for traffic because it’s about a useful as Alexa! and we all know how accurate Alexa is…right?

Since about 2003 I have never looked a PageRank as a way to work out how much traffic a potential website has. Google should have dumped it years ago..the only thing I feel PageRank has done is enable the likes of Text Links Ads and Text Links Brokers to build a business model from it by ways of infalting the price of a link based upon PR.

Google (you’ve got it wrong) we can still buy and sell Text Link Ads and Google will still give your SERPs a boost based on your keyword buying. I prefer this, as you can purchase on the evalution of actual (real) site traffic and not some stupid toolbar which is highly inaccurate.

I think PR will only matter to the average (naive) internet user wanting to know what PR you have before you sell them a banner advert or sell them your site. I have a PR3 site that gets more traffic than this blog and this blog has quality content and dedicated readers!?

I have a simple step for you to do today go and Unistall Google’s silly little toolbar…

Our Text Links Ads are Only $75 shown in the right side bar (Get Yours Now!) – Text Link Ads / Advertise

Our Poll results proves what I just said!

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5 Reasons to Sell Some of Your Content

Posted on 26. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

I want to start a new income stream. I’m choosing between a paid content site and PPC affiliate marketing. I’ve been thinking a lot about the paid content business model. It seems like a good idea. Now I don’t plan on charging for all my content. I would still produce quality free content to draw readers in and build my brand. But here are a couple reasons why I think you should sell some of your content.

Make more money. You’re reading this blog because you want to make more money. It’s called Net Business Blog not Net Hobby Blog. And if you’re building a business, you need to sell something. Some of you are saying, “I sell advertising.” That’s fine and you should continue selling ads. But if you sell some of your content, you’ll make more money.

Raise your perceived value. Perception is reality. If you’re selling a quality product, you automatically look more credible. You look like an expert. You look like you know what you’re talking about. You look like an online business rather than a hobby site. And people are more likely to buy from an online business rather than a hobby site. Why? Because they’re used to buying from businesses and getting free content from hobby sites.

Marketers have done tests where they raise the price of a product and the sales increase. Think about that. Some people will not give you money unless you raise the price! So if you only have free content, you are leaving a lot of money on the table ;) Now you may not like what I’m saying, but it’s probably because you’ve been hanging out with people who only want free stuff. The general public that surfs the web has credit cards and likes to use them.

Also, you’ll get more quality traffic. Wouldn’t you rather visit a site where the webmaster has published a book, ebook, or DVD over a webmaster who only has a free blog?

The big players are doing it. SEO Book sells an ebook. SEOMoz sells premium membership content. SEO Black Hat sells private forum access. Seth Godin sells small conferences and physical books (check out his sidebar). These are popular blogs that sell some of their content. Some of you may be saying, “But I have a news site. You can’t sell news.” I point you to ESPN. ESPN is sports news site in the top 100 of Alexa. It gets a ton of traffic. Yet ESPN sells content.

I think the paid content model is the future. More people will get on the web. The web will become a bigger part of their lives. More people will build websites. The web will become “noiser” as these websites get built. As these things happen, internet users will want to pay for content just like they pay for hardcopy magazines. Don’t get left out. Be an early adopter. Right now, there is a small group of webmasters you don’t know about who have paid membership sites. You don’t know about them because they have relatively low traffic. However, they make great money because they extract a lot more profit from each visitor than free content webmasters.

More profit per visitor. The less number of visitors, the less headache and work. You don’t have to keep trying to get massive amounts of traffic. You just need the right kind of traffic even if your traffic volume is relatively low. There’s a lot of talk about being more efficient in business. I can’t think of anything that increases efficiency as much as increasing your earnings per visitor.

Finally, people don’t like to be sold but they like to shop. If you create quality content that meets a need and you market it well, you can sell it and make money. It’s that simple. It’s how good business has been done for years.

Is it harder to execute the paid content model over the free content model? Yes. But mostly because of the paradigm shift many of us have to make. We’ve been web users and the web has been 99% free. But you don’t have to follow the crowd.

Yes, it takes more effort to separate your content into free content and paid content, but think of the monetary rewards. You can spend a little bit of effort creating a paid content section for your site. This effort will lead to much higher profits than if you only have free content. Also, stick to one site and you won’t get overwhelmed.

What do you think of the paid content model?

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Selling PageRank is not a Good Business Model

Posted on 25. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

Why not?

Well, check out these PageRank (PR) drops I found on Andy Beard’s blog.

http://www.autoblog.com/ PR6 PR4
http://www.engadget.com/ PR7 PR5
http://www.problogger.net/ PR6 PR4
http://www.copyblogger.com/ PR6 PR4
http://www.joystiq.com/ PR6 PR4
http://www.tuaw.com/ PR6 PR4

http://www.searchengineguide.com PR7 PR4
http://www.searchenginejournal.com PR7 PR4
http://www.johnchow.com PR6 PR4
http://www.quickonlinetips.com/ PR6 PR3
http://weblogtoolscollection.com/ PR6 PR4
http://andybeard.eu PR5 PR3
Vlad PR4 PR2

These are quality sites with good content. So, why did they lose up to 3 PR points? I don’t know. There is a lot of speculation but one thing is sure, you can’t depend on Google. They can randomly wreck your PR.

So, stop focusing on PR. It’s not in your control. Instead, focus on getting more money from each visitor by selling some of your content and also learn to promote your site without relying on Google.

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Excellent Basic Guide to Pay Per Click Marketing

Posted on 25. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

Zac Johnson recently published a simple but quality guide to pay per click (PPC) marketing. He recommends NeverBlueAds to find affiliate offers and Google AdWords for PPC advertising. He gives step by step instructions including pictures.

Search Network Vs. Content Network

The reason I like this guide is because Zac’s PPC background is in using the content network of Google AdWords rather than the search network. What is the difference between these two networks? On the search network, the AdWords ads show up on the Google search engine results pages (SERPs). On the content network, the ads show up on sites that have signed up to put AdWords ads on their pages.

The search network has a better conversion rate. However, you have to set up landing pages and deal with quality scores in the search network. Landing pages are web pages you create that link to the offer and quality scores are scores based on the quality of your landing page. If you have a high score, you will pay less per click. If you have a low score, you cost per click will be expensive. Basically, in the search network, you can’t send your PPC traffic directly to the offer.

In the content network, you can send the traffic directly to the offer. This makes it easier to set up a content network PPC campaign. The content network does have a lower conversion rate but you can find high paying affiliate offers to compensate.

Check Out Zac’s Comments

Make sure to also read the comments on Zac’s post. He answers relevant questions and gives more tips. For example, here is a question by one of his commenters and Zac’s response.

Mike C: Wow there is so much information here. Am I curious to know if there is a minimum amount of click throughs that you can pretty much count on. Would you say you can convert at least 1% of the click throughs?

Zac Johnson: On the content network, if you can pull 1% CTR? you are super lucky and good! Setup multiple offers, don?t just focus on one too long.

So, as you can see, you don’t need a high click through conversion rate to succeed with Zac’s PPC method. You just need a lot of profitable campaigns (even if the profit margins are small), so go for the high paying offers and setup many different campaigns.

If you want to try out PPC but don’t want to deal with quality scores and landing pages, check out Zac’s guide.

Found via: Internet Marketing Sucks!

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Being the First to Do Something is a Huge Advantage

Posted on 23. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

Aaron Wall is one of the most popular SEO bloggers. His Alexa rank is under 2,000. He writes:

If you think about the success of this site, much of it is due to being one of the first bloggers covering SEO stuff. Start a blog about SEO today and it would be much harder to gain traction. I also was one of the first SEOs to make publicly available extensions for modifying search results and aggregating data via widgets.

Too many people are starting sites in markets that are very saturated. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that. But realize that you are making it more difficult for yourself to make money.

Yes, being passionate about your niche is important. However, if you’re passionate about multiple niches, pick the one that’s less saturated and competitive. Also, you can develop a passion for less saturated niches. This takes getting out of your comfort zone and having a teachable attitude.

So, find a niche that’s small but growing and be one of the first to cover it.

Or be one of the first to do something that provides great value for your niche. For example, many niches don’t have a top 100 blogs list. Create one for your niche and you’ll get links, traffic, and excellent branding.

How will you create a first-mover advantage for your site?

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For All You Non-Techies: $10/Year For a Wordpress Hosted Blog

Posted on 22. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

One of the things that keeps people from being as effective and efficient as they could be in blogging is a lack of technical skills. Some of you may be like me. I don’t have much technical and programming skills. It took me awhile to learn tasks like installing Wordpress or modifying themes.

It would’ve been great to see a service like this back when I was starting to build Wordpress blogs a couple months ago.

TechBurgh has teamed up with Tubu Internet Solutions to create a new hosting service where you can get hosting for a Wordpress blog on your own domain for $10 a year. This is a great price for someone looking to start blogging without dealing with the technical hassles.

Even if you have a blog already, you might have a friend that wants to start blogging but doesn’t want to use free blog hosting (like blogger.com and wordpress.com).

TechBurgh’s hosting service is a great way for that friend to start blogging. They can use their own domain name. They can monetize their blog any way they want. They can use any Wordpress theme. They don’t have to learn how to install Wordpress. Also, the people at TechBurgh and Tubu Internet Solutions can help them learn how to use Wordpress.

What will your get for $10 a year? You’ll get a 200mb disk space and 10 gigabytes of bandwidth. This is more than enough for new bloggers.

For more information about this offer, click here.

Found via: Chris Brogan

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Have Fun Getting This Permanent PR5 Link

Posted on 21. Oct, 2007 by Dave.

Link building doesn’t have to be boring. Here’s a PR5 link that can be fun to obtain.

1. Go to Shoemoney’s store and buy a shirt.
2. Take a picture of the shirt. The more interesting the picture, the better. For example, you could wear the shirt and take a picture in an interesting location.
3. Send the picture to Shoemoney along with the URL of your site.
4. Shoemoney will publish your picture and link to you on this PR5 page.

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