Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Ten Tips to Get High Traffic to Your Blogs

If you look at the professional blogs, you will notice that most of them thrived in their first months merely due to high quality content. Ordinarily, this high quality content draws high amount of organic traffic to these blogs, and will pave way to several quality backlinks. The effect of these backlinks is twofold: organic search engine traffic, and indirect referral traffic.

Most of the traffic building methods used by high traffic blogs are still secretive. The amount of traffic through normal methods, such as directory submissions, writing quality posts, social media submissions, etc., may not be substantial. And due to high competition in the Web, it may take several years to build a really high traffic blog.

Here, we will see some tricks you can use to get high traffic to your blogs within a few days.

1. Post a Related News Story

The effect of news stories on blogs can be very powerful. Particularly on blogs, which have a Google PageRank of 4 or above, any post written gets indexed within a few hours. News stories, getting indexed early on search engines can detonate traffic overnight, since quite a lot of folks search for them. By publishing one such news story, you can take your traffic to a handful hundred visits up.

You can even include news stories outside of the generalized topic of your blog. The drawback of these visitors is that they may not be interested in the additional posts on the blog. Therefore, they may not revisit.

2. Commenting on Professional Blogs With a Strict Comment Policy

There are scores of highly popular blogs on the Internet, including TechCrunch, LifeHacker, ReadWriteWeb, etc. These blogs get more than one or two million pageviews each month. Among these blogs, ReadWriteWeb has a specialty. Its comment policy is stricter and hence, it doesn’t get too many comments to its posts. If you post a highly valuable comment there, it will be extremely conspicuous. Links placed on conspicuous comments will be clicked countless times.

3. High Traffic Forums

High traffic forums like Digital Point Forums have at least a thousand visitors online at any time. If you manage to post any interesting entries on these forums, it will be highly commendable in terms of organic SEO as well as traffic. Any new thread in Digital Point gets great attention, and several people can visit your blog, if your thread becomes popular.

4. Yahoo! Answers

Yahoo Answers can fetch you a great amount of traffic. The questions and answers posted in the site are indexed by search engines and showed on search result pages. You can include any number of relevant links to your site on your answers. Usually every query and its answers can get several hundreds of natural visits daily through search.

Anyone visiting the Answers page is most likely to click on your link, if your answer clears the problem well and the link is highly relevant. It has also additional perks like RSS subscriptions to your blog, more friends and votes through Yahoo Answers, etc.

5. Facebook Marketplace

Facebook is the largest social network in the world with over 90 million active users.

Have you ever posted a link to the Facebook Marketplace and seen its effect? For this, you have to find the most appropriate marketplace to list your link.

For instance, imagine your company sells the most affordable health insurance services in say, New York, but your website is rather new and has less reach than your competitors. If you post a link to the New York network’s marketplace, several New Yorkers will see it and visit your site. And it can give you a horde of brand new customers.

6. Social Media Submissions

Social media submission is another great way to attract traffic to your blog and get backlinks. If your posts are very useful, they can go up to the front page of social media sites like Digg, and give you loads of traffic. However, the main reason that you submit is natural SEO. The blog should slowly build many incoming backlinks to get organic search traffic.

Submitting all your articles to social media sites will get you a great number of incoming links. Also, these submissions are ranked high in search results. Hence, they can provide some indirect traffic to your blog too.

7. Press Release Submissions

Press releases are also highly useful in building backlinks to the blog, just as social media submissions. Several press release sites out there allow you to submit your press release and have a backlink from it.

The press releases you submit to certain sites like PRLog.org, are ranked very high in organic search results. These submissions, hence, can give great indirect traffic.

8. EntreCard Advertising

These days, EntreCard advertising is very popular among bloggers. However, many bloggers don’t tap its full power. They pile up a few credits and advertise on low traffic blogs. These ads won’t bring any benefit to the blogger.

The way to really manipulate EntreCard to get high traffic to your site is advertising on popular, professional blogs. Usually these blogs take thousands of credits to advertise for a day. You should build credits by selling ads and dropping EntreCards for a few days, and then with all those credits, advertise on a professional blog that gets tens of thousands of visits daily. This way, you can instantly get hundreds of visits to your blog.

When selecting the blog to advertise on, check out the daily pageviews of the blog, its Alexa traffic rank, number of RSS subscribers, the time for which the site has been active, etc.

9. Craiglist Classifieds

Craiglist is the most visited classifieds advertisement site. Millions of people from around the world visit Craiglist on a daily basis. Placing a classified advertisement here is effortless. An ad can give you hundreds of highly targeted audience to your blog. Place images and attractive description on your ads and you can maximize the effect.

10. Mass Emailing

Don’t you frequently receive forwarded emails from your friends, with some cool photographs, videos, text, etc? Most of us just pass on these mails to our friends thus participating in the thread. Next time, when you get such a forwarded email, without just forwarding it to your friends, add some of your relevant links or photographs to it, and then forward it. These emails have a viral persona. Several people, on receiving them, forward them to their friends. This way, you can reach many people you don’t really know, and your link will travel with the email.

Conclusion

These tips can build exceptional amount of traffic to your blog within days. However, only the content and usefulness of the blog will make the visitors come back for more. So, give importance in building quality content.

Great Ideas for Making Passive Income

Passive income is the only real way to get ahead in the earning game. After all, if you are being paid by the hour, you have a very specific limit as to how much money you can earn. If you build a product instead that will bring in money on its own, without you lifting a finger, you have passive income and the possibilities are endless.

So, how do you go about making passive income? It isn’t as passive as it sounds! In fact, setting everything up takes a lot of work, so don’t think it’s a free ticket to dollar paradise! But once you have what you need in place, your passive income kicks in and you are able to move on to your next project. If you set up enough passive income models, you can actually become quite rich . . . provided they work, of course!

There are several ways to create a passive income online. One of the most popular ways is to become an affiliate. You can go to Clickbank or Commission Junction or simply find a product that you like that offers an affiliate program and then promote a product or products. Every time someone you send to the site buys a product, you earn a percentage of the sale. Now, the trick is to set up a method or two or three of promoting the affiliate product and letting it run on its own.
One way to do this is to write free articles and include a link to your website (affiliate links aren’t usually allowed in free articles) in the bio box. Post these up on free article directories such as EzineArticles and GoArticles and you will shortly have plenty of people looking at them. Hopefully, some of them will click through to your site where you will have a presell page that further directs them to the product website. Once you have a bunch of articles out there, your site should be generating a profit all on its own and you are free to move on to the next project.

Another method of generating passive income is through creating your own products that you can sell over and over again. Information products are ideal for this because once they are created; you really don’t need to do anything more except promote them. There are no costs incurred for printing or shipping, they are instantly downloaded by your clients. Ebooks, article packs and short informative reports are perfect for this, as is custom built software.

Once you write your report, ebook or create your software, all you need is a website where you can have the item for sale and download and a method of promotion. While free articles are fine, you will probably want to go a step further and set up a more advanced promotion. This could be through Google AdWords, or you might consider setting up your own affiliate program through Clickbank or PayDotCom. This allows you to have a team of vendors selling your product for you. Just give them a generous percentage (up to 75%) in return for selling your product and you will have plenty of takers. It’s worth giving away a large chunk of money earned because you have no more work to do, just sit back and let the money come rolling in!

To double up on the two methods mentioned above, why not promote your affiliates in your information product? This allows you to earn twice, once from your info product and again when the readers sign up or buy your affiliate products! The more passive income you can generate, the better!

How Creative Problem Solving Can Save You Money

Creativity is vital for frugal living. No, you don't need to be a poet or a sculptor to save money, but you do need to look at life a little differently from how most people do. One of the ways creativity comes into play when saving money is in problem solving. Trying to discover the least expensive way to solve a problem or meet a need is a great exercise in creativity.

Even if you don't have much innate creativity, you can cultivate it. Read articles and books about how to be more creative - you will find most of the advice (such as writing down ideas immediately and exposing yourself to activities and hobbies you don't normally enjoy) will help you become better at solving everyday problems frugally. Also look for tips from other savers, which are readily available online and in books you can get from the library. You don't need to think too hard to find frugal solutions to everyday problems when others have already found and shared solutions that work.

Whenever you see a product you like with a new or unusual feature; one way to save money and to hone your creative thinking skills is to ask yourself, "How can I accomplish the same goal?" Most of the time, new products that offer "great new features" simply adapt the product to be used in ways resourceful people have been using similar products for years. Aluminum foil bags? Make them by folding regular foil into a bag shape. As an added bonus, you only need to buy one foil product. Select-a-size paper towels? Simply tear off a smaller part of a regular paper towel if you don't need the entire thing. You get the idea.

Last year, a television advertisement offered a line of disposable products to help parents keep their cars clean. The mom in the ads looked so organized, and wow - wasn't that amazing how she grabbed the wipe from the specially designed container on the back of the driver's seat, cleaned off that sticky child, and threw the wipe in a trash bag that she could then easily carry inside to throw away with the rest of her trash?

So how can you accomplish the same goal? Well, even if all moms had those specialized products, few could be as organized as that television mom, who didn't really have to get her children bundled up and strapped into the car seats, only to unstrap them a few miles away and then carry one child on her hip while holding another's hand and tucking the trash bag containing the disposable wipe under her arm, where it bumps against the diaper bag over her shoulder. But, realities of parenthood aside, most of us could have readily available cleaning products in their car. Consider stashing a container of wipes in the elastic mesh on the back of the driver's seat and keep plastic grocery bags in the car to dispose of trash. The advertised products looked ingenious, but you could accomplish the same thing for significantly less money. In fact, the wipes designed to fit onto the back of the driver's seat could have some unadvertised problems, too: Can you imagine a toddler's laughter as she pulls them out one by one while her mother is driving?

Most products advertised as more convenient or clever than the competition are more expensive, as well. The extra features are rarely worth the higher prices, especially when those features can easily be copied with a little creativity. That cool product may be the greatest thing since sliced bread, but don't forget that you can inexpensively reproduce sliced bread, too - all you need is an unsliced loaf of bread and a knife.

Anyone has the potential to be creative because at the end of the day, creativity is a state of mind and a way of being, that has the ability to look at life afresh from moment to moment.

Brian Schwartz encourages individuals to think outside the box and sharpen their creative skills, so they can live a more fulfilling and meaningful life. Whether you are running a business, if you're an artist or stay at home mom; you can become more successful with what ever you do with creative flair and finesse. Visit Brian's website at http://www.FlipMyText.com and exercise your mind.

© 2008 FlipMyText - All Rights Reserved

Survival Tips For an Economic Depression

Banks are reeling under subprime losses. Real estate seems so unreal. The U.S. Government is finally seeing red in their economic predictions. What options do individuals, investors & regular employees have in this economy? What should small businesses do to prepare for the recession? Certainly none of us can afford to take things lightly.

It is not the end. Dark clouds of recession are certainly hovering around the financial horizon. The economic indicators point towards a downtrend in business, which means problems for real estate investors, businesses & job seekers. Gas prices have hit an all time high. It is certainly time to prepare for a rainy day.

Recession means the axe will fall on the employees first. What they are going to witness is an exodus of sorts. Keeping our job intact will itself be a full time job. The best advice during recession is to find ways to make yourself indispensable. You should take on some more work load which ultimately would mean savings for the company. Your job would pay for itself & would make sound financial sense. It is another matter that anybody else's job would become redundant. But that's least of your problems. Your company's financial situation would dictate whether you keep your job or not. It is possible to keep your job safe from recession.

Survival tips for employees

Every employee should start behaving like owner of the company. Your job depends on it. Where can you cut costs? What innovations can be implemented? How to sell? All these questions need to be addressed by you. This won't only mean survival of your company but yours as well.

There's hundreds of job aspirants out there. Among these lots of have spent a small fortune educating them to be MBA's, engineers & what not. A bleak economy is something they've to prepare for. Forget about huge pay packets. Look at the ground reality & grab whichever job you can get. Financial security should be your first objective. Climb the job bandwagon first, secure a job. During recession, you can't wait for manna to fall from heaven.

Survival tips for investors in the stock market & real estate

Investors in the stock market have to be extra careful during times of recession. The economic indicators will bring down the market & the investors along with it. That's for sure. An investor should therefore have a serious look at his portfolio. Get rid of the junk stocks quickly, if you have already not done so. These penny stocks appreciate smartly during the lovely times. they also fall flat like a fat puppy during an economic downturn. lots of millionaires have become paupers overnight due to holding on to these stocks. Stop loss if you have already lost. The economy is in bad shape; don't let it drag you along. Go for the blue chips. Even in recession they are likely to hold on to their price. Over a period they would give reasonable returns. You may not become a millionaire but then you never know.

Subprime losses are the engine which drove the economy into recession. Gross avarice & greed on the part of Bankers & a knowing wink from owner makers has lead to this situation. It is therefore unlikely that real estate investments would pick up in the near future- if ever. It is best to cut losses & move away from the real estate market. Sale of property at prevailing rates is the only option even if it means loss.

Another piece of advice for investors is not to purchase stocks with borrowed money. they are all optimists at heart & a hardcore investor is the biggest optimist of all. This sometimes forces them to borrow, in the hope that they will make a killing. A hot tip here, a slight upward movement in a certain stock or a credible rumor. All are sure signs of big bucks for a compulsive investor. This is a recipe for disaster. Reign in your financial horses & wait for better days. The economy will rebound sooner than later.

plenty of of us have purchased real estate as an investment. Some use them as weekend gateways. Letting out your second home is a lovely option you must consider. This will bring you a steady monthly income while you wait for the real estate to appreciate. Idle real estate is no longer viable. If you have a farm house you should explore the possibility of growing fruits & vegetables. This can fetch you a tidy income.

Survival tips for the common man

plenty of highly popular books have started giving the impression that one can become rich only by investing passively. This mindset has taken root in lots of US citizens. Work is only passé. Taking financial risks means rewards. It is only now that millions have realized the fallacy of it all. For some it is late. they've to get out of this apathy & disregard for hard work. In lovely economic times even the craziest ideas seem to work. But during recession one has to tighten ones belt.

It is an age old saying that money saved is money earned. Save a part of your income. Even ten percent is . You must not touch any of it for a whimsical expenditure like a vacation or on a luxury. Your credit card is your biggest enemy. You must bring your credit card liability to zero & then keep it away altogether. You must live within your means even if it hurts & pinches your lifestyle. Look at the recession on its face. Bad economy does not mean becoming poor. It is simply a warning to get your act together.

Survival tips for businesses

It is a great idea to start planning for early retirement. This will force you to think about your economic future. Investment in pension & retirement currency will secure your future. If you get laid off, at least you can retire to your little financial nest. Retirement is not a bad word any longer. It may even turn out to be the best part of your life.

Modern technology is a boon for small businesses. than renting out an pricey office, one can innovate & work from home. Finance & investment consultants, CPA's, real estate agents & a host of other business can operate from home.

The small businesses would be the hardest hit due to the worsening economy. It may sound depressing, but the truth is that lots of would be closed down. But one need not take it lying down. The smart guys have already started preparing for the days ahead by doing secretarial work on their own.

Have another look at your fees. Can you become more competitive? Instead of charging $100 can you get by with $75? Customers are looking for a bargain & reducing your professional fees will make them happy. Consider this to be one of your effective marketing tools during times of recession.

It is time to look at your accounts receivable. Businessmen should closely monitor their outstanding & reduce it as much as possible. If you hold stock, inventory should be minimized. Shift the cost of carrying inventory to your principal by using 'Just in Time' owner, which will save you from investing in dead inventory.

Recession is a big economic bully. It can make you do things which you would not otherwise consider. simultaneously it is not necessary to surrender & succumb to it. Taking measured, well thought out steps to counter the threat is the only prudent way out. It is all a query of managing your finances.

Brian Schwartz encourages individuals to think outside the box and sharpen their creative skills, so they can live a more fulfilling and meaningful life. Whether you are running a business, if you're an artist or stay at home mom; you can become more successful with what ever you do with creative flair and finesse. Visit Brian's website at http://www.FlipMyText.com and exercise your mind.

© 2008 FlipMyText - All Rights Reserved

Monday, November 10, 2008

7 Key Things to Start Your Own Online Forum Community

Are you ready to start your own online forum community? Having a forum can channel interested traffic to your website and make money at the same time, making it a true multi-tasker. However, many people are confused by the process of starting an online forum. There is no reason for this confusion; starting a forum is a simple process that can be broken down into a few easy steps.

1. Choose a Niche. That's right; you will need to start your career as a forum owner by selecting a very narrow target audience, preferably one that doesn't already have an active web presence. The market for general sites is saturated, so opening a general forum is sure path to failure. If you want to use the forum to market another website, you should make sure this niche ties in well with that website's topic.

2. Work Out the Details. There are a variety of webhosts, and just as many companies offering several different types of forum software. You will want to make sure you have the bandwidth to support a large amount of traffic, because a successful forum can go from a handful of hits to several thousand overnight. You will also want to make sure the software you choose has the features you want to add in the future.

3. Drive Traffic to Your Forum. Maybe you can tell friends, family, and coworkers. Alternately, many people go to mailing groups such as Yahoo Groups and announce the forum's opening in relevant groups. If your website is targeted to the same niche as your forum, getting relevant traffic may be as simple as posting a link on your homepage.

4. Consider Paid Posting Agencies. These can 'prime the pump' by getting a forum off the ground. Very few people are willing to be the first poster in a forum, or even the second or third. Most of the time, you will need a busy forum running smoothly before unpaid traffic will join in. Quality posts can be bought for a surprisingly low price.

5. Create a Team of Moderators. A surprisingly large number of people are willing to be moderator solely for the respect that comes with the title. Moderators will manage the site in your absence and help with administrative tasks. A good moderator is difficult to find and even harder to get rid of, so choose thoughtfully.

6. Sign Up for Advertising. Don't worry about it cheapening your site; people have come to expect a minimal amount of targeted advertising everywhere they go. You will have to walk a fine line between using advertising that fits in with your site but stands out enough to invite clicks. However, advertising is the main source of income for online forums, and every day without ads is a day without revenue.

7. Have Regular Forum Events that Appeal to Your Target Audience. This could mean giving a comedy CD to the person who submits the funniest post at a comedy site, or having a book drawing at a children's literature site. These types of events bring in new blood while encouraging your existing users to remain loyal.


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Monday, November 3, 2008

Earn Extra Cash at Home With Paid to Post Forums

Are you looking for a way to earn money in your spare time without dealing with deadlines or even changing out of your pajamas? Do you have a solid online presence and enjoy posting in forums? Earning extra money with paid to post forums may be the perfect work at home opportunity for you. Thanks to paid forum posting agencies, you can work for a variety of paid to post forums without juggling multiple bills and account details.

Many people think this deal sounds too good to be true, but getting paid to post in forums is in actuality a lucrative and very real opportunity for people who want to use their superb writing and people skills to make money from home. Paid forum posting services are always looking for new and talented posters to add to their stable of freelance writers, and you could be their next star employee.

Who can benefit from this opportunity? Earning extra cash with paid to post forums is a great job for stay at home mothers, college students, and anyone who has more time than money. The expectations are low and the pay is decent. Although most people use this as part time work, it could easily become a career for someone who is a quick and savvy learner.

What are the benefits of getting paid to post? First, and most obviously, making money is one huge selling point. The pay, which can vary between a few pennies per post to a generous fifty cents, will add up quickly if you are a fast thinker and have good typing skills. If you are one of the millions of people already spending time posting in forums, why not get paid for it?

Another bonus is that there are no quotas or deadlines. This is a part time, work at home job that you can fit in between family, school, and other obligations. The dress code is nonexistent, and there is no supervisor looking over your shoulder. Unlike traditional employment, this is a job that you can leave and return to at your leisure.

The drawbacks are few, but you still should be aware of them. First, you will need to be a good writer and follow the directions given to you by both the forum and the posting service. If your posts are too short, too long, or otherwise don't follow the precise instructions you were given, you run the risk of not being paid for your work and even being fired by the forum and the paid posting service. Also, as with any work at home freelance job, you will need to be able to motivate yourself in the absence of bosses and managers.

If this still sounds like a good deal, all you will need to get started is a personal computer with high speed internet access and a small dose of entrepreneurial spirit. Then, sign up with one or several of the paid forum posting services and watch those pennies add up to hundreds of dollars. Earning extra cash getting paid to post in forums can be a dream job for the right person.

Check out the Forum Pay Per Post Exchange powered by FlipMyText.com - It's the fastest way for forum owners to increase their forum traffic, while forum users can make money for posting quality information.

11 Ways to Make Money in a Forum

Are you an active forum poster who would like to use your internet reputation to earn money? Are you a web entrepreneur who is always looking for free advertising? Regardless of your situation, posting on web forums can be a great way to make money by cashing in on your knowledge of a situation or industry.

1. Post thoughtful comments on a subject you are passionate about in popular forums. Make sure to put a link to your own website in your signature. As you post more often, you will gain credibility-and traffic. The more relevant the particular forum is to your website, the more money you can make from the traffic, so target your posts accordingly.

2. Ask for help and advice related to the forum's topic. For example, you could report that you are starting a niche site and need feedback. Most people who wouldn't follow a link in your signature are more willing to give you an expert opinion. If your content is good, they'll be sure to return, building both traffic and ad revenue.

3. Use forums as a form of test marketing. Are you wondering if your latest idea is going to fly with your target audience? Do you need ideas for new webstore items? Most niche forum posters will tell you exactly what they want and how much they are willing to pay for it.

4. If the forum allows it, you can put relevant text affiliate links in your posts. However, you will need to be careful to stay very targeted and very relevant, or you will jeopardize your reputation and your ability to continue posting on the board. Ask yourself: Would I post this link even if I weren't being paid to do so?

5. Create a T-Shirt or other wearable item that is applicable to the forum niche through a site such as CafePress and put a link to your 'e-store' in your signature. Because forum regulars can be fanatical about their favorite topics, you can make a lot of cash this way with little or no upfront investment on your part.

6. You can post product reviews on popular forums. There are actually two ways to make money doing this. One is to contact the company that makes the product and ask them to pay you for your post. The other way is to become a program affiliate and use an affiliate link in your review to direct readers to the product.

7. Many forums have paid administrators who keep tabs on the posts, start relevant topics, and handle administrative tasks such as dealing with new users. The pay varies from forum to forum, but this is easily earned cash.

8. If you are currently a writer for a website such as Suite 101 that pays based on revenue sharing, you can post the first section of your latest article on your favorite relevant forum with a link to the rest of the article. If you have a compelling lead, this should entice many people to read the whole article, and increase your pay out as well.

9. Use the polling feature of many forums to set up polls. You can either use the polls as test marketing or use them to direct people to your website.

10. Posting quality responses and forming relationships with other people always pays off in the end, especially if you are in a business that depends on marketing yourself or a website. People who respect you as an individual can turn into your biggest promoters, sending other people in the web community to your site(s) and creating the kind of mouth buzz that exponentially increases both traffic and earnings.

11. Sign up with one of the many paid to post agencies. These companies pay you up to fifty cents a post to talk about meaningful topics with other interested people. Although this is hardly a fortune, if you are already an active forum poster, it would be free money. Who knows - maybe one of your favorite forums is paying people to post through one of these sites.

Forum Pay Per Post Exchange Powered by FlipMyText.com - The fastest way for forum owners to increase their forum traffic, while forum users can make money for posting quality information.