Increasing Your Blog Traffic

Below are some tips to to attract more readers to your Blog:

Yahoo Answers: Go to Yahoo answers and search for unanswered questions that are related to your blog’s topic. Give a relevant, quality answer and be sure and include a link to your blog as well. You can even copy and past your answer onto a multitude of similar questions.

Ping-O-Matic: Every time that you write a new blog post, use Ping-O-Matic to submit your fresh content to a large list of search engines. This system makes it so easy to let all of the search engines know that you have new content on your blog.

Guest Posts: Contact the owners of popular blogs in your niche and ask if they would mind if you created a guest post specifically for their blog. If they accept, create a well written post that will attract others to want to learn more about your blog. Guest posting is a sure way of increasing traffic to your blog.

Reply to Every Comment: If someone takes the time to leave a comment or response on your blog and you don’t take the time to respond back, chances are that that person will not be coming back to your blog. Remember that your readers are the lifeblood of your blog and without them you’d be going nowhere fast!

Interview a Big Name: Ask a big name blogger in your niche if you could interview them for your blog. If they accept, they are likely to put a link to their interview on their own blog and in turn you can gain some quality traffic. Be sure and ask interesting questions that will intrigue your reader and keep them coming back for more.

There are many more things that you can do to attract visitors to your blog. Remember that whatever your niche is, you should always act as though you are an expert in your particular arena. Follow this advice and you too can double your blog traffic speedily.

Blogging to the Bank?

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Boosting Blog Traffic

Submit Blog To search Engines:

An easy way to give your blog a traffic boost is by letting the popular search engines know your blog exists. Of course, many of them will find your blog eventually, but why not help them along by taking the time to submit your blog's URL to some of the most popular search engines?

Follow the links below to submit your blog's URL to some of the web's most popular search engines:

1. Google

2. Yahoo!

3. Technorati

4. The open directory

5. Msn's Live search

However, submitting your URL to search engines won't suddenly bring an overwhelming amount of traffic. However, it does mean your blog is on the search engines' radar screens and has a chance of being picked up by keyword searches.

Blog Advertising

Main Types of Blog Advertising Opportunities:

Online advertising offers three primary types of ads bloggers can use to make money from their blogs.

Pay-per-click: The advertiser pays the blogger each time someone clicks on the advertiser's ad.
Pay-per-impression: The advertiser pays the blogger each time the ad appears on the blog's page.
Pay-per-action: The advertiser pays the blogger each time someone clicks on the ad and performs an action such as making a purchase.

Contextual Ads:
Contextual ads are typically pay-per-click ads. The ads are delivered based on the content of the page on the blog where the ads will be displayed. In theory, the ads shown on the page should be relevant to the content of the page thereby increasing the chance that someone will click on them. Google AdSense is an example of a contextual advertising program.Google AdSense and Kontera are examples of contextual advertising oppportunities.

Text Link Ads:
Ads that are not served based on the content of a blog's page but rather are placed based on specific text in the posts of a blog are called text link ads. Text Link Brokers and Text-Link-Ads are examples of text link advertising opportunities.

Impression-Based Ads:
Ads that pay bloggers based on the number of times the ad appears on the blog are called impression-based ads. FastClick and Tribal Fusion are examples of impression-based advertising opportunities.

Affiliate Ads:
Affiliate ads give bloggers a choice of programs to provide links to products. Bloggers are paid when someone purchases the advertised product. Amazon Associates and eBay Affiliates are examples of affiliate advertising programs.

Direct Ads:
Many bloggers offer an option for visitors to purchase advertising space on their blogs. Direct ads are typically shown in the form of banner ads or similar display ads provided directly to the blogger by the advertiser to be uploaded to the blog. Pricing and payment methods vary from blogger to blogger (often dependent on the amount of traffic the blog receives). Direct advertisers on blogs are sometimes called sponsors of that blog.

Reviews:
Reviews (often called sponsored reviews) are an indirect form of advertising on blogs. A company might contact a blogger directly asking them to write a review for a product, business, website, etc. If the blogger is paid to write the review, then it is a form of advertising revenue. Some companies offer forms of review advertising such as PayPerPost.

Monetizing Your Blog

5 tips to monetize your blog:

1. Advertising
Including advertisements on your blog is the most obvious way to derive an income from your blogging efforts. Ads can come in the form of text links or banner ads, and advertising options are available that you can easily tap into through pay-per-click, pay-per-post and affiliate programs online. Google AdSense, Amazon Associates, eBay Affiliates and Pay-Per-Post are just a few of the most common advertising programs available to bloggers.

2. Merchandise
Another simple way to monetize your blog is by selling merchandise through a service such as CafePress who will work with you to create custom items for you to sell through your blog.

3. Reviews
Bloggers can make money by reviewing products, events, businesses and more through blog posts.

4. Ebooks
A great way to bring in some revenue on your blog is by writing an ebook and offering it for sale through your blog. Ebooks are particularly successful for bloggers who have positioned themselves as experts in their fields and advertise their ebooks as additional or exclusive information just for readers of their blogs.

5. Donations
Many bloggers add a donation button to their blogs asking readers to make a monetary donation to keep the blog alive. Donations are also solicited with clever taglines such as, "If you like this blog, why not buy me a cup of coffee?" The donation link leads the reader to another website such as PayPal where the individual can easily make their donation.

Top 10 Reasons to Start a Blog

Blogging is becoming more and more popular everyday. Should you join the blogosphere? Take a look at this list to help you make your decision about blogging.

1. To Express Your Thoughts and OpinionsYou have something to say, and blogs provide a place to say it and be heard.

2. To Market or Promote Something
Blogging is a great way to help market or promote yourself or your business, product or service.

3. To Help People
Many blogs are written to help people who may be going through similar situations that the blogger has experienced. Many parenting and health-related blogs are written for this purpose.

4. To Establish Yourself as an Expert
Blogs are wonderful tools to help bloggers establish themselves as experts in a field or topic. For example, if you're trying to get a job in a specific field or hoping to publish a book on a specific topic, blogging can help legitimize your expertise and expand your online presence and platform.

5. To Connect with People Like You
Blogging brings like-minded people together. Starting a blog can help you find those people and share your opinions and thoughts.

6. To Make a Difference
Many blogs are issue-based meaning the blogger is trying to provide information to sway people's thinking in a certain direction. Many political blogs (like Daily Kos, Istanpundit, Think Progress, etc) and social issues blogs are written by bloggers who are trying to make a difference in their own ways.

7. To Stay Active or Knowledgeable in a Field or Topic
Since successful blogging is partially dependent on posting frequency and providing updated, fresh information, it's a perfect way to help a blogger stay abreast of the events in a specific field or topic.

8. To Stay Connected with Friends and Family
The world has shrunk since the Internet has become more accessible. Blogs provide a simple way for family and friends to stay connected from different parts of the world by sharing stories, photos, videos and more.

9. To Make Money
It's important to point out that most bloggers don't make a lot of money blogging, but the potential does exist to generate revenue from your blog with hard work and commitment. There are many bloggers who bring in big bucks. With patience and practice, you can make money through advertising and other income-generating activities on your blog. Examples of these activities include ebay, amazon associates, Google adsense, affiliate progams etc.

10. To Have Fun and Be Creative
Many people start a blog simply for fun. Perhaps a blogger is a fan of a particular actor or loves knitting and wants to share that passion through a blog. One of the most important keys to successful blogging is having a passion about your blog's topic, so you can write prolifically about it. Some of the best and most interesting blogs started out as blogs that were written just for fun and to give the blogger a creative outlet.

What is a Blog?

A blog (also called a weblog or web log) is a website consisting of entries (also called posts) appearing in reverse chronological order with the most recent entry appearing first (similar in format to a daily journal). Blogs typically include features such as comments and links to increase user interactivity. Blogs are created using specific publishing software.

Variations of the term blog:

Blogging: The act of writing a post for a blog
Blogger: A person who writes content for a blog
Blogosphere: The online community of blogs and bloggers

The World Before Blogging:

There was a time when the Internet was just an informational tool. In the early life of the World Wide Web some 20 years ago, websites were simple and provided a one-sided conversation. As time went on, the Internet became more interactive with the introduction of transaction-based websites and online shopping, but the online world remained one-sided.

That all changed with the evolution of Web 2.0 (the social web) wherein user-generated content became an integral part of the online world. Today, users expect websites to provide a two-way conversation and web logs (or blogs) were born.

The Birth of Blogs:

The earliest blogs started in the late 1990s as online diaries. Individuals posted information on a daily basis about their lives and opinions. The daily posts were listed in reverse date order, so readers viewed the most recent post first and scrolled through previous posts. The format provided an ongoing inner monologue from the writer.

As blogs evolved, interactive features were added to create a two-way conversation. Readers took advantage of features that allowed them to leave comments on blog posts or link to posts on other blogs and websites to further the dialogue.

Blogs Today:

As the Internet has become more social, blogs have gained in popularity. Today, there are over 100 million blogs with more entering the blogosphere everyday. Blogs have become more than online diaries. In fact, blogging has become an important part of the online and offline worlds with popular bloggers impacting the worlds of politics, business and society with their words.

The Future of Blogs:

It seems inevitable that blogging will become even more powerful in the future with more people and businesses recognizing the power of bloggers as online influencers. Anyone can start a blog thanks to the simple (and often free) tools readily available online. The question will likely become not, "Why should I start a blog?" but rather, "Why shouldn't I start a blog?"

Blogging

You don't have to have your own Web site, or install blogging software, or even figure out how to set up the advertising. At Blogger you can set up a blog for free in less than five minutes without knowing a thing about web design, and Blogger even automates setting up Google AdSense so you can make money off your blog by displaying ads and getting paid when people click on the ads. To make even more money from it, set up an affiliate program (More on that shortly)for books, music, etc., and insert your affiliate links whenever you refer to those items. You'll have to get a lot of traffic to become a six-figure blogger, but pick an interesting topic, write well, tell all your friends, and you're off to a good start.

Living the dream

Once you achieve a steady income from this passive system, you are going to want to protect it. You can do that by diversifying and expanding.

You want to diversify the ways that you make money from a site. If you only have one way to earn money online, and for some reason that becomes blocked or banned, then you are completely out of luck. If you have several different ways to make money from a site though, then you are protected from this complete disaster.

Likewise, you could lose a whole site. It has happened. For example, Google might decide that you are cheating the system and they will simply deindex your site. If they did this then you would probably lose at least 80 percent of your income, especially if you are following the techniques I outlined here.

So you want to diversify, and make more websites. If you can build up several web properties that are all making money from different sources, then you are well protected from random disasters.

Bottom line: you have to take action to make this stuff happen. It will not just fall into your lap. You have to make an effort in order to reap the rewards…..

Expanding what works

So let’s say you pick some good keywords, write some articles for those keywords, and now you are building links. You throw on the adsense and eventually you see a trickle of money start to pour in.

What do you do now?

Well, obviously you need to do more. More of what works. But there are a few ways to do that.

One way is to watch your stat logs and build on them. Most people use a stat program to keep track of the visits to their website and give them data about each visit. There are dozens of such programs but 2 good ones are Statcounter and Google Analytics. Both are free.

If you use one or both of these on your website then you can glance through the stat logs each day and find new keywords to write about. For example, say your site is about Cookie dough and you notice that someone found your site through a search engine after typing in “low calorie cookie dough.” You might not have an article about that yet, so you could write one and probably rank a lot higher for that term and get even more traffic for it. This method works really well because the search engines are already ranking your site for the term, you are just going to rank even higher for it by targeting a whole post at the new keyword.

If you go through and do this every day and write new posts for new keywords then it will expand the reach of your site and you will pull in more and more traffic as time goes on.

Obviously, aside from this technique, you can simply research related keywords for your niche and keep creating new posts for those words and then building more links to those new posts. If you keep doing this over and over again then eventually you will have a large authority site that is getting lots and lots of traffic every day and if you run ads on this site you will make a bunch of money.

It really is that simple but you do have to put in the work and also give it some time to age. But once you are successful at it, the money just rolls in.

Creating content

Now once you have a list of keywords that you want to target in order to build up this income, you have to create the content itself and publish it on your website. The idea is to create relevant content that does not read like a keyword stuffing robot wrote it. It should be naturally and flow nicely. I always shoot for 400 words or more.

As far as seo goes, I keep things pretty simple. I use the keyword I am targeting once in the post title, and once in the post itself. That is it. I would not stuff it into a post more than once, nor would I bother to bold the keyword or anything like that. Keep it simple and then build your links. That is how you are going to rank well anyway.

If you try to over-do the seo stuff you run the risk of penalty. It is not worth it. Write naturally and do not produce crap content.

Many people try to write horrible stuff that does not really answer the searchers question in the hopes that they will click on your advertisements instead. I discourage this technique and I think it is important to provide quality content over the long run. If you are building up a sustainable business then you want to have a nice website that provides genuine value and can pass visual inspection easily. Also, decent quality will gather more natural links over the long run, which is hugely important as we are about to see.

Building Links for Traffic

Now if you pick awesome keywords and write incredibly good articles, this will do nothing for you unless you build links. No one will show up and find you without the backlinks in place.

What I mean by links is that other websites have to link out to yours. You need incoming links.

Now if your keyword that you are trying to rank for is “cookie dough” then you could go and google that term. The top sites that are returned for that phrase are the best possible places that you could get links from for that keyword. These are the authority sites in your niche for this keyword. If you got links from the top 5 results then you would quickly rank very high for that term, probably number 1 in fact.

How to do this? You have to beg, borrow, steal, plead, be creative, be outrageous, sell yourself, sell your site to others, write awesome content and promote it, and so on. Getting links is actually easy, but getting excellent links is very, very difficult. If you can find ways to get the best links out there then you will make a ton of money. It is that simple.

So you can start with lower quality links. For example, you can write an article and publish it at ezinearticles or goarticles and get a link back to your site from them. This is actually not a bad link at all but it is not as good as the top authority sites in your niche.

Building links is tough and takes time. You don’t want to build them too fast anyway or you can be penalized for that too. If you devote 90 percent of your time to building links, and 10 percent to writing new articles for your website, then you will probably make a ton of money. Most people do the exact opposite and they make nothing.

You need links to make money this way. What I’ve said here just scratches the surface as far as link building. Remember, this is what 90 percent of your effort will consist of. It is that important. So obviously there is going to be additional resources here for building links.

Building A Site

This is the easy part if you're already web savvy. If you aren't, the learning curve isn't that steep. Get yourself some web hosting, learn how to install Wordpress, and you're off. Alternatively, you can can use the free Blogger platform (which this site runs on) to host your sites. Both can work well, and I use both myself.

Then, start writing content. I write about 5-10 posts focused on whatever my main topic is. For post titles, I use sub-keywords of my main topic. For example, if I have a site about hardwood flooring, I would have posts called things like "Installing Hardwood Flooring" or "How to Choose A Wood Floor." This makes your site complete, and the title keywords will help your site to rank well for your chosen term. Once I've got the basic site fleshed out, it's on to getting links!

Finding Keywords

Finding the right keywords is probably the hardest thing about getting started in making money with niche sites. You need a keyword that people are searching for, that advertisers are willing to pay for, and that you can reasonably expect to rank in the search engines for. You might ask how it is possible to know all this ahead of time, and the answer is that you really can't. However, there are some tools out there to help you out.

The biggest of these tools is the Google AdWords keyword tool. I use this all the time for researching potential sites. I plan on covering its use more later on, but basically you enter in keywords and it will tell you how many people are searching for certain terms, and how much advertisers are willing to pay to have their ads appear in the sponsored search results.

Once I've used the Google tool to get some potential niche site ideas, I try to see which ones have reasonable competition, and this is the real key. See, it isn't really that hard to find a popular term that pays a boatload from advertising (i.e., credit cards). However, there is no way you are ever going to rank number #1 in Google for the term "credit cards." There is just too much competition.

So, instead you find terms that hit a sweet spot in terms of monthly search traffic, earning potential, and lack of competition. I like terms that get more than 6000 visits a month, have a listed cost per click in Google of over $1, and has a number #1 ranking site in Google that I think I can beat.

There is a lot more to all of this, but that will come in other posts later on. For now, understand that selecting the right keywords is essential to making a good niche site.

Building Niche Sites

Heres my basic formula for building Niche Sites:

1. Identify keywords that:
a. Get search traffic
Have advertisers willing to pay for said traffic
Have a reasonably level of competition (i.e., can I rank #1 in Google for it?)
2. Build a site based around this keyword topic
3. Build links to this site to get traffic
4. Add monetization once I have decent traffic

5. Repeat

It's a fairly simple process, really, but it takes some learning and getting used to.
We'll take closer look at these steps at subsequent posts.

Actions You Can Take to Start Making Money

When you first get started learning about internet marketing, it is quite easy to spend all your time reading blogs and dreaming about how nice it would be to have passive income rolling in from your vast stable of sites.

However, none of this will ever happen if you don't get started. To help put an end to procrastination, I am going to give you a list of things you can start doing today to jump start your internet marketing career. Nothing fancy, just a few things you need to do to get started. I will explain more how to use these tools later, but just getting these accounts will help eliminate barriers to getting started.


Get a Blogger account and/or a web hosting account

Obviously, you'll need some sort of web host to build web sites. Blogger is a free option that does allow you to monetize your sites, but there are limitations. You will never be able to sell a site, and you won't be able to add as many customizations. Still, if you want to get started making money online, a Blogger account is a must, even if you don't use it for your primary sites.

If you want to host your own sites, get a basic shared hosting account to get yourself going. Host Gator offers a good services at a good price (and yet I do get a commission if you order through that link but that statement is still true). With this account (or one like it), you will be able to make Wordpress powered niche sites quickly and easily.

Get Article Site Accounts

To make money with your sites, you must get links. One of the best ways of doing this is to write articles on other sites that link back to yours. The following sites are good places to go to get started with article marketing.

http://ezinearticles.com/
http://www.squidoo.com/

Apply for an AdSense Account

You're not going to want to put AdSense on any of your brand new sites, but having the account ready to go will help you feel like you're getting somewhere. When you do have the traffic, you will be all ready to go. Apply for an account here. Note that you will need a website. If you have a decent looking site that would be relevant, list that to get accept, otherwise you will need to hold off until you have something to list.

Get A Google Analytics Account

One key aspect of these business is analyzing your traffic to learn which keywords you need to be targeting. Sign up at www.google.com/analytics

Use the SEO

The SEO helps you analyze your competition. It will display a number of ranking factors for sites you visit, the most important of which is number of incoming links. This will become one of your most used tools once you start getting the hang of things.

So, this list should help you get all the basics in place for starting to make money online. I realize I haven't instructed you on the use of any of these items. That will come later, though I would be sure to read around each of the sites listed above so that you know how to use of each of them in a basic sense. Now, stop reading and start applying for some accounts!

How to Make Residual Income Online?

Its possible – but its not a get rich quick scheme! I Its not even that difficult once you filter out all the noise from the get-rich-quick artists. You can make a great living online – but to do so you actually need both a good work ethic and some patience.

Heres one tip:

How To Build Income Producing Websites

Select the correct niche. The topic of your site needs to be about something that people are;
1. searching for, and
2. doesn’t have sites which are too hard to compete against. Almost all searchers will click on one of the first three sites on the first page of the search results – if you can’t get your site into one of those slots you are probably wasting your time.
Build a site focusing around the keywords you identified in step 1. The site doesn’t have to be huge – around five to ten articles is quite often sufficient.

Monetize your site. Ugly word – it just means find a way to make money from your site common programs include: Adsense, eBay and Amazon affiliate sales, ClickBank products.
Build back links to your site - links which link back to your site using your keywords rather than your site’s name or “click here” or similar. You can build back links in an infinite number of places but common approaches to back links include:
links from articles
links from free Web 2.0 sites such as Squidoo and Hubpages
links from guest posting on other people’s blogs
links from forum signatures
links from commenting on blogs

If that sounds like a lot of work – it is – if you will be spending a lot more time promoting your website than you will be actually building it …

Then you have to wait , eventually, Google and other search engines will notice your website and start to rank it higher in their result listings. Once you start to rank high in the search engines you will get what is called in the jargon – organic traffic – people who found your site by typing your keywords into Google (or Bing or Yahoo). Those people are the ones most likely to consider spending money on your offers or clicking on your Adsense ads.

Productive and Unproductive Internet Activities

You probably don’t even realize it until you stop yourself from whatever it is that you are doing and ask yourself - What am I doing, and is this something that is productive and will make me more money?

I thought I’ll start a list of activities that most internet entrepreneurs do daily, and categorize them as productive or unproductive in my business.

Funny thing is I am able to come up with the unproductive activities easier than productive ones

Feel free to add to the list.

Productive:

Write content for site/blog
Write articles
Improve/split test sales copy
Write my next product
Blog commenting
Writing software requirements
Keyword research
Rewrite PLR article/content
Seek out link exchange partners
Sell!

Unproductive:

Checking email (what a time waster!)
Excessively checking Adsense stats
Excessively checking my CPA affiliate accts
Excessively checking my Google Analytics (only to find out my traffic hasn’t changed a bit since the last time I checked)
Browsing the WSO (no offense to anyone )
Check out what people are saying in the Main Discussion
Going on Facebook
Going on Youtube

Types of passive income streams to build online:

Making extra money online can help you achieve financial freedom, change your entire outlook and better your life. But internet is full of so called business opportunities that promise and dont deliver. To find a good way to create income online can be a difficult task.

Here are some brilliant online income ideas:

Build residual income through affiliate marketing

This is one of the easiest ways to start your internet business. You dont have to have a website or your own product to sell, nor deal with hassles that come with usual business operation. This is a sure way to financial freedom.

Use auctions to produce an ongoing cash flow

The advantage to selling via auctions is you dont need a website. The product set up is easy and less time consuming.

Generate income with your website

Building your own website is easier than you may think.It gives you unique advantages on your way to financial freedom and is a great tool overall to use to create income online.

Profit by completing offers from various companies

This is one of those paid to participate online income ways. You just sign up for offers, take short surveys, shop, fill in forms, or refer others.

Earn by filling out surveys

Are you interested in giving out your opinion for money? Then create income online by filling out surveys.

Make money with PTR

There is no easier way to create income online than this. Receive ads in your email you are interested in, click the link, visit the advertisers site, and get paid. Thats it! Whats more, you can earn a percentage of your referrals earnings.


More details on these later.

Passive Online Income

Earning Residual Income Online

Wouldn't you like to take a vacation whenever you want, or
have your wife stop working so she can look after the kids
and still keep up the payment of your bills? Well, if you
wish to achieve this, you need to build a passive residual
income.

Definition of passive residual income:

The definition of traditional passive income is "Income
generated with minimal work from your investments such as
interest, dividends, or real estate rentals." However in
this article we are discussing creating a passive income
online. Investment of time and money is initially required
to build a passive income online, then possibly minimal
work thereafter.

The benefits of generating a passive income:

1. Make a strong initial effort to get your income started,
then do minimal work (or virtually none) thereafter,
resulting in earning more and doing less.

2. Freedom to choose when and where you wish to work.

3. Your passive residual income is not dependent on a 9-5
work week and can be generated 24 hours, 7 days a week.

4. Able to give yourself a pay raise whenever you want by
creating multiple income streams.

5. Create an unlimited amount of income - you are only
limited by your imagination. Establish yourself into financial freedom!

6. Have more free time to spend time with your family,
friends or go on vacation.

7. Ability to give to charitable causes.

8. Create residual income for your future retirement.