Wednesday, November 22, 2006

Spring Cleaning...

Was a busy day today. I have just cleaned-up the blog. Also I increased the font size so that the text is more readable. Got rid of the clock widget (I was getting bored of it, besides I never used to get the right time :->).

And after careful consideration of what Mr. Brettbum had to say about google adsense in the comments of one of my previous posts, I decided it was better to play it safe. So I stripped down the google adsense adverts from the blog. At least for now.

But what fun is a site without ads. Especially if one of your major concerns is revenue. So I added another ad. This time by ClickBooth. ClickBooth is known for giving some of the highest payouts in the industry. I don't know much about ClickBooth. I will be seeking deeper answers and when I get them I will be sharing that info with you. Until next time, happy blogging...

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Sunday, November 19, 2006

A Few More Directories To Submit To

I came across a few more directories that you can submit to. I have given them below...

  1. Directory 2.0 - STOP whatever you are doing right now and submit your site to this directory. It is worth it. You'll see...
  2. Globe of blogs - Once you register here, you can see your inbound links exploding on search-engines. Definitely worth it.
  3. Blogarama - A huge site with a similar sized directory. If you own a blog, you probably ought to be on this site.
Until next time, happy blogging...

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Higher Rankings Anyone?

Well, who wants a better blog ranking? I am inviting you to exchange links with me. For the uninitiated, this is a win-win deal. You put my link on your site and I put yours on mine. This is called reciprocative linking. Getting as many links to your site as possible is important. More the links, higher your search engine rankings. And reciprocal links are one of the best ways to get quality inbound links.

So if any of you are interested in reciprocal linking, just add a comment and your url and I will add a link to your site on this blog hoping that you would do the same on your's.

Just in case, my url is given below. Happy Blogging...

http://dasimpleblog.blogspot.com

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Saturday, November 18, 2006

The Growing Blog

Watching your blog grow could be one of the most exhilarating experiences online. Its like playing a strategy game like the Sims or Civilization IV. But some might call it as boring as watching paint dry. Blogging is not for them. When your sole aim is to make money using your blog, it takes great will-power during the starting weeks of your blog.

For me the time has arrived when I will have to muster all the courage and will-power I can get to continue blogging. It has been half-a-month since I started this blog. So far it has been fun. This is usually the time when a blogger stops blogging and takes up philosophy or something of the kind. He feels that all his hard-work isn't paying off. Almost 90% of starting bloggers stop blogging before they have unleashed the true-potential of their blog.

I should know. I have been there, done that. This post is a sort of morality-booster cum encouragement drive on my part to all the bloggers that are stuck on this phase of their blog and feel like quitting. HOLD ON! The time hasn't arrived yet. Maintaining a high-paying blog is no silly matter. It takes determination. And a lot of hard-work. When I feel low like I do now, I go through other people's successful blogs and read about their success stories. It lifts my spirits. In the two weeks that I have maintained this blog, I've seen it grow slowly and steadily and have received some encouraging pat-on-the-backs from well-meaning bloggers.

So if you identify with what I just talked about, I implore you to continue and not look back. Soon the toughest stages will be over. From there on, its a free and easy ride. The grass, I assure you, will be greener on the other side...

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What's The Deal With eXlinks?

I've been following this new exponential website growth site that has been prelaunched. It is from the creaters of BlogMad. I feel that is reason enough for me to join it. But they are extremely tight-lipped about it. Except for a few leaked screen shots, I don't think anyone knows anything about this site. All they are saying is that

eXlinks is the ultimate, exponential link-swapping, site exploding system, and is completely free.
It seems people are signing up fast. No one wants to risk not being involved in potentially what (just maybe) might be the next blog revolution. Atleast that is what they are leading us to believe. Plus they proclaim some gifts for those who sign-up now. This is what they are saying:
Signing up now will guarentee you a spot in the beta, updates through the newsletter, and a few extra benefits.
Whatever it is, I'd sign up simply because the leaked screenshots look amazing! Keeping fingers crossed...

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Thursday, November 16, 2006

Advancing this Blog...

I have just gone ahead and signed up for yet another blog exchange program at BlogAdvance. Although I have just signed up, initially it looks and I'm guessing works just like BlogSoldiers. I may be wrong. This is just the initial inference. This blog being in its infantile stage, needs as many visitors as it can get. Moreover, I realized that BlogAdvance has a whole lot of different reader base than the ones that are available at BlogMad, BlogExplosion or BlogSoldiers. For a nascent blog, I would recommend all of these...

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Wednesday, November 15, 2006

A little Off-Topic...

I am going ahead and taking a risk by going a bit off-topic. I am presuming that if you are reading this blog, it must be because you are willing to give a little effort to make some money online. Remember, only the initial part is tough. Once you are well on your way, there could be nothing easier. What this post is about is this site that I got referred to from another blog. It is a site that pays you for reading mails sent to you by them. So far, I have made $11.38 from this site by simply reading mails. If you are really dedicated, you can even sign-up on some of their sponsored sites for gaining money ranging from $0.50 to $10! If you think you have the time to incorporate a few extra clicks into your daily mail-reading routine, I highly recommend you try this site. Oh and did I mention that they give you a free $10 sign-up bonus for a limited period?


E-mailPaysU



Until next time, happy blogging...

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A few more Directories...

These are the few sites that I have submitted my blog to. I suggest that if you haven't already, you should go ahead and submit to these sites. The more directories, the merrier! I will be adding this blog to more directories soon. Its just that my exams are starting on friday and I am a little short on time. Until next time, happy blogging...

  1. Today - A very important site. Will require a reciprocal link.
  2. Blog Street - Enter your url.
  3. Ice Rocket - Ping them your url.
  4. We Blog A Lot - Ping them your RSS feed if you have one.
Any doubts will be welcome...

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A Short Note on BlogSoldiers

BlogSoldiers is a traffic exchange site. It is one of the most versatile I have come across. It even pays you money for browsing other blogs. Although, I am yet to test this feature, it appears to be present. Moreover you can do a lot of nifty things like set the amount of visitors that visit your site through BlogSoldiers. Besides, they have just upgraded their credit ratio from 1 : 2 to 3 : 4. That means, for every 4 blogs you browse, you get 3 visits.

Let me remind all you skeptics out there that traffic exchange sites are a good way for your site to get noticed initially. The early days of a blog are the most difficult. The same goes for the uninitiated blogger as well. I will start looking more seriously at directories which is also an important factor in marketing your new-born blog. Until then, happy blogging...

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Sunday, November 12, 2006

Time to visit the (bloga)ZOO!

I have just signed up on another nifty little blog exchange site called Blogazoo. Now, let me explain what caught my attention on this little site that separated it from the rest of the crowd.

At Blogazoo, the age-old problem of getting quality traffic to your site gets solved albeit to a very small extent. But hey, any quality traffic is better than none, right? It will be interesting to see how their concept works out practically. In theory it sounds somewhat ok.

What they do is place a Gazoo on member blogs. Gazoos are text links which when clicked by a surfer, will get him multiple credits for the single click. This will encourage users tp read through blogs. Who knows? They might even contribute valuable clicks to your site as they surf it searching for Gazoos!

I have just signed up and as of yet, my site has not been approved. But once it does get approved, it'd be interesting to see how things work out. Check it out here! Keeping my fingers crossed. By the way, for those of you who haven't already, I recommend you sign up to the following traffic exchanges as soon as possible. You won't regret it.

BlogMad
BlogExplosion
BlogSoldiers

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Saturday, November 11, 2006

Feed your blog and generate money...

Feeds. What are feeds? According to FeedBurner,

A feed is the format that allows your content to be delivered (and subscribed to) on the Web.
FeedBurner is one of the world's largest feed provider. Generally, feeds are of two formats: RSS and Atom. As far as I can tell, feeds are generated automatically and can be read by people without coming to your blog using feed readers. If you want to know more about feeds you can go here. By the way, it is also called syndication. Check out my feed on the left sidebar. Its the orange, square little button. Yup, that's it.

Why feeds? Well, feeds will get you a lot of extra readers. And we all know what that means. More readers, more traffic, more revenue. Moreover I think there are ad services for feeds including adsense. I will be checking that out soon.

To get yourself a feed, I suggest you go to FeedBurner. It's easy to set up. They have a very well-explained set of options. Just go to the homepage, enter your blog's url and create an account. There is more but that part is better left explained by FeedBurner them selves. They'll give you a shiny new button to put on your site and even give you a chicklet for displaying how many readers you have. Like the little black button I have on the left sidebar below the FeedBurner button. Until next time, happy blogging...

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Friday, November 10, 2006

The Adsense

OK. The time has finally arrived. Its time to start the ad campaigns. Figuring out the right time isn't such a big deal. I'd let my instincts do the time-keeping. There are many sites out there providing ads for site owners to generate revenue. You can try them all. I'll be reviewing most of them here. But I'd recommend you to start off with adsense. It's the easiest to set up. Once you get the feel of having ads on your site, you can try different ad providers. Check out the ad I have placed on the right sidebar. More on adsense later...

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Wednesday, November 8, 2006

Ingredients of a good blog

By ingredients of a good blog, I mean what you need to make money from your blog. What it takes to stand out from the crowd. This list is by no means complete. But just a foundation stone. It will be updated as this blog progresses...

1. Content is king. You have good content and people will come flocking to your blog. Its a fact.

2. Traffic is queen. When your aim is to make money, traffic is what you have to aim for. If traffic is high, then everything else falls into place almost automatically.

3. Links are the princes. Links, links and more links. You can't have enough of it. Get as many inbound links as possible. I guarantee you'll never regret it.

4. Ads are the ministers. Choose wisely when it comes to ads. I will be doing a detailed feature of ads in the near future. Don't forget to check it out.

That's all for now. Use the permalink if you want to see future updates to this post.

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Sunday, November 5, 2006

Submit to Search Engines...

Now I think is the right time to start submitting to search engines... I've said it before and I'm saying it again... Search Engines will take like, forever to process a new site. So waiting until they come and find you is not an option. So it is better to let the search engines know that you have a new blog and would like for it to be indexed.

Excluding some of the biggies like google and yahoo! submitting to all the known search engines is not physically possible. So what do we do?

Well there are a number of free sites that will do the submission for you somewhat automatedly. I personally use Submit Express's Submit page. They submit to 25+ search engines including AOL, HoTBoT, etc. for free. But, be sure of including the best meta data you can, before you submit to search engines. To go to the free submission page click here and submit away. Slowly but surely, your rankings are bnound to increase.

Another page for free submission is Free Web Submission. I suggest you use a combination of these two submission services to get maximum exposure. But be careful. They have a lot of common submissions between them. Some search engines have a policy agianst multiple submissions fearing spam. So, I suggest first you try Submit Express and then Free Web Submission as in the case of the latter, you can select which sites to submit to. That gives you flexibility. Try it out. And Happy Blogging...

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Saturday, November 4, 2006

The Story So Far...

The second day of this blog has been completed. Lots and lots of work are still left. Today, I was able to complete the following...
Paypal :- Paypal, what can I say. If you haven't already, register at paypal and get an account. It will be helpful to you forever. And I mean forever. I have added a donation button. If you want to donate, all you have to do is click the button and enter your login info. And you're all set. If you, by any chance, feel like donating now :->, check the right sidebar. I have added the donation button in this post...

Donate Here....



Zoom Clouds :- This is a tag manager. It shows all your tags in a tag cloud. See the sidebar on the left if you want a tag cloud. Zoom Clouds is one of the best tag managers around on the net for free. You can customize it endlessly!

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Friday, November 3, 2006

A little SEO-ing...

SEO or Search Engine Optimization means just that. Optimizing your site to make it Search Engine Friendly. It helps to increase the number and quality of the visitors to your site. Talking about SEO will take up a whole new blog in itself. There are many rules and shortcuts to get you indexed on a search engine faster and higher. In this post, I am going to tell you a seldom used method to get yourself indexed correctly by any search-engine.

Search engines display their results using information they get off the site itself. For example, most search engine displays the title, description, URL and some even display the author's mailing address. This is shown in the pic below.


The search-engines have various methods to get these informations. But if we let them do it, it might not look as good as we want it to and of course it will take lots of time. For example, we might need a different description than the one used on the site. For this, we can use the <meta> tags of the site. <meta> tags are HTML elements that the spider (bot) reads for such information. I'll explain how to get it and where to put it.

The basic form of an HTML page is

<html>
<head>
<title>
</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>
</p>
</body>
</html>
It consists of tags that define the HTML document. The HTML document is divided into the head and the body. The body contains the content of the site and the head contains the title, scripting, style-sheets, <meta> tags, etc. So the head is where we are interested. It has been given a bold font for identification. As you can see, the title is given in the head. Now onto the <meta> tags.

For us, mainly there are three <meta> items of interest. The Keywords, Description and Author.

Keywords: These are like tags. They are used by a search engine to relate a particular search string to its respective site(s). For example, in youtube, if a keyword in the <meta> tag is set as online video, and a search is conducted for online video, the search engine knows that youtube is a potential result. Get the drift?

Description: Description is a what it's name implies. A short and concise explanation of the site. It is what the user sees in the result page beneath the title of the site. Make it eye-catching and people will inadvertently click on the result!

Author: Self-explanatory, it shows your e-mail address to the world and makes it easier for people to contact you. Use with caution.

So how do we add these to our site? I will give the general form to use...
<head>
<title>The Simple Blog</title>

<meta name="Keywords" content="the, keywords, separated, by, commas">
<meta name="Description" content="the description of the site. usually upto 200-250 characters can be used">
<meta name="Author" content="daywalker_34@hotmail.com">

</head>
The area of interest in the above code is in bold and I have color-coded it for easy reference. The words in red are the tags and they are required. The ones in blue specify what sort of a <meta> tag it is. And the ones in green specify the content of the <meta> tag. The part in the quotes is all that has to be edited by you. The rest is self-explanatory.

Add this code to the HTML part of your site and you are set to go. As the spiders 'crawl' your site, they will take the meta data into account.

If all this coding is not for you, then I suggest an easy to use webpage where all you have to do is enter the content of the tags and then the site will generate meta tags for you. Happy blogging everyone...

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Exchanging Traffic

As I had mentioned earlier, it would take months for the search engines to give you a proper pagerank that would drive enough traffic to your site. There are many methods to get listed faster. I will be going into those details at a later date. But right now, what is it that you really need the most?

Now, and trust me on this, you really need to get people to see your blog. Let them know that it is there. But of course, as always we need to do this economically. That is, without spending a single penny. This is where traffic exchanges step in.

Traffic exchanges are sites through which you view other people's webpages and get traffic in return. They utilize a system of credits. For every site that you visit, you get a specified credit amount. This is then exchanged for traffic to your site. 1 credit = 1 view. There are quite a few such sites. There are even traffic exchange sites that are meant specifically for blogs. In this post, I am highlighting 3 such sites that I have found to be the most effective for my needs. They are given below:

- This is one of the biggest and oldest traffic exchange sites around. They have a 2 : 1 traffic exchange ratio. That is, for every 2 sites you visit, 1 random guy visits your blog! Highly recommended. They even have games and other tools that help you get more credits.

- This is another huge traffic exchange site. They have lots of tools and games and they keep you really entertained as you swap traffic with other bloggers. They also have a traffic ratio of 2 : 1.

- My personal favorite. This site has the cleanest interface. It looks way cool. It is brought to you by Kinetiq a Web 2.0 startup company. Be sure to check-out their other tools. And the icing on the cake? They have a traffic ratio of 1 : 1! Brilliant.

If you are a starting blogger, I recommend you to try all three of these.

A little disclaimer: The quality of the traffic you get from these sites are more often than not, just visitors in search of credit. So don't expect a huge jump in the number of your readers. But hey, something is always better than nothing!

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My Work Today

Today being the first day of the blog, it was a busy one. I joined a few directories and added widgets. Given below are the details...

  • Technorati Add to Technorati Favorites - I joined technorati. It is one of the biggest blog directories. Plus they have this really neat feature of showing the number of inbound links your blog has. Cool!
  • The Truth Laid Bear - This is a cool and famous site for information regarding your blog. They list the inbound links (from other listed blogs) and outbound links (to other listed blogs) and show you your traffic standings. It also classes you in the 'blogging ecosystem' based on your popularity. Check it out on the right sidebar.
  • Blogwise - This is a huge directory containing around 65,000 blogs and counting. You better not forget this one!
  • Blog Catalog - Another directory that is popular and has a large database. Easy to submit.
And the widgets...
  • Technorati Add to Technorati Favorites - Got myself one of the blog-search widgets from technorati. It has a link that directly takes me to the place where they show information about my inbound links.
  • Widgetbox - Amazing widget site. Lists hundreds of free widgets. I got myself a cool-looking 'space-time' clock. You can catch it on the side-bar.
  • Buttons - This is a small area of the blog where I can store all the buttons of other sites that I may put on this blog.
So that was that. All in all a very fruitfull day. If you get time, I'd like you to visit my other blog CAUTION: Words Ahead!

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You've Got to Love This Kinda Traffic!

Traffic is by and large the most important facet of a blog. Period. No other factor determines the success of your blog like the Traffic that is driven to it. Okay, so you've set up your blog just the way you want it and you are now satisfied. So now what?

It is a fact that no new site can start getting any traffic initially. The tried-and-tested method of waiting for the search-engines to find you and index you will not work. Neither is the costly Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tools and services method an options for us. So do we wait?

Well, no. There are tons of stuff you could do while you wait. You could add toys and widgets to your blog. You could keep adding your blog to new directories. But that isn't really enough is it? That is why some nice people got together and started sites such as blogmad, blogexplosion and blogsoldiers. These are sites that are designed for traffic exchange. A traffic exchange site is where most of the bloggers go for their traffic needs.

In such sites, you surf other blogs from around the globe and earn credits. These credits are then redeemed by the sites in exchange for traffic from other bloggers doing the same thing as you did. Usually the ratio of visits to other blogs by visits to your blog is 2:1. That is, only half the number of credits. But, in blogmad, unlike the other two, the ratio is 1:1.

The quality of this traffic is highly debatable. But in the early days of a blog, this traffic would surely be a welcome addition to the already meager count of visitors. Maybe a few of them might notice you and turn regular readers.

Oh and by the way, you need something to track all the traffic. How else are you gonna know how many people view your blog. There are lots of online tool sites that will help you sort out this problem. Two such sites are given below...

Sitemeter
Statcounter
Needstat

Personally, I use sitemeter but statcounter is just as good (if not better) than sitemeter. Moreover, these are temporary ones. They can only log 100 visits. So if your visitors exceed 100 between checks, use nedstat which keeps a much larger log.

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Thursday, November 2, 2006

Directories... Can't Live without 'em!

Remember the 'Quality Inbound Links' that I mentioned in my previous post? Well, the best way to get a few of them is through Directories. You may be wondering what I mean by 'Quality'. The quality of a web-page in this context, is its search-engine ranking of that particular web-page. If a link emanates from a highly ranked page to your site, that augurs well with our buddies the spiders (bots). They think more highly of you as a web-site. If a lot of such 'Quality' links point to your site, rest-assured you will have a fairly high ranking. But be warned, links aren't the only criterion for the ranking.

The most coveted ranking is the Google PageRank. Click on to this site to see the current page-rank of your web-site. This ranking is used by Google to decide how far along the results page your site should appear. Of-course, the higher you are, the more search-related traffic you get. And we all know what that means! More Money! There are many other methods to increase your inbound-links. We'll see them in later posts.

On the sidebar, I will be continuously updating the links of directories that I submit this site to. You can use them to submit to the directories. But I suggest that you find some more of your own directories and submit away. Below are the list of some of the big and best directories...

  • ODP - The Open Directory Project, is undoubtedly one of the biggies. Tough to get into though. Used by Google!
  • Yahoo! Directory - The name says it all... And of course, used by Yahoo!
  • Blog Catalog - A directory meant specifically for blogs. Lots and lots of blogs.
Will be posting more...

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Links and SEO

To understand the importance of links to and from your site, you will have to know a little about how search engines work. I will give you a brief idea about search engines, but if you want in-depth analysis, check it out at HowStuffWorks.com.

Ever wondered how search engines search the net so fast and retrieve thousands of results within seconds? I will explain how the majority of the search-engines do this and by majority, I mean Google! First and foremost are the bots. The bots are scripts that are designed to scour the net for new and changed information. They are also called spiders. These spiders jump from page to page and index the pages onto their servers.

Now how do they jump from page to page you ask? LINKS! Each page usually has at least one link to the outside world! As soon as it spots a link it goes through to that page and indexes it. So now you know how important a link is! So the more links you have for the spider to find the more the spider likes you. And you know you have got to be liked by the spiders! On the net, they're the one's you should befriend if you need fame and fortune!

Anyway those are only outbound-links. What we really need are solid inbound-links. These are the links that will help your blog. The reasoning is that if there are a few inbound links, that means that you have something interesting on your site. But if you have more than a few links, then that means that your site has something very popular. So you rise in ranks in the search-engine. The higher the rank, the more traffic you are likely to get. The more traffic you have, the more profitable your site is gonna be! See, links are an indispensable part of fundamental Search Engine Optimization (SEO). In my next post, I'll tell you how to get some quality inbound-links to your blog. don't forget :

QUALITY INBOUND LINKS -> MORE TRAFFIC -> HIGHER PROFITS!

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Starting Off...

The first and foremost thing to do is select a good tool for your blog. By tool, I mean the software or site that will provide you with the basic functionalities. Me? I am currently blogging on the new beta version of the blogger. It has a nice, easy to use interface and is highly customizable provided, you know XML. Any blogging tool will suffice as long as it has basic blogging functionalities. Below are some of the well-known ones...

Blogger
Blogger Beta
Wordpress
MySpace
TypePad

This should get you started...

Next, you have to choose a good template for your blog. The template decides the layout, font, color, functionalities, etc. of your blog. For those of you who are blessed with a respectable knowledge of XML, editing the template in blogger beta is a breeze! If you need a good XML tutorial, you can visit A Technical Introduction to XML.

For the rest of us, all hope is not lost. There are many respectable XML gurus on the net who spend time and effort to create cool and custom templates for you. I visited one such person's blog and got this template for blogger beta. This is the link to where I got this template. I am now in the process of customizing this template. Check out some of the template sites listed below for all sorts of templates.

Blogger Templates
The Ultimate Template List


The look and feel of your site is an important factor. Don't underestimate it's importance. If you were to go to a well-designed site, you will surely check it out more than if it were a dull, boring, tough-to-navigate site. Right? You need the traffic. Trust Me. So the design and customiz-ability of your blog is IMPORTANT!

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The Beginning...

This is the first post on this blog and I am going to tell you what this blog is all about, why I felt I had to create it and how it will help you.

This blog is for all those first-time-bloggers or bloggers who-have-just-started-blogging recently. Oh, what the heck, even you expert bloggers might find something useful here. My aim is to guide you through the different phases of blogging that most of the more successful blogs (and bloggers) have gone through. And help you make money along the way.

I have found that many bloggers didn't (and don't yet) know that they can generate huge amounts of revenue from their blogs using simple methods and services. Throughout this blog, I'll take you through the steps that I will be going through to make some money for myself and record the whole thing in the form of posts. Moreover I will provide links to the services I will be using.

Everything you ever needed to earn some side-money was always with you. All you need to do is recognize the tools that the good people all over the world are providing you with and then add a dash of amazing patience to those tools and wait as your blog grows in front of you. Its one of the most beautiful things to watch since SimCity! Then you are off on your way to financial freedom...

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