tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32699911199615523142024-02-19T07:54:27.715-08:00Slow Online Wealth- A Guide to Online Money MakingHow to make money online with your web site or blog is a very popular topic. Here you'll find some different and unconventional ways to bring in traffic and revenue to your internet projects, including backlinks, SEO, Google Adsense, PayPal and much more.Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-17072581469426530852013-12-14T04:46:00.002-08:002013-12-14T05:22:28.401-08:00Can you make money with Ebates? Is it legit or a scam?Those of you who are familiar with my online money making strategies know that my (absurd) plan is to create one million web pages or online projects which each make one dollar per year. Then, just like that, I'm a millionaire!<br />
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I explore many different avenues for making money online, and stay away from the get rich quick schemes. They don't work. The ones that work for me (to varying degrees): eBay.com, Adsense, Amazon.com, Chitika, Bidvertiser and a dozen or more others that I forget about and then suddenly a little money appears in my PayPal or checking account.<br />
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<b>Let's look at Ebates</b><br />
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<a href="http://www.ebates.com/rf.do?referrerid=0SmSaLCSC6HObi6bOZK4tQ%3D%3D">Ebates</a> has been around for more than ten years and has a very simple program: sign up (only your email is required and it's free), then shop online at more than 1,600 stores (including Macys.com, Sears.com, Kohls.com, Amazon.com, Walmart.com and the list goes on), and when you make a purchase you get a little cash back which goes into your account and is distributed to you on a quarterly basis.<br />
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They also pay for referrals, so <a href="http://www.ebates.com/rf.do?referrerid=0SmSaLCSC6HObi6bOZK4tQ%3D%3D">sign up</a>, share your referral link via Facebook, Twitter, your website or blog, and see what happens. I know of one woman who signed up, booked a trip to the Caribbean and earned $64. Just think, If you book 1,000 trips per year, you'll earn $64,000. Oh wait, that isn't possible. But you get the idea.<br />
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You can shop by store or category. Often, you will get the stores' deals (coupons, sales, etc.) as well as your cash back. BONUS!<br />
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So, if you buy online and haven't signed up with Ebates yet, do it. Hopefully, through my link, but whatever. :) My Ebates affiliate link is: <a href="http://www.ebates.com/rf.do?referrerid=0SmSaLCSC6HObi6bOZK4tQ%3D%3D">http://www.ebates.com/rf.do?referrerid=0SmSaLCSC6HObi6bOZK4tQ%3D%3D</a><br />
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If you're wondering whether Ebates is legit or a scam, my research indicates that it is a respected online shopping portal which does pay you cash back when you use their service. You will get a little cash back, receive rebates, find discount coupons and be able to do all of your online shopping from one location. I say it's worth a shot. I'll let you know how much I'm raking in. Stay tuned.Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-91378123159072587792013-05-29T06:08:00.000-07:002013-11-07T12:48:28.400-08:00Making money with Ebay podcast - How I took $126 and turned it into $2,500Once upon a time, a friend and I started a business called Loading Dock Auctions, where we planned to open a storefront and sell other people's stuff on Ebay for a commission. We did it for a while, but man, that was a lot of work and we quickly realized that people wanted to sell their stuff which wasn't nearly as valuable as they believed. Initially, we just rejected the crap and looked for the diamonds in the rough, but they were few and far between and still no guarantee that the stuff would sell.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://clickoncomedy.com/SOW/SOW-2.mp3" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzf1Cpt6dxMPr6xG7Ztz0090qkd-O9Q-qEwXv3agMopaCnRHrwPM2W0OpjU-o8YEvFFlGG64iItjTOeb2glDkUUaXca0o82cNq-KO4s2o53yw6Scg4g08xwzwsYi1O56pC29zlJfXGbuA/s1600/SOWPodcastArt3x3.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://clickoncomedy.com/SOW/SOW-2.mp3">Click here to listen.</a></td></tr>
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So, I shifted my online attention to other methods of generating income. The ones I like the most are the ones which bring in residual income. Put something online, monetize it and rake in the dough. Okay, usually you don't need a rake. Maybe a cocktail fork. But money is money and if one idea brings you ten bucks a month, ten of those ideas will bring in $100.<br />
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That being said, no one who is looking to make money online should overlook Ebay. In this episode of the Slow Online Wealth Podcast I look at a few ways to pad your pocketbook with Ebay monies and share some of my success stories (like buying an antique mandolin for $126 and selling it on Ebay for $2,500).<br />
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So, give it a listen. Your feedback welcome.Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-61469783166954860912013-05-15T11:11:00.000-07:002013-05-16T05:18:50.676-07:00Slow Online Wealth Podcast is live! Give it a listen...please.I finally got off my ass and started producing the Slow Online Wealth Podcast. Sometimes you just want to listen instead of having to read all of my ramblings.<br />
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<a href="http://clickoncomedy.com/SOW/SOW-1.mp3" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZUozgpTmb2V1gNeyb95Poa43srBvD2lMlyWOZkvdTWLzNmpHaUgDEC9q-d21aLZp1FwbocbZaVVAc7QpaD2LBqfdMh3Wfz9ME6opRvMT_qljF-4aSlcFZYL3_reuNndCUxnhjbZ05Vys/s1600/SOWPodcastArt3x3.png" /></a></div>
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This first installment is simply an overview of the many topics I plan to cover in the future, including: making money on Ebay, monetizing your YouTube videos, Adsense tricks, making money with Fiverr.com, creating a free online store, using Amazon to sell your niche, and lots more.</div>
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So, please, give it a listen and I welcome your feedback, comments, heckles and suggestions.</div>
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Listen to <a href="http://clickoncomedy.com/SOW/SOW-1.mp3">SOW-Episode-1 here.</a></div>
Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-39653559974502837372012-12-12T06:36:00.000-08:002012-12-12T06:53:34.378-08:00Is Chitika.com a good alternative to AdSense?Chitika is an advertising service which offers publishers online, search-targeted textual advertising over online and mobile platforms, not unlike what Google's AdSense does. Chitika serves up over two billion ads per month. Pretty impressive.<br />
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I joined their program and began a test about a month ago, placing their code on a few of my most highly trafficked pages and those which do quite well with AdSense. Research assured me that placing their code on the same pages would not adversely affect my AdSense account or revenues. Unless, of course, some people click on a Chitika ad instead of an AdSense ad and I get substantially less money for the click.<br />
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So, how does Chitika fare in comparison? So far, not good. On just one of the pages which has Chitika code, I have had 1,377 impressions and 17 clicks in the last seven days, earning me a grand total of 31 cents. What? Less than half-a-penny per click? I don't this is going to work out.<br />
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From AdSense ads for the same page, I earned $37.20. And honestly, it's usually higher than that, but I think I lost some revenue to the 17 people who clicked on the Chitika ads.<br />
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I'm going to continue testing it on other pages, but will probably remove their program from my busier pages. Perhaps Chitika will be successful in brining in more revenue on pages that currently don't do well financially. I have seen mentioned numerous times that Chitika is more successful if you have European visitors. Hmmmm. Don't know why, but maybe I'll add the words "bloke" and "mate" to my pages and see if that helps. :)<br />
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If you have a different experience, or some tips on how to make Chitika perform better, I'd love to hear from you.<br />
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<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=interactivelunac&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=0470051051&ref=qf_sp_asin_til&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe>
<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=interactivelunac&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=0071743863&ref=qf_sp_asin_til&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe>
<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=interactivelunac&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=0470529393&ref=qf_sp_asin_til&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe>
Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-32756541060392503352012-10-02T07:55:00.000-07:002012-11-14T12:20:53.141-08:00Can you make money with Bidvertiser? Yeah, sort of...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://secure.hostgator.com/~affiliat/cgi-bin/affiliates/clickthru.cgi?id=rainyghost-GWS" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://tracking.hostgator.com/img/Discount_Shared/Hostgator-new-_AN-468x60-1.gif" /></a></div>
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Sometimes, I'll find a potential revenue source, set it up and activate it, then forget all about it. I mean completely forget about it.<br />
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That's what I did with bidvertiser.com. What is Bidvertiser? BidVertiser is an online advertising network offering site-targeted pay-per-click (PPC) text ads and image ads. <br />
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So, apparently I set up an account with them in October 2011 and added their code to some of my pages on both my <a href="http://interactivelunacy.com/">Interactive Lunacy</a> site and my <a href="http://hookedondroid.com/">Hooked on Droid</a> site. Then, I pushed their existence from my mind.<br />
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While updating Interactive Lunacy, I ran across a page that had Bidvertiser code. So I went to my email, searched for a username and password, found it and logged in. That's when I discovered that I added their code to some pages. The problem is, I don't know which pages have the code (except the one I ran across) and I have lots of pages. Somehow, though, the code that was on the page that I found didn't seem to be active. So, I'm not sure if it's been displaying properly anyway.<br />
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But, forget about all that, I just want to go to my reports for the last year and see if I made any money. I knew it couldn't be much because I don't recall getting any money from them, but because of my master plan (10,000 websites each making $8.00 per year will bring in $80,000), I had to check. And Woo Hoo! from October 2011 until October 2012 I made $8.87. That's almost up to their payment threshold of $10 to actually give me my money.<br />
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So, is it worth it, considering that $8 is just a mediocre Google AdSense day on some individual pages on that same site? Maybe. But now I have to do more work to see whether Bidvertiser plays nice with my other revenue generators.<br />
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According to some, Google doesn't allow Bidvertiser ads on the same pages as AdSense ads. That doesn't seem to be the case. However, most users who display both ads are reporting that Bidvertiser does not give nearly the return of AdSense ads, and sometimes the ad relevance is a bit askew on Bidvertiser.<br />
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From what I recall, I probably only had Bidvertiser code on two of my pages over two domains. And I made $8.87. So, had I put the code on 100 pages it COULD have generated over $800. Again, that's not good at all when compared to my better AdSense pages.<br />
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So, what I'm going to do in the relatively near future (too many projects...not a bad thing), is pick a couple of my moderately trafficked pages and remove (gulp) the AdSense ads (or not) and insert Bidvertiser ads.<br />
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Stay tuned. I'll let you know.<br />
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Oh, and if you wish to give Bidvertiser a try, here is the email referral request they gave me. Use it.<br />
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Hi,<br />
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I have just signed with a company that allows me to run text-ads on my website and they pay me each time someone clicks on the ad. The best thing is that they pay me via PayPal with a minimum of only $10.<br />
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The company is called BidVertiser, here is the link to use:<br />
<a href="http://www.bidvertiser.com/bdv/bidvertiser/bdv_ref.dbm?Affiliate_ID=25&Ref_Option=pub&Ref_PID=421774">http://www.bidvertiser.com/bdv/bidvertiser/bdv_ref.dbm?Affiliate_ID=25&Ref_Option=pub&Ref_PID=421774</a></div>
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Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-71173281897008137032012-09-27T09:29:00.000-07:002012-10-02T08:42:21.962-07:00Making money on the internet - it's a numbers game<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://secure.hostgator.com/~affiliat/cgi-bin/affiliates/clickthru.cgi?id=rainyghost-GWS" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://tracking.hostgator.com/img/Shared/468x60.gif" /></a></div>
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A lot of people sit around and wait for something good to happen. You know the type: "When I win the lotto" or "I can't wait until Spielberg calls." And then there's us. The ones who spend a lot of time trying to discover how to pursue our passion and make a little (or a lot) of scratch (aka: how do I make money from the Internet?).<br />
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I'm certainly not an online marketing superstar, but I do okay. Why? Because I try lots of different approaches to writing, blogging and selling online, then stick to the ones that seem to work. In sales, the more calls you make, the more deals you get. In online money making endeavors, the more things you try, the more likely some of them will succeed.<br />
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Here's a few to consider, if you don't already:<br />
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<strong>Can you make money with Google AdSense?</strong><br />
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Although you are at their mercy, Google's AdSense program works pretty well for me. Once accepted into the AdSense program, you log into their interface, set up channels (to help you track your ads), choose an ad size, get the code and paste it into your html. Then the good robots at Google generate ads relevant to the content on your page.<br />
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Of course, this works best if your content contains the words that make the robots pick the right ads, but that is another problem to address.<br />
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I am lucky enough to have some pages which get 50,000+ visitors per month. Those ads, because of the reasonable traffic and click-through ratio make up the bulk of my Google AdSense money. <br />
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The downside of AdSense, of course is that you cannot choose specific ads and really have no idea as to which ads are working or how much they pay. I have had AdSense ads pay as little as a penny per click, as well as over $20.<br />
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One of the other negatives about AdSense is that they can change the rules whenever they want, and it may adversely affect your revenue. Or, visa versa, I reckon.<br />
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<strong>Fiverr.com can pad your revenue stream five bucks at a time</strong><br />
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In a nutshell, fiverr is another niche finding situation. Find a niche that works for you (singing in your underwear or creating great graphics) and you'll get some orders. I write articles, scripts and some graphic design on fiverr and it has been a pretty nice little additional revenue stream. Read my review of <a href="http://slowonlinewealth.blogspot.com/2012/03/fiverrcom-wants-to-know-what-youll-do.html">fiverr.com here.</a><br />
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<strong>Make money by creating website, after website, after website</strong><br />
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If you know how to create and promote websites, you're ahead of the game. You can purchase domains, create new sites, monetize them in a variety of ways, and even if it isn't all that successful (until you find the one that goes viral), all you really need is to make five or ten bucks a month to cover your costs.<br />
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If you're looking for a cost-effective hosting solution, I strongly recommend <a href="http://secure.hostgator.com/~affiliat/cgi-bin/affiliates/clickthru.cgi?id=rainyghost">HostGator.com.</a> Not only will you pay less than five bucks for hosting, but their interface will walk you through designing the site as well.<br />
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In some cases, I have a blog and a web site with essentially identical content. Check out <a href="http://hookedondroid.com/">HookedOnDroid.com</a> and <a href="http://hookedondroid.blogspot.com/">http://hookedondroid.blogspot.com</a> to see what I mean. This affords me the opportunity to put affiliate ads, Adsense ads, independent ads, etc., on two separate sites.<br />
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Another method of generating revenue is a review site or blog. One of my sites <a href="http://walkersforseniorsreviews.com/">WalkersForSeniorsReviews.com</a> is an example you can use as a model for your own ideas. Simply put, you want to find products that people are actually buying and reviewing (positively) online, write reviews of a number of the top sellers, and provide a link to where they can actually buy the item.<br />
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Of course, you'll have to promote and optimize each of your sites individually, but like I said, it's a numbers game. The more opportunities you have to make money, the more money you're going to make.<br />
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<strong>Sell ad space on your sites</strong><br />
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This is kind of obvious, but not so easy. Before you can solicit others to buy ad space on your pages, you'll need to be able to show reports as to how much traffic you are getting and prove the relevence to the potential client. Once you have all your ducks in a row, you can get a lot of ideas as to potential advertisers by observing the kinds of ads that just show up with Google's AdSense. Then, email them with a proposal and see what sticks. I have picked up some relatively high paying advertisers using this method.<br />
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<strong>Affiliate ads</strong><br />
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There are so many affiliates out there it's mind boggling. Amazon.com of course is one of the main players, but there are thousands of others. You could go through the trouble of applying with every website that you'd like to be an affiliate for (like jcp.com, Target.com, Lowes.com, Macys.com, Ebay.com, etc.), or you can get an account with a company like Viglink which will essentially hook you up to all of them (and lots more).<br />
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Without going into all of the details here, Viglink makes it so that if you add their javascript to your page, any time you mention any one of thousands of affiliates they have, it will become a hyperlink which is tracked, and you will earn a commision for any sales that occur. If you use a service like Viglink.com, you have to adjust your writing so that you give attention to words that will turn into hyperlinks, but this is a very good way to monetize your pages without even thinking about it.<br />
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If you want to be successful making money online, I think you need to be either really lucky, have an amazing, one-of-a-kind idea, or put in lots of time and build up your traffic and revenue slowly. I pretty much do the latter.<br />
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But, hey, the way I figure is, if I put up 10,000 web pages that all make one dollar a month...I'm making $10,000 per month. <br />
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Back to work.<br />
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<br />Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-38975029956528495022012-03-13T09:43:00.003-07:002012-07-22T07:30:32.500-07:00Fiverr.com wants to know what you'll do for five bucks. I'm making money.[NOTE: July 22, 2012] Since first writing this article about fiverr.com I have done more than 50 gigs, never had a major issue with payment, have 100% positive reviews and have been elevated to Level 2, which allows you to charge up to $25 for each individual gig. Ain't getting rich, but extra money is great when you find your niche.]<br />
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I don't even remember how I ran across Fiverr.com, but I know I loved the concept right from the beginning.<br />
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Fiverr.com is a website which offers visitors the opportunity to purchase a number of products and services, with every one of them costing five dollars (sort of). Some of the offerings are commonly needed business services like logo design, banner ad creation, testimonial videos, script and copy writing. Others are WAY more bizarre. Such as a guy who will sing happy birthday to whomever you want (or another message) with balloons and confetti while taking a bath. Or maybe you'd like to have a girl recite your message while hula hooping in a bikini. Not your cup of tea? Then you're probably interested in a guy who will write your message on his fat hairy belly for five dollars. No? Odd. I thought everyone was looking for that, but just didn't know where to purchase it.<br />
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Being intrigued, I set up an account and then pondered what I could do, or would be willing to do, for five dollars. I won't tell you some of my ideas, but stay tuned, I just might actually do some of them.<br />
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What I settled on were the two following "gigs." 1)<a href="http://fiverr.com/rainyghost/design-a-custom-banner-ad-or-website-header"> I will design a custom banner ad or website header for $5</a>; and 2)<a href="http://fiverr.com/rainyghost/write-a-funny-video-testimonial-script"> I will write a FUNNY video testimonial script for $5.</a><br />
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[NOTE: If you try to visit the above pages and the links are no good, that's because I suspended them due to getting too much work. Which is a good thing. You can see some of my recent fiverr gigs in my <a href="http://garyportfolio.blogspot.com/">portfolio blog</a>.]<br />
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After I launched these gigs, I figured I'd see if I got any takers, do a couple of jobs (which my wife kept reminding me that it wasn't worth the time for five bucks), try to get paid and then report on everything to you guys, here in the blog. Well, as it turns out, I've done about twelve gigs so far (in just a little over a month) and have elevated my status to Level One, which allows me to add on more stuff to my gigs and get paid more than five dollars.<br />
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So, even though I couldn't imagine making enough money to quit my night job <a href="http://clickoncomedy.com/">(stand-up comedy)</a> or writing my other Smartphone technology blog <a href="http://hookedondroid.com/">(Hooked On Droid),</a> I'm also not going to stop doing the Fiverr gigs. <br />
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So, even if you only want to get a few laughs by checking out what other people are actually willing to do for five dollars, I'd visit the web site and check it out. Who knows, you may discover that you're willing to pee someone's corporate message in the snow while juggling cupcakes.<br />
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[NOTE] Here's a couple of other ways you may want to try to make some extra money online. Maybe a lot. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004ZS965S/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=interactivelunac&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B004ZS965S">The YouTube Money Machine- How To Make Money Online With YouTube</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=interactivelunac&l=as2&o=1&a=B004ZS965S" style="margin: 0px;" width="1" /> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0974571792/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=interactivelunac&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0974571792">Make Money Online: How I Created a Six Figure Income Giving Away a Dead Guy's Book</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=interactivelunac&l=as2&o=1&a=0974571792" style="margin: 0px;" width="1" />. Hey, ya never know what will work for you.Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-81395871758231640502011-12-08T05:20:00.000-08:002011-12-08T05:20:56.864-08:00Groupon and Living Social are great, but Moolala pays you for daily deals- program reviews<a href="http://garyt.moolala.com/?pid=91G4VV6&cid=YJDUM8Z&aid=XRT3JNR"><img alt="Moolala Banner" border="0" height="47" src="http://www.moolala.com/images/banners/moolala_728x90_earn.png" width="400" /></a><br />
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I don't know about you, but I use coupons whenever I can to save money on food, clothes, gas and whatever else anyone will allow me to. I sign up for every emailing list and often use the coupons that are mailed to me to make purchases for dinner, groceries, vitamins, etc. I use <a href="http://hookedondroid.com/shopkickappreview.html">Shopkick</a> on my Android phone to acquire points for just visiting stores and looking at products and, most of all, I use the daily deal web sites and Smartphone apps.<br />
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The two biggest daily deal programs are <a href="http://www.groupon.com/r/uu34531592">Groupon</a> and Living Social. I have no interest in most of what they're offering, but once in a while I'll see a deal I can't pass up. Like Italian dinner for four with two appetizers, four entrees and four drinks for $39 at a restauant near me. Or maybe someone to clean my house for half-price. I'm in.<br />
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While Groupon will give you ten bucks for each person you refer, and Living Social will give you your deal for free, the newer kid on the block, <a href="http://garyt.moolala.com/">Moolala</a>, will pay you every time someone in your matrix buys any of the daily deals.<br />
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I signed up for Moolala and sort of forgot about it. I told some friends via Facebook and put a few banner links on some of my web sites, but didn't pay much attention. I was still getting the daily deals from them, so I'd glance at the deal and if I wasn't interested I'd hit delete. <br />
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Then one day, I noticed at the top of one of their daily deal email blasts that they listed the number of people in my matrix (you also get paid when friends of friends buy) and how much money I made. Hmmmm.<br />
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I highly recommend participating in all of these daily deal programs. Firstly, you may save a lot of money on purchases you would have made anyway, and as a bonus you may earn actual cash or free stuff. So, sign up through the links on this page (see how that works). Then place banner ads on your web sites and blogs, write about it in your blogs, share it on Facebook and Twitter. You're helping others out, and pocketing some cash.<br />
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You ain't gonna get rich quick, but every little bit helps. Diversify.Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-11350674025365095802011-11-11T06:54:00.000-08:002011-11-11T06:54:31.977-08:00Alternative revenue streams to Adsense - Bidvertiser review<div>As I watch my Google traffic and revenue plummet, I am more dilligently trying to find other legitimate advertising revenue streams for my web sites. I don't know what Google has done to affect the referral and organic search aspect of their robot, I just know that whatever they did, it sucks for me.</div><div> </div><div>My most visited entertainment oriented web site, <a href="http://interactivelunacy.com/">Interactive Lunacy</a>, which has had nearly 1.25 million unique visitors since I began tracking it, has seen its traffic go down about 35% and the revenue from that site down more than 60%. If this is the result of changes that Google has made to their engine, I'm not exactly sure how this makes any sense when it's causing Google's Adsense publishers to find ways to replace AdSense ads with other ads. Sure, it may benefits the AdWords paying customers a little, but once you get to the non-paying listings Google will be sending visitors to websites which no longer feature AdSense ads. And that is good, Google people, how?</div><div> </div><div>As I searched for other ad publishing options, one that frequently popped up in my searches was <a href="http://bidvertiser.com/">BidVertiser</a>. Just because it shows up in Google doesn't mean it's good or even legitimate but it seemed like it was worth giving a try. At least for starters I know that their staff knows how to administer a decent dose of SEO.</div><div> </div><div>The sign up and approval process was easy. After signing up, you seem to be approved immediately. I then went to their ad template link and created a 468 x 60 banner ad which I placed on a few of my Interactive Lunacy reasonably trafficked web pages. My CTR (Click Through Ratio) for Adsense Ads, at it's current terrible rate is between 1.5 and 9%. After having Bidvertiser ads on my site for a couple of weeks so far, my CTR is 0%. Not one click yet with a few hundred page views.</div><div> </div><div>Although they claim that advertisers bid on your online real estate which should make ads relevant, I see no indication that the Bidvertiser ads running on my pages are in any way related to my content. They all seem to be those deceptive "Download - Play" ads.</div><div> </div><div>They also had slide-up ads, which they claimed received a higher CTR, but I didn't see that (obviously, with no clicks at all). Since I find those ads to be very annoying, I disallowed the slide-ups, hoping that I'd get an occasional click. Still...nothing.</div><div> </div><div>So, my initial impression of the Bidvertiser program: Primarily Poopy. I will now search for other possible revenue streams to add to the reduced Adsense money. I'll keep you posted.</div><div> </div>Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-49690639377399436042011-10-26T06:27:00.000-07:002011-10-26T06:27:01.822-07:00If you want to make money on the internet you need a web site - even a free one like thisThere are so many different ways to (allegedly) make money online that I'm sometimes overwhelmed as to which ones to explore. There are dozens of affiliate programs, ad programs, content locking programs, pyramid schemes, ebooks, and the list goes on.<br />
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But, there is usually one constant: you need a website that offers something. It could be entertainment and the way to make money is through AdSense ads or funy products from Amazon or other affilliate programs. You could <a href="http://walkersforseniorsreviews.com/">review a particular type of product</a> and have links so the visitors can actually buy them. You might have naked pictures of your best friend's sister's boyfriend's brother's cousin that people will pay to see. But, ya gots to have a website of some type.<br />
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The easiest website to get a "website" is to start a blog like this one. You just jump through a few hoops and you will have a spiffy interface at which you can learn to create page after page after page of content about whatever the hell you're trying to share.<br />
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But, ain't nobody coming.<br />
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So, you have to promote. And after that, you have to promote. Then you need to go into promotion mode. After which time you get back to promoting.<br />
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If you have basic web design skills and html knowledge you are a bit ahead of the game because you can implement your ideas and have more control over the meta content and SEO factors that you have with blogging or free website programs. In that case, have both. That's what I do.<br />
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One of my websites which does pretty well in its pretty large niche market is <a href="http://hookedondroid.com/">Hooked On Droid.</a> This site basically reviews apps for Android, iPhone, Blackberry and other Smartphones. Sometimes I write about what the companies involved are doing, like Google buying Motorola Mobile and such. A little revenue (and I emphasize the "little"). Virtually all of the content can also be found at the <a href="http://hookedondroid.blogspot.com/">Hooked On Droid blog.</a> Both of which are promoted extensively on all of my Twitter accounts including the <a href="http://twitter.com/hookedondroid">Hooked On Droid Twitter</a> account.<br />
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See what I just did there? I created backlinks from this blog to three of my Hooked On Droid pages. As you know (or should) backlinks are huge.<br />
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After you create your website and/or blog, you must spend as much time as possible fine-tuning the page content, meta content, searching for places to list your site, comment in forums and on other blogs, always inclued a link to your site in your signature (sneaky but effective backlink), visit competitors, check out their meta content, ask to be a guest blogger at related blogs, the list goes on and on.<br />
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Get started right now! Choose a niche, and if you can't create a website (yet) go make a blog. Get the feel for sharing your passion or idea. Add appropriate, relevant labels (tags) and tell all of your Facebook friends and Twitter followers. (If you don't have FB and Twitter accounts you gotta go do that right now too). <br />
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You're gonna be busy.<br />
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Then, stay tuned, because we'll be looking not only ways to earn money from your website or blog, but also learn about many free programs to check how you're doing (keyword analyzers, meta tag analyzers, viewing backlinks, etc.). <br />
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Okay, get to work. And keep me posted.Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-90278859928839237082011-10-17T07:26:00.000-07:002011-10-28T08:30:38.684-07:00Can you make money online with adfly and does it affect your Google traffic?<strong>Review of adfly (adf.ly): The url shortening service that pays! </strong><br />
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As I am always on the lookout for new ways to generate income from my web sites and blogs, I was intrigued with adfly (<a href="http://adf.ly/">http://adf.ly/</a>). They have a number of ways to help publishers make money from their blogs and web sites, and you can even generate revenue from content that isn't even yours.<br />
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<strong>Shorten url's</strong><br />
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The first way to make a little money is to use their url shortening service. In a nutshell, it works pretty much like tiny url and bit.ly in that you can put in a longer web address, and it will shorten it to a more Twitter-friendly address.<br />
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Example: I recently put up a comedy spoof page about online dating. Essentially, it's just a little javascript which types in what I want, while you're typing in what you want. (I know, that doesn't make a lot of sense, but just try it and you'll see what I mean.)<br />
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So, I took the long url for that page, logged into my adfly account and shortened it. Adfly then gives me a shorter url which, when you visit it, forces you to see an ad for five seconds before you can skip it and go to the page your originally intended. Here is the <br />
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adfly url: <a href="http://adf.ly/3FolD">http://adf.ly/3FolD</a><br />
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The actual page you are being directed to is: <a href="http://interactivelunacy.com/FindPartner2.html">http://interactivelunacy.com/FindPartner2.html</a><br />
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Since you do not host the shortened url, the way that you generate money is to promote that address. The most common way that can be done is through your social media sites (Twitter, Facebook, etc.). However, since the final destination is a page which I do own, I'm not really comfortable with forcing people to wait five seconds to get to my page, so except for a little testing, I don't think I want to play this game. Actually, the main reason I don't want to engage in this activity is that the amount of money that you make is very small.<br />
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However, if you have a gazillion followers on Twitter or a bazillion friends on Facebook, this could generate reasonable extra money for you.<br />
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<strong>If you own websites</strong><br />
Adfly has two methods to make money if you own your own web site(s): <br />
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When you log into your adf.ly account you'll see a link which says: Do you run a website? Click on the link and you'll be taken to a page which will provide you with some javascript code to add in the body of your html. There are two types of ads you can insert: the first is just like the url shortening feature where, when the visitor enters your site's url, they must wait five seconds before they can skip the full page ad. The other is called Top Banner and requires that you change one line of the code so that the featured ad only appears at the top of the screen.<br />
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The Top Banner is the least obtrusive ad, and also the worst paying.<br />
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I played around with all three of these methods on about ten of my moderately trafficked pages. My traffic on the hosted pages was down, probably because most people are like me. If I get to a page which displays a full page ad that I have to wait to skip, I just hit my back button and get the hell out of there.<br />
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On one occasion the full page ad which was displayed required that I click on the advertiser's little javascript annoyance 30 times before I could actually leave the damned ad page. Not acceptable.<br />
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The oddest thing, and I don't really know if there is any connection, but as soon as I started adding adfly ads to three of my domains, my overall traffic went down big time. Like five times less traffic. And, consequently, I made a lot less money from my bread and butter Google AdSense ads.<br />
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For my purposes I don't think adf.ly is a good additon to my roster of ways to make money with my online endeavors. After using adf.ly on about eight or nine of my pages, I only generated a little over 20 cents. Not to mention (wait, I just mentioned it) that my AdSense revenue also diminished five times.<br />
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Nice try adfly, but not for me.Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-86703999636657050172011-10-05T08:40:00.000-07:002011-10-05T09:01:08.817-07:00How to generate traffic to your blogs and web sites with Twitter - and make money<div>I didn't get Twitter right away. I mean I "got" it (as in set up an account), but I didn't really see how it could be a beneficial business tool at first. It just seemed like a way to discover what your friends, family or favorite celebrity had for breakfast.</div><br />
<div></div><div>I sort of get it now.|</div><br />
<div></div><div>What follows is an overview of some of the ways that I use Twitter accounts to build not only Twitter followers but also readers of my blogs and visitors to my web sites.<br />
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</div><div></div><div>As is always the case with social networking applications, one of the keys is to not toot your own horn too much. If every Tweet or blog posting is nothing more than links to your own stuff, your followers may get tired of your shameless promotion and Unfollow. (I still break this rule a bit too often, but just mentioning it may help remind me to knock it off.)<br />
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</div><div></div><div>If you have multiple interests and more than one blog and/or web site, then you should also have multiple Twitter accounts. Some of my Twitter accounts are related (ie: humor oriented), so I have the additional traffic generating opportunity of Retweeting my own Tweets. More on that in a bit.<br />
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</div><div></div><div>So, by way of example, let's start with my <a href="http://jokingsmoker.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">http://jokingsmoker.blogspot.<wbr>com</a> blog. Initially, this blog was to consist of primarily cigar and smoking accessory reviews and information. But, as it turns out, it's the one I use to rant and write whatever is on my mind, so I want to reach more readers than just cigar smokers.<br />
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</div><div></div><div>So, my initial Twitter account, which was connected to this blog is <a href="http://twitter.com/cigarponderings">http://twitter.com/cigarponderings</a>. Whenever I would write a review of a cigar or smoking accessory I would log into my cigarponderings Twitter account and post a blurb about and a link to the blog. This informed my followers that I posted something new (since I don't see a lot of blog subscribing these days), and also alerted the search engines that my blog had another backlink (which helps improve rankings).<br />
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</div><div></div><div>Once this initial process is complete (writing the blog and linking to in from Twitter), it was time to further promote the blog post.<br />
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First stop, Facebook.<br />
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</div><div></div><div>Since there is a whole community of cigar smokers and afficianados on FB, I make it a point to visit a number of FB groups and post a link to my new blog entry. (Yay! More backlinks.) Of course, this is after I post the same link on my wall.<br />
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</div><div></div><div>Then, back to Twitter, where, one by one, I log into my other Twitter accounts and Retweet my twitter post. Since I have a whole bunch of Twitter accounts for all of my varied interests, this does increase (although not dramatically) the interest and traffic to your Twitter account and the blog.<br />
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</div><div></div><div>If you follow my Twitter accounts and check out the postings, you'll see that usually each of them Retweets the others.<br />
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</div><div></div><div>There is a slight advantage to creating a completely different posting for each of your Twitter accounts (as opposed to Retweeting), but it's much more time consuming to do each one separately. However, if you only have a couple of accounts, this does afford you the ability to add different #hashmarks and @ information at the end of your message so that different Twitterers may find it when searching for different keywords.<br />
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Here's an example of a jokingsmoker Twitter post: <br />
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<div class="tweet-row"><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text">"Spitball gun confiscated in algebra class cuz it was a weapon of math disruption. More puns: <a class="twitter-timeline-link" data-display-url="bit.ly/obfKOK" data-expanded-url="http://bit.ly/obfKOK" data-ultimate-url="http://interactivelunacy.com/puns.html/" href="http://t.co/yBdDVSa1" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" title="http://interactivelunacy.com/puns.html/"><span style="color: #2d76b9;">http://bit.ly/obfKOK</span></a> <a class=" twitter-atreply pretty-link" data-screen-name="omgthatspunny" href="http://twitter.com/#!/omgthatspunny" rel="nofollow"><span style="color: #2d76b9;"><s>@</s>omgthatspunny</span></a> <a class=" twitter-hashtag pretty-link" href="http://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23punny" rel="nofollow" title="#punny"><s class="hash">#</s>punny</a>"</div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text">Now, since I have another account (<a href="http://twitter.com/comedygary">http://twitter.com/comedygary</a>), I have two choices: 1) log into that account and RT (Retweet) the spitball posting, or 2) rewrite the posting with different hashmarks and at signs:</div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><div class="tweet-row"><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><br />
"Spitball gun confiscated in algebra class cuz it was a weapon of math disruption. More puns: <a class="twitter-timeline-link" data-display-url="bit.ly/obfKOK" data-expanded-url="http://bit.ly/obfKOK" data-ultimate-url="http://interactivelunacy.com/puns.html/" href="http://bit.ly/obfKOK" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" title="http://interactivelunacy.com/puns.html/"><span style="color: #2d76b9;">http://bit.ly/obfKOK</span></a> #funny @comedycentral"</div><br />
<div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text">You get the idea. </div><br />
<div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text">And of course, when you do click on the link to see more puns (on my <a href="http://interactivelunacy.com/">http://interactivelunacy.com/</a> web site), you will also see banner ads to some of my other web sites and blogs and maybe visit them as well.</div><br />
<div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text">Additonally, if you're lucky enough to attract readers to your Twitter account because they searched for something you posted, this also gives them an opportunity to click on whatever links you may have in your Twitter profile, further promoting your web sites and blogs.</div><br />
<div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text">In my case, the main purpose of most of this is to generate readers, traffic and hopefully revenue from visitors clicking on the ads on my pages.</div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><br />
Perhaps just checking out a bunch of my Twitter postings on my Twitter accounts will help it make more sense of this:</div><br />
<div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><a href="http://twitter.com/jokingsmoker">http://twitter.com/jokingsmoker</a><br />
<a href="http://twitter.com/cigarponderings">http://twitter.com/cigarponderings</a><br />
<a href="http://twitter.com/comedygary">http://twitter.com/comedygary</a></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><a href="http://twitter.com/2funnyshow">http://twitter.com/2funnyshow</a></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><a href="http://twitter.com/hookedondroid">http://twitter.com/hookedondroid</a></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><a href="http://twitter.com/magicexposed">http://twitter.com/magicexposed</a></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><a href="http://twitter.com/getwealthyslow">http://twitter.com/getwealthyslow</a></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><br />
So, if you haven't yet created a Twitter account, do it now. Even if only to observe and learn. And make sure you search for others with similar interests and follow them. There's a good chance they'll return the favor and follow you.</div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"><br />
Then all you have to do is come up with something to say. </div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"></div><div class="tweet-text js-tweet-text"></div></div></div></div></div>Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-70023155330139871292011-09-13T06:10:00.000-07:002011-09-13T06:13:51.711-07:00How to make money blogging - check list for starting a business onlineBack in the days of brick and mortar, in order to start a business you had to have some capital and a line of credit to get things off the ground. Today, you need a good idea, a computer, some learnable skills, an Internet connection and, most importantly, passion for your project.<br />
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For lack of a better phrase, I'm going to call what I'm outlining here a business model. This model, although simple, still requires a lot of work, determination and you have to learn to laugh in the face of disaster when nobody seems to care about your project. Until they do.<br />
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<iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=0470616342&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe>The business model is simple: create a blog or web site focusing on a specific topic or product line and then let web surfers know about it through literally thousands of different online marketing methods.<br />
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Let's say your idea is to have a blog which covers Alternative Music. The blog may consist of articles that you write reviewing bands, concerts and recordings, as well as gossip you uncover about the musicians themselves. Here is a list of things I think you'll need to spend some time on to get your project off the ground.<br />
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<strong>1) Secure your domain name or blog.</strong><br />
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Even though you probably won't actually be posting anything just yet, spend a lot of time thinking about what you want to call your blog and/or what domain name you want for your web site. Research similar sites and bookmark every one of them for future reference. <br />
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As far as a domain name goes, we shall go with "alternativemusicgossip.com" (which is actually available if anyone wishes to grab it and try this very idea). But wait, what if you don't want to purchase a domain name and have a monthly or annual hosting fee? No problem. You can create your "web site" using any of many free blogging sites. Personally, I use Google's blogspot program because I initially figured that placing Google Adsense ads would be much simpler since they own the whole ball of wax. Use the same care in creating your blog name. If you wish to use Google's blogspot, you'll need a Gmail account. I create a new Gmail account for each blog to help keep them separate and that allows you to create different, distinct profiles for each of your blogs. <br />
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Once you have your blog set up, play around with it if you wish. Check out different looks. Write a draft of one of your ideas. Start working on your description. Then, move on to step two.<br />
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<strong>2) Decide how you plan to make money from your blog.</strong><br />
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Are you creating a blog to just share information? If so, you'll want to explore affiliate and ad serving networks like Amazon and Google's AdSense. Do you have actual products you want to sell? Then you'll need to set up some sort of shopping cart and some method of accepting payment. There are lots of options out there, but I use PayPal's. It's free (you pay them a little piece only when you sell something) and most people seem to have a PayPal account. Again, do your own research and find a solution that fits you best. <a href="http://interactivelunacy.com/talkingshirt">Here is a page I created for one of my allegedly funny products</a> which utilizes all three of the above mentioned services: AdSense, Amazon.com and PayPal's shopping cart. If the visitor doesn't want to buy my t-shirt, they may be interested in whatever ad was served up by AdSense or one of the Amazon product ads I have featured on the page.<br />
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So, once you have your blog set up (though not yet live), then I suggest getting started on your methods of bringing in money. Get an Adsense account. Get an affiliate account with Amazon. Set up your PayPal account. Then read, read read. They all have great tutorials, FAQ's and forums to help you along.<br />
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Another great thing about these specific services is that Google has created widgets embedded right into your blog interface to add Amazon products and Adsense ads with just a couple of clicks. More on that in future postings, but you'll probably figure it out by then.<br />
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<strong>3) Promote your page.</strong><br />
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This is the part that never ends. In the course of trying to let people know about your blog you will find approximated four gazillion ways to get your name out there. A lot of them sound really good, but suck. Some of them are very effective for targeted audiences. The one that I know works for sure is simply minding your SEO (search engine optimization).<br />
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The major search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing are essentially a robot which searches your pages (and the whole rest of the planet's) looking for the specific words that the web surfer typed in. If those relevant words are somewhere on your page (preferably in the title), your page will be ranked (once it's indexed by the engine). The trick is to manipulate your keywords and descriptions so that yours comes up before your competitors.<br />
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Believe me, that ain't easy.<br />
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I could spend screen after screen just talking about this topic (and many blogs do), but I'm going to just cover the basics which should help you be on your way to learning and implementing more.<br />
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Put on your thinking cap and ask yourself, "What words would I key into a search engine if I were trying to find what it is I'm offering?" Then, search those words and see what comes up. If you find a web site that you particularly like, you can see what additional information they may have hiding in the background by viewing their page source and checking out their meta tags (way more on this in the future). Just go up to the top of your browser and click on View and then Source (or something similar depending on your browser), and you will be able to see all of the code used to create the web site or blog you are viewing. You will most likely see meta keywords, title, meta description and alt tags on photos and images. These are all ways that you can add extra frequency of the words that you think are most important in conveying the purpose of your blog or site.<br />
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This may seem confusing right now, but it will all fall into place later and who knows, you may just come up with a viral idea that is going to have tens of thousands of people flocking to your page and generating lots of money for you even before you figure it out. That's the exciting thing about this arena. It does happen every day.<br />
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For a page like this one, what do I think people may key into search engines to find it? Here are some ideas:<br />
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"How can I make money by blogging?"<br />
"How do I start an online business?"<br />
"Can I place ads on my blog?"<br />
"How do I make money with AdSense?"<br />
"How do I create a blog?"<br />
"Make money online."<br />
"Do people make money from blogs?"<br />
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See what I did there? I just put all of those keywords right into the body of my blog, making those relevant, descriptive phrases searchable. How did you find this page?<br />
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If you are somewhat web savvy, I recommend double-dipping (in a non-spamming way). Create a blog and duplicate the basic content (with different keywords, ads, etc.) with a web site. I do this with Hooked On Droid. Hooked on Droid is a blog/web site which reviews Smartphone apps, primarily for the Android market (although many of the apps are also available for Blackberry and iPhone). Here is the <a href="http://hookedondroid.com/">web site link</a>, and here is the<a href="http://hookedondroid.blogspot.com/"> blog link</a>. See what I'm sayin' here?<br />
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Which reminds me of my next topic (not right now), backlinks. Stay tuned.<br />
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Now get to work. And let me know how it's going.<br />
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<iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=0470573775&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe><iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=B004C44ONY&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe><iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=0672330652&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe>Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-86141257133258466332011-08-29T06:27:00.000-07:002011-08-29T06:27:54.652-07:00Making money online by selling stuff - your products, services and writing can make you money<br />
Although my online blogs currently do generate income, they weren't the first thing I did online to try to make money. After a bit of a long-winded set up, I'm going to focus on one particular page (my comedy CD page) and discuss the many ways I use that page to diversify my income opportunities.<br />
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<iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=1933596708&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe>Before I launched this blog, and a few others, inluding <a href="http://hookedondroid.blogspot.com/">Hooked On Droid</a> and <a href="http://jokingsmoker.blogspot.com/">Joking Smoker</a>, I launched some web sites which featured my other passion: comedy. I have been writing and performing stand-up comedy for many years and after hitting comedy clubs across the country for a long time, I found a niche in that arena by performing full stand-up comedy variety shows for private functions and corporate special events.<br />
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So, after a number of attempts, my main comedy site (promoting my act, not just funny stuff) is <a href="http://clickoncomedy.com/">Click On Comedy</a>. This site still remains my main money maker because if a visitor finds this site because he/she is looking to hire an entertainer for an upcoming function and ends up booking me, that's a direct sale from the web site. <br />
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Even if the visitor isn't interested in booking my act, they may end up watching some video clips and decide that they'd like to help a struggling comic by purchasing the CD <a href="http://interactivelunacy.com/comedycd">"As Funny As I Never Was."</a> This affords me another opportunity to generate some income from the site.<br />
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Now, let's spend a little time on my CD page so we can examine what's going on there and how it may give you ideas as to how to incorporate your owne niche and ideas to generate traffic and revenue.<br />
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The first thing I hope that a visitor will do is order my CD. The CD is available for only $8.00 and a simple click on the Add to Cart button will get the process started. Although there are many shopping cart options out there, I opted to use PayPal, primarily because it's reliable, respected and free. So, without going into all the detail about how to set up a shopping cart on PayPal, I'll just say that if you don't have a PayPal account, get one now. If you need to set up a shopping cart to sell whatever it is you're selling, simply follow their simple instructions. If you have any problems, feel free to email or comment and I'll do my best to assist.<br />
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So, if visitors watch some video clips and decide that they want to purchase the CD, I've made a sale. But notice the other possible ways to generate revenue on that page.<br />
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That one page has ads to other products and services that I offer, Google ads and banner ads that link to many of my other sites which may then turn into sales of a different nature.<br />
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The ad at the top of the page is a link to <a href="http://dirtyjokeshow.com/dirtyjokeshowjokebook.html">"The Dirty Joke Show" joke book</a>. I am currently co-producer of the hit Vegas production<a href="http://dirtyjokeshow.com/"> "The Dirty Show"</a> and the book is a collection of jokes that appear in the really funny show which appears nightly at Hooters Casino Hotel. Again, to purchase the book you simply click on the button and you are taken to a PayPal shopping cart.<br />
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So, in addition to having a Google Adsense account which automatically places relevant, targeted ads, I also have ads that link to my own projects. In fact, almost all of the ads at the bottom of that page take you to my other sites and blogs.<br />
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The links to my other blogs and sites serve a dual purpose: 1) visitors may go to those pages and click on a product or ad there, and 2) they act as backlinks (which are very important) to some of my other pages. By having multiple web sites and blogs you ca n get a jumpstart on getting backlinks (which are links from other sites to yours, which shows search engines that your pages have interest by other sites and make it more likely for your site to get better rankings). More on backlinks later.<br />
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So, there you have it. I know this article is probably a bit different than most of the other articles you may read on how to make money with your blog or web site, but I can assure you that these methods are effective. They take some work, but if you have a passion for your interest it's worth every minute.<br />
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<span><span><iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=1451560435&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe></span><iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=B004XDYYB6&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe><span><iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=047056556X&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe></span></span>Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3269991119961552314.post-70628693938626241062011-08-26T12:35:00.000-07:002011-08-29T06:44:33.545-07:00Want to get rich on the Internet? Me too!You're probably here because you searched "how to get rich on the internet" or "how to make money online." If your looking for some get rich quick plan or some pyramid or multi-level marketing scheme, you're in the wrong place. Even though I would love finding such a beast, I don't think it exists.<br />
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<iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=0982769601&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe>So instead, I approached this fantastic medium known as the Internet from a more practical standpoint. How can I share what I love, learn how to bring in visitors and make some money by selling products or having ads on my web pages. <br />
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I will start with my basic story, then delve into specifics:<br />
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In the mid nineties I knew that this new Internet thing was going to catch on, and being a <a href="http://clickoncomedy.com/">stand up comedian</a> who wanted to be found by comedy clubs as well as booking agents and corporations looking to hire entertainment, I knew I needed a web site. At that time the few people who knew how to write the html code (there really weren't any WYSIWYG software programs yet) charged a fortune. Literally. Then, once they designed your site they charged two to three gazillion dollars to host it on their servers. <br />
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It was clear to me that I had to learn how to do it all myself and it wasn't going to be easy because there weren't as many resources out there to teach you how to design and launch a web site. Then I remember thinking, "I'll just Google it. Oh wait. Google doesn't exist yet. In fact, neither does Yahoo!" Dammit all.<br />
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So I set out to learn the hard way, and without belaboring how I did that (because it really isn't relevent any more), I finally created a really crappy looking web page (not that my <a href="http://clickoncomedy.com/">current one </a>is really great or anything) and danced around my living room excited about the future and knowing that my calendar was going to fill up with all of the bookings that would soon be coming my way via the World Wide Web. <br />
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One problem. It didn't happen.<br />
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Why? Because simply having a web site didn't guarantee that anyone could find it. So the next step was to learn about promoting a web site. This led to learning about meta tags, and Search Engine Optimization, and all the other high learning-curve things that I knew very little about.<br />
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To make a short story just a little longer, that web site (well actually it's the second or third carnation of my comedy web site) makes me the most money of all of the web sites and blogs that I now own. And once you find your niche and your audience, I'm confident that you too can make a few bucks from your passion.<br />
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Be patient.<br />
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Stay passionate.<br />
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Read.<br />
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Observe.<br />
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Work hard.<br />
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Please subscribe to this blog and stay tuned. The rest of my story is on it's way.<br />
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<iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=160061972X&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe><iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=0966488903&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe><iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=widgetsamazon-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=1582973571&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe>Rainyghosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16966327464442241847noreply@blogger.com1