Don't Hate When You Don't Even Believe

Have you ever noticed how people claim a business isn't legit if they can't make money from it or they get frustrated when they lose money and give up because they can't make a profit from the product they are trying to promote?

I see both of those scenarios time and time again and I want to shake some sense into those who are a part of them. A good example of this comes from an empower network video produced by a woman name Jen. You can check it out here: http://jennytrecommends.empowernetwork.com/

In the video Jen talks about how she got easily bored with the products she promoted time and time again, so she almost gave up. Well, the reason she became bored was because she focused on the money and not on a product she truly loved.

If you're promoting a product you know nothing about or you wouldn't use yourself, why should your customers buy into your offer?

Believe it or not, your customers are no dummies and they'll see right past your pushy sell.

Don't let that become you! If you want to truly knock your customers dead, you have to enjoy the business you're in. You have to love the product you're selling.

Take for instance, my favorite blogging guru, John Chow. He wrote a review on empower network here: http://www.johnchow.com/taking-a-look-at-the-empower-network/

He gave his honest opinion and tried the marketing blog out, and it's what he does best. He loves blogging and technology, and of course it shows in every video, every post he does. He is a trusted blogging source. Businesses love him and customers love him!

Another good example that has earned a lot of trust is Stokes Media: http://stokesmedia.empowernetwork.com/

Have you seen their Cajun cooking show? You have no idea what you're missing if you haven't. Here's the link: http://www.cajuncookingtv.com/

Stokes does what they love the most, just like John Chow. I'm telling you, you really have to love what you're promoting or you're just not going to be as successful as you can be!

Know Your Readers

One of my old bosses is building his business online. Some of the ways he brings in an income is by way of affiliate programs. I know several other online entrepreneurs like John chow who are also making a little extra money this way. But I also know that most of these guys and gals trust in programs that they use personally or have a similar interest in.

For example, if you're a writer like I am, you might not want to consider using a weight loss affiliate to create a little extra money, since your readers are visiting your website or blog for writing or stories. However, if you have a fitness blog, this type of program would be perfect for it since many of your readers would be interested in weight loss and fitness.

Knowing who your readers are and sticking with affiliates that are similar to your website or blog's subject, gives you a better chance of becoming a successful online entrepreneur like my old boss and John Chow.

The Sour Deal of Scour and Why I'm Moving On

Well, it's official. Scour has changed or rather dropped their rewards program and suckered quite a few people into working with them to improve their search engine (a job) without any pay or rewards. Well, sorry to say, but I'm no longer one of those suckers.

Here's what the search engine had to say:


Subject: Scour has changed its Reward Program
Dear theinsanewriter,

Over the past year, Scour has received a lot of feedback regarding the rewards program and the direction of Scour. Based on user suggestions, we have decided to discontinue the Scour Points Rewards program for the time being and instead focus on using our resources to improve the search experience on Scour. We are confident that you will be very happy with the changes and updates to come.

If you would like to read more about this change, please visit our Scour Blog: http://blog.scour.com/2009/09/01/scour-focuses-on-search-and-features/

Thank you,

Team Scour

Of course I understand that times are tough thanks to the economy, but giving users something to get excited over and then never paying up is not the way to do business -at least not honestly anyway. And I'm really not sure why users would be happy over those changes. Of course if you have accumulated points with the search engine, I wouldn't expect anything from them and it's just best to chock it up or blame me if you need to towards a waste of our time.

Really I could stay with Scour, but to be honest, I find Google (despite my ill tendencies towards their ad program) to be a much better search engine even without the enticing rewards. So it's time I said goodbye to the no-rewards program (ironically you have to have permission from them to delete your account.) and move on. Hey, we live and we learn about better ways to become successful online. It's like John Chow said, never put all your eggs in one basket. There are other and better fish in the sea or maybe it's the ocean. hmmm.

In Pain, But Hopeful

I woke up this morning in pain and not sure why. There was a piercing pain through my midsection both front and back. It lasted for a few hours, but has calmed down a little now. If it continues it's probably a good idea to see a doctor. However, it's a tough call since I don't currently have insurance and can't get it. They did recently open a free clinic, so if I need to I guess I'll just drop by there. I'll keep you updated if the pain continues.

Meanwhile, as many of you may already know I like keeping up with blogger John Chow. If you're unfamiliar with who he is, he's the blogging guru who took a risk and decided to try making money online with his blog. Well, it worked and now he's known all over the world for his success.

Today I was reading one of his posts about sponsored tweets. Apparently he's made $1,000 with them in about a month's time. Damn, the man is good!

While I'm not as active as I used to be with tweeting on twitter, I've realized I miss slowing down and smelling the cappuccinos, fresh baked bread and freshly bathed babies. Of course I've already been missing out in twittering because I actually could have been twittering my way out of this economy with another way to make income. Damn it.

Well, that's what I get for not keeping up with my social clubs. I just hope you're not doing the same. I'll let you know how sponsored tweets is going when I have something to report. I think someone needs to just kick me in the ass and say hey, get busy, life isn't going to stop for you. Time to hop on that train and kick myself in the ass.lol

Online Jobs and Those Get Rich Scams

I wonder, how many online users click on those ads that say, Real Job Opportunity Online. Make Money At Home. I know not all of them are bogus ads, but how do you tell what's real and what's not.

As a freelance writer I've learned a lot about online marketing opportunities. If they say make millions in a month, week, days, etc. They're most likely a scam. I don't know anyone who's made millions that quickly. Not even online guru and blogger, John Chow. It takes time and a lot of hard work to succeed in the online world of marketing. But that shouldn't be discouraging, however.

Companies like Stokes Media and HerMedia are seeing some success and have been for a very long time. While they might not be rich, they are able to put food on the table and share their success with others using various affiliate markets and some specific programs just like the Real Job Opportunity Online. Make Money At Home ads.

So of course they're all not bogus, it's just a matter of doing your research and finding out what's real and what's not.

Here I am Working on Christmas Eve!

It's Christmas Eve and here I am online working. It's not that I really enjoy working. My job just requires me to work on days I don't want to at times. So even working online isn't all fun and games. You have crazy and odd hours just like in the real world.

There are some added benefits of working online, however. As I stated in my prior post, I get to review some great products. Everything from electronics to toys to books, to music, makeup and clothing. And you can bet your ass I'm not the only one who does this! If you hop on over to John Chow's website you'll find he reviews all kinds of electronics and gets to keep them! I haven't had the privilege of getting a new laptop or digital video camera yet, but I hope I will someday! Because everyone knows I can certainly use a new laptop!!

XR and John Chow Giving Away $6000 for a Wonderful Cause

When I first decided to launch an official site, I worried that the URL would be too long. Then, I realized that it wasn't so bad compared to my blogger url. For those that have blogger accounts you could easily redirect your url using a domain name, but what if you can't afford a domain name?

If you're like me and trying to make ends meet, XR.com allows you to create a TINY URL for free.
All you need to do is head to their website and sign up for an account. There are no fees involved. Once you have signed up, you can type in your blogger URL and reduce it to a smaller link for visitors to click on.

Once a visitor clicks on that URL it takes you to your page. Through XR's website you can select whether you want your page to be framed or non-framed. For those that want to keep the page framed, visitors can easily click a link that will allow them to remove the frame from your page.

You can also use them to shorten all of your bookmark links if you wanted to. For me, it really doesn't make much of a difference whether they are short or long.

The only disadvantage that I saw with this company is that my page took a few seconds longer than normal to load. This might be a problem if you use dial up, however for those that use anything faster it shouldn't be very noticeable.

Now, the best part about XR is they are giving away $6,000 along with the help of my favorite blogging entrepreneur John Chow. $5,000 will go to a charity of your choice and the remaining $1,000 can be spent on whatever you want to spend it on. Deadline for the giveaway is December 24th and the winner will be drawn on December 27th.

Now I'm really not expecting to win, but if I did I think I would want the $5,000 to go locally to the food bank here in Independence, Kansas. I'm not even sure that is possible, but I think it would be a wonderful way for our small town to share with those here who do not have enough food for the holidays.

Each year the Independence, Kansas food bank runs out of food around Christmas and they are always needing donations. Unfortunately we're a small town, so not many people are able to help as much as they would like. And with the economy in shambles, more and more people are losing their jobs or they are being laid off until next year.

I think donating to the bigger charities is wonderful, but there are some smaller charities who need just as much help as the bigger ones do and $5,000 would do so much for our community!

Financial Update for November

As I said mentioned earlier, I am a little behind on blogging updates, work, etc. Here is my update for the first two weeks of November's financial update and goal. I have not paid any more towards debt in these two weeks, but I plan on reducing the balance on the debt next month. The reason for this is because we have five kids we want to buy Christmas gifts for. However, I did put a little money into savings for a car.

Also, I am trying to add to my freelance projects and other online financial opportunities. I am a follower of blogger John Chow. One of his famous quotes talks about not putting all of your eggs into one basket.

However, John Chow isn't the only one who has talked about this. I was reading money magazine today and an article in the magazine suggested the same idea. I think it's a wise decision, more so because of the economic crisis that we are in. Here is my update:

November 1st thru 14th

Payu2blog: $10.00
Payperpost: $17.05
Adbrite: $0.27,
Private Sales: $150.00
Kontera: $0.00

Total: $177.32

As you can see my total dropped by over $100 compared to the last two weeks of October!!! I am hoping to raise this up again!

Don't Put All of Your Eggs in One Basket

You'll notice a few minor changes to my blog. I won't name names because there is no reason to, but I woke up to find that I was removed from an advertiser without a given reason. So I asked them about it and got the same results. Then I did a little research and learned that if you blog about something they don't like, you're dropped. Or if you have a sudden leap in visitors as I did when I wrote about actress Megan Fox (yes, she's that hot!), you're dropped.

The funny thing is I remembered John Chow's knowledge about not putting all of your eggs into one basket, so I didn't. The money that the advertiser held was ghost money to me, but when I reached the payout limit I was removed from their system and told I would not receive any money. Funny that it took me over two years to get to that very small amount. So in reality they received free advertising from my blog. I was so very generous!!! LOL

The morale to this story is, if you're putting your eggs into one basket and you are relying on that money, please don't! I learned many years ago not to rely on extra money because in the end it's never there. Now if I have it in hand, then that's great! But if it's on hold somewhere I just base my income on what I do already have and go from there.

DON'T PUT ALL OF YOUR EGGS INTO ONE BASKET!

Win John Chow's Stolen Cash

Don't you just love contests? I know I do. Even if I am not a winner, contests are always fun to enter. Take for instance, John Chow's post on Blog Word Expo -Win Cash Money. This is the second contest for winning cash money with him and Market Leverage. This time however, he's teaming up with JoeTech.com or maybe Joetech's teaming up with him? Hmmm.

It also seems, John Chow has been up to no good for his readers by stealing money from the Cashinator when no one was looking.lol In total from all of his efforts and Joe Tech's efforts someone will be winning $67! How insane is that?

If you want in on the deal, just head over to John Chow's blog and tell him so. Then if you really want in on the deal, just blog about it.

Google Adsense VS. Kontera and What John Chow Said

Google Adsense in total has made me $54.54 and I have been with them since last August. The downside to this is, I'll need a minimum of $100 before I can cash it out. Kontera in total has made me $2.01. I started working with them about a month ago.

It's not a good as google adsense, but in the long run I wonder if they'll both do equally good. I know that keywords are a big money maker when it comes to google adsense and I am now wondering if Kontera is the same way. Keywords haven't really been my strong point, but then again, I haven't really sat down and researched it either. I mean what do you come up with as far as good keywords? There are really no good Kontera tutorials that I know of at the moment that can help increase revenue.

John Chow said not to put all of your eggs in one basket and he makes a really great point. Which is exactly why I have both Google Adsense and Kontera on my blog.

Eventually I'd like to expand, but until my blog is up there with the big dogs, there's not much I can do at this point.

Brian Campbell and $10,000

A few days ago I decided to change my life forever. I started something spectacular. I became a part of Brian Campbell's SMMS. For those of you are unfamiliar with who Brian Campbell is, Brian is making headlines with his $10,000's in less than 37 days deal. Did he do it? Ask my favorite online entrepreneur John Chow.

Brian not only made the $10,000 in less than a month, he's continuing to make more and he's offering his secrets on how he did it. Is it a gimmick. No. Does it take work? Yes. But in the end, it's worth it.

After I signed up for Brian's free online course, I started thinking about something I had mentioned here on this blog. A goal I wanted to obtain in life. To help people. I am now turning that goal into a reality with Just Believe. And when I am through. I am going to pay it forward by donating 50% of what I earn to Hope House. Hope House is a non-profit organization that helps women who are a victim of domestic violence in and around the Kansas City, Missouri and Kansas area.

By the way, that $10,000? Brian payed if forward by giving the money to John Chow. The entire $10,000! How insane is that??

My Way of Advertising in a Small Town

I have the opportunity to advertise for a company called Market Leverage in my hometown. Well, almost an opportunity. It's actually, if I win John Chow's contest. His contest post really explains it all, but hey if I win, I can guarantee, Market Leverage will have some great exposure.

You see, I don't live in a huge town/city like NYC. I live in a small town. Now it's not one of those one horse poe dinky towns, but it's a place where I know the radio station, newspaper, office and many of the businesses around here. So, it's not hard for me to spread the word about Market Leverage.

Plus I am in desperate need of a video camera! The ipod nano and $200 Market Leverage Amex Rewards card would be nice too. Sooo, I am crossing my fingers! I could really use the video camera!

Readers are What Makes Us

In order to make money online, whether it's using google adsense or any ad program, you need people to visit your page. Just because you're dedicated at posting articles to your blog, doesn't mean you are going to gain much traffic unless you're famous like John Chow.

So how do you go about getting traffic? One way is to ask family and friends to stop by your page, but if you don't have family and friends who are as dedicated as you are to making money online, then you'll need a backup plan.

Readers are your most valuable source when you're trying to get noticed. Whether it's to make money online or get noticed as a writer, readers are your number one fan. Without them, you're nothing.

One way to gain readers is a little program known as entrecard. Entrecard is like a business card, only it's online. It allows bloggers like you and I to gain readers by leaving our blog ad on another blogger's page. And the best part about entrecard is, it's free.

But, even with entrecard, it still means you'll need to do some work. There's a saying that the best things in life come for free. I believe that saying is true, but even with free, a little work is needed to get to the top. No, it doesn't cost money. However, it does cost a little time. In order to get something for free, you need to give as well.

Work? Give? Yes, work and give. I think way too many people believe that they should be able to make money online by sitting around and doing nothing. How do I know this? Because at one point I was insane enough to believe it. Sorry, but it just doesn't work that way. If you want to get to the top, you have to work. If you want to get all the way to the top, you really have to work. And if you really want to go above and beyond you have to give as well. Millionaires like, Donald Trump and Oprah Winfrey know this and so do John Chow, as well as anyone else who's made it to the top and beyond.

So if you want readers, work and give. View your readers pages, leave comments, click on their entrecards. Encourage your readers to get involved with your posts. It doesn't take a genius to make money online. All it takes is your fans, your readers.

The Real Rules For Working at Home Part 1

For many at home parents, the idea of making a little money online sounds great. But, for some there's still that question of.... "How do I get started?"

If your goal is to make a little money online, the first thing you want to avoid are work-at-home scams.

The Number One Rule in this is: Any job asking you to send them money in order to make money is a SCAM. Simply put. You can argue all day long that, "Ohh, I can make money and get my money back by joining this program." However, I just don't and won't buy it. Now don't get me wrong, there are people out there who have made money this way, but I am a firm believer that you can make money online without having to spend money. Why? Well, because for most of us who are already on a tight budget, spending (wasting) money is something we simply can't afford.

Now let me add this. If you're spending money on a domain or upkeep for your website(s), or something along that line, that's different. What I am talking about is those work-at-home programs that ask you to send them money in order to get the job and then never pay up.... or ask you to send money and tell you in little tiny print that, "You could make money, but it's not a guarantee."

Number Two: You simply cannot expect to start a blog or a website and make big bucks overnight. It just doesn't happen that way. What you should expect is to make a reasonable amount of money overtime and then work your way up the ladder from there.

Number Three: It takes time and a lot of work to make money. Even an at-home job isn't something as simple as a few clicks and you're rolling in the money. It takes a lot of hard work and patience to make your blog or website a killer success. Even after you begin making money, you can't just expect the blog or website to run by itself. You'll still have to update it in order to keep things fresh if you want to keep earning money.

Number Four: You can't expect to earn a steady amount of money if you just rely on one source. Soo many bloggers like John Chow, can tell you this. It's been known as the phrase: "Don't put all your eggs (ads) into one basket." And of course, it's true. This goes for more than just ads, however. If you write reviews or articles like I do, you can't limit yourself to writing for one source or company such as payperpost. You have to get out there and keep yourself open to other resources as well.


Okay, I think I've said enough for now. If you have something to add to the above, please feel free to comment. I'd love to hear what you have to say.

In the meantime, I'll be sharing how to get started in working at home and obtaining goals for making money, in future posts!

John Chow and Why I Won't Succeed

If you don't already know, I'm a fan of John Chow and his blog. Not only is he famous for making money from his blog, he is also an inspiration to many people...including of course, me.

In his latest post, John talked about "The Biggest Problem Standing Between You and Success." My first reaction when I started reading his post was, "Oh No. Not another, it's all your fault lecture."

What I learned was, it really is my fault. It took John Chow to actually get me to see that, unless I start looking at things differently, I won't succeed. I won't be where I want to be in my life. And I don't want that. I want to reach my goals in life. Not just financially, but every part of my life.

After reading John's post, I also took a look at the comments other readers left for him. Some disagreed while others agreed and even added their own thoughts on why many of us are not able to succeed. One comment that stood out was from a blogger named, Steven Truong. In his comment he mentioned that while most people are motivated, they are too lazy to do what is necessary to succeed.

Is he right? In my opinion, I think so to some level. While not everyone will agree, I believe that John Chow's post, "The Biggest Problem Standing Between You and Success," is definitely worth the time to check out.

A Quick Update: There is a great interview video that Steven Truong did with John Chow. He left the link for us in comments, but unfortunately the full link didn't show. Luckily we're all smart enough to just click on Steven's site and search for that great video.

But, to make things easier, here's the link: John Chow Video Interview at Affiliate Summit West
2008

Please be sure to leave a comment for Steven and thank him for the great interview/video!

To Comment or Not to Comment. It's Not a Question... For Me...

I happened to drop by Cash Quests, a site that has been mentioned by money gurus like John Chow. To my surprise, however, Cash Quests has decided to turn off comments on their blog. At first they did this because of an experiment. You can read all about that in their main post. Now however, it's an until further notice thing. While the experiment looked interesting, I must disagree with their bold move to turn off the comments until further notice.

Comments are the heart of the blog. They allow readers to communicate with the writer and vice versa. Without them, we writers would have no idea what our readers truly think. Plus we gain some great friends from comments. I enjoy comments from my readers. Good or bad. They help me to improve my blog and give me new ideas for my posts. They offer advice and lend a hand. They give out hugs when I need them the most and put a smile across my face. Without comments, my blog would not be the blog it is today. So to my readers who comment, Please continue to do so!!!!! Comments are a great thing!

A Warning About Google Adsense,Payperpost and Freelance Writing

Today, I made my usual stop at John Chow's website and discovered an interesting, yet scary post about Rich Twin Poor Twin. Rich Twin Poor Twin is a website built by twins who were trying to make their millions using Google Adsene Only. Well, no more! After a pending loss of nearly $200,000 that was due to them from adsene last month, Google decided to ban the twins! Why they banned them was because google claimed they had invalid clicks coming from their ads. It's a story that sucks, but we learn from our mistakes. The worst part about it is, once google bans you, any money due to you will not be sent. So the twins are now out of nearly $200,000.

Never rely on google adsense as your only source of online income. If you do, you're asking for trouble like the twins did. Instead, look at other money making opportunities as well. As John Chow has mentioned in a prior Google Adsense post, putting all of your eggs in one basket is a big mistake! Don't do it!

On the other hand, if you're like me and have yet to receive any money from google adsense, you're probably not too worried, right? Well, you should be. You see, for a while my biggest mistake was relying on Payperpost and my freelancing job as my major source for income. To be exact, I was relying on my freelancing job as a writer, more than anything. Well two things have happened to me lately.

1. Payperpost hasn't qualified me for any opportunity posts lately. This is more than likely because I have a very low Google Rank that I can't seem to lift. Obviously as far as rank goes I am doing something wrong, but not sure what. So until I can raise my google rank, there will be very few payperpost offers I imagine.



2. My job as a freelance writer as I said, has been a major source for my income. While I love my job, lately my boss has had a really bad habit of going back on her word. Her first time was during a period when her payroll department didn't pay me the entire amount of money that was owed to me. The money I had expected was suppose to be used to help make a payment on this house. After letting my boss know about the shortened paycheck, she said it would be on it's way by that Thursday.
   
   Well, I never received it, so of course I emailed her. Her response was, it would be on it's way two weeks later like she had originally noted! So, as upset as I was, I sent her the original email she'd sent me about getting the money due to me by that Thursday (not two weeks later). Even though she did apologize, the damage was done and it was too late, so I ended up waiting the two weeks.

She did however, advance me money from last weeks paycheck, which was nice of her. But a few days ago I sent her a new list of articles and received a response saying that she had given all of the writers a month off. Something I never received notice about. She did however note that I could write 30 articles for her that month. While it shortens my income again, I figured it was at least some money.

So I queried her about the articles I had sent her for approval. Her reply to me was, she was unable to approve the articles until further notice, but I could write the 5 celebrity articles that were included in the list. So we went from 30 articles to 5 in just one day! And if we really want to go into details, I went from 60 to 30 to 5 in a matter of 4 days. And of course this is all during bad timing! Sigh, just my luck!!!

Getting Creatively Insane with Desi Baba

I decided to drop by and see what was new with John Chow when I found his review on Desi Baba. So who the heck is Desi Baba? Well, he's some guy who's creating an insanely interesting life and looking for reviews. Ahh entertainment at its best! So, what does Desi have to offer as far as blogging? Well, readers can find some interesting insight on making money through blogging and blogging how to's. The unique difference about Desi's blog is that he adds a personal touch to his posts. For instance, Don’t Blog Harder, Blog Smarter starts off as -"When I was young, around 11 or 12 years old, I used to watch this cartoon show on Disney Channel...."  Desi also varies his topics. He's not just about making money or blogging knowledge as you can very well learn under the advice category! Looking for a little debate? Check out his politics category. I think by far my favorite is the entertainment category. If you're looking for something different in blogging, be sure to drop by Desi Baba's Blog and say hi. After all, how can John Chow go wrong?

Getting Your Work Done with Jane May and John Chow

If you wander on over to John Chow's website, you will find a blog titled, "Maximize Your Daily Efficiency." There, guest blogger Jane May blogs about how to get more done by organizing your time more efficiently. She has nothing but very good ideas for getting your work done. So good actually, that it opened my eyes. So now I am posting her post on my computer, as a reminder of what I need to be doing. Rather than blogging as I am now. HA! So kuddos to the both of you and May Jane and John Chow, keep right on blogging!

To go directly to the post: Maximize Your Daily Efficiency