SEO Software and Link Building

Hi folks. A little bit of everything in this post as I want to tie up a few loose ends and ramble a bit. The basic gist of this post will pertain to SEO - more specifically I want to show you exactly what it is I do in order to take some of the mystery out of SEO.

I want to start off by referring you to a comment left on a post I made in December.

The post was How I Find a Money Making Niche Dec 5, 2008

The comment was by Jez and you can read it below.

Hi Griz,

Problem I have with this post is that 95% of the backlinks to this sites are from blogs / social sites links.... many are from bloggers you know / are friends with.

What I would like to see is a post on link building for a "non bloggy" topic would be very useful... for example... say you had a niche site about "reactolite spectacles"... how would you approach link building on a site like that?

Jez

I have had a number of emails similar in nature. Since this keeps cropping up I think it needs to be discussed.

Yes - it's true. I get a lot of links simply because I am ranked highly in the serp's. I have lots of friends - they do link to me. What Jez and others don't realize is that I didn't develop all my friends until I was found on the search engines. I didn't (and still don't) use social networks to make friends. I had to get my site ranked well in the first place and I didn't have any help back then. The fact that this blog benefits from friends helping me now doesn't mean that this was always the case. If you think I don't really know how to build links and rank well without the help of my friends you are sorely mistaken and doing yourself a dis-service if you don't heed my advice.

Jez you wondered if I could rank well for a non-bloggy niche like "reactolite spectacles".

Here you go... Reactolite Spectacles

And you can find it ranked number 1 with double indexing in Google.

Click all images to enlarge



As for my link building approach - it only needed a handful of links. None of the links are from friends.



I'm not a one trick pony like John Chow. This blog is successful and makes a lot of money for me but it is not all I do. I created 20 new sites in December just like the reactolite blog - 16 of which are now ranked number 1 for their main keyword. Only 1 is showing any promise as far as having decent traffic. The rest will probably end up on the farm - just like the Blinkweb by Brad Callen blog. This doesn't mean I wasted my time - the farm is quite useful. One of the 4 links I needed to rank the Reactolite site came from the Blinkweb blog.

This is how I find niches - I simply throw up enough sites, get them ranked and see which ones get traffic. Those that don't become useful later on for linking to yet more sites. Over and over. Throw enough crap against the wall and sooner or later something is going to stick.

Folks you don't have to go after the big niches all the time. Learn to get non competitive sites on top of the serp's. If they pan out great - if they don't then use them for linking. Get a stable of a hundred of these simple blogs and you will find that you can chase down the more competitive niches.

Btw - as you can see it doesn't take long (a month) to get a number 1 ranked site and it doesn't take a lot of links if the niche (keyword) has no competition. In fact I have shown you how to rank number 1 in a day when targeting short term hot topics like Asia'h Epperson. Maybe some of you need to put away the "insurance" blog for a bit and hone your skills ranking for "ants scratching their asses".

Simplify things and find out what it takes to rank on top of the serp's for easy niches. Build your confidence and your network at the same time. Baby steps. I guarantee that in a year from now you will be able to get that "insurance" blog on page 1.

Speaking of "a year from now". If you are going to make real money online then get realistic. I started this blog in Dec 2006. I picked a very competitive niche. I didn't expect to earn a dime until I cracked the first page in G. I didn't think I would get there any time soon. I was patient and took my time knowing that a year or two down the road it would be worth it. It's been two years since I started this blog and yup - it was worth waiting for...

For your inspiration. My January income for this free ugly blogger blog...

Adsense income = $3999.36



Project Payday Commissions = $1922.80



Assorted Affiliate Commissions Paypal = $427.39

Assorted Affiliate Commissions Clickbank = $365.91

Advertising Revenue = $225.00

January Total Revenue = $6940.46

Expenses = $0.00

Net Income = $6940.46 usd

Yes - 7k using a blogger blog. Would you stick it out for a year or two for that kind of income?

Total January income for all sites/all networks = $37,213.76 (primarily Adsense and Leads)

Total Expenses all networks = $1029.00

The bulk of my income comes from Blogger sites and all of it is earned by using SEO to rank well in the serp's. The A-list and their readers have never heard of me but I have 37,000 reasons why I don't really care. My system makes money and all it takes is - yup - backlinks. I will beat that horse until everyone of you learn that backlinks and Google are all you need to make money online.


And where do you get those backlinks? Link networks, article marketing, your own farm, friends, social sites (I don't but you can) and our own free resource that keeps growing every week - the niche support page on my Make Money Online with Griz blog.

SEO Software

My last post touched off a discussion regarding SEO Elite. (see the comments - set aside an hour to get through them all. lol) Paul mentioned that he preferred Aaron Wall's Free SEO Toolbar over SEO Elite. (I am not including links as this is not a sales pitch) I mentioned that if there were free tools that could provide the same data as SEO Elite then I would recommend people use them instead. I have yet to check out the SEO Toolbar but Paul assures me it does the same thing as SEO Elite and Fiar was kind enough to send me a sample of the SEO Toolbar rank checker this morning. (Thanks Fiar) I use SEO Elite for a number of things but it is the rank checker that is central to my success online. From what Fiar showed me it appears that SEO Toolbar does provide a useful rank checker and therefor I will suggest you all take advantage of the toolbar sight unseen on my part.

I will continue using SEO Elite as it is paid for and I am accustomed to using it. I bought SEO Elite ages ago when there was nothing comparable. Since then a multitude of free SEO software tools have made their way onto the scene and from the sounds of things SEO Elite has become redundant. If you can find free tools that produce the info you need then there is no need to buy any program just because it has a few bells and whistles that the free tools don't. (I'm leaving SEO Elite in the sidebar just because it makes me a few bucks a month off of search visitors who don't read my posts - anyone who doesn't read my blog is fair game in my books.) If you are a reader of mine - ask me in the comments before you buy anything you see on this site - I'll tell you whether I really endorse it.

The Rank Checker

My comments in the last post brought a flood of emails from readers wanting to know what the big deal was regarding the rank checker. The big deal is that it's what I use to mount a backlink campaign. It tells me where my keywords rank, how fast they rise in the serp's, which keywords need more backlinks and when to add them, how my competition is doing, what keywords they are competing for and which ones they aren't and a whole host of other things relevant to ranking well in the serp's. In short the rank checker is my NASA control center for my linking.

The screenshot below is just a section of the hundreds of keywords and sites I have loaded into SEO Elite's Rank Checker.

You will see instantly how well a site ranks for the keywords and what direction it is moving in (higher or lower in the serp's). It allows me to see if the competition really does know SEO. Below you will see Gary Conn's name. A few months ago he didn't rank worth crap in the serp's (meaning he was all BS before). He has been reading Vic's site and mine (not that he will admit it but I see him lurking) and now he is ranking for the MMO keywords. He is competition. Problogger on the other hand doesn't appear to have a clue about SEO and is really just a social blogger (a really good one) and isn't competition. Jonathan Ledger has a 3 way link program that he sells. Does it work? Nope. How do I know? I've tracked all his keywords and he doesn't rank for anything. His 3 way links program can't be very good if the owner of the program isn't ranked for squat. The rank checker is a great tool for checking out just how well different affiliate products work. If someone claims they are an expert at something and don't rank for their area of expertise they are full of crap. In short I use this tool for spying, for planning my strategies and then for implementing my links. It gives me the feedback I need to dominate the serp's. If you don't think it's important then go back and review my income again. Dominating the serp's IS my income.



Most of you know by now that I don't post often. There are many reasons for this. One is that I make more money not posting - notice the Adsense revenue dropped off over the last two weeks of January? Go through my posts in January and see when I posted. I explained why in one of those January posts. Another reason is simply because I don't have to. The reactolite blog only required 2 posts to rank number 1. What I'm trying to say is this - content is necessary only to the extent that you need something relevant on your sites (targeted keywords). This takes 10% of my time. I spend the other 90% of my time getting links. Posting is a waste of my time unless I need to add keywords to a site or trigger different Adsense ads. Otherwise leave it alone and work on the links. The links are what make you money - not the content. This is true for what I do at least.

I don't think I can simplify my system any more than this. Yes there is lots to learn when it comes to tweaking sites to optimize your income but that is something you can all learn once you have the traffic. Put all that aside and get the traffic first. Create keyword optimized sites - get keyword optimized backlinks. This will bring you traffic. If the traffic doesn't pan out - stick it in the farm and create more. And more. And more. Build your own network and as you grow you will start to dominate the niches that do have traffic. Too many of you are starting out looking for the 1 great niche or doing the MMO thing. This is fine for the long term and you can keep plugging away but maybe you should work on some reactolite type sites just to see some immediate results.

Okay - this is long enough. I want to talk about Google and its move towards social metrics in the next post. Fiar and Gary have both questioned me on this issue and I want to explore it further.

Until then here are a couple of blog posts that made me chuckle this week.

see Splork's Crap is Still King

and VicW's Make Money Blogging

Making Money with Affiliate Marketing

Let me start by apologizing ahead of time for being a manipulative bastard. I've just finished a set of tests on this blog and now I want to explain a few things to you about the world of Internet marketing. Some of this you will have heard before but even you seasoned readers should read on.

I just convinced several hundred people to download a firefox add-on that apparently doesn't work and only Paul from Internet Marketing Product Reviews dared mention that Brad Callen's products tend to be crap. After having a few PPC friends check their own ads with the PPC Web Spy tool - we found out that it didn't bring up their keywords. In fact it looks like the tool simply digs out the relevant keywords and CPC much like keyword elite does from the same source - Google. It doesn't appear to show the advertisers individual keywords or bids after all. If any of you use PPC then please check your own ads and let me know if the tool is working.

Why do so many people trust the word of others (yes even me) and never bother to check things out for themselves?

This is the X factor.

Do you know who really succeeds online? The people who think for themselves, the people who take everything with a grain of salt and verify things on their own. The people who know how to separate the bullshit from legitimate information.

I shouldn't have to tell you folks to verify the things I say. You should be doing it on your own. Now I realize many of you wouldn't call bullshit on me in the comments out of friendship or respect but no one did it quietly in an email either. I can list on one hand people who have taken me to task in the past - Fiar from Political Humor, Gary from Everything Everywhere, Frank at How to Earn Money Online and a few others. I love these guys and can tell you they will be successful. They sniff out the bullshit and think for themselves. (I don't want too many links but Terry, Trent, RT, Splork all belong in this category as well). Considering the amount of readers I have the list is small. I'm not trying to insult anyone or show a lack of respect - I truly value all the friends I've made with this blog but I am trying to point out one of the biggest factors when in comes to being successful online or elsewhere.

Think for yourself.

Why do the A-List have such large fan bases? Because the majority of people trying to make money online don't think or verify anything. They just follow along doing whatever the so-called expert tells them to do. They are a gold mine for anyone who wants to manipulate them. I can just imagine how much money I would have made if I had told everyone that PPC Web Spy was a great affiliate product and buy the upgrade!

I joke all the time about how I am just setting my readers up in order to scam you all big time one of these days. The scary thing is I probably could. (I won't but I'll keep threatening)

Now there is a point to this other than being a jerk. A recurring theme in my emails is "Please talk more about internet marketing". The emails aren't asking for advice on selling "Oil Filters" - the people all have MMO blogs of one kind or another and they want in on the whole "selling IM products to Bloggers and IMer's" niche. Now instead of me telling you how broke you will be following that path I set up this little experiment to show you results instead. I'm not pulling the PPC Web Spy banner down just yet. My readers have had a crack at it and now I will see what kind of response I get from my search traffic.

Here are some stats.

9156 visitors have seen the banner.
218 people downloaded it with my link. No idea how many may have downloaded it without the link.
No one paid for an upgrade. (Thankfully)

So you want to sell to internet marketers huh?

I only got a 4.2% conversion for a "free" download. And not a single sale.

Remember I have a lot of targeted traffic, I'm seen (I think) as reasonably honest and this is all I could pull off.

How well do you think you are going to do selling to other Internet marketers?

One of the biggest problems with this whole online biz is assumptions. People assume a site with 5000 visitors a day must make a killing selling things. People see someone with 50,000 feed readers and assume they get 50,000 visitors a day - not. Do you really think Darren Rowse makes a killing everyday selling the crap in his banners? No. He makes money selling ads to others who put up the banners and they make nothing from his traffic. The assumptions stem from the fact that no one who has a large traffic base is willing to tell people just how few affiliate sales are made in the IM niche. Rowse won't admit it or he wouldn't get advertisers willing to pay big bucks to put their ads on his site.

One of the reasons for me adding that banner is to gauge my own CTR when it comes to selling advertising space on top of my blog. I have run a few different banners just to see what an advertiser might expect. The results are woeful. In fact after this episode I don't think I will offer the ad spot. My Adsense revenue takes a beating (a loss of about 30% ctr every time I've added a banner). This means charging an advertiser at least $50 a day for the ad. Unfortunately the advertiser won't get their money's worth and that bugs me. I know others would just sell the spot and don't care about the results but I don't want my name dragged through the mud for ripping people off.

You have all heard the saying that there is no money in selling to other bloggers. With the exception of the developers and their handful of super-affiliates this is true. Even then the return is small. Callen may make a few grand from his latest venture but he won't retire on it. In a month he will be flogging something else. He has too to keep a steady income coming in.

But Griz - you're in the MMO niche so there must be money in it... right. Yup - using Adsense there is. Selling products? Nope. ( Yes alright - with my targeted search traffic I could probably sleaze out a living scamming beginners but would you want to do that?)

Think on this. If I put through 9000 people in two days on my shoe site how many affiliate sales (or leads) do you think I would have compared to the IM crowd? Actually it's not as high as you think but still a world away from IM. On average my conversions are in the 8-12% range and sometimes a lot higher when a hot seller comes along. Strangely enough I still tend to do better with Adsense than affiliate sales. The thing is, civilians buy and click. IMer's don't and while you are tired of hearing this I thought some hard numbers might get the point across. If I can't make a good buck selling crap to bloggers do you really think you will with a fraction of the traffic?

I'm sorry if I sound harsh and that I have avoided answering all the emails asking for help in this area. The fact is I don't want to encourage any of you to follow the IM path. I'm not hogging it for myself. It just isn't a profitable business model and especially for beginners. Learn SEO and get non - IM niches to the top of the serp's first. Once there you can experiment and flog whatever you like but at least you will have traffic to flog it too. And there is always Adsense if nothing else pans out.

Most importantly - learn to question everything and everyone. I don't mean that you should become a cynical bugger - just have a healthy skepticism about what you hear and learn how to verify the claims you come across for yourselves.

I just want to mention this - a congrats of sorts. While I was typing this up Lane left a comment on the PPC Web Spy post.

Here is part of it.

(1) When I click on each of the advertisers, they don't necessarily have the specific keyword that I queried for on their list. For instance, I just typed in the keyword phrase: buy perfume. The top advertisers are clearly looking for people looking to buy perfume, as their ad reads "Buy Perfume at Sephora" However when I click the "View Keywords" button, NONE of their ads listed are about perfime -- they, like several of the other advertisers listed show ads about other things liked shaving cream and acne.

Why don't I see the keyword that I was searching for?

(2) Sort of related to the previous question... Since I don't see the keyword that I am looking for, how can I tell which advertisers are the lower priced one that I would want to eliminate?

Finally someone actually used the tool and realized something fishy is going on with it. Well done Lane. The answer to your questions btw - it's a piece of crap.

Again sorry for misleading everyone with this download - I just had to make a point.

Don't believe everything you read online - check it out yourselves. I don't mind people calling bullshit on me. It means you are thinking things out.

I hope you will all forgive me but I imagine the old feedburner cancellations will start about a minute after posting. I hope not as my intentions were honest.

I will provide the search stats for the banner in a few days.... and then it will be gone.

PPC Web Spy - Brad Callen

Brad Callen's New PPC Web Spy Software - Free

Update: If you found this post while searching for a Review of PPC Web Spy then read this post and then read part 2 before you act - PPC Web Spy Review Part 2

Since my Adsense is shot to hell this week anyway I may as well do another post - yes my faithful readers - 3 posts in a week! Your feedreaders must be overheating!

Full disclosure - I could make money from this "Free" product but it is unlikely and I will get to that in a moment.

You will notice the new banner ad on top of the page. If you click it you will be taken to the PPC Web Spy landing page. Type in your bonafides and you will indeed get a free copy of Brad's latest software.

What is it?

The landing page explains it all quite clearly but basically it's a tool for finding the keywords that Google Adwords users are targeting. This will be very helpful for all you PPC marketers. I don't do PPC anymore but it turns out that this little tool, inadvertently, is also a handy addition for those of us who make money with Adsense. And the tool is free so why not use it?

Essentially it highjacks your browser (you must use firefox btw - and you should be using firefox anyway!) by adding a little widget to the bottom of the browser that you can toggle on and off.

If the widget is off you see Google search results like always. If the toggle is turned on then you see search results that look like this;

Click all images to enlarge



If you click the "Keyword" Button located beneath each Adwords advertiser you will get a list of keywords like this;



By now I shouldn't have to explain to all you Adsense people how useful this is. Imagine how helpful in targeting high paying keywords?

The software also shows you who the Noob Adword users are as indicated in the next screenshot.



You will see this whenever you click the "Keyword" Button and the Advertiser doesn't have a track history. In other words don't target his/her keywords as they don't know what they are doing. Target the professionals as they will lead you to the keywords that pay.

You can also tweak your competitive ad filters in your Adsense account to eliminate all the low bidding advertisers from showing up on your content ads. (Note - I just gave you an important tip! lol)

Now what is the catch to this clever little program?

Well the software really is free and for us Adsense users and PPC users the "Catch" is not important as you can get the software for nothing. The catch, as usual is the sales spiel which will try and entice you to pay for the premium package. The premium package is nothing more than a new version of a Branded Giveaway - in this case you brand the PPC Web Spy Free giveaway software with embedded affiliate links which will then earn you money every time one of the people who downloaded your free branded copy of the software buys something. Or that's the premise but it's not likely to work so I wouldn't go hog wild paying for the premium package.

Here is the scheme.

If you pay for the upgrade and giveaway branded copies this is what happens.

When the person who downloaded the copy through you uses it they will benefit from the "Keyword" info as outlined already but in using the product they will also add 2 new serp listings to the number 1 and 2 positions in the serp's for whatever keyword they are researching. These listings will be for affiliate products and if the person clicks on them and buys then you will get the commission. Watch the video on the sales page for a complete understanding of how it works. (You can see the Video without paying anything.)

The problem with this gimmick is that anyone you get to download the free software is likely to be another marketer and/or blogger and they will see the same video and know the serp listings contain your links. And being true IM'ers they will dutifully never buy a product with your link in it. If this software could be added to the millions of browsers used by internet civilians like teenagers then yes this could make someone a lot of money. That's not going to happen though - the only people who will have it installed will be other bloggers. I don't recommend upgrading to the premium package unless you enjoy trying to sell affiliate crap to other affiliate marketers.

I do recommend you download the free software though and add it to your Adsense Keyword Tools folder. The program will be dynamite for targeting keywords. The bonus - a lot of you can stop sending me emails asking how to find "good" keywords to target. This tool is pretty useful and I don't say that about many programs online.

If you want it you can download it free from the Banner on top of the page.

Don't buy the upgrade - just my opinion.

Blogger Public Service Ads Fix

If you are using Blogger and run Adsense then you may have awoken this morning to find all your Ads are showing Public Service Ads (PSA's).

First off don't panic!

Second stop sending me emails! Lol.

There is an easy fix.

Why this happened is unclear but appears to be connected to several recent and ongoing changes within Adsense and Blogger.

If you are showing PSA ads then you are using the Channels feature available when setting up your ads in Google Adsense. This method requires you to set up your ads in Adsense and then transfer the code supplied over to a html/javascript Gadget in Blogger.

Simply remove all those html/javascript Gadgets (just the ones using your Adsense code) and replace them with the "Adsense" Gadgets provided in Blogger. This means opening an "Adsense" Gadget, selecting the ad format you want and then place it in the appropriate location. These ads don't require you to use Adsense setup.

The PSA ads will be gone but you will not be able to track your ad blocks as you did using the code supplied by Adsense setup.

How to Game Alexa

Dear Alexa.com,

Your website ranking algorithm is so flawed as to be virtually useless as a barometer of online traffic. It is so poor that it is in fact misleading and should require you to add a disclaimer along the lines of "our traffic estimates are accurate to plus or minus 100%" - 100% of the time.

In layman's terms your traffic rankings are broke.

I suppose the odd beginner may take your stats seriously but the majority of experienced Internet marketers have come to realize that your algorithm is in need of serious adjustment. Anyone with more than a handful of sites online has seen the absurdity of your rankings.

To whit...

The following two sites have roughly the same amount of traffic. The first site averages 87 visitors a day. You deem that good enough for an Alexa rank of 250,000 give or take. The second site averages 102 visitors a day and you rank it 2,577,000 give or take. It appears that because the first site (with less traffic) averages 19 returning visitors daily this is enough to rank 2,250,000 spots higher than the second site (that has more visitors) but only averages 2 returning visitors a day.

Click all images to enlarge.



This site above has an Alexa ranking of 250,000 give or take.



This site above has an Alexa ranking of 2,577,000 give or take.

What else could effect the vast difference in rankings...

The first site has a bounce rate of 54%.
16% of visitors stay longer than an hour.
92% of traffic is from referrals.
8% of traffic is from search (mostly Google).
The site does get social network traffic (Stumbleupon, Digg etc).

The second site has a bounce rate of (strangely enough) 54%.
No visitor stays longer than 5 minutes.
55% of traffic is from referrals.
45% of traffic is search (mostly Google).
No social network traffic.

But let's not stop there.

The site below has an Alexa rank of 1,169,000 give or take. It averages 252 Unique visitors a day. Only 8 returning visitors...



This site has a bounce rate of 60%.
Very few visitors stay longer than 5 minutes.
21% of traffic is from referrals.
79% of traffic is search (mostly Google).
No social network traffic.

I find this interesting because you are ranking a site with 252 Uniques a day 1,169,000 ish while ranking a site with 87 Uniques a day at 250,000 ish. Better yet the site with 252 Uniques a day just barely ranks better than the site below which is ranked 1,177,000 ish.




Yup... a site with just 18 Uniques a day ranks just marginally behind a site with 252 uniques.

This site has a bounce rate of 85%.
13% of visitors stay longer than 5 minutes. (3% longer than an hour)
2% of traffic is from referrals.
98% of traffic is search (mostly Google).
No social network traffic.

Oh yes I know - you mention that your stats are more "accurate" for sites with greater amounts of traffic - sites that make your top 100,000. Hmmmm...

You may find this interesting.

The site below is ranked 70,000 ish and only averages 289 Uniques a day. It has 30 more Uniques per day than the 1,169,000 ish ranked site. Wow.



But let's see...

It has an average of 80 returning visitors a day as opposed to 8 visits a day to the 1,169,000 ranked site.

and...

This site has a bounce rate of 57%.
22% of visitors stay longer than 5 minutes. (11% longer than an hour)
87% of traffic is from referrals.
13% of traffic is search (mostly Google).
It has a relatively large amount of social network traffic in relation to it's low overall traffic.

And how about a site that really does get a moderate amount of traffic?

The site below is ranked 170,000 ish.



It averages 2500 Uniques daily and has an average of 357 returning visitors a day - more returnees than the other sites listed have in total traffic. Scratch my assumption that returning visitors is the key to gaming you. It should rank in the top 10,000 if that was the case.

So why isn't this site in the top 100k at a minimum? It has vastly more daily traffic than all the other sites combined.

This site has a bounce rate of 66%.
12% of visitors stay longer than 5 minutes. (3% longer than an hour)
14% of traffic is from referrals.
86% of traffic is search (mostly Google).
It has a relatively low amount of social network traffic in relation to it's moderate overall traffic.

I could go on and ask why another site of mine averages 5500 Uniques a day and only ranks 132,000 ish. Or why my best site, in spite of 10,000 plus Uniques a day manages to top out on your scale at a whopping 204,000 ish?

I could ask but I don't really need to.

Every site I own that get's the majority of it's traffic from the search engines ranks quite poorly.

Any site that receives the majority of it's traffic from referrals and social networks ranks inordinately high - far higher than its traffic warrants.

Moreover any site that draws predominantly social network traffic ranks absurdly high.

The other noticeable factor is that sites that garner more page views per visitor rank higher than those that don't - regardless of overall traffic.

I am not a social blogger but I'm hoping that many of my readers (when I post this on my MMO blog) who do receive social traffic will be kind enough to provide their stats in my comments (keeping their sites anonymous of course) in order to pin down just what social traffic is required to game your stats. We know you love Digg, Stumbleupon and Twitter traffic but it will be interesting to see if a pattern emerges highlighting the easiest way to game you.

Why should we game you?

Because you are a joke and it might be a good thing to warn unwary advertisers that believe your stats have some credibility.

The best way to discredit you is by gaming you.

Btw... you might want to add another disclaimer to your site stating that your stats completely ignore the single largest source of traffic online - the search engines - and as a result your sample is based solely on sites that engage in social networking. Ultimately your stats are simply a measure of which sites get the most traffic from Digg etc and are not even remotely accurate in terms of the overall total traffic online.

Making Money Online Anonymously

A big fat PR0 - yup - the big G finally slapped me good. Why?

Well when all your pages are reduced to the big goose egg it is usually a sign that they perceive you to be selling links. Am I selling links? Nope. But I can see how they might get the idea based on the amount of links I have on my homepage. I could write them and plead my case - I have a lot of friends and all my links are legit but I'm not going to. I have said this for ages - pagerank has nothing to do with serp rankings and perhaps dominating the MMO niche with a big fat PR0 site will get my point across in spades. For those who were concerned my serp rankings haven't changed and the SE traffic is still pouring in.

How this happened is likely the result of some "friend" who reported the site as selling links. You will find that dominating a popular niche is a constant battle with competitors and they will do whatever it takes to unseat you.

Which brings me back to keeping anonymous online. Yes I know this goes against every blogger's deepest desire - to get famous. The thing is I'm not a blogger - I'm an internet marketer and my goal is to make money. You make money by flying under the radar and I want to give you all a prime example of what I mean.

I don't post often. I get a lot of emails asking me to post more. There is a reason for not posting (aside from being lazy)... I make more money not posting.

Huh... wtf you say.

Tis' true... let me show you what I mean.


Some Adsense Secrets

This has taken a long time to decipher and I'm still not convinced that I have it right so don't take this as gospel but...

3000 ad impressions a day seems to be a magic number with Google.

The screenshot below shows my Adsense income for January (for this blog only) - the January 18 (today) total is not final as it shows my earnings early in the day when I took the shot.

After two months of lower than normal earnings (lack of advertiser competition I believe) my January earnings bounced back nicely and until a few days ago were on course for a new high with this blog.

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A recurring problem is that weekends see a drop in visitors. Friday night until Sunday evening is always the poorest traffic - sometimes several thousand fewer visitors. When my visitors drop below 3000 ad impressions (according to Adsense stats - not your own stat counter) I notice a drop in my CPC (how much I get paid per click). I am not allowed to divulge all the details but my CPC can drop as much as half. It varies though and it has to do with the traffic I get.

Whenever I post I get a surge of traffic - the surge is un-targeted (my readers) and my CPC drops for several days until readers tail off. As long as my ad impressions stay above the 3000 barrier my CPC doesn't drop more than 10 cents a click. If my ad impressions fall below the 3000 barrier I see a 30 cent drop in earnings per click.

Because I haven't posted since December 27, 2008 my earnings have been great - my traffic has been 80% search engine and 20% social. In other words I make more money when my readers aren't flocking to the site - ie. the less I post the more money I make.

Absurd? Yup. Unfortunately this is the key to making money with Adsense.

So what happened on Friday the 16th? My earnings nosedived without me posting.

Less clicks? Nope. I had more clicks on Friday than on Thursday but earned $50 less.

Less Ad impressions? Yup - I dropped below the magic 3000 for the first time in weeks.

and to top it off I began getting a steady stream of un-targeted traffic from the Warrior forum.

The cumulative effect was a quick drop in earnings.

And since my earnings are already in the crapper I figured today was a good time to post a new entry.

And now you know my secret to when I post. I usually only post when my earnings are down and more un-targeted traffic won't do any more damage.

This is not to say I don't appreciate all of you who read my blog - I surely do. This blog completely baffles me as it actually has readers and I have made a lot of great friends because of it. Friends can do a lot to help you online so I can't say social traffic isn't worthwhile. The conundrum I have is that I make money with Adsense and Social traffic isn't conducive to that. I, of course, want my cake and to eat it too. If nothing else this blog is a great learning tool when it comes to straddling the Internet Marketing/Social Network approach with straight up SEO. I've always known that SEO works - it did 4 years ago and it hasn't really changed today. The thing is I have learned a lot this past two years about Google and Adsense that I wouldn't have known if not for the Social traffic.

The thing that interests me now is how to convert Social visitors into earnings without resorting to the A-list method. (selling crap to your readers and advertising crap to your readers) Perhaps if there was something worthwhile to promote... the thing is... there just isn't.

I get a ton of JV emails - people wanting me to promote stuff - many of the people are legit and well-meaning but they sell crap. Sorry - no offense but if I wouldn't buy it then it's crap. I'd really like to see something worthwhile come along one of these days.

I digress - back to the point. For the thousand or so emails I have about how often should you post. If you are using Adsense - only when there is no reason not too.

If you truly want to make money online - stay anonymous. This greatly lowers the amount of "friends" who want to dethrone you. Yes I know this contradicts everything you've learned from the A-List but that crap concerns blogging and not Adsense.

In my absense...

- I have several thousand emails piled up... oops

- It's winter road season here at the Lodge, just finished building the ice road last night, it's been cold r' n' hell for weeks now - 30-40 below zero, everything that can break has broken; water lines, sewage lines, trucks, boilers etc, all fixed except the water line to my house, wife and kids unhappy about that "little" exception, haven't read a blasted email in weeks - social blogging has some drawbacks and hope everyone understands, Lodge is full and real life has intruded upon my online endeavors once again and probably why I have always liked making money passively with Adsense.

I have lots to yak about but little time at the moment. I will get to it as time permits but I have a water line to look at...

Cheers,

SEO for Google 2009

This past year I have been fortunate to rank a number of blogs on top of Google's search listings and the result has been a steady stream of income from Google Adsense, selling Advertising space and Lead Generation. This is passive income that is generated daily regardless of how much I post and is not dependent on social media or social marketing. My interest online is to make money with the least amount of effort required. My methods are widely used by Internet Marketers and almost completely unknown to Bloggers. In fact, the prevalence of social blogging has obfuscated what was once widely known - that search traffic is steady, it converts into sales or clicks and it can be grown almost exponentially by simply targeting more and more keywords.

The advent of social marketing has produced bloggers by the millions, each one chasing a dream of large readerships in hopes of generating buckets of income. Each one almost completely ignorant of search traffic or the benefits of high placement in the serp's. The irony is that social traffic is much harder to get on a consistent basis, consists mostly of other bloggers, doesn't convert into buyers and requires a huge time commitment. Worst of all it generates no income until you are able to achieve "authority" status in your niche and are pulling in thousands of visitors a day. Even then your revenue consists almost entirely of advertising fees generated by selling space to other bloggers trying to monetize your traffic. They find out soon enough that your traffic doesn't convert either - how many of you buy or click on the ads pasted on the A-List sites? The A-List is fortunate that there is no shortage of new advertisers willing to fork over large sums in order to replace former advertisers who learned that social traffic doesn't convert. In most cases the A-List is paid to promote sign-up programs - more social media networks for the most part. An endless circle...

The fact that there can only be a limited number of A-List sites or authorities in any one niche is lost to the masses who believe they have what it takes to reach the top. Everyone, it seems, believes they have the right stuff. I have seen a lot of bloggers rise quickly - develop a decent readership, some good PR and just as quickly lose interest in their blog in spite of thousands of RSS subscribers. Why? They don't make enough money to cover the time commitment required to keep the blog fresh in the readers mind.

The alternative to social blogging is of course SEO or Search Engine Optimization. In truth this can and should be applied even if you choose to chase social traffic. I don't chase social traffic at all but because of my high serp rankings I find that social bloggers find me anyway. I mention this simply to point out that those of you hoping to gain fame and recognition for your work can achieve it by dominating the top rankings in the serp's and save yourself the countless hours of work needed to make a name for yourself in the social arenas.

As 2008 draws to a close I have given a lot of thought to how Google will tweak its algorithm over the coming year. Without getting long winded it doesn't take a lot of imagination to assess Google's predicament; the search engine has to have a means by which to rank sites based on keyword relevancy - the easy part and it has to have a means for deciding which relevant site should rank at the top of the serp's - the hard part.

How would you do it?

Would you rank sites based on their RSS subscribers?

Would you rank sites based on their Page Rank?

Would you rank sites based on their social links and traffic?

Would you rank sites based on their Alexa Rank? Their Compete rank?

Would you rank sites based on the fame of the site?

If you would entertain any of these ideas then your ranking system would lead to a useless search engine. All these methods are easily gamed or have no relevancy for the vast majority of niches. How would sites related to "Oil Filters" be ranked if Google used RSS subscribers as a basis for ranking?

Google's predicament is that it has to have a system that works for all keywords and not just those that apply to social niches. Many a social A-Lister has preached that Google will use social media in its rankings - a belief that I find laughable. Google has been eliminating metrics that can be easily gamed - not adding them to the mix.

Ultimately the only system that works well but is not perfectly fair is to rank sites based on incoming links. Yes this can be gamed as well but for the vast majority of niches this is still the best measure of a site's authority.

Rather than find a new system Google has methodically tweaked its system to degrade or dismiss links of poor quality and give greater weight to links that are deemed high quality.

Almost all social links - Do-follow comments, Bookmarks, Digg, Stumbleupon etc are considered low quality and while they may be registered by G they will not gain you top ranking in a competitive niche. They will work fine in an un-competitive niche but even then a single link from a quality source will outrank all your low quality links.

Google's algorithm will reward you well if you follow my recommendations outlined below.

4 Steps to Google Dominance

Keyword Research

Forget Quality Content (No such thing to a machine) - use Relevant Content.

On Page Keyword Optimization

Develop 1 way Inbound Links to your site.


Target the most popular keywords in your niche, add relevant content, use your main keyword in your URL, Blog Title, Page and Post titles and then spend the rest of your time developing quality inbound links.

I have said this many times - quality inbound links are the single most important aspect for ranking well in Google.

The 5 Measurements of Inbound Links

The Quantity of inbound links.

- This is least important but effective for low competition keywords.

The Title keywords on the page linking to you.

The Anchor Text used in the link pointing to you.

- You will only rank for the terms others use in their links pointing at your site. This is crucial for gaining top ranking.

The Relevance of the content on the page linking to you.

- The site with the most keyword anchored links coming from relevant content posts/pages will outrank all others.

The Quality of the inbound link.

- The best link you can possibly get is a PR10 link using your main keyword in the anchor coming from within a post relevant to your keyword. The further from this optimum the less quality the link. A few of these quality links will easily have you outranking sites with 1000's of lesser quality links.

I have not talked about Domain Age or the popular SEO blathering regarding keyword density, blog platforms, site design, posting frequency or any of the other "tips" spouted at length by all the so-called experts online. The reason is simple - it is all window dressing in the greater scheme of things and ultimately unimportant when it comes to serp domination.

The simple truth is that I can rank any site on top of the serp's with the right backlinks and provided the site has legit content (but only because it may get a human review - I could do it with spam if I only had to dupe the machine). How much content or how well it is written is insignificant for ranking purposes.

If you just have to chase social media then do yourself a favor - as you get yourself known ask your friends and readers to use your keywords when they link to you. Do you know how many times I have heard a social blogger tell me that social media is great because it gets them PR and backlinks. When I check they have hundreds of links using their name in the anchor. Yup - they rank really well for a term no one searches for. What a waste and yet the links could be so beneficial. As for PR - just remember this - your own PR has no bearing on your ranking. It's the PR of the sites linking to you that effects your ranking and only if they use your keywords.

Making Money Online is not complicated. Rank on top of the serp's for as many keywords as you can. Add Adsense. Collect money. Rinse and repeat.

It really does work and I hope many of you will achieve the same success as I have over the coming year.

Have a very happy and prosperous 2009

Cheers,