No More Kontera!

I hinted in my last post that I would be making some changes to this site. I have just removed the Kontera code from this sites template. Kontera provided the 'in-text-content links', which were the words in actual posts that were underlined in orange. This may seem like a fairly minor change, but I assure you it is a tiny one in comparison to the things to come!

Why did I remove them?
1. They hardly made any money. I made a grand total of about $7 with them and they were here for over a month.

2. They make the page slow to load! This page may have loaded super speedy for you, but for me it loaded far to slowly, even with my high-speed broadband!

3. They looked bad. No matter how you disguise them, Ads look bad.

4. They are bad for the readers’ experience. I hadn't bothered to filter out unrelated or scammy sites, so who knows what I was promoting and where I was sending people.

5. I was getting sick of the over-monetisation. I think this is something you can only understand if you have spent a certain amount of time blogging. I have reached the stage where I read a lot of blogs and I am ashamed to say that this site was (and still is) grossly over monetised compared to almost all the blogs I read. I have formed a sense of pride in what I blog and my standards are being raised all the time. No more sneaky tacky ads. Thanks Maki for giving me the nudge I needed.

Will the Adsense go too? Wait and see.

I'm not expecting the removal of Kontera advertising to have a major effect on this blog, but it is a step in the right direction. It’s funny actually, people spend a lot of time waiting with eager anticipation of the day their blog 'comes of age' for acceptance into an advertising group; but losing Kontera is a relief. I have finally dropped a heavy burden.

Breaking news: PayPerPost has Bought a Company!

Payperpost (a service that sponsors posts on blogs) announced that they have bought a company! Next week they will announce what that company is and what exactly it will mean for us.

For now all we can do is speculate. Buying a company clearly shows PayPerPost's growth. Being a member/fan of PayPerPost I say good for them. A lot of the veteran 'posties' say PayPerPost are deteriorating and only have offers about real estate and credit cards, however I disagree.

PayPerPost may have a smaller range of offers than in the past, but they are still one of the highest paying and most reliable sponsored posting services out there. This acquisition (whatever it may be) will hopefully enable PayPerPost to add new features to their service, which is becoming aged. It wont be long before they will lose the advantage of their reliable reputation. They are in danger of becoming just 'one of the many' sponsored posting sites, instead of the leader of the pack.

I am actually quite exited about what this new company could do for PayPerPost. Maybe there will be more offers relevant to the 'blogging and making money online' niche. It should coincide nicely with the Google Page Rank update, (when it finally happens), enabling us to all make more money!

Why Bloggers Need a Personality

By know most people have heard the phrase 'content is king' and all that jargon about the importance of creating original and unique content. The 'business' reason for this is that content forms the basis of SEO. In short it does this by providing material for the search engines spiders to crawl and a way to categorise and rank a site. Secondly good content creates linkbacks; this sort of content has become known as 'linkbait' and is a productive and honest to make your site popular. My example of this is Maki from DoshDosh who has been cranking out post after quality post, which has created numerous linkbacks and brought popularity to DoshDosh.

So what does having a personality have to do with it?
In this day and age it is very hard to find a totally unique original topic that has a demand for it. This means bloggers have to develop new ways to make their site stand out from the competition. One of the easiest way to do this is to be honest and speak your mind. You don't have to follow down this line of thought very far to see why it works. Whatever your beliefs about life, the universe and blogging, everyone has experienced something different in their lives which makes their views unique.

Everyone has clicked on different pages on the internet and read different articles about blogging (well at least all bloggers have). This means all our views are going to be slightly different! My example of this is Kumiko from Kumiko's Cash Quest. She is gradually becoming known for writing quirky posts that are never quite what people expect. It is important to remember at this stage that repeatedly writing controversial posts isn't going to get you anywhere. Providing you have read enough about any given subject you will have formed a view of your own and there will be no reason to exaggerate your views.

A wise blogger (I can't remember who) once said that there are two paths to becoming a successful blogger. Either, by becoming an expert in your niche, or by becoming a well-known personality. My example of this is John Chow. The chances are that if you read this blog you also read JohnChow.com. This is because he has become both and expert in his niche (making money online - ish) and he is a bit of a celebrity. He shows what happens in the rare occasion someone manages both.

There are other added bonuses of 'having a personality'. These include the worship and fan mail of readers as well as hate mail and devastating spam attacks. Hate mail is a bonus simply because it ads some excitement to what at times can be a (dare it say it) boring profession of blogging. Perhaps I am being naive having never experienced hate mail, buy you know what they say, don't knock it till you've tried it.

Google Alerts - A Cure for 'Blogger's block'

It was over a month ago that I last wrote about Google Alerts, but don't let this fool you, using Google alerts is a great backup for finding content and cure for 'bloggers block'. If you are unsure of what Google Alerts are then have a quick read of that post before you continue with this one.

What is bloggers block?
Bloggers block is just like a writers block, where you just cannot come up with something creative to blog about. Many people tend to get bloggers block when they just start their first blog and simply don't know where to begin. I have had a few questions from readers of this blog asking things like 'how do you find something to write about?', which I shall now endeavour to answer.

1. By reading blogs that are in the same niche.

Positives
- A potentially infinite (well not infinite but you get the idea) number of blogs can be read, so lots of information can be gathered + 'meditated upon'.
- Visiting the blog yourself presents the opportunity of commenting and 'networking' and possibly building the foundations of a relationship with that blogger. - Kills two birds with one stone.
- Gives practice surfing the blogosphere. By using the search engines we can gain an idea as to what sort of sites have done well with SEO (search engine optimisation), which we can learn from. This is a bit of a loose point but you can't have a hope of implementing successful SEO with out being an experienced search engine user yourself! (most of us already are anyway...)

Negatives
- Time consuming.
- Can yield few poor results if you don't know where to look.

2. By using Google Alerts!

Positives
- Quick, easy and free.
- You can choose how often you want to be sent an alert, so potentially can provide infinite ideas.

Negatives
- Makes networking a bit less appealing, because you didn't find the site yourself and have not had a rummage around on it to find what you are looking for. I.e. you don't have an idea of the blogs popularity and so cannot judge how to word your comments accordingly. (Does that make sense?)
- Some alerts are a 'mismatch' and are completely off topic.
- No experienced gained for searching the blogosphere.
- Posts made using Google Alerts can seem unconnected; despite being on the same niche you will have fewer opportunities to refer to a previous post.
- Can clog up your inbox if you find yourself not using them after signing up

Conclusion
Google Alerts are a great backup, but should not be relied upon. I personally have only fallen back on them a couple of times for content, and both times I have ended up writing about Google Alerts, rather than any of the actual alerts! lol... Put into a single sentence, only use them if you don't have time to browse other blogs yourself., which should be a rare event if you are going to be a successful blogger.

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If your blog isn't updated very often and you need something for your readers to read you can just put my Blidget in your sidebar. A Blidget is a widget from Widgetbox that will display the latest Successful Online Money Making ! posts. You can see what the Blidget would look like at Affiliate Program Guide.

You can get my Blidget by clicking the button at the bottom of this post. Installation is very easy. Post your comments about it I would love to know who is using it and what it looks like on your site!