Archives for February 2010

Most Blog Fail at This, Marketing!

by Melvin · Feb 7, 2010

Ever wonder why 90% of the blogs just can’t get off the ground? Simple, they suck at marketing!

Because of the nature of blogging and what it really is, a lot of people doing blogging just couldn’t really make it. Blogging is defined originally as a hobby, something that’s like a personal diary where you can enjoy doing it without needing to spend that much of time. So up until now this is the stumbling block that most newbie bloggers and even intermediate ones face.

Almost always, the case is that bloggers don’t want to learn marketing at all. Selling sucks isn’t it? And besides you never dreamed to be a sales person throwing up stupid sales pitches to your audience. That being said, it‘s safe to conclude that bloggers don‘t think marketing is essential for the success of their blogs.

If you‘ve been reading this blog for quite some time, you always hear me say that blogging is internet marketing. That is true and your success depends on how competent you are with marketing. Some people who want to learn it even pay for those expensive internet marketing courses and programs while others simply just try to learn it themselves.

In blogging, however you really don’t need to know each and every stuff about internet marketing, you only need a few of them to get started. Coupled with building relationships, good marketing can really skyrocket your blog/brand/profile w/c would get you more traffic and obviously the end result is income.

Blog Marketing for Fame

So for the last 2 and half months or so, I took some time in creating this guide w/c would help an average blogger grow their blog on a quick rate. Nope this isn’t a make money eBook or a crappy PLR product. This is a simple info product w/c is targeted to bloggers who like to explode their blog traffic, get their brand known and simply just slay it in the blogosphere. Whether you’re a newbie blogger or an intermediate one, I would like to hope that this product is one that can be very valuable to you. It contains tips on how you can grow your blog quickly in less than one month (or whatever pace you want to). And by saying growing your blog, it’s not just about increase daily hits or huge unique, it’s about building a real brand with real community that will be with you for the long haul.

Edit: This book has been rebranded and updated as ‘Blog Marketing Guide‘

Subscribe now & Get Immediate Access

After signing-up to my blog’s newsletter you will immediately be able to download your copy of the Blog Marketing for Fame eBook. On top of that you’ll also receive my exclusive tips and tricks to market your blog (stuff that is not published anywhere else), insider’s information about my upcoming projects and so on. The newsletter is totally free and if you think the content you’re receiving is crap, you can cancel anytime.

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Head to Head 6, Asian Money Bloggers

by Melvin · Feb 4, 2010

So welcome back to the 6th edition of the ever so popular Bloggers Head to Head. So far we’ve had matched up several good blogs here and the response I was getting was really fantastic. Now for 2010, I would try to do this for at least once per month.

And for today’s flavor I am featuring two asian make money online bloggers (I know they’d disagree that they are mmo bloggers). They are not just the usual mmo bloggers that suck, instead they are too good and quality bloggers who have quite built a good following for their blog. Let’s now match Ajith from DollarShower.com against Shanker Bakshi or ShankerBakshi.com.

Questions	Ajith	Shanker
Describe yourself in less than 5 words?	90% Programmer and 10% Blogger	Self proclaimed dot Com Guru
What is your favorite breakfast?	What I like the most for breakfast is Idli – Sambar which is simple a South Indian breakfast dish. I also take one or two eggs upto four days a week. A cup of strong tea is a must for me for breakfast.	Gobi ka Parantha (Thats Chapati stuffed with cauliflower for you in English)
In a brief explanation, you are blogging about?	Well, what I write about is probably the most boring combo of SEO – Blogging Tips – Make Money Online that you get to see on every other blog these days 🙂 However, I try to do justice to my job by writing some unique posts at least one in five.	I usually write about how to Make Money Online and other technical facet of web 2.0, I am a fun loving guy, a kind hearted man who loves to help other.
Any story behind choosing that domain name?	I was after domain names related to money as I intended to write about make money online stuff alone at that time. When I was searching for the available domain names that included words like ‘money’, ‘cash’ etc I did not see anything good for two-worded names. Then I switched to ‘dollar’ and found this expired domain name quite accidentally. To be frank, I wasn’t aware of the fact that it was an expired domain name at that time.	More than anything else I want to see my name written on clouds, it can’t be better then Shanker Bakshi dot Com
How many uniques are you getting monthly?	Google Analytics shows that it’s about 5000 visitors per month though according to my host stats, it’s more than 30000 human visits (discounting bots, pings etc).	Sad to say but I am seeing a declining trend in traffic in recent time, I should give some more time everyday to my blog. It misses me a lot these days
What is your average blog income?	It is consistently above $400 in the last six to seven months and I already had four figure income three times during last one year. However, as a policy, I give away majority of what I earn as discounts and rebates to my referrals. This is because of the fact that blogging is only a part time activity for me.	Can’t say a fix amount it varies dramatically every month, I usually try to sell affiliate products through my Make Money Online blog so some time I made good sales and sometimes no sale at all. But it will be making me a wealthy stuff one day, that’s for sure.
How many hours do you spend on blogging?	Purely for blogging activities (publishing, link building, moderation etc) I spend about one to 1.5 hrs a day. However, I also do one or two hours of reading and research in addition. Initially I used to spend up to 7-8 hrs a day on blogging and promoting my blog but I found that it’s not worth to spend time like that at the expense of one’s health.	Two hours per day, actually I am in full time job which sucks 12 hours of my previous day time that’s too for full six days in a week
What do you think is the difference of being an Asian blogger?	If you carefully analyze you will see that majority of the BIG bloggers are from pure English speaking countries with USA and Australia leading the pack. My personal opinion is that, a big bulk of the second-rung bloggers are from Asia – predominantly from colonial, commonwealth nations. However, most Asian bloggers settle for short term mini ambitions and do not really try to make it big. This is the main difference from big time bloggers in the west vs Asian bloggers. In Asia, we have the unique advantage of understanding/speaking decent English and also we get resources pretty cheap (e.g. To get articles written on a daily basis via multiple bloggers, paid comments, theme designs/customizing etc). I would like to see the next Engadget or Tech Crunch coming out of Asian countries	Asian are doing good in the every sphere, we are making waves, we are no more helpless creature of the third world now. It’s good to see people give respect and follow religiously to Asian bloggers.
What’s your biggest goal for your blog?	Nothing! I know it’s bad but I would love to take life as it comes with respect to blogging. Two years ago, though, when I started DollarShower, I had some huge ambitious goals which were never achievable for a part time blogger.	I want to see my blog No. 1 blog in make money online niche in India and in the world
Pitch people why your blog is of a good read	I am a bad marketer (one reason why I am still with a development group) and hence never really did a good campaign for my blog. As a policy, I never ask people to subscribe or link to my blog for any favors received or even as prerequisites for contests that I am running. If people find any good consumable information there in, let them come back again – that’s my thinking!	This is the only blog in the world which teaches about how to make money online in simple plain English. Lots of people befitted by following my blog and doing well in online business, this is the best part, and I love to see when people email me about how helpful they find shanker Bakshi dot Com. Wish me Luck Malvin for my quest to glory
Give me a blog you admire and why?	I like Brian Clark of CopyBlogger because I thought his writing tips are pretty unique and not really repetitive. However, I hate him over-promoting the thesis theme. (Did you notice that I have imitated his theme styling?))	John Chow dot Com, He is the inspiration and role model for me, I follow him and sometime try to imitate him (evil me). I have learned a lot from him, I am lucky that he is always available to me over IM whenever I need to discuss anything about blogging and other stuff with him.

Questions	Ajith	Shanker
Describe yourself in less than 5 words?	90% Programmer and 10% Blogger	Self proclaimed dot Com Guru
What is your favorite breakfast?	What I like the most for breakfast is Idli – Sambar which is simple a South Indian breakfast dish. I also take one or two eggs upto four days a week. A cup of strong tea is a must for me for breakfast.	Gobi ka Parantha (Thats Chapati stuffed with cauliflower for you in English)
In a brief explanation, you are blogging about?	Well, what I write about is probably the most boring combo of SEO – Blogging Tips – Make Money Online that you get to see on every other blog these days 🙂 However, I try to do justice to my job by writing some unique posts at least one in five.	I usually write about how to Make Money Online and other technical facet of web 2.0, I am a fun loving guy, a kind hearted man who loves to help other.
Any story behind choosing that domain name?	I was after domain names related to money as I intended to write about make money online stuff alone at that time. When I was searching for the available domain names that included words like ‘money’, ‘cash’ etc I did not see anything good for two-worded names. Then I switched to ‘dollar’ and found this expired domain name quite accidentally. To be frank, I wasn’t aware of the fact that it was an expired domain name at that time.	More than anything else I want to see my name written on clouds, it can’t be better then Shanker Bakshi dot Com
How many uniques are you getting monthly?	Google Analytics shows that it’s about 5000 visitors per month though according to my host stats, it’s more than 30000 human visits (discounting bots, pings etc).	Sad to say but I am seeing a declining trend in traffic in recent time, I should give some more time everyday to my blog. It misses me a lot these days
What is your average blog income?	It is consistently above $400 in the last six to seven months and I already had four figure income three times during last one year. However, as a policy, I give away majority of what I earn as discounts and rebates to my referrals. This is because of the fact that blogging is only a part time activity for me.	Can’t say a fix amount it varies dramatically every month, I usually try to sell affiliate products through my Make Money Online blog so some time I made good sales and sometimes no sale at all. But it will be making me a wealthy stuff one day, that’s for sure.
How many hours do you spend on blogging?	Purely for blogging activities (publishing, link building, moderation etc) I spend about one to 1.5 hrs a day. However, I also do one or two hours of reading and research in addition. Initially I used to spend up to 7-8 hrs a day on blogging and promoting my blog but I found that it’s not worth to spend time like that at the expense of one’s health.	Two hours per day, actually I am in full time job which sucks 12 hours of my previous day time that’s too for full six days in a week
What do you think is the difference of being an Asian blogger?	If you carefully analyze you will see that majority of the BIG bloggers are from pure English speaking countries with USA and Australia leading the pack. My personal opinion is that, a big bulk of the second-rung bloggers are from Asia – predominantly from colonial, commonwealth nations. However, most Asian bloggers settle for short term mini ambitions and do not really try to make it big. This is the main difference from big time bloggers in the west vs Asian bloggers. In Asia, we have the unique advantage of understanding/speaking decent English and also we get resources pretty cheap (e.g. To get articles written on a daily basis via multiple bloggers, paid comments, theme designs/customizing etc). I would like to see the next Engadget or Tech Crunch coming out of Asian countries	Asian are doing good in the every sphere, we are making waves, we are no more helpless creature of the third world now. It’s good to see people give respect and follow religiously to Asian bloggers.
What’s your biggest goal for your blog?	Nothing! I know it’s bad but I would love to take life as it comes with respect to blogging. Two years ago, though, when I started DollarShower, I had some huge ambitious goals which were never achievable for a part time blogger.	I want to see my blog No. 1 blog in make money online niche in India and in the world
Pitch people why your blog is of a good read	I am a bad marketer (one reason why I am still with a development group) and hence never really did a good campaign for my blog. As a policy, I never ask people to subscribe or link to my blog for any favors received or even as prerequisites for contests that I am running. If people find any good consumable information there in, let them come back again – that’s my thinking!	This is the only blog in the world which teaches about how to make money online in simple plain English. Lots of people befitted by following my blog and doing well in online business, this is the best part, and I love to see when people email me about how helpful they find shanker Bakshi dot Com. Wish me Luck Malvin for my quest to glory
Give me a blog you admire and why?	I like Brian Clark of CopyBlogger because I thought his writing tips are pretty unique and not really repetitive. However, I hate him over-promoting the thesis theme. (Did you notice that I have imitated his theme styling?))	John Chow dot Com, He is the inspiration and role model for me, I follow him and sometime try to imitate him (evil me). I have learned a lot from him, I am lucky that he is always available to me over IM whenever I need to discuss anything about blogging and other stuff with him.

Paste, Share, Earn – PasteWeb.com Review

by Melvin · Feb 2, 2010

This is a paid post sponsored by PasteWeb.com

I will be honest with you guys, when I was contacted to do this review I was a bit hesitant. But ultimately I decided I can accept this review and share to you what this program is really all about.

Paste Web is a website that allows you to earn by just pasting stuffs and letting people know of what you pasted. To be more detailed, you start things off by pasting literally anything. Then after that you will be given a link where you can share what you’ve pasted to your friends. How are you gonna earn then?

You are going to earn $0.5 per 1000 visitors that see your paste. If you’re going to ask me that’s a small amount since most CPM companies pay people a dollar and above per thousand impressions. Their minimum payout is $20 and its paid out every week as long as you meet the minimum.

Navigating and testing through their site, I found out that the system is easily gameable. The number of impressions goes up even if you just refresh your own paste over and over again. I don’t think the system detects hits from same IP address and stuffs. Obviously that is one thing that they need to fix or prepare to be gamed.

They also have a unique referral system where you get 10% of the earnings of the person you referred. And the best thing according to them is that its forever so as long as your referrals are earning, you are getting paid as well. So if you don’t like the site, all you could do is refer as much active users as you can and then have them making you the money. Again don’t expect that much money since it’s not really going to make the bank

Design

Site wise I cannot really review them that much as they are sporting that very simple, oldish look. It reminds me of old sites who use tables primarily for their design and stuffs. If being simple means more profitable for them, then they’re heading the right way design-wise. Here’s a quick look of the site:

I feel the site is lacking a lot. They should’ve had a FAQ page so that it can answer the basic questions about the site. They should also have that about us page so for people to understand they’re for real and etc. There were also some instances wherein the client area is not working properly. Overall I think they need some sort kind of a redesign both for aesthetics and usability

Conclusion

I would speak frankly about it. If you’re into building real online business I don’t see the reason for you using this service. After all it’s no different from get-paid to click, and survey sites which I always deem as a waste of time. You could very much benefit more by exerting your effort in building real sites with real income potential.

Second, I really cannot speak so much if the site really pays or is just another scam site. After all, its new and doing some research I really haven’t found anyone yet using this site. I also question the business model as a whole. How can they pay that money? What are they getting in return to be able to have that fund to pay out a lot of people?

As a whole, it looks a pretty decent site. Knowing majority of my readers, I know this may not really suit you. Comparing to building a more reliable business model, the only advantage that PasteWeb.com offers is that it can give you that small startup income that you can definitely use to jumpstart your business. And yes, you always hear me emphasize the importance of startup income.

What do you think guys? Has anyone here ever tried that site yet? If not, then please check them out at PasteWeb.com