MelvinBlog

A blog that chronicles my journey on online marketing, blogging, social media, technology and life.

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MelvinBlog.com is now PR3 (Lol)

MelvinBlog.com is now PR3 (Lol)

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I’m not really sure on when exactly the pagerank update has occurred but last Friday I opened the home page of this site to see if its still functioning properly (lol) and then I easily noticed that the pagerank toolbar suggested MelvinBlog has now a pagerank of 3. Yay!

Actually I don’t really know how to react primarily because I never cared about pagerank anyway. In fact as I was writing this post, I was thinking if its even necessary to post this blog article. But because I see that most people post articles when pagerank update occurs, I was convinced. 😉

Back about not caring about pagerank. The truth is I never really cared. Most of the sites that I own do have pagerank yet my main business model does not really rely on getting huge search traffic or building tons of backlinks. But for MelvinBlog its quite a bit interesting. Here’s a brief story why.

MelvinBlog Pagerank Story

So everything started last August of 08 I think.  I got PR2 and that was considering that my blog was just started just June of 08. So for 2 months only, I was able to manage getting my blog into that pagerank without doing anything at all literally.

Then 2 weeks after that, Google slapped me back to PR0 for no reasons at all. You see I don’t sell links, or if  I ever do, it usually is redirected from OpenAds back then which means no PR juice is passed to a site. I do sell reviews but even that, I nofollow all the links. So even though I didn’t care that much with PR, I was quite baffled.

After two years, I still had PR0. And that came with the fact that I have over 10,000 backlinks, that I guest blogged for majority of big and reputable blogs like JohnChow.com & DailyBlogTips.com, and have never done anything that would piss off the search engines (Google in particular).

At the time, I was thinking that maybe the linking structure of my site is super flawed that Google cannot just read my entire site properly. That’s because my blog isn’t set up normally, I do usually try to nofollow page that I dont think add value, noindex tags and categories page and even do my robots.txt page extensively.

So with that I really lost hope that my blog would ever get passed PR0 and like I said, I have come to the point where I don’t care about it anymore since the bulk of the income that I make is through advertising, something that pagerank has nothing to do about.

So that’s it. I think it’s important to note too that we as bloggers shouldn’t be caring too much about these metrics because after all, it has nothing to do with our success or the money that we could potentially make.

Personally, I could say that its nice to see this blog get a PR3. How about you? I like to hear your say about this topic and I’d like to know too if your blog/s received an increase or decrease in pagerank as well.

Melvin = Dead?

Melvin = Dead?

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With just 3 posts for this month, with this one being 4th you’re probably wondering on where Melvin has been? Is he dead? Has a serious illness hampered him that he can no longer type using fingers? Is he on the court now battling some lawsuit cases against him? or what?

One of those may be correct but the real reason why Melvin hasn’t been active lately is because he’s busy…

Lols, of course it’s me talking here and I just thought it would be nice to talk in the third person at least for the introduction.  So yep the reason is that I’ve been busy with a lot of things lately. Here are those:

Personal Stuff

There’s been some personal issues that I have been battling lately. Some family issues as well as some illness to a family member that I cannot really disclose for a reason. Also I’ve been quite struggling with keeping my sane as far as being the interim head of the family is concern.

But I’m expecting that go away after October ends. 😉

Work

I don’t want to stress it that much anymore as I’ve mentioned it already myriads of times. Since August my responsibility has increased and I was assigned to become a software tester while keeping my designation as an online marketing guy.

I don’t really consider it tough but if you combine everything, traveling, going home late, partying every fridays or saturdays, then its gotta take a toll on your body I guess.

Consulting & Client Work

Ok, a lot of you probably aren’t aware of this but sometime last year I did some consulting in SEO and online marketing in general. I got a couple of good clients who are willing to work with me to increase their search visibility and stuff like that.

It wasn’t really a core of my online business but I decided to open it up last month (even though I was hyper busy). Eventually I got this client who has nabbed my services for at least more than 2 months I’m estimating, and that has been considered as my other work aside from my job.

What’s next for MelvinBlog?

Am I selling it? Heck no, at least for the moment. Its funny because the traffic has still been consistent even though I haven’t posted here nor have done anything in the blogosphere. The advertising income is still somewhat somehow consistent thanks to the loyal sponsors.

As for the content, I have some really really good stuff that’s currently in draft so stay tuned for that. Also expect me to throw a bunch of guest posts out there. I’m looking on returning on the normal posting frequency here for the next month so stay tuned.

Lastly, if you want to keep in touch with me closer by following me on Twitter and/or on my Facebook Fan page. Till then folks!

Can We Connect More in Facebook?

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Since having a job late last June, I took it as a challenge to maintain everything that I’ve been doing. I always think I’m a good darn multitasker and with that, every plan that I had prior to taking my job has still been the plan.

Obviously its getting tougher and tougher each week as I realized things are not as easy as I thought they would be. I’m sure you notice it that there were times that I couldn’t even publish a single blog post here or maybe respond to an email in a timely manner. Yes, having a day job is a huge time sink.

So it left me thinking what could I do to still maintain my connection with you, as my readers like I did before. Since it’s nearly impossible to pop out as much blog posts as I used to in the old days, I had an idea of being more into the social media scene.

Obviously I thought of Twitter. I mean, I tweet a lot of time, I have a thousand followers so maybe I can just tap into it and communicate with you more. Good idea but I realized something else.

Twitter is good but still it doesn’t really possess the “real-timeness” of Facebook. I mean how many times can you reply to someone, only to get a reply after a day or two? and then getting confused with the reply because  you already forgot you asked a question.

Since I brought up Facebook, then it’s a good idea to use it right? Facebook probably is the largest social network outside Twitter and people there spend more time than with the latter one. I have a Facebook account with a couple hundred followers but the problem is it’s used more to connect to friends and people here in my country. If you’re my friend there, I’m sure you see me say a lot of “Tagalog” words that you just don’t care at all because you don’t understand it in the first place. Most of my things there are just catered to my friends and relatives, not in a wider user base as for instance, my blog’s readers.

With that I realized, the fan page. Yes, the MelvinBlog Facebook Fan Page. The fan page started late last year and I even held a contest to populate my fans, lols. It started off good and nice, I was active there, some of the fans are replying on a daily basis and I’m also using it to gain more traffic back to the blog and vice versa.

I started automating things, connecting it with Twitter and my feed and eventually what happened is that it became stagnant. I mean who cares replying to an automated wall status message right? As days passed by, it started becoming more and more dull. The usual 3-4 replies I get in my wall messages turned to zero, zilch! My bad eh!

The Resurrection of my Fan Page

Yes, you guessed it right. I’m going to switch it back to its old setup and start being more active there. I know the fan page has been “dead” for the past 5 months but its time to resurrect it.

As I’ve said my plan with it is to use it more to communicate with you when times are hard (means busy days).  Just to give you an idea, here’s what you can do with my fan page:

  • Greet me hi or hello
  • Say I look good
  • Ask questions
  • Complain about something
  • Collaborate with your ideas
  • Spam your links 🙂
  • Beg for money
  • Shoot me with your funny pics
  • Tag me with your food for the moment
  • Use it as an email alternative
  • and super many more

As you can see, you can literally do anything by being hooked up in my fan page. And I can assure you that I’ll never let you down. Fortunately, surfing Facebook is 110% legal in our office so rest assure that we can then be closer with each other.

You may want to closely follow it since I’m having some brilliant contest ideas that I may throw just in that fan page. Its going to be really nice and fun out there as we can learn more about each other on a more personal scale. Be a fan of my blog now and let’s start connecting. =p

The Best Blog Marketing Tips Around the Internet

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The contest has finally ended and it’s really really such a great one. It ran for almost 2 months and we’ve had successful feedbacks all over. On top of that, the quality of the entries that we’ve received is just superb. So if I am about conclude now if the contest was successful or not, there’s no question it is.

Best Blog Contest

Anyways first I’d like to apologize for not having this post earlier nor reminding people that the contest has already ended. Actually, it is just this month that I started feeling the sting of having a day job. Although it’s enjoyable and exciting, it disables me to do a lot of things that I used to do when I was still in college.

Anyhow, the winners for the contest will be announced in August 5 as the current entries are already in the hands of the judges. But with that I’d like to honor those entries and give them some link love not because they participated in the contest but because they are really good reads. So if you’re looking for the best marketing  tips around, then you may want to read these articles:

I’ve personally read all of them and I’m so happy with the quality. As I’ve said before, the goal of this contest is really to give back to the community and with the participants adhering to that, I think this is the most awesome contest I have ever  run so far. With that I’d like to congratulate everybody already for really doing a good job. 🙂

Now if you’re contest entry was not there, feel free to hit me up via comment form asap. I tried to find all the articles, tried to moderate all the trackbacks and even went as far as the spam comments page just to make sure all entries are received. Yes, I know how it feels when an entry is ignored. Anyway, again feel free to hit me up in case your article isn’t here.

So what’s next? Well there’s a lot of things to watch out for in this blog but as for the moment, why not try to support your favorite blogger by reading, commenting and retweeting his article above? What do you think?

Major Contest Announcement and Some Guest Posting Opps

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The MelvinBlog Best Blog Marketing Tip Contest has finally come to a close and I can really really see it as a major success. Just with the fact that all entries are superb entries that it exceeded my expectations is a reason good enough to call this contest a success. And add to that, the massive interaction between the community of those blogs who participated in the contest. So again I’d like to thank the sponsors by presenting this uber big banner.

Best Blog Contest

As I’ve said, that’s the goal of this contest. Sure it gave me a lot of traction for the entire 1 month of holding this one but it’s just all about the other intrinsic benefits I guess. So right now, I’m going to announce the winners.

And the winners are…

Congratulations to… uh oh! not so fast.. Actually as for the request of some of the contestant and as mainstream as it may sound, I am going to extend this contest. Yes, extend this!

I’m sorry if I spoiled you as I know you’re really excited to hear if you’re one of the winners but after much discussion with some of the sponsors, the contest will be extended up to July 25, meaning you still have 9 more days to either get as much people to read your contest entry or write another killer blog marketing tip to increase your chances of winning.

Another reason for that is the mini side-in contests. Do you remember that when I opened this contest I announced  that there will be a lot of side-in type of contest? The reason Im extending this is because I still have some really nice exciting small contest for you in the coming days, so stay tuned!

If you haven’t joined yet, what are you waiting for, enter the contest and get a chance to win over $2000 of REAL prizes at stake.

Looking for Guest Writers

I don’t really want to do this but I have to since I’m still trying to figure out managing my time for work and for business.  I’m now officially accepting guest post entries for this blog again. All you have to do is register for an account and then wait for me to upgrade your account. After all is done, you can now write your articles inside my wp-dashboard. That’s it.

I don’t want to put “what to post” and “what not to” here but obviously in order to land a guest post here in this blog, you have to submit a high-quality and unique guest article. Of course, I reserve the right to accept or reject articles if I feel they don’t meet my taste but rest assure, I’ll let you know about it.

So I guess that’s it for now. I made 2 announcements in this post and I’m sure there will be a lot of clarifications so just let me know through the comment form.

I’m Decreasing My Posting Frequency, What’s your Take?

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My last post last week is a very clear indication that some necessary changes are imminent in this blog. So now in this post I would particularly talk about the decrease on the blog posting frequency here in MelvinBlog.

Over the past few months I have been consistently churning out 8-10 blog posts per month or a post per three days. During my school days, it was I think 6-8 posts a month. That being said, for a very long time you as my reader is trained for that frequency. You’re not expecting me to post twice a day because you get used to the current frequency that I have

Now that I obviously don’t have the same time to be dedicated in blogging, I’d like to make a short announcement that I would be decreasing my posts more. I don’t have an exact figure in mind but I think 5-6 a month is where its currently heading.

I’m sure a lot of people really don’t think it’s something that important and I really don’t think it is too but because I care for my readers so I’d like to let everyone know. Couple of years back, there was an awesome post at Problogger on that subject and it has been concluded that blog post frequency doesn’t really matter that much in as much as people would like to think to. And I agree.

Right now, I look at bloggers like Glen of Viperchill, Marko of HowToMakeMyBlog and even Neil Patel of QuickSprout as good examples. They really don’t need to commit into writing everyday, what they commit to is writing high quality content each and every time they write and it’s really something that I’d like to implement here.

I’m sure you would notice it with my recent “how to” posts that I really have started to shift into that writing way. That being said, Im not really worrying on a sudden drop of traffic (maybe that would be evident on the first few weeks) because my aim since this year was to make this blog more as a reference guide where people could actually look into this as a reference, not just a blog.

Another reason I’m doing it is because I want to set aside time some time to some of my bigger projects in conjunction with my real-world work/job. I’ve announced a couple of weeks back that I’m working on my relaunch of my info product called MMO Blog Monetizer 2.0. I’m also working on some side projects that may need to take some of my time as well.

How about you guys? Whats your take on posting frequency? Do you think it’s overrated too or what? I’d like to hear you out on this matter.

$2000 Blog Marketing Contest Recap & Announcements

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Update: Super sorry for a 5 day delay in the drawing of this contest. Was super busy with work. All in all there were 10 entries so great odds for everyone. The winner through random.org is @danalingga. Contact me on how to claim your prize. 🙂

So the first two weeks of the MelvinBlog’s Marketing Tip Contest w/c does have $2000+ of prizes at stake has ended and today I’m going to make a recap of  the entries thus far. If you haven’t joined yet or it’s your first time to learn that I have a contest, make sure you join now.

The contest itself has received so much attention (and traffic) from the blogosphere but I’m quite surprised that less than five people have so far joined. As expected (like in any type of contest), most bloggers who say they will join NEVER really join (or haven’t yet). It’s expected considering the contest will still run up to July 15  and most of the entries will come as we approach that date.

However like I said, joining today is by far the best way. Remember each participant can write up to 5 entries and with that being said, I’m sure some of the contestants who started out early will have a decent advantage over those who will wait, before they write.

Anyways as for the recap, I’m really happy with the turnout. The entries that I’ve received so far are good entries and reading comments from their audience I know that it has become so beneficial them. As I stated initially that’s really my goal, to give good value to the blogosphere through this contest. And for the entries thus far, here they are. Be sure to check them out and give feedbacks if you like their articles.

As you can see, only three people have participated in the contest yet with a total of  4 entries. (If you had written your entry and wasn’t mentioned here, feel free to shoot me a PM). There’s really no risk in this contest so if you have the best marketing tip then just throw it in.

Like I said, it’s people’s mentality to wait for the last minute before entering but if you do yourself a favor and actually start right now, you’ll be getting much higher chance of winning. Remember we will only have 3 winners for this main contest with each winners receiving prizes not less than $200 worth of good products from good people.

Surprise “Side-in” contest

As I’ve said, we’re going to make this entire celebration more special by having in more “smaller contest”. In short, its contests within contest and for this post, I have made this really easy for you.

So for this mini contest, all you have to do is follow me on twitter and retweet this statement:

Reading MelvinBlog’s Best Blog Posts from his blog http://bit.ly/bestbloggingtips  RT @melvinblog

That’s it! At the end of 21st of June 2010, I’m going to randomly pick a winner which will get $10 paypal cash straight to his account.  Remember, you have to follow me first on twitter and then retweet the statement. You can do it just once or it depends to you. There will be only one winner and since this is not really the biggest blog in the universe, your odds of winning is really high! Easy eh?

That’s for now, see ya soon!