MelvinBlog

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

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Fan My Blog & Win Exciting Prizes

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To kick start this year, I had some mini contests idea in mind and also some huge ones which will happen sometime in March. And so for today I thought I would launch this one for all of us to have fun and excitement on the way.

Postnote: Sorry for the delay, the contest winners are the ff: Joseph, Dana, CredFollow, Neil, Simon. I’ll be contacting you soon with your prizes.

The Facebook Fan My Blog thing has originated since mid last year. Some of the bloggers have really made the most of it. So back to the days when I was thinking about the blog redesign, I had included it in my plans. As you can see below the blog only has 12 members as I haven’t made a huge marketing push yet.  So how about this contest for my marketing strategy? 😀

Ok, this contest works very easy. All you need to do is complete three steps which are all required. Don’t worry it will not cost you a tooth and nail to do both.

Step 1

Fan MelvinBlog.com on Facebook – Just follow this link, fan my blog and you’re done with this step.

Step 2

Tweet about this contest – Click the retweet button above or copy and paste the text below to your Twitter account.

“Fan MelvinBlog.com on Facebook and win amazing prizes RT @melvinblog http://bit.ly/6eUHar ”

Step 3

Put both your Facebook name you used and the link to the Twitter status about this contest in the comment form.

Example: “Hey I just entered your contest. My facebook name is James and my tweet can be found herehttp://twitter.com/melvinblog/statuses/7773505186“

Mechanics & Prizes

On January 25, I will pick five winners via Random.org. The first five persons who will show up in the random listings will be the five winners who will win the following (forget the value!):

So the winners will choose their own prize. If you are the first one to show up in random.org then you will have the privilege to pick first!  Hoping for a fun and exciting contest and good luck to all participants. Cheers!



The Big Glitch In Guest Posting

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By now you probably have been already told that the quickest way for a brand new blog to get traffic and build some buzz is by doing guest posting. It doesn’t just apply to new blogs, it also applies to mid cap blogs like my blog and probably your blog. To sum it up, doing guest posts is vital in increasing your blog’s brand awareness.

Anyways, I’m always a good observant when it comes to the blogosphere and all the things that are currently happening in it. And one thing I noticed is that there is “somehow” a big glitch in guest posting (glitch means minor problem, adding the word big means it’s a big problem, lols!).

It usually happens like this. A famous blogger is entering a busy weekend thus no time for blogging. Then he would offer his readers to guest post. Lastly he would publish the said post. Where’s the problem? Well if you observe it’s not hard to figure out that the certain guest post SUCKS! In formal terms, it doesn’t meet the quality that the owner usually publishes. What the heck? How is that possible?

This is debatable and many will not agree with me. That happens simply because of the fact that the owner blogger is busy. When someone submits a guest article, the owner doesn’t really read it, he just skims at it! He just looks at the basic things, the grammar, spelling, if the sentence makes sense, if the paragraph is well done and etc. They don’t really analyze that much if it’s a generic boring article or a regurgitated concept. In the end they think like it’s better to post something than have nothing for your readers right? Wrong!

This is obviously a big glitch. It harms both blogs. No one will click on the link of the guest poster because the blog post sucks and on the other hand, the loyal readers of the famous blog would feel bad that the quality they used to see is not met. And worse, they might start lose your trust if you do it again and again. Reputation tarnished!

Guest posting is good, cool and nice. You reap both benefits. But if done like the way I mentioned above, it becomes a recipe for failure. This is my call both to guest posters and the blog owners. Be sure to do it right.

Do You Know You’re a Boring Blogger?

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The number 1 advice people always say to you to succeed in blogging is that you need to create good and high quality content. So there ya go! Because of it you’re forced to write articles like a freelancer, you’re fed into acting like you need to be like Darren Rowse and stuffs. The end result, you become a boring blogger.

Most people get it wrong by thinking that writing top-notch content is all about the perfectness of the grammar, the formality of how words are written and just sounding absolutely professional. Believe me it’s not! The problem with most bloggers is that they try to be perfect and because of that, they sound like a robot. It’s just like reading an article in a monotonous tone. Try reading books in your school library and you’ll know what I mean.

Ironically sometimes, you don’t realize that you’re starting to bore your readers to death. Results? A decline from just about everything (readers, subscribers, traffic , etc). Anyways here I compiled a list why you might be or starting to become a boring blogger:

  • You sound like a lawyer – and you don’t need to. I don’t know but professional blogging for me is not really about being professional words-wise or with the proper grammar and stuffs. Pro Blogging is about treating blogging as a serious business. So if you’re a 15 year old kid who’s trying to sound like your teacher, then you’re not helping your blog.
  • Generic Articles – generic articles is a really big NO NO. Or at least minimize it. Generic articles is like the ones that has been tackled 300 million of times and you still tackled it and talked it in a none unique way. Articles like “how to earn money from blogging” or “Make Money By starting a blog”. You see, it’s hard not to regurgitate a topic. But you make it unique from the rest by adding something unique and breaking it down to more specific topics.
  • Transformed into a  news site – Blogs like TechCrunch can certainly do this considering the audience that they have right now but smaller bloggers SHOULD NOT. I see a lot of bloggers just writing the same news on their blogs w/c really adds 0 value. Just because Dennis Yu is popular,  does it mean you have to write about him too?
  • All Promotional stuffs – I guess we can blame a guy named John Chow for this? lols. It turns me off so much when I see someone promotes a product for the obvious sake of just earning a commission. How many times do you see someone make a clickbank product writeup and then recommend it to people w/o even him knowing what the product is really all about? Booooring stuff!

There’s nothing wrong in being quirky and putting some humor in your posts. At least in this way, you don’t get to have them have the impression that you’re a lame, boring blogger that makes  “robot-ish” sounding articles. By not being that, you are easily separating yourself away from 70% of the bloggers. What do you think? Does this article make any sense to you?

AdvertiseSpace.com, Anything New to Offer?

AdvertiseSpace.com, Anything New to Offer?

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Since late last year, I’ve been quite seeing a small buzz around a startup advertising network that simplifies the process of buying and selling ads which is called Advertise Space. I’ve seen them advertising on big blogs around the blogosphere and was quite intrigued about them.

Ultimately I signed up on their service because it’s free and there’s nothing to lose. Now as I was navigating their whole site I wondered “does this site have anything unique to offer?” I mean since blogging has emerged there are sure tons of third party networks that present themselves to “automate” the process of selling ad spaces on our blogs and obviously most of them have just died in the process.

Unfortunately I really haven’t seen anything new about their platform. You sign up with them and get approved (or not) and you can start displaying the script and their ads. Obviously, there’s nothing in their system that I find appealing. When you click on a blank ad space you are redirected to page like this:

And when you click on the buy now button you are redirected to a paypal payment page. So frankly speaking, I find it absurd. I mean sure they’d find the advertisers for you and in exchange get like 60% of the revenue but these days that isn’t anything that can make us get excited. BuySellAds does have the same program BUT they have better features like showing site metrics and also takes small percentages. Obviously OIO Publisher has been still one of the leaders and gets NO cut at all (and you’d be crazy not to take advantage of their $15 off promo for this month seriously!)

To end this one, should you still give AdvertiseSpace.com a look? Definitely! It’s free, there’s nothing to lose, and you get to blame no one when you don’t make money. 😉 Again that was just my sheer opinion in it and you should not base your decision on it.  How about you guys, what do you think of this new startup platform?

P.S. This is not a sponsored review or whatever

Fruitful 2010 for Everyone!

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Hey guys, as I was typing this, its like just 5 minutes before 12 am, the first day in 2010. Here in Philippines, people are so used to being noisy before the eve up to January 1. We use a lot of fireworks and firecrackers, noisy sounds, and small trumphets (w/c is called torotot here), and just about every asset we can use to be noisy..

For today I have a short message to everyone of you (I rarely do video posts). Again happy new year and may 2010 be the best year in our lives. 😀


P.S. I am creating a new report that would be FREE (interestingly) to all of you guys and I’m promising you it’s a great stuff, so stay tuned!

My Best and Worst For Year 2009

My Best and Worst For Year 2009

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So looks like it’s time to say goodbye to year 2009. Whew, how quick time really flies! The time I first started this blog is still fresh in my mind and now Im close to 2 years with this blog.

Anyways since most people are still enjoying this holiday, I believe they won’t have any time to swallow marketing tips, blogging tips or whatever. So for today’s recipe I am putting out a list of the best and worst things that happen to me (not just blogging and business) for the year 2009 (in no chronological order):

Note: Bare in mind that some entries here can be irrelevant due to the fact Im typing drunk (not that much) and I still have that hangover,lols). Either way isn’t it sweet that even Im drunk I still have something for you. 😉

Best of this year

  • Went in love (the usual teenage love affair)
  • Won an Ipod from Market Leverage (w/c was converted to cash)
  • Won a gift card from another ML Contest.
  • Finished my 3rd year in college w/o any problems at all.
  • Become a more responsible person (both family and community-wise)
  • Sold old sites for a total amount of $1230
  • Purchased a nice Presario Laptop
  • Bought another walkman phone and then a smartphone
  • Attended several good conferences
  • Invited as a speaker in a local SEO Conference (I rejected it though)
  • Gained weight during the summer (good because I am skinny)
  • Leverage my online earnings and used it in offline business dealing with nuts.
  • Had 2 extremely successful internship stints
  • Finally did a redesign with this blog.
  • Never had a month without an advertiser/sponsor
  • Orlando made the NBA Finals
  • Achieved my goal of being as frugal/thrifty as possible.
  • Had a superb relationship this year with my parents.
  • Made a lot of new good friends while still keeping in touch with old ones.
  • Had myself interviewed thrice and getting mentioned a lot of times in the blogosphere.
  • and many more.

Worst of the year

  • Lost weight during the internship
  • Got a cease and desist letter twice
  • Got a legal letter from Yahoo! Search
  • Lakers won the Championship
  • Lost over $1000 in affiliate marketing
  • Lost my skill in playing guitar and keyboards
  • lost my skill in playing basketball
  • Have never been involved in sports for the whole 2009
  • Got banned for a month in Digital Point Forums
  • Bought some stupid info products
  • Never got my blog featured in a local newspaper here
  • Let some of my good domains expire & get picked up by someone
  • Still Pagerank 0 for MelvinBlog
  • Has not launched 4 out of 5 of my big projects this year

And that’s it. The list goes randomly crazy and I really never thought I would share some of the stuffs there with you guys. 😀  Either way, I would love to here yours too and you can do so in the comment form.

Photo Credits by Under Consideration

BloggingTips.com Is For Sale, BIN is $60k+

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So I was bloghopping (does this term really exist?) today and have noticed that one of the bigger blog known as BloggingTips.com is for sale. If you don’t know ( I doubt it), Blogging Tips has been in the blogosphere for quite some time. I watched how it grew, how it used to have a superman logo and how it has a ton of writers now. Again like I always say, it’s sad when you hear people selling their blogs.

Anyways, the auction can be found here and Kevin, the owner is looking for a minimum of $60,000. The blog is an established blog and really one of my favorite reads when talking about blogging. It’s also ad-free I believe and has a good interactive forum (most blogs don’t have). And of course you can add the premium domain where the blog lies in.

Know what? What I don’t like when seeing blogs get sold is the fact that the new owner usually sucks. We’ve seen a lot of good blogs that are turned to so-so blogs when ownership changes and if Blogging Tips gets sold, I do hope its not the case. Either way, good luck to Mr. Muldoon.