MelvinBlog

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

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The Sunday Thing Everyone Is Doing

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Love

So being busy for almost the whole week and coming weeks to come(search for the word busy in this blog, and you’ll find a ton), I have to do the link love that most people do. Btw, just want to say the comment rewards would be inactive at least for a short month as I was looking for a more eye-popping prizes. So Stay tuned! Also I was very happy to have sponsors for this blog that have booked long term!

For the best post that I have seen and bookmarked, here they are:

The perfectionism thing is a great read. When I have read the title I was about to contracdict it and when I read the content I suddenly agreed with it. 😉 Shoemoney’s most commented post that week is an eye-opener. Just because guys like him who never finished college  became succesful, all of a sudden everyone wants to quit going to school and start making money online, which again I say is not for everyone. The Why do you blog question is popular these days and its interesting to see what are people’s take with it. Mr. Cooper talks about the importance of design. It’s so true that because everything has become a 2.0, design seems to be an important factor(very important) for getting viral.

For this coming week, I have a lot of unique ideas that can surely piss you out. 😉 I have prepared some posts that will break your neck make an emphasis on reality rather than what most people say. 🙂 So again stay tuned and make sure you are not subscribed to my feed

The Pleasure Of Being Read

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Once in a while, I got a question and answer here and someone asked a question like this:

Wess Stewart: What motivates you to blog? What made you want to blog in the first place?

I just said for the pleasure of being read and for money. Well I think I would love to say more about that. The money, of course everyone in the blogosphere has believed they can become rich and they can put up a decent amount of money having their blog. It’s given, I mean not so many people can continue a blog that you have to pay $10 a month and get no moolah for it.

Back again to the pleasure of being read. I was looking at my stats and it says I am getting 800 page views a day and 350 uniques. About 1/4 of that probably is just because of AdWords and some PPC. So thinking of having about 150-250 readers a day reading the simple thing that you say about something, man don’t you feel happy for that? Being read from US to Australia to India, New Zealand, Philippines and etc. just seems to be a pleasurable thing for me. I even have some offline friends who says “oh dude, you’re post about this topic pretty got a great response!” And I was like “oh I thought you’re not reading my blog”.   I know a lot other blogs there have bigger number of readers but for someone like me who’s just a dork and a cool student, it’s really amazing. I also got about 100 feed subscribers and its great!

To be honest, I never think at first blogging can be this  fun. Back to my first day I just posted how I think making money online being not for everyone and I think receiving no responses to now getting 5-10 comments per post and keeping on growing. I also meet a lot of people and learned from a lot of people who commented on this blog to share something about what they think and how they disagreed and such stuffs!

I see people who are getting depressed with their blog not piling up hundred of dollars for them every month but with great readership. I know its hard not to get a lot of money but well you just always have to think that a lot of people are following you. You may not be gaining money but for sure you’re getting the traction that most people couldn’t get. And believe me, this will be more useful for you and your journey!

If you like this one you can stumble it!

Internet Babel vs The Germz, Head To Head 3

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So this one came a little very late because of the season. The June part onwards seems to be the busiest part of the year as some people focus on their work, young ones like me go back to school and so. This round of head to head is a pretty interesting one. I really haven’t had much time picking a nice matchup. It’s pretty a little contrasting. Dave of the Internet Babel looks like a old older person than most of us while Germz cannot even watch rated x movies at cinemas! But well oh well, like other previous head to head this is a pretty interesting one. Check it out:

Dave Germz
Describe yourself in less than 5 words? A handsome balding hunk. :) Easily Bored Person.
What is your favorite breakfast? Hmm – Crispy Bacon, scrambled egg and Toast. Coffee, it’s the only thing I drink for breakfast. If there is no coffee I won’t eat breakfast.
How long have you been blogging? Currently – 1 hour a day cos I have a lot of other work on. Hope to ramp it up a bit soon. Usually an hour, I spent way more time researching new business ventures and freelancing.
Any story behind choosing that domain name? I bought Internet Babel as a developed blog (but I liked the name). My friends call me germz, and Germz.com was already taken.
How many uniques are you getting monthly? July (my first month of owning the Blog) was about 2,000 UVs and 15,000 Page Views.. About 6000.
What is your average blog income? hah 😉 Only 1 month in so very little to show at the moment. Ask me again in 12 months ;-). About forty bucks per month, great thing that’s not my main source of income!
Do you read other blogs feeds? How many do you track? – not a big consumer of feeds – prefer to visit the blogs i like and just Google around the web I’m not a big fan of blog feeds, I don’t like having my email spammed with hundreds of emails per day with new articles. I hardly subscribe to any feeds unless I really like the content or I’m doing a favor for a friend. I currently only track about 3 or 4.
What are the other thing/projects that you are doing aside from blogging? – Website development (got about 20 clients at the moment)
– Helping develop some mining/data logging software
– domain flipping/speculation
– got a few websites of my own that bring in some Ad$en$e
– Writing articles
– drinking beer		 Studying, and freelancing.
What keeps a blogger from making money from his blog? a few things off the top of my head (in no particular order)
– lack of time
– lack of commitment
– not enough belief in their own skills/ability
– treating readers like idiots
– no interaction with community
– aiming for a saturated market/not finding a niche		 I don’t use my blog to make money, I don’t think it’s easy to earn money from a blog unless your blog has a niche that’s easy to exploit. My only source of income for the blog comes from the advertisers. I only use the money to pay for hosting and aweber.
When does a blogger have to consider monetizing Well, unless you’re doing it purely for the love of your subject and income is not a factor, then ideally you should be thinking about monetization before you start – it should be a part of the planning process. Money isn’t the key factor for a
lot of Bloggers though so they shouldn’t get hung up about it.		 As soon as possible, it’s best when you have some content otherwise no one will want to advertise from you.
What makes your blog unique from others? Me. Hehe. Well, that’s the main reason – the blog is about my personal entrepreneur experiences and projects, which differ from other entrepreneurs, good and bad. It’s written by me! 😀
What’s the biggest goal for this blog? Apart from the things I mentioned above:
– get the stats back up to where they used to be and then make them even better
– increase the earnings (although that’s not my primary driver)
– spread some useful knowledge
– have some fun “		 At the current moment I’m doing a very special project which I’m sure everyone will like.
Give me a blog you admire and why? At the moment, I like reading the Net Fool – a lot of good info in there usually, and a nice ‘tone’ to it. Thenetfool.com I visit his blog every time I get a chance, it’s very informative and I really like Jim’s point of view on most of his articles.

They Hacked This Blog And How My Determination Fixed it

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Most of you probably know that this blog was hacked a couple of days ago. In fact, you can see in my archive page that there is a notice (until now) saying to just go directly to my posts instead of going to the homepage. Well, long story… (you may not want to read this because this is boring!)

The day started when I tried loggin in to my wordpress blog admin page. I was surprised to see that the my login wasn’t succesful so I retried it. But well still to no avail. I immediately pressed the forgot password and well my password was reset and I was able to login again. Being curious, I immedaitely visited my site and saw that I am hacked! Well, I was surprised at it that I wasn’t even able to take a screenshot of it (if everyone has, please give it to me 😉 ) I then panicked a bit mainly because obviously I know little with things like this and well its just that from my point of view I can do nothing by myself.

So I then turned to the busiest forum in the world, the digital point. I have made a thread there saying my site was hacked and I immediately got great responses. Some were saying that I should check for some shells, others are saying this and that and those. I also went through the teenager internet marketing forum, blog premiere. Many people have responded as well, but in a longer span of time. Jason pointed out saying that I should get the db from my host which is gator. Oh, yeah! I forgot I should have a conversation with my web host which should be done first and foremost. I immediately called them and talked (they were polite) and they say they would get back to me asap. The incident reminds me of the hacking of Carl Ocab’s site. When his site was hacked, what he did was to change host and update the nameservers and it became fine. The process is a little lengthy though.

I was busy all throughout the day. I then called Rajaie who could probably help me with this. he responded immediately (thats what friends are all about:-) ). He asked for my wp account and I immediately made one for him and made him an administrator. One clear thing is that I dont have a clear path of what to do. While waiting for him, I emailed Scocco of DBT, I tweeted Shoemoney, and the number of replies from dp kept on growing. I then revoked the admin privileges to Alkorani because I feel I should on a more clear direction.

Turned the PC off and think more. I had to be more focused and DETERMINED for it. The blog, well aside from having sold out ad spots, hundreds of readers, the main thing is that it’s a part of me. That’s why my name has on it. After 2 hours, turned the PC again, got reply from Scocco saying I should reinstall wordpress and load the backup. Problem is that my last backup was made way back June, wtf! I told him if there;s other solution? and he said none! I am a click away from removing wordpress and reinstalling it and loading an outdated backup but I said No! Then the great light came in and it seemed that in a blink of an eye I know the end of the tunnel is very close.

I, have searched on C99 shells and have found some of them on my public_html folder, then I also found suspicious files which I fearlessly deleted. Then still not fine~ oh shit! Then an idea popped out and well I changed my template back to the old and ugly Kubrick theme. I loaded it and to my surprise it loaded succesfully… Aha! The problem was on my template. Obviously, the site’s main page is the only one not functioning. What I did is look at the index.php and bingo! I have found out the culprit! I immediately restored the code back and it was back again. The rest was history…

What did I learn? Many things; always back up, never lose composure, trust yourself, and believe in your friends that you can do it, they add positive things. To all, thank you for the help, digital point, blog premiere, the bloggers I have contacted and everyone. A very great experience to me!

Ad Spots/Types I Don’t Think Look Good For Readers

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Well as you can see I am almost pretty sold out on private ads. Maybe that’s because of the super duper affordable but quality advertising I am giving them. 😉 There are some who have booked it for long term. If you are interested in advertising (I know you’re not!), look at the advertising page.

So, selling ad spots depends on the owner. You can oversell every space on your blog to make money. Just look the evil Chow and the number of ads on his site. But of course sometimes this may hurt your readership (in some cases they dont). Well, these are the spots and/or type of ads that I hate:

  • Stripe Ads – I will never consider this one. On older browsers, sites that have stripes do not look well. But well even though if everyone is using Firefox, I wouldn’t still consider it. For me it’s annoying and would hurt your readers (literally)
  • Leaderboard – Although I have used it in my basketball blog, it isn’t really much of a great choice I think. After all it’s very HUGE and the focus of your reader will instead shift to the leader one.
  • 300X250 – Again Chow and some guys like Tyler Cruz and Carl Ocab are selling this spot. Why I don’t think its good? Well because oftentimes people will wonder what’s the relation of that pic/ad to the certain post! Your readers will wonder what is it for and it’s not so good for branding. Will never try it!
  • Peel away Ads – For some other people they have had some success with it but for me it’s like giving almost 1/4 of your blog to advertising. Although it’s not as intrusive as others, I have received feedbacks that it slows down your blog/site. Anything that makes a site slow is BAD!

That’s it for now. Maybe someday I can appreciate those spots and start thinking of selling them (no way!) But well it depends on people and needs. Maybe if I need it badly to buy me a house and lot then I would consider it. 🙂

Blogote vs TechTreak, Clash of Two Tech Blogs

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So today it is going to be the technology blogs turn to face each other in this week’s featured ‘Blogger Head to Head”. Technology blogs are blogs that blog about technology. Well, that was before. Now, technology blogs tend to expand their reach. As the technology expands it’s channels, so as the blogs. Just take a good look at techcrunch.

For this week, it’s going to be Blogote and TechTreak. Honestly I have a difficult time remembering (pronouncing) their names but hopefully I can get over this hump. Blogote is a blog that I have visiitng since months ago while Techtreak has also a great one which I am reading lately. Here are the questions I fired to their faces. 😉

TechTreak Blogote
Describe yourself in less than 5 words? crazy, Contest(too many to say) freak, helper, smart, geek Indifferent,Simply and Smart! 😉
What is your favorite breakfast? Almost all indian foods Bread butter Jam 🙂
Any story behind choosing that domain name? Me and my brother just wanted to have a tech blog so we just searched through godaddy but all the good ones are booked then my brother came up with TechTreak(we still dont know what treak is ) and we took it, at first it is a bit tough to remember but after some weeks we just getting good response and we made it so far! yes, Blog + promote = Blogote
Why did you choose the technology niche? Coz am a big tech freak and just wanna try the lastest gadgets so it will be fun to blog about them! Tech is a part of life,So experiencing the Tech and writing about it is not a tough task.
How many hours per day do you spend blogging? Almost 3 to 4 hours but in busy day i cant blog for even 4 days Not even 1 hour 🙁
How many uniques are you getting monthly? 14000 before 3 months stats but now due to some personal(father expired) problems i just stopped everything and now started to get on the track back(its really hard)! First month I received 16k+ http://blogote.com/2008/site-news/blogote-june-2008-monthly-wrap-up.html
What is your average blog income? around $800 before 3 months but now just $250 due to bad days! This is the beginning.. I will post about them in the coming months!
Do you read other blogs feeds? How many do you track? Yeah i love to read others! i have more than 50+ No I dont read blog feeds.I do visit some of my friends blog to pass my time.
What keeps a blogger from making money from his blog? Content + Traffic + Good Circle and with good management! Motivation and discouragement..These two things make a blogger reach any of his goals.
When does a blogger have to consider monetizing While having a great content, traffic and decent link love After writing first 10-20 posts,he has to find out his niche and then Quality seo readable posts will do the job.Also submission to social sites is recommended for every blogger.
What makes your blog unique from others? Style in posts, good design(some self made ), covers almost all interesting stuff like mixed juice! I have No answer,I cant say if my blog is really unique bcoz Blogote is yet to be discovered and nourished.
What’s the biggest goal for this blog? ha…biggest!? almost every month is a sucessfull month for TechTreak coz as a contest freak i try to get on as much as possible and try to make most of my content with a better traffic each month so it just going to increasing!
But to the most hardest part i ever faced is face off with johnchows blog review, i dont know about johnchow that much untill then, when i seen him in a RuffPC(worth $3000) contest, that is the month i tried to make most of my blog to get nore votes and win but with both our votes euqual the whole contest rules and schedules are changed because of us but sadly i lost it and it still hurts(i even cant says that tons of xxxxxx comments i got from a month from JC fans) me the most! but the only hope is one day i’ll be there to break the chains!!!		 For now it is to break the traffic shackles obviously to be the best blog with quality content.
Give me a blog you admire and why? Problogger.net since in the beginning i learnt a lot from darren I don’t admire any blogs,why to admire a blog when you have the capability to blog better than others..

Providing Something, That’s What People Love

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So I don’t really know if I can still compete to the blogging Idol. I would be entering the busiest week of this month. If you aren’t subscribed to my feed then consider subscribing now! 😉

Most people are thinking “how can I make my site popular?” And I admit, this is something that everyone of us wants but only few can have it. You see all the tips everywhere on how to run a blog and get tons of traffic and readers and how to promote and so. But the truth is, it boils down on how you make other people like your site, how you can provide them something that is useful. For this matter let’s take some examples on sites that do this one very well.

JohnChow.com – I know many are despising and hating Chow for putting so much ads on his site, for doing ten paid reviews a day, for having posts not related to making money online and more. But does it make his traffic suffer? how about the comments? Not even close! The truth about Chow’s traffic is that people enjoy him as him! I have seen many video posts of Chow and he’s very hilarious (looks very hilarious)! In this way, he provides ENTERTAINMENT for people like us. Of course, he’s still one of the more established make money online blog. But he does this with a twist! That’s what make John Chow’s blog grow!

JackBook.com – Well I am sure not many of you know this site. But I think it’s a popular one! Jacky Supit, the owner is a Malaysian blogger. Upon looking at his blog you can count on  both of you’re fingers why you will not like his site so much. Plenty of ads, lack of value of posts, atrocious grammar (worse than mine), an ugly tagline of “a master of blogger”, a 728X60 advertisement at the top of his header and doing reviews about casinos! Yeah, I don’t really much comment on his site. So why there are about 50,000 people following his site? Because he provides things! He converts wordpress themes to blogger for free, he shares his hacks to blogger blogs, he let people scorn at him, he’s very generous with most people and many more. That’s because he started with Blogger and then later moved with wordpress and he’s also a good coder. To count the rate of positives over negatives is just too much. Now, no wonder why many people are subscribed to his feed.

DoshDosh.com Dosh Dosh is probably my favorite blog. It is probably one of the more super duper informative blog about many things. Blogging, Social Meda, Internet Marketing and so. With Doshdosh I know people don’t bother with the anime faces at his blog. Now think if someone unpopular do this tactic. I’m sure people would question it and scorn at it. Also Dosh Dosh has also decreased his posting frequency. I think he’s just posting two to three times a week! Does it affect his traffic? No! Because every single post there is marked with educational and proven tips and techniques (in a formal language) that we could surely apply.

You see, these blogs are blogs that other people can easily think the reverse way what we (I) think of them. But because they have overdelivered with something that is beneficial to us, readers, they remained to be at the top of their niche. At the end it’s not important, how your site looks like, how you hide your privacy too much and even where you came from! It boils down to how you can greatly affect the society, and that is what people will follow!

You and you’re blog, what do you provide to the society? Do you just do it in hopes that you’ll make money from it sooner than later? Or you really have a genuine intention of providing something?