My own experience of Buzz Group Rage was with my very first message to a Buzz Group for social marketing. The name of the Buzz Group is not important. What happened is and I am wondering if it is taking place all over the Internet at other Buzz Groups?

The instructions on joining the group were to submit posts to various social networks and then ask members of the Buzz Group to buzz the posts. The rules as I understood them to be, were to only Buzz posts that were in my niche, related niches or niches I was genuinely interested in.

Call me naive but what I saw was Buzz Group members buzzing everyone’s posts with complete disregard for the rules. So, silly me sent a message to all group members asking what was going on. maybe I could have not used the words "Group Monitors".

"Hi Buzz Group,
>
> I’m new to this group. I have just read an email from XXXXXX about buzzing ANY posts, rather than ones associated with your niche. 
> Can we get a statement from the Group Monitors please?"

All seemed to be going well and I was getting into the swing of things.

Then I got this email from one of the group members:

"PLEASE SEND ME your voting names so that WE CAN BE ALLIES and I can vote for you as we move forward.

I subscribe to the principle: "One hand washes the other." When you vote for my posts, you are actually voting for your own posts.
I humbly request Buzz on the following. I’ve included extras in case you’ve been banned from some of these sites."

Note this person was in a niche not related to me and one I am not interested in at all.

I thanked him for buzzing my posts but added:

"I’m reconsidering if I will continue here because I’m not sure I agree with the way the Buzzing is occurring. I mean no disrespect by this.

I realise the group does not have critical mass in many niches and so people are helping each other out. Whilst I can sympathize with people and see the logic in this approach I do not believe it is right.

I can see that buzzing in this way may well get us some “traction” to go forward and grow the business. The problem I’m having is deciding if that really helps everyone or causes those who are really wasting their time in a niche to stay there rather than put their efforts elsewhere. Those that have good niches will probably get to critical mass quicker this way, but would get there anyway without their ”Buzz-mates”. Those that don’t are doomed to live under the impression they are getting somewhere. Anyway that’s my 2 cents worth ;0)

I think I will probably not use this Group for my current niche but will monitor it for use with my Internet Marketing Niche. I think it could  be good value for that niche.

I have Buzzed your posts as a thank you for your help and advice to me."

I thought I had gracefully stated my position and thought nothing more of it.

Then I got another email from the same person which said:

"Okay, so now I know who is stirring things up.
Like you said, you are New to the group. So why don’t you just keep a
low profile and buzz the posts like almost everyone else, and learn
about how this group is run before you start to stirrup chaos and
dissension among a group of good people?
I don’t give a damn what "YYYY" says. As far as I can see, (I’ve been
in the group over six months), YYYY doesn’t do any buzzing for
members in this group. BUT XXXXXX VOTED FOR EVERYONE EVERY
SINGLE DAY, AND NOW SHE IS GONE BECAUSE OF NEW MEMBERS COMING IN HERE
AND SHOOTING THEIR MOUTHS OFF.
I don’t know where this idea that the Web 2.0 sites "know all and
they’ll ban you if you buzz out of your niche or buzz too often" came
from. But I do know that there are a lot of ‘SEO Experts’ on the web
who have a PR-ZERO blog with no traffic and no income who don’t rank
in the first 500 pages of Google or Yahoo - who some of you people
are listening to like their words are cast in stone along side of the
ten commandments.
Wise up people! Digg doesn’t know all, Stumble doesn’t know all, and
even Google doesn’t know all. But yet you allow people to come in
here and you blindly believe their know-it-all hogwash.
How many of your know-it-all’s spewing this crap have a 7 figure
income from their Internet business? I want to know, because that’s
who I’ll listen to.
Respectfully, "

Well, I was aghast, shocked and devastated ;0) Not really I was just very disappointed.

I then spent the next hour going through all the emails and messages at the Buzz Group to find the facts. I didn’t believe my question would force a long-time member to leave the group. It turns out that XXXXXX had decided to leave the group well before I asked my question. The message below was sent by them to the group, but my question just preceded it. So I was the last man standing as it were.

"After many months of buzzing and commenting posts on this group, I now find my posts are not being buzzed because of my niche (education). 10-12 Diggs or Propellers a week is simply not a good ROI for the amount of time I invest.

Thank you to everyone who has abided by the original rules by which we all joined. I appreciate your support in the past and I wish you well in the future."

So I then put together a long email that included all the email messages that preceded mine where others admitted they might have upset XXXXXX and a polite explanation of the events and asked that they be considered. I was hoping for an apology but instead I got this:

"I appreciate your responding to my email. I don’t mind new members asking questions. I encourage it. In fact, I’m the first one to offer advice when I see them supplying links that are not correctly made, or they are to the wrong place.

It’s the suggestions that I resent. In my opinion, nobody has a right to suggest changes or make a negative comment about how the group is doing something until they’ve paid their dues to the group and been and active member for awhile.

As far as the "Group Monitors" that you mention, that’s a total joke. There aren’t any. There are just us members. When I started with this group only a very small percentage of people voted and the group was full of freeloaders. Now we each get twice as many votes, and we don’t have any more active members than we did six months ago. The reason that we get twice as many votes is that the core of us vote for any niche. The spirit of the group is to vote for any post that has some educational or entertainment value, and to not vote for spammy posts.

Sorry, but for anyone to think for a minute that voting outside of one’s niche is going to hurt their credibility with the web 2.0 sites or the members of those sites is pure folly. Nobody knows what you are doing, and nobody cares. They are all too busy trying to run their own business and make a few dollars. People are allowed to have varied interests, and in fact it’s only natural if they do. And if you want your voting record to look natural, then you will be voting on posts regardless of the niche they represent.

Personally, if you are making web 2.0 a big part of your marketing efforts, then you are dooming yourself to failure. 80% of all sales start with a search engine search. Stats published all over the Internet say that web 2.0 produces very poor quality visitors who don’t convert well at all.

I’m happy to say that I’ve got one of the 2% - that’s the 2% of the sites on the web making enough money to actually provide a decent living for its owners. And I can tell you that after 6 months, I’d have to guess that only 5% of my income is derived from social marketing. Social marketing does NOT provide a good ROI at all. The only reason that I continue to do it is to prepare for the future when the kids who are running the 2.0 sites grow up and might become an actual customer for my programs.

Is this normal behaviour in Buzz Groups? It seems to me if this person is getting such poor responses from social marketing why stay in the group?

In closing let me say after joining the Buzz Group my first post was buzzed 28 times at propeller.com in 5 days. I have left the group since and posted my second post 3 days ago and am still waiting for my first Buzz.

Maybe I’m just stupid Duh!

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Before beginning this next step make sure you have installed RoboForm. Because by the time you have registered your domain, hosted it on Hostgator, installed WordPress with MySQL database, Web20Wealth and RapidActionProfits you will have so many user names, logins and passwords your head will spin. And that is just for your first Blog.

Don’t even start this process without Roboform installed in your browser.

What I intend to do on this blog is try and find places on the Web which already cover much of what has to be done to create your first blog. I do not believe in re-inventing the wheel if there is already something out there that is hopefully FREE or can SAVE you money, or has a SMALL COST associated with it, but clearly explains what needs to be done.

So my first search on Google was for a video on GoDaddy Domain Name Registration. I typed in the Google Search windows “Godaddy Videos”. There were 30 videos covering subjects from the Superbowl to actually registering a domain name. Some of the videos are entertaining but distracting! We’re here to work ;0). Take a peak later if you want to.

This is the one I want you to see. By doing a Google Search on the Web for Discount Coupons you can significantly reduce the cost of your GoDaddy Domain Name Registration. Take a look and then get yourself a coupon just like they do in the video, before you register your domain name.

How To Buy A Domain Name From GoDaddy And Get Top Discounts, By - video powered by MetacafeYou can go to Earn Money Online Blog to see a post on the latest Godaddy Discount Coupons.

Click here to go to the GoDaddy Web Site for Domain Name Registration to find and register your domain name.

Technorati Tags: Godaddy.com,Godaddy Discount Coupons,Domain Name Registration

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Yaro Starak is one of the Blogging Guru’s you should take a good look at. He has several sites devoted to blogging. These include:

http://www.becomeablogger.com/ -If you are new to blogging this is the place to go. There you can watch a video on how to set up your first blog and create your first post.

There is also a FREE Report Blog Profits Blueprint that you can download and read and begin to understand how Blogs can make money.

http://www.blogmastermind.com/ -This is Yaro’s site for his Training Program which is full right now but you can subscribe to be notified when he opens the course up again.

http://www.entrepreneurs-journey.com – Here is another site from Yaro. This one concentrates on Blogging as a business and has lots of informations on how to do this. But read the article “How to Write Great Blog Content – The Pillar Article”.  This is one of the secrets to successful and profitable blogging. He mentions “Flagship Content by Chris Garrett and “Cornerstone Content” by Brian Clark also bloggers you should take note of.

Blog Pulling Power – Creating Flagship Content – This is one of Chris Garretts’ Blogs. He talks about flagship content, which is the same as the Pillar Articles mentioned by Yaro. Chris describes flagship content as “Is there anything that you could point to that your blog really owns? It could be a single post, a series of posts, an over-arching “message”. Now think about your favorite blogs. I am sure you go back to these blogs because of good quality regularly updated content but is there also a reference or series that you can refer to again and again?”

http://www.CopyBlogger.com is one of Brian Clark’s blogs you must read. You can also get the article “How to Create Cornerstone Content That Google Loves”. Take a look around the rest of the Blog too to find great content.

You should spend some time on reading everything these three guys write on their blogs. It is free education but more than that they will show you by their example how to create really great blogs. 

Brian Clark’s closing paragraph really puts it so well -

The first goal of cornerstone content is usefulness and relevancy to the website visitor, no matter how they arrive. The second goal is to make that content so compelling and comprehensive that people are willing—no, make that excited—to link to it.

Are you beginning to get excited about the possibilities of becoming a professional blogger like these guys?

By the way the Crap Detector doesn’t even register a reading with these guys.

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I’m sure you know almost everything you do on the Internet requires user names and passwords.

In 18 months I have created something like 600 user names and passwords as I have signed up for anything and everything that looked interesting to me. Initially I would save the user names and passwords in One Note but each time I wanted to login to a site I’d have to search One Note to find the User Name and Password I used, then type them in. It was tedious, time consuming and frustrating because I’d often type the password incorrectly too.

Then I went looking for some software to save all the user names and passwords in. I found a couple of programs but again it was hard to manage them and use them easily.

Sometimes I found myself signing up for so many sites that I could not remember the passwords I’d used just a few minutes earlier. As a Baby Boomer I do find my short-term memory is not as good as it once was! But why remember silly things that a computer can easily manage?

Then I stumbled upon RoboForm – which “Remembers Passwords so you don’t have to”. I got the FREE version first. Although it has some limitations it gave me enough information to realize this was the best thing for me to use.

When I am researching on the Internet I often sign up for a site and then move quickly to other sites of interest. With RoboForm I can immediately capture the login information and easily come back later to take a closer look at the site.

RoboForm installs as a Tool bar on Internet Explorer or FireFox, so is always available to you when surfing the Internet. If you sign up for any site it will prompt you for a user name and password and save it within the RoboForm database.

The next time you want to go to that site you can locate it in the RoboForm list and click it. It will take you straight to the site and enter your user name and password for you.

It is an incredible time saver and you never have to go looking for it as it is there as soon as you open the explorer. There are several other features besides remembering your passwords.

I am an Affiliate for RoboForm        

If you are new to Internet marketing you need to know about Affiliate Programs. RoboForm allows people to sell their software and earn a commission. This is called an affiliate program. They do this by providing the affiliate with a link that includes the Affiliate user code. If you believe the information I have provided is of benefit to you and you decide to purchase the Pro version for $29.95 please use the links on this Post.

You can download the Free Version from here : RoboForm Free Version,  It has my Affiliate Code embedded in it and should you purchase RoboForm Pro later on, I will get the commission on the sale.

You too can become a RoboForm Affiliate for FREE. Affiliate Marketing is one tool you should use too, to start generating income from the Internet.

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My first venture into the Internet Business was a disaster. I invested $18,500 USD with Stores On Line to help me build three Web sites to sell products. I spent many hours (not included in the $18,500) creating the first site and did sell some product but it was hard work.

Stores On Line support was just too hard to use. It took some months to get the payment processor approved. Then it took weeks for me to have it cancelled. The coaching and marketing was a joke. It was an experience I would not want you to go through.

I found out later that a year earlier in Australia their Australian agent or subsidiary had to pay back approximately $600,000 to people who had purchased their packages. StoresOnLIne is still operating in Australia.

If you Google StoresOnLine you will see thousands of entries on them. Many they have set up themselves, to counter the negative sites. A forum is also on line so you can check it out yourselves here at the Online Merchant Forum.

Despite all of this I got bitten with the Internet Marketer’s Bug and have kept working at it. I have now gained a good understanding of the Internet.

Since then I have tried many products includes Google Cash, Affiliate Radar PPCRiches and SpeedPPC. Many I have asked for and got a refund. Some were good products whilst others looked like rubbish to me. Many were not what I wanted to do after I looked at them in more detail. But not one of them were as difficult to deal with as StoresOnLine was.

The result is whilst I have spent some money on eBooks and low cost software I have gained a good education on Internet Marketing and have decided to write about what I haver found useful and helpful that may lead to making money from a Blog.

I can also write about blogging from a Baby Boomer’s perspective since I will be 60 this year and am in semi-retirement.

In the next few posts I will talk about what software I have found the most useful for getting started on the Internet. There are many things you should know that you can do yourself or out-source.

Don’t forget to turn on your Crap Detector though!

Tags: baby+boomers, blogging, storesonline.com

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The problem is we often turn off our “Crap Detector” as we desperately try to get our Blog or Web Site up and running. And that’s when the wisdom of the two statements becomes relevant. We stop thinking and start buying, believing that the “Holy Grail” to our problems is the next eBook, or eCourse we purchase.

It never is - and it never will be. As with all good things we succed in little steps then look back and see how far we have come. As we look back we will see all the detours and all the back-tracking we did to get to where we are now. We see we have often gone a great distance but we travelled two or three times that distance to get there. This is called learning and experience and it cannot be avoided if we are to succeed.

Oh sure, we can outsource much of the technical stuff and that will give us a ride for part of the way. But at some point we have to do the walking and make it happen ourselves.

It is imperative you understand the Internet environment and work your way through selecting only those tools and services that are going to assist you achieve your goal and rejecting those tempting ‘nice to haves” that will drop in your lap to distract you, as you journey towards your goal.

This Blog will try and guide Baby Boomer Internet Newbies through the Internet. I will try and ensure FREE really is FREE and where it is not, I will try and point out how you will end up paying for it.

But remember as soon as you open up the Internet make sure your CRAP DETECTOR is turned ON!

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