Money from Nothing

Set Up A Fans Leaderboard For Your Facebook Page

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 09:28:00 +0000

A good way to encourage your fans to engage on your Facebook Page is to set up a Fans Leaderboard. Fans receive points for posting, comments and Likes.

You can get this free application from Booshaka and when you install it, a custom tab called Top Fans is added to your page.

You can view the stats of each fan listed to see how they have participated. The app gives a complete history of the fan’s activity on your page.

To install the app, just go to Booshaka and click the blue Install button. They also have a Top Fans Pro version that rewards the top fans with perks.

Get More Out Of Your Facebook Page By Improving Your EdgeRank

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 09:24:00 +0000

Do you have a Facebook Page?

You may think that the more 'likers' ('Fans' as they used to be called) you have, the more outreach you have. However, this is not necessarily the case. Facebook has something called Edgerank, which determines how much of your content is actually seen on people's newsfeeds.

There are ways to improve your Edgerank - including posting more photos and videos. Your blog may be on Networked Blogs and each post is automatically posted on your FB Page as well, but you need also to post directly to the Page and in general create greater engagement.

There is a White Paper on the subject, which you can download for free here.

You can also check what the Edgerank for your Page is at EdgeRank Checker here.

How did your Page score? How do you think you can improve it?

Adding A Job Board To Your Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 11:27:00 +0000

You may not have thought about adding a Job Board to your blog, but it offers two benefits in particular -

It offers something useful to your readers, especially if you have a niche blog.

It can make you some money. You can get paid when people visit sponsored job ads and when employers pay for an ad on the board.

Below are 2 free tools to set up your own Job Board. The good thing is that they will populate the board with available jobs even before you get people paying for ads. You can choose the fields that are relevant to your site and so only those type of job vacancies will appear.

Simply Hired Job-A-Matic

JobThread

I used Simply Hired to set up a Foodies Job Board on my blog Authentic Greek Recipes. You can take a look at it here.

Have any of you installed a job board? What do you think?

New Google +1 Button Available. How To Add It To Blogger

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 09:39:00 +0000

The new Google +1 Button is now on general release. I've just installed it and you can see it at the top of the posts in this blog now. By clicking on the button, you can recommend the posts to other readers - the short video below shows how it works.

The button is simple enough to install and if you have a Blogger blog, then you can find very quick and simple instructions here.

For detailed information you can also visit Google here.

Have you installed it? What do you think?

Get Paid $50 Just For Signing Up At DomainIt

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 13:36:00 +0000

Earn cash with your website. $50 signup bonus!

Good news for potential affiliates! DomainIt will pay you $50 when you sign up as an affiliate with them.

DomainIt, which was founded in 1996, provides Domain Names, Web Hosting, E-Mail Services, Design Templates, Web Promotion and other Tools and Resources. The prices are also extremely affordable - up to 74% cheaper than competitors.

And the good news is that you can sign up as an affiliate quickly and easily and get $50 placed in your affiliate account straight away. Your earnings are processed at the end of the following month - so your February earnings will be paid out on April 1st. Payments are made either by PayPal or by check and there's a relatively low payment threshold - $25.

How To Publish And Sell Your Own E-Book

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 19 Feb 2011 10:11:00 +0000

If you want to publish your own e-book and to sell it yourself, then this can be done relatively easily. And it can be done without spending a cent! I'm going to discuss the process after you have written and prepared your book. You can publish it and sell it through a combination of PayLoadz and Paypal, including getting affiliates to sell for you.

You will need to convert your file into PDF. If you don't have a converter, then a very simple way to do it is to use Open Office. This is a free set of programs - Text, Spreadsheet, Presentation, Drawing, Database, Formula - and if you use the Text program, you have the option to convert it to PDF.

Go and register at PayLoadz and then go to Create New Product To Sell. Once you have filled in the details, you upload your pdf file and cover image. They will let you have a Buy Now button to place on your selling page and the payments will be done through PayPal. PayLoadz will also give you a code to give to affiliates and then handle the affiliate selling procedure and letting you have reports. Your e-book can also be made available to affiliates on PayLoadz, who are looking for products to sell.

Simple and free!

LOOKING FOR AFFILIATES

Having said all that, I myself am looking for affiliates to sell the following 2 e-books. You may choose either or both, depending on what you feel would be appropriate on your site.

The e-book Greek Vegetarian Recipes sells for $3.50 and affiliates get $1 per sale - a pretty generous percentage!

If you are interested in becoming an affiliate for this book, then just click on this link.

https://www.payloadz.com/affiliates/gen_2.asp?id=1413598&merch_id=81247

The e-book Super Jokes - with over 250 pages of quality jokes - sells for $3 and affiliates again get $1 per sale.

If you are interested in becoming an affiliate for this book, then just click on this link.

https://www.payloadz.com/affiliates/gen_2.asp?id=1412925&merch_id=81247

Chitika Pays Me Every Month

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 16:12:00 +0000

I've been using Chitika for a while now, but over the last few months I've been receiving payments from them at the end of every month.

Chitika ads are what are called 'behaviourly targetted'. That means that they respond to what people using search engines are looking for. In other words, if you search for hotels, then the ads displayed will be related to that. For this reason you can use them along with AdSense.

So if you get a decent amount of traffic from search engines - and especially from North America - then I would suggest trying it out. There are two particular practical advantages to Chitika. The payout threshold is very low - $10; and they pay through PayPal. If you want to be paid by check, then the threshold is $50. So if your earnings are over $10 for February, then at the end of March the money will be in your PayPal account.

As I said at the beginning, I've been comfortably over the threshold over the last few months and it's nice to see the money in your account at the end of the month!

Definitely worth a try!

Publish Your Book For Free With CreateSpace

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 13:37:00 +0000

If you want to publish a book to sell on the internet, then CreateSpace is an excellent option. A part of Amazon, CreateSpace will let you publish your book with them for free.

We have just brought out our recipe book with them - Authentic Greek Recipes - and it has already started selling. However, I have to say that if you are doing it for the first time, then perhaps you're going to spend more time getting it together than perhaps should be necessary.

The procedure itself is pretty smooth, but you don't fully know what the procedure is until you actually go through each stage. For that reason I'll give you a brief summary of what you have to do until your book is available for sale - I only wish that CreateSpace gave this summary to new users.

- Obviously you need to have the material you want to publish.
- Choose the size you want your book to be and you can download a formatted template from their Resources section. Use this template to put the material for your book. I find this an excellent resource as you don't need to worry about formatting it with margin sizes etc.
- Once this is ready, convert it into a pdf file. If you have photos, then they need to be at least 300 dpi.
- If you can't or don't want to create your own cover, then there is a selection of cover templates to choose from.
- You have to choose whether you want colour or black and white. Obviously, black and white is going to allow you to set a lower price.
- Once you have your pdf file and cover ready, you submit them for approval. They say that this takes up to 48 hours, but I found that they responded within 12 hours. You will be told if it is acceptable or what problems need to be fixed.
- If you stay with the free option, then your book will only be available from CreateSpace - in other words just direct selling from you. There is a ProPlan, however, which is just under $40 a year, with which you can make it available on Amazon plus they promote it to other sellers and libraries and institutions. You also get a higher royalty with ProPlan.
- However, even if you don't use ProPlan you still have to pay the cost price of the book plus shipping for them to send it to you to approve before it's made available.
- You can electronically approve it once you've seen it. Then you have to choose the price. They give you a minimum to sell on CreateSpace and a higher minimum for it to be available on Amazon.
- On CreateSpace you have the option to create discounts if you want.

That is a brief summary of publishing your own book with them and so far I have been happy with the results. Is there anyone else who has used them? Or anyone thinking about it?

Adgitize Continues To Deliver The Goods

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 09:52:00 +0000

I've previously posted about Adgitize - and many people already know about it - but I just want to say that I've been with them for just shy of 2 years and have never regretted it. You won't make huge amounts of money here, but it's a steady little earner without really having to do much for it. You also get extra traffic from views of your ad(s).

To get the most out of Adgitize, you really need to be an advertiser - it only costs $14 a month to get displayed across the whole network, and it's possible to get that back through your earnings. Plus the increased traffic - I've been getting around 50-60 visits a day from Adgitize to the 2 blogs I advertise there.

So what do you have to do to make money?

Article Points - you get points if you post on your blog(s). You do this anyway, so there's no extra work involved here.

Click Points - you get points for clicking on the Adgitize ads. I combine this with Entrecard dropping, which I do anyway. Not everyone has an EC widget, but I would say that out of the 50 Adgitize sites I visit every day, only about 5 don't have one. Why do I only visit 50 sites? Because, as an advertiser my points are doubled and I get my maximum 100 from visiting just 50 sites.

Ad Views Points - If you display Adgitize ads on your site, you get points for the number of views of those ads every day.

Page Views Points - As above, but these are points for views of pages that have the ads displayed.

Advertisers Points - This is points for being an advertiser.

So where's the extra work? The only thing 'extra' you have to do is visit some blogs, which you're doing anyway if you're in EC, and even if you aren't, how long does it take to visit 50 blogs and click on them? Especially if you're getting paid for it! I would say it takes me about 30 minutes a day - perhaps longer when I stop to read articles I'm interested in.

But even if you don't want to visit blogs and click on the ads, you're still earning points - and money - from the other categories, it's just that you're losing a potential 20% of your earnings.

You can earn as a publisher, without paying anything, but by becoming an advertiser as well, you not only can get your $14 a month back, but also make more on top of it. I've managed to be in the top 3 of the points leaderboard regularly and, as I said, I've never regretted joining - in fact I would definitely recommend it!

Get A Free Analysis Of Your Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 08:27:00 +0000

I just found this great site where you can get a free analysis of your blog - SpiderFX-Lite. Their tool spiders your page, analyzes and scores the on-page factors that affect your search engine ranking.

You just type in your URL and your keywords and it produces an online score out of 100. It shows your strengths and weaknesses and scores the following areas -

Search Traffic
Organic Keywords
Google PageRank
Domain Authority
Page Authority
Number of Incoming Links
Social Media Mentions
Top 25 External Links
Keyword Page Density
Heading Summary
Image Summary
Title Tag
Meta Description Tag
Top 3 Anchor Text Terms
Domain Age
Server Info

I got a score of 80 out of 100 for my recipes blog and after making some tweaks based on their comments, I got it up to 85. A really useful tool that not only analyzes quickly, but gives advice.

Have any of you used it? What did you think?

Ipad Auction! - Sponsored Post

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 09:54:00 +0000

Ipad Auction! - 1.ltroute.com

Wow! Check out this Ipad auction - only 1c per bid! The last one went for 96c!

sponsored like

symposio's profile on MyLikes

Adding A Facebook 'Like' Button To Your Blogger Posts

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 11:08:00 +0000

Facebook released their new 'Like' button a few days ago. When people anyone who is logged in to Facebook clicks on this, it is displayed on their FB Wall, thus giving exposure to you to their Friends. The code that Facebook provides for the button is aimed at giving you a Like button for your site, but not for individual blog posts, which is what bloggers are more interested in.

Not to fear, however, you can get a code to paste which will place the button on each of your posts. For those of you using Blogger you can visit this post here to find out where to get the code and where to post it. The only problem I can see so far is that it doesn't show the number of people who have 'Liked' your post. However, the Like is automatically posted on their Wall in FB.

Ning No Longer To Be Free

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 12:23:00 +0000

For those of you who use the free Ning service, you may or not have heard that the network of social networks that boasted 20 million visitors a month has announced a complete end to free services for its users. Those who pay for premium services will be asked to pay more, and those who are getting their social networks free of charge will be asked to upgrade to a premium service or phase off the Ning platform.

For those of you who want a social network, but don't want to pay for it, you may want to check out the following free alternatives (each also has premium services).

Grou.ps

Spruz

SocialGO

Of these 3, Grou.ps also offers you the possibility to monetize the site with AdSense as part of the free package.

What Time Should You Post On Your Blog?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 12:57:00 +0000

Often, writing posts on our blogs is done whenever we have the time or are feeling 'in the mood'. However, usually your posts will not only be read by blog readers - in which case it doesn't really matter at what time you post - but by others on social networks, especially Facebook and Twitter.

Personally, I'm a 'morning person' as far as writing is concerned, but I started to realise that I may be missing a lot of the people that could be reading my posts. Three of my blogs are on Networked Blogs on Facebook, which means that not long after I have posted, it is automatically fed onto FB. But is this the ideal time for it? When will most of my friends be on FB and will my post still be easily visible to them at this time?

The same applies with Twitter. I read somewhere recently that the highest numbers of people are on Twitter at between 11.00 and 14.00 EST. Again, my blog posts are automatically fed to Twitter through Twitterfeed, so I have to wonder, 'Are most of my followers fast asleep when my blog posts are tweeted?'

So, basically I'm rethinking the time that I should post on my blogs in order to get the maximum exposure in social media as well as on the blog itself. I just have to take into consideration the time differences and when I reckon the optimum number of friends and followers are online.

Getting Links To Your Posts From Popular Blogs

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 09:31:00 +0000

A good way to increase traffic to your blog or to particular posts is to get a link from popular blogs with a lot of readers. Just recently the Problogger blog published a post with 30 Bloggers To Watch In 2010. Readers were then asked to post a similar article on their blog and send the link to Problogger.

I posted 10 Food Bloggers To Watch In 2010 on my Authentic Greek Recipes blog and then posted the link on Problogger. A few days later all the 'To Watch' posts were listed and I got a sudden increase in traffic from it.

Watching out for opportunities like this can be beneficial as popular blogs not only have a large number of readers, but are also considered to be authorities in their field, so links posted there are taken seriously.

Yet another way to get yourself out there and get seen.

10 Sites To Write For Money

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 11:26:00 +0000

As well as writing on your own blog, there are plenty of opportunities around to write articles for money. I've listed 10 sites below where you can get paid for what you write or you can get in touch with people who are looking for writers.

They're listed in alphabetical order.

Amazon Mechanical Turk

A marketplace for work that requires human intelligence. Based on the idea that there are still many things that human beings can do much more effectively than computers, such as identifying objects in a photo or video, performing data de-duplication, transcribing audio recordings, or researching data details.

Bhokta

Here you can write about anything you want, as long as it isn't copied, and get paid between $1 and $4 depending on the length of the article.

Blogger Jobs

As the name would suggest, a site putting you in touch with people that are looking for writers.

Constant Content

Serving over 10.000 websites by providing them access to almost 30.000 writers, Constant-Content claims to have developed the most comprehensive and quality articles production system on the web. You can either write an article, which becomes available to purchase, or respond to specific requests.

eHow

A chance to write articles on 'How To' do something. Payments are only made to residents of the USA, however.

Freelance Writing Jobs

Again, the name is self-explanatory.

Helium

You can earn cash for contributed work, daily revenue share and writing contests.

Lulu

Lulu is a self-publishing site where you can write your own books and e-books and sell them.

Online Writing Jobs

Displaying available writing jobs.

ProBlogger Job Board

Run by ProBlogger, it lists regularly updated jobs available to bloggers.

MyLikes - Sponsored Post

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 12:56:00 +0000

MyLikes - www.mylikes.com

I joined when the site was Likaholix (see previous post) and now that it has come out of Beta and become MyLikes it seems that it has improved and become more interesting. I've got a feeling that it will take off in a big way. Great to be in at the beginning!

sponsored like

symposio's profile on MyLikes

Learning From The Pros Again - The Shoemoney System

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 14:45:00 +0000

I've written in other posts how important I feel it is to continuously learn from those who have been extremely successful online - they've obviously done something right! In that vein, Jeremy Schoemaker is launching his Shoemoney System for those that want to follow it. I have to be honest, basically the only thing I know about Mr. Shoemaker is that he makes a lot of money online and over the last 5 years has really turned around his financial situation.

Anyway, I signed up and look forward to seeing his system and improving my effectiveness online If you want to check it out, it's here. I'd also be interested to hear anyone else's opinion of it.

Making Money From Ads

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 11:11:00 +0000

One important way of making money from your blog is through Ads on your site. Some of the most popular ways of doing this is through Adgitize,CMF (CMF Ads - 30 day ads starting from $0.01), and Project Wonderful. You can also sell adspace on your site directly.

Does anyone have any other recommendations?

Which of the following brings you the greatest income?

Which of the following brings you the most cash income?(polls)

Clicky - Real Time Web Analytics

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 11:40:00 +0000

I've been using Google Analytics to monitor my statistics, but I heard about Clicky and decided to give it a go. Whereas with Google you have to wait until the following day, Clicky let's you watch what's happening as it's happening - Real time. You can see details of who's online at this moment, what they're looking at, how they got to the site, their geographical location etc.

You can customise the dashboard to get the statistics you want and I've found it really easy and clear to view what's happening - I have to say I'm impressed. You can sign up with Clicky for free - which is what I've done - though there are Pro programmes with different price levels.

You can use it along with Google Analytics, which is what I'm doing at the moment, to see how it goes, but compared to GA and Sitemeter - which I've also used - Clicky has been giving me the clearest picture of what's happening. Click below to check it out.

Bhokta - Get Paid To Write About Whatever You Want

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 11:46:00 +0000

I’ve just signed up at Bhokta, a relatively new site which pays you for articles that you write. You can write about anything that you wish, submit it and after it has been reviewed and checked to see that it hasn’t been copied from anywhere else, it’s published and you receive immediate payment via Paypal.

This is one of the things I like about Bhokta – it pays immediately. There is no waiting until the end of the month or until you have reached a minimum amount. The amount you get paid for each article varies from $1 to $4, depending on the number of words and there is a maximum payout of $100 per week.

Apart from the payment, the other advantages are the links generated to your site from Bhokta plus the chance to increase your traffic. You can also write reviews of Bhokta if you have a site with a Google Page Rank – the amount you get paid depends on the PR.

It seems to me that it’s a good opportunity. Compared to writing paid reviews on your blog, perhaps the amount paid is not the same, but this is far outweighed by the fact that you can write about any subject you wish – you are not constrained in any way, plus you can write as many as you wish and don’t have to wait around for a suitable opportunity to come along.

You don’t need to be an expert for your articles to be published, but I would think that it is better to write about subjects that you have a reasonable amount of knowledge about in order to establish some kind of ‘authority’ and gain quality and repeat traffic.

It’s free to join, so do try it. And what does the word Bhokta mean? Well, apparently it means ‘happiness’ or ‘enjoyment’ in Sanskrit – so now you know!

Free Online Forms For Your Site

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 10:01:00 +0000

I recently needed to have an online form for people to register for next year's cookery classes here and I decided to use EMailMeForm.

It's a free service and offers customizable web forms ( Contact forms, online Questionnaires and Surveys ) and they host it on their server, so it works with any site, regardless of the ability to run scripts. I found it really easy to set up - I'm a non-techie! - and they also use Captcha to block spam.

You set up the fields that you need for your form and then copy the HTML code and paste it onto your site. When people fill it in they don't need to leave the site and they are directed to a page of your choosing which acknowledges that it has been sent and thanks them.

With the one account you can have forms on several sites.

As I said, I found it really easy to set up and ... it's free!

Ciao - Get Paid To Review And Give Advice

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 15:30:00 +0000

I've just signed up at Ciao. This is a multi-million-strong online community that reviews and rates millions of products and services for the benefit of other consumers. In their own words they "combine unbiased consumer reviews and up-to-date price information from hundreds of online merchants to make it the most comprehensive source of shopping intelligence on the web." Apparently more than 38 million consumers visit the site every month, "making it one of the largest shopping portals in Europe."

The good news is that you can make money by writing advice and reviews of products and services as well as through their referral programme. As I said, I've just signed up, so I'm eager to get started and see how it goes. Is there anyone else who has had experience with them?

Increase Your Traffic With Along For The Ride

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 15:08:00 +0000

I've just started using Along For The Ride (AFTR). This is an interesting approach to increasing traffic to your site. You'll see the widget on the right sidebar of this blog - if you mouse over it, then after 3 seconds a mini-window opens up with the site of another member of AFTR (this is done on a rotational system).

It's as simple as that. If you have the widget on your site, then the visitor doesn't have to leave it to view the other site, nor do they have to click on anything. Your blog is available in the same way on other members' sites.

I've just had it for a few days, but have already noticed a steady increase in traffic. I'd recommend checking it out here.

Advertise On Money From Nothing

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 11:28:00 +0000

If you would like to advertise on Money from Nothing please click on the PayPal button and choose the duration of your ad. Send me, in an email attachment, your 125 x 125 image and URL link. Please send to tc2906ma@yahoo.com.