pesos per diem

Rewriting Articles

2006-06-24T03:18:00.000-04:00

While talking with my roommate about ways to rewrite articles, we came across an interesting idea: use one of the online translators to translate an article into another language, and then translate it back to english.

As a test I created a couple subsites on a new domain to see how they'd perform. As I made the sites about 2 weeks ago it's too early to tell however there are a couple things I'd like to discern.

1) I'm pretty sure they'll be no duplicate content penalty however since the resulting article is only marginally good (and sometimes outright unreadable) I want to get an idea of what the user will do when faced with this text: click or back?

2) While I made sure to keep the main keyword in the article I wonder if the translated article will on subject enough for the contextual aspect of the ad system to work effectively (i.e. will the clicks pay?).

I'll be keeping an eye on this one over the next 4-6 weeks to see how it works out while I look for other ways to rewrite articles. I think synonym replacement will be the next step.

Another Neat Tool for Mac

2006-06-23T19:04:00.000-04:00

If you're like me and like to login and check your AdSense stats a couple times per day then you might want to add TigerWidget.co.uk's Stats Widget to your Dashboard. This neat tool automatcally logs in to your account and display the past week's stats including impressions, clicks, and CTR's as well as averages for the former.

While I've not been a big fan of Dashboard since it came out, this donationware download has gotten me used to using it for other things as well as checking my stats as there are actually some pretty cool Widgets available.

Anyways if you're running Tiger might as well give it a whirl!

May Roundup

2006-06-06T10:19:00.000-04:00

Some of my newer sites started to kick-in in the latter half of May to push my earnings up to the $374 mark, which, as like last month, is about double the previous months earnings. I don't know if I can keep it doubling month-to-month but I've already "cracked-the-ton" this month so I guess it's not that out of the question.

This months goal is to create 5-10 new sites using my modified rssgm and also try to figure out the best use for all the plr articles I've been getting lately, with the first step being to find a quick way to rewrite them.

Return of Project X

2006-05-29T18:10:00.000-04:00

This is a little off topic but it looks like Bobby (aka Chemo) has decided to resume development of his Project X shopping cart system. Hopefully within a couple months we will see a first release as I don't think I can stand to develop another OSC-based site.

Note to self

2006-05-18T11:24:00.000-04:00

I had my first deslisted domain a couple days ago. It originally had a very low CTR (about 3-5%) but was indexed and ranking well in the major SE's. In an attempt to raise the CTR I changed the template to a more ad-focused one (read spammy). While the CTR did get up around 15% after the change, it got delisted about 2 weeks after the change. I'm convinced (although one can never be too sure) that since it was a techie site someone reported it to the SE's.

Moral of the story: When you create a scrapper site in a somewhat tech-savvy niche don't use a spammy template.

Lesson learned.

Competing with yourself

2006-05-15T16:19:00.000-04:00

Last night while trying to sleep I was thinking about my best earning site. As I don't think there's much I can do to make it a better performer I thought why not create a second (or even third) site using the same keywords.

While I don't know if it's a good idea to start competing with yourself, it may turn out to be good plan of action for a couple reasons. Since I assume my current site will eventually get deindexed having a backup site in the same niche may keep the $$ coming in. Also since I can vary the keywords and content slightly from my current site I may start getting hits from search terms that I may be missing out on.

There may be some downsides as well, with the first one coming to mind as possible duplicate content, and of course, having several sites competing for the same keywords.

Either way I guess there's really only one way to find out. If it works out well I'll write about it again in a month or two.

Nifty tool for Mac

2006-05-12T17:19:00.000-04:00

While writing a PHP script to extract text from a webpage I came across a cool tool from Metafy called Anthracite. While there are too many features to list here, in a nutshell what it does is let you mine webpages' content.

As an example of what it can be used for I wrote a quick "script" to extract the content section of an article from ArticleCity, remove all html tags and classes, split up the paragraphs and titles, then apply my own html formatting and spit out a text file of the article.

The real beauty of it is that it is scriptable, meaning all I have to do is browse to the page I want to scrape with my webbrowser (safari), click a button and in about 5 seconds I have a copy of the article on my computer ready to be used with my page generation software.

Another nice use for it is as a keyword scraper. By using the integrated Google API module I can mine thousands of keywords from Google by parsing the meta tags of the sites returned for my main keyword, usually only taking a couple of minutes.

While the software does cost some $$ there is a 2 week trial available. If you're on a Mac and know a bit of HTML you should download and give it whirl. I think you'll be quite pleased with the results it can give you.

Number of ad blocks

2006-05-05T19:25:00.000-04:00

It may just be me but I've noticed lately that pages with fewer ad-blocks seem to perform much better than those with the max. Currently my best performers have only one ad block and one link unit.

Obvioulsly this is not concrete but my results are from different sites in the same niche so if you think you should be getting more per click you might want to try reducing the number of ad blocks on your pages.

April Roundup

2006-05-01T16:32:00.000-04:00

April was my best month so far totaling $156 and change which is slightly more than double last months total. In fact I made more in April than all of my previous months combined (Dec-Mar) which makes me think I'm going to have to step up the site building if I'm going to increase my earnings again in May.

Using Feeds as Content

2006-04-30T16:09:00.000-04:00

Most of the sites I see use either results from the serps or a generic technology feed which doesn't match their theme for some additional content. While this is a good start if you're including rss feeds on your sites as an additional source of content, I find it's worth spending an extra 10 minutes or so to gather some feeds that are more relevant to the keywords you are targetting.

There are many sources for feeds out there, and depending on the niche you are targeting, some are better than others.

For example if I'm creating a niche site on a product (i.e. iPod's) I might include feeds from Yahoo Finance, CNet Reviews and various news sites and product sites like Nextag and Alibaba.

Non-product based niches like hobbies (i.e. Scrapbooking) are sometimes a little trickier to find depending on their popularity. Usually about.com has a good feed or two and then a Google search for "keyword rss" will find the popular sites for your niche, some of which will provide feeds.

Here are some other sites to find rss feeds:

Generally the more pages I'm creating the more feeds I will use. Also I recommend the caching of feeds (I use a week or so) to reduce the load on the feed providers.

KWA Thoughts

2006-04-29T15:06:00.000-04:00

A couple people commented on my joining KWA post so I thought I'd share my thoughts on it as it's been a month since I signed up.

For the most part the forum is pretty good. There are a lot of tips and tricks and examples that I have not seen anywhere else and people are usually more than willing to help out. Also there are a number of video tutorials that can get you up and running pretty quickly. The only thing I don't like are all the commercial products being offered. I doubt one could actually follow any of the tips/advice successfully without spending $500 on software and there seems to be a new product every week. Also half of the discussions seems to be on how to use the commercial products.

The keyword lists you get are not bad either. I've actually made some $$ off of the ones I've used which surprised me as at least 499 other people have the same lists.

Is it worth the $57 month? If you're a beginner and have a bit of $$ to invest, joining KWA is probably the best thing you can do to get started. However if you know how to code a bit and understand the internets nuances (ftp, dns etc) then you'd probably be better off spending the $$ on domains and hosting and reading burts blog.

March roundup

2006-04-12T13:38:00.000-04:00

My Adsense hasn't really increased since february, coming in at $70.55. However this month is starting to look pretty good - I'm almost at last months total and it's not even at half the month yet. This seems to be due to the new sites I launched in March reminding me once again to build build build.

Keyword Avalanche

2006-03-08T14:38:00.000-05:00

Well I decided it was time to take the leap and subscribe to a KWA membership. I've been trying to do AIS without spending any money (aside from domain names) but everything I've read says this place is the ish so I figured it is worth a try (at least for a month). I haven't had the time to really check out the forums yet so I'll have to wait and see whether it's worth the $57/month.

First $100 in AdSense

2006-03-06T14:46:00.000-05:00

Today I finally got to $100 in earnings with AdSense. My first site was launched on September 3rd of last year with my first clicks registered on November 2nd. That makes it just over six months to reach the $100 mark using just 4 sites over that period.

Now I guess I'll see how long it takes to get a check from Google. I'm assuming it will be issued in about 4-6 weeks, with another 4 weeks transit time. Maybe I can get another $100 by the time it arrives as I've launched 4 more sites over the past two weeks. Only time will tell.

February Roundup

2006-03-02T09:37:00.000-05:00

My AIS sites are starting to do really well. With only 5 sites up I made $60.04 in AdSense in February which is about 3x more than I made in Janurary with the same sites. Unfortunately about half of that total is from one site so I need to get more up in case it goes the way of the dodo.

I had hoped to have more sites up by now but I have been busy tweaking my site making process to produce better results by adding more relevant content and articles to my pages. I'm almost there and will probably share my code when it's ready.

Burt's Challenge Entry: Niche-Templates.com

2006-02-03T10:24:00.000-05:00

Intro
Let me start by saying that although I have a lot of experience online, I am very new to the AIS concept. Since I found Burt's Blog a couple months ago I've spent some time and created a couple NPB and RSSGM sites to get my feet wet. I've had mixed success with these types of sites so far (although I can see the potential), so the challenge seemed like the perfect way to progress.

What to do
After taking into consideration the terms of the challenge, and the knowledge and advice gleaned from Burt's and others' blogs over the past couple months, it seemed the most successful AIS sites were the product based ones. As the challenge was to earn the most in a set amount of time, I decided this was the route to go.

I've always wanted to do a template store (but never found the time) so I started to think of what type of template I wanted to make and hopefully sell. I have a lot of web design experience as well as development experience with several open source scripts so there were a couple avenues I could take. In the end I decided to create templates for RSSGM as it is relatively easy to make them and the market for the product is small but growing. Plus if I end up not selling any at least I can use them on my own sites :).

Making the site
First thing on my list was to research download scripts that integrate with PayPal. After searching Hot Scripts I settled on dotWidget for PayPal as it seemed like it offered the best features for the price, plus it has Burt's seal of approval so that helped in the decision.

For the domain I wanted something that would be somewhat relevant but I wanted to keep RSSGM out of the name in case I want to provide other types of templates in the future. Since the word "niche" is used quite a bit in the AIS world I thought that might be a good one to go with. Combine that with "templates" and I got niche-templates.com.

Next I created 5 templates to be sold on the site. I made 3 versions of the first one and 2 versions of the second by varying the colours and graphics used. As I was going on vacation for Christmas this was all I could manage to get done for a Dec. 15th launch. After getting back in the new year I found I had made some sales which motivated me to create another template for the site which I did a couple days later.

Promoting it
I created a couple backlinks from some of my established sites to get Google to come by. This seemed to work as I got indexed very quickly. I also wanted to get the word out about my site to the community that would most benefit from it so I decided to create and release a template to the project under the GPL, as from past experience this seemed like the best way to get visitors to your site (I only did this about 2 weeks ago so I'm not entirely sure what results it's given me).

Results
My total income from the site during the challenge period was $147.30 USD gross (there was $8.91 in PayPal fees) by selling 14 templates.

There were also some startup costs associated with the project. The domain name was $8 USD and the dotWidget script was $29 USD, totaling $37. Hosting costs weren't a factor as I used my pre-existing reseller account. My time spent on the project was about 20 hours (give or take a few).

Positive notes

I had only expected to get my $37 back at the start of the challenge so I am quite pleased with the final result.
I have had to answer zero support requests which hopefully means the product is working properly.
Gained more knowledge about AIS in general.
I had fun doing it.

Downside

Took quite a bit more time to do than if I had created a generic keyword portal site with adsense and affiliate links.

Possible future avenues

Some of my customers purchased more than 1 template. I might create some bundles to see if that helps with more sales.
Making some theme-based templates seems like a good idea (holidays, seasons, events, popular niches).
Running promotions/specials near the end of the month seemed to drive sales, although it could have been a coincedence in timing.

Conclusion
Overall it was a good experience. There are probably some things I'd do differently if I were to do it again. In any case I should be able to bring the knowledge I've gained to my next AIS.Also I'd like to put out a big Thanks! to Burt for sponsoring the challenge.

January Totals

2006-02-02T21:53:00.000-05:00

With 4 AIS sites up so far my AdSense income was $17.86 for January which isn't too bad. I just setup a new site the other day so I guess we'll see in a month or so how it does.

Also I submitted my challenge results to Burt so check his site to see how I did.

Round up

2006-01-28T15:25:00.000-05:00

Some of my AIS sites are starting to get traffic (and clicks) now that they've been online for a couple months. With the four sites I currently have I've got about $14 in adsense income this month, which is not a lot really, but makes me think that if I were to start outputting even something like 1 site a week over time it could bring in a nice amount of "gravy".

My only problem with this is coming up with new ideas/keywords/designs etc. on a frequent basis. I've been trying to do this without spending any money on "niche products" but am seriously considering trying to get a KWA or similar membership. From what I've heard it's a great resource, although the monthly fee makes me a little hesitant.

On another note I think my burt's challenge entry is doing suprisingly well but I haven't seen anyone reporting on how they're doing so I don't know where I am in the pack. The contest is ending soon so it'll be good to see the results everyone got, although I bet that even with the head start that burt gave us before launching his entry, he'll still come out on top.

Back after vacation

2006-01-12T14:26:00.000-05:00

I just got back from a nice sunny (and warm) vacation in Florida. I had very limited internet access down there so I was not able to do much in the way of AIS, other than think about my next one while on the beach.

Although I haven't made much (maybe $10-$15 total), it's getting more clearer now that I've had a couple of sites running for about a month or two on how to best do an AIS site (or at least the benefits and downsides to each of the methods are clearer).

While having the right tools is important (ie Niche Creator or RSSGM), it seems the more important thing is finding the right niche and/or keywords. For the sites that I have setup so far, the most popular ones are geared towards a specific aspect of a certain product or specific information about a topic. The sites that cover a broad range of stuff, while still getting traffic, get nowhere near the amount of clicks that the really specific sites do.

This is probably obvious for most of the AIS'ers out there and I had assumed as much when I originally started out, but sometimes trial and error is the best way to find out what works for you.

With this in mind I believe I have my next AIS idea. Hopefully between my day job, my freelance work, and my friends/girlfriend I'll find some time to set it up by the end of the week.

Chellenge accepted

2005-12-10T15:13:00.000-05:00

Well I've decided to enter Burt's challenge. Unfortunately since it is the holiday season I don't have much extra time to concentrate on AIS sites. Couple this with the fact that I'm going on vacation for 10 days and I'm going to have to put AIS site generation aside in the hopes that my "challenge" website will actually do some business. Let's see if I can get something together in a week.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it...

2005-12-07T12:40:00.000-05:00

Burts at it again. This time he is sponsoring an AIS competition. The goal? To build and monetize a website in 45 days (and hopefully learn something along the way). The winner (person who earned the most $$ from their site) will receive a cash prize from Burt and will get to brag to us how they did it.

Entry deadline is the 16th of December. Make sure you check out the details of the challenge over at Burts Blog.

Good luck to all the contestants!

RSSGM?

2005-12-01T19:27:00.000-05:00

I was looking for some additonal info on RSSG and came across RSSGM or RSSG Modified which is being hosted as a project at SourceForge. So after comparing the two I decided I would post a note on the differences I found beween the two.

At first glance they seem almost identical. Some of the filenames have been changed in RSSGM but the code in them remains mostly the same. The only major difference I found is that RSSGM uses (by default) uses three keyword page template files plus one index page template file whereas RSSG uses only one page template for each of the keyword pages. When your site is generated, RSSGM randomly selects one of these pages for inclusion. This lets you vary the code, headers/titles, and ad placements from page to page to give make your site less of that script-generated feel. Also the page template that comes with RSSGM is quite different from the one in RSSG so if you're looking for an additional template to use with RSSG it is worth the download (just make sure you change the hard-coded paths to ../rssg).

I'm going to keep my eye the project to see if it is developed further. There have been several updates over the past couple of days so I think that is a good sign.

Now I have an excuse to make a new site :)

No time to spare

2005-11-30T15:30:00.000-05:00

While I'm waiting for my sites to get indexed I decided to take a closer look at RSSG. At first glance it seemed a little confusing as my PHP skills have been learned from develping an osCommerce site but a little playing around made it clear it is quite a nice little tool.

Unlike many directory generators this one's page are generated on the fly through a single template file making it very easy to update all your pages without having to "regenerate" the whole site. This also makes for great page updates as the RSS feeds are re-generated after the cache has expired - leaving your site with new content for the search engines to gobble up.

If I have the time I would like to make it a little more user friendly, maybe making the config/generation process a series of forms. I'm going to watch and see if the current maintainer releases any new vesions as hopefully there will be some motivation as he should be making some $$ off of templates and custom installs.

Indexed after 2 days

2005-11-28T12:59:00.000-05:00

Well my Unclaimed Money AIS site got indexed by MSN after only two days which is much faster than I expected. Not only that but it has already brought in $0.16 in Adsense earnings! Hopefully this pace will keep up. Now I guess I wait for Google to add the site to it's index.

New AIS Tool

2005-11-26T13:22:00.000-05:00

Another AIS blog I've been reading has announced a nice little AIS of their own in providing installation and templates for Really Simple Site Generator, an open source directory generator.

I took the liberty of downloading and installing the RSSG tool and it looks like a nice start to something great. I've already made some changes to the code and have ideas for other ways to improve the tool. Since I had another unused domain standing by I decided to put RSSG to the test over at Joomla Website Templates.

Google and MSN have already visited most of my pages within 12 hours of it going live so hopefully it will be incuded in their indexes soon. As time passes I'll keep an eye on the sites stats and will keep this blog updated with how things are going.