Currently I’m working on some CPA work which hasn’t been doing much. In the past three weeks I’ve made one sale, netting me a grand total of 13 bucks (edit: now 18 bucks). I really hate CPA but it’s currently the only untapped revenue source that I haven’t looked into.

Merry Xmas!

This is where I ORIGINALLY HAD ADS. I was getting a CTR of around 7%. I had originally thought this placement to be pretty good, but from someone else’s tip I decided to change my placement.

This is where I put the new ads, giving me a CTR of 12-14%. Be careful, you can’t have the ad directly underneath the article title because this is a violation of Adsense TOS.

Also be sure to make your links the same color as your ads for better blending.

That’s it for now. Happy earning.

Follow the general principles in order to make money on the internet. Remember, these principles are about MAKING MONEY not getting a lot of traffic and having a big website. Trust me, there are big websites out there that do not make money at all (Youtube actually loses millions of dollars for Google).

1) Find niches that make money

I need to start following my own advice, because right now many of my sites are in niches that doesn’t make a whole lot of money (this blog is also in one of those niches - internet marketing). Use Google trends to find topics that people are talking about.  Or visit the following page to find high paying keywords and make good content. Making websites off the good key words is the best way to get success using Google Adsense.

http://www.top-adsense-keywords.com/highest-paying-keywords.htm

2) Write the content and USE BLOGGER

Keep your website/blog updated. Also a good idea would be to use blogger for your blogs. The reason you want to use blogger is because Google puts the best paying keywords on your blog if you’re using adsense. Obviously, if you’re not using Adsense then it doesn’t matter what blog program you use.

Don’t be afraid to outsource your content. Get guest writers or staff writers or ask to borrow the content from another website.

3) SEO & Backlinks

Search engine optimization (SEO) is crucial. Make sure you have the right keywords, the right meta tags, and content that effectively promotes the content that you want to SEO. So this means that if you have a page that you want to rank high for “Buying Used Comic Books, ” then make sure your title and description tags mention these words and that you write the phrase on your page as well.

The second step would be to increase your page rank by getting backlinks. This can be done by simply buying relevant backlinks, or by getting link trades with other bloggers/website owners. http://forums.digitalpoint.com is the place that I like to go to for my link buying or my link trading.

Also a tip that most of you guys probably know. When you buy links, ask them to make your linking text something that you want to optimize for. An example is that if I wanted to get links for Sector Online and rank high for the keyword “make money online,” I’d ask them to use the linking text “Make Money Online.” Also make sure to buy links from websites that are actually related to your niche as well, since it is rumored that Google actually penalizes you for buying random links.

4) Traffic

With good seo, good traffic should come. However, if you’re optimizing your site for incredibly obscure search phrases or phrases that people aren’t that interested in, then don’t expect SEO to do it all (in fact, if you’re doing this, you probably should just forget about your site altogether because it generally won’t be profitable if no one is interested in it). Of my websites that are content-based, about 80% of my traffic comes from Search engines. If you don’t know SEO, then buy a book or download a book or read the hundreds of articles that are on the web.

You need to advertise your website somehow. I remember that at the beginning of one of my websites, I had advertised on the forums of a competitor of ours.  I also made a Myspace profile and got a bunch of friends, built a bunch of different Squidoo lenses, uploaded some of our videos to Dailymotion, put my websites link on my forum signatures, and probably a bunch of other ways that I can’t name right now. Entrecard.com is also another good way to drive traffic to your website.

5) Use the good networks

I recommend Adsense for your CPC ads and Tribalfusion for your CPM ads. Alternatives are Adbrite (CPC) and DirectMedia (CPM).

Thanks in part to Google Adsense. However, my revenue with my CPM ad network is a lot lower than with TribalFusion. I am getting a pathetic average 0.14 CPM. (Currently DirectMedia - look them up on Google).

But with Google Ads, my revenue went up double to what I had been previously making with Adbrite. Won’t share the details for now.

Also I made my company’s website.

http://www.kevintang.net

A very simple page, not really much to it right now.

Another one of my sites went online. It’s called AsianCyte and I’m doing the beta testing for it right now. Check it out at http://www.asiancyte.com

BUTTTT, I really want this blog to succeed so I’m going to work harder in the next few months. Hopefully I can generate a decent amount of side income from this blog just documenting my adventures. I don’t profess to be a master at blogging or web marketing, so maybe I am going to change the topic of my blog. I’ll let you guys know later.

- Kevin

So for just an update on what’s been going on.

- Accepted into Google Adsense (YAY, seriously Yahoo Publisher was sucking big time)

- Accepted into Tribalfusion, and then unapproved because I didn’t follow their TOS (I had their banners on an invalid domain). This sucked because Tribal Fusion was an amazing CPM company and I regret that I won’t be doing business with them anymore. Lost a lot of revenue because of this.

- Trying out CPA - I never really liked CPA but I have found a few programs that are very close to my niche.

There you have it. An update of my life.

The network you should avoid: Bidvertiser

Don’t try Bidvertiser. Sorry, but it sucked for me. Not only did it not deliver relevant ads at all (I chose to target towards “entertainment” and it delivered stuff like poker ads), but it gave me a horrible revenue per click (averaging like 3 cents a click).

The network that you should test out: Yahoo Publisher Network

Of course, not everyone can use YPN due to the fact that it is invitation only at this point. However, YPN for me had its ups and downs. There were times where I was getting GREAT revenue, but then recently it slowed down to a trickle (like $0.35 a day at its worst). The good part about YPN is that IF you can get targeted ads, you should be making TONS of money. YPN’s revenue per click is top notch, but the ads they serve unfortunately aren’t targeted as well as I would like them to be.

The network that has performed most consistently: Adbrite

Adbrite has been the most consistent stream of revenue for me. Although the revenue per click varies between 0.03 and 0.10 (pretty low), I’ve found that I can get TONS of clicks. The ads aren’t even targeted at all, but they are actually INTERESTING ads that should appeal to a majority of web users. Also, I’ve been getting a lot of revenue from selling ads as well.

More reviews later guys! Here’s some Leah Dizon for ya

Ok two other prominent bloggers in the blogosphere are doing a contest of sorts. Basically they are getting other bloggers to “vote” for one or the other. I’m not sure what the vote stands for, since their contest rules are unclear. It’s just basically voting for the site that you feel should win their little contest. The loser has to pay 3 people that voted for the other blog $100 each. Right now, Tyler Cruz is losing 14 â�?��?? 30 to Gyutae Park. Yet, my vote still goes to Tyler.

Why’s that? Well the thing is I had never actually heard of Park’s blog, Winning the Web. Looking at it now, it seems kinda interesting, but probably not a blog I would visit often. Tyler’s blog, on the other hand, has a bunch of content that I’ve absorbed in the past year.

I first visited Tyler’s blog probably sometime in 2007. It was interesting to see another web entrepreneur like myself making enough money to live without having a job (which I’m not able to do at this point). So he was kind of like the inspiration for this blog. I actually didn’t enjoy making blogs in the past and preferred to make other kinds of websites that had user-generated content like forums and communities. But I realize now that my blog can’t be considered as working its more like a place where I can document my thoughts while simultaneously helping other people.

So my loyal viewers, I hope that you’ll vote for Tyler’s blog. He still has some ground to make up until January 14^th. Why would I vote for the underdog? Well I don’t really care that much about the $100 prize, but it’s the fact that Tyler is giving out 150 Entrecard credits that really makes me interested in this competition. So if you’ve got a blog, hopefully you’ll also vote for Tyler.

Not to brag or anything, but I’m pretty decent at making templates. Template coding I’m a little iffy on so don’t hire me for that. I’ll post some of my template work in the near future.

And that’s my last post for the night. Finals are coming up for me… ouch.

Good night.