Karlonia.com

Traffic from the search engines came back up again last week, thanks in part to more efficient keyword targeting on recently published pages. More importantly, I am actually writing articles around keywords that can be readily linked with a relevant Clickbank product, giving me a much greater chance of effectively monetizing the traffic.

Meanwhile, I am also doing research into various CPA (Cost Per Acquisition) offers and networks. I have been reading reports about people making big money by promoting simple CPA offers like zip or email submits and sending targeted traffic to them via PPC services such as Google AdWords. Depending on the niche, I may be able to do something similar but with organic traffic instead of PPC. This will take some good keyword targeting and market research, but if I can pull it off, the revenue will be almost pure profit because I will not have to pay for the traffic.

Before I return to my research, however, I will review some of the queries that came in last week from our inquisitive searchers.

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Although it has been a long time since I have continued my Adventures in Spam series, this morning I received an email that qualifies for a new post because it reminds me of a scam mail category that I have not yet covered. This is the tactic of false account block messages, where the spammer tries to appeal to your fear that something has gone wrong with one of your accounts at a bank, payment processor, or other type of financial institution. Here is an example from this morning’s serving of spam that was targeted to users of the relatively new payment processor Liberty Reserve:

** Liberty Reserve Account Blocked **

Your account has been blocked due to numerous invalid login attempts. You will be unable to send and receive funds until your account has been activated.

Failing to unblock your account will result temporary account suspension. Please read attached account block notice for details.

Sincerely,
Liberty Reserve Customer Service

Below the message there was also an attachment in HTML format. Although I was not foolish enough to click on it, I suspect that it leads to a fake Liberty Reserve login page or some other type of web page that is designed to fool you into entering your login details in an attempt to fix the “block” on your account. If scammers manage to collect these, they can come back later and drain money from your account.

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After figuring out how to remove the Blogger navbar, I took some time earlier tonight to research the issue of how to remove the nofollow tag for Blogger comments. For those who are not aware, ‘nofollow’ refers to the rel=nofollow attribute which, when added to a hyperlink reference, will instruct Google’s algorithm not to count the link for the purposes of rankings in the search results. Contrary to persistent myths, nofollow does not block access to a linked web page’s content or prevent search engines from indexing it.

The two most popular blogging templates, Blogger and WordPress, both use nofollow tags in comments by default. Although the original justification for including nofollow was to discourage blog comment spam, the advent of strong anti-spam plugins for WordPress and moderation options in Blogger have rendered this argument effectively moot. Meanwhile, if you want to explore this issue further, Michael Hampton at Homeland Stupidity wrote an excellent article about what nofollow is and why it does not stop spam.

For now, however, we will look at how to remove nofollow for comment author links in the Blogger templates. The advantage of doing this is that it rewards commenters with a small amount of “link juice” to help them with their SEO efforts, which in turn encourages more people to comment and contribute to your blog’s content. The disadvantage is that it may attract quasi-spammy comments that are sparse on content but have niche-oriented keywords placed in the name field. Therefore, it is advisable to actively moderate your comments if you choose remove nofollow.

Here are the steps required to do so if you’re using Blogger:

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In our modern computer age filled with e-mails, e-books, websites, blogs, and many types of printed materials, increasing your reading speed is an important skill that can help you deal with the problem of information overload without stressing out or missing anything important. While it may seem counterintuitive at first, with practice the techniques of speed reading can actually increase comprehension and allow you to extract the main ideas from a book or article more efficiently. Here are a few techniques for how to increase your reading speed so that you can be more productive in your educational endeavors.

1. Remove distractions. If you’re going to practice speed reading, it always helps to find a quiet place where you can concentrate your full efforts on reading quickly while absorbing as much material as you can. Any kind of environmental noise such as conversations, televisions, cell phones, or even background music can dilute your brain’s concentration and reduce your overall reading efficiency.

2. Consider what kind of book you are going to read. Some types of writing such as poetry, archaic literature, or technical manuals are not well suited to speed reading because you will need more time to decipher the meaning of the words. It’s best to practice on text where you can easily understand the language used and do not need to concern yourself with technical details.

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After doing some research earlier today, I noticed that many of you are looking for lists of high-paying keywords to use for AdSense monetization. This is understandable; after all, making money from advertising is the primary reason that many of us are creating and managing websites in the first place.

As you may have already read elsewhere, the value of developing and monetizing your site based on high AdSense keyword lists is questionable because the actual amount of money you will receive for ad clicks is affected by more than just the cost per click (CPC) of the keyword. This is particularly true with Google, where advertisers can specifically choose which sites to run their ads on, not to mention the fact that many of them will avoid the content network altogether. There is also Google’s “smart pricing” algorithm to contend with, which makes publisher revenues very difficult to predict even for a consistent set of keywords.

Nevertheless, looking at CPC values may be a good way of determining the potential of a keyword under ideal conditions. It never ceases to amaze me how much some folks are willing to pay for advertising around certain topics. For example, the topic being discussed here (making money from AdSense) actually has its fair share of high-paying keywords associated with it. In fact if we use Google’s Keyword Tool, we find out that the single word “adsense” carries a maximum CPC of $10.05. By looking at the related terms, we can find examples of even higher click values. Here is a list of the top 20 highest paying keywords related to the word “adsense”, sorted by cost per click (CPC).

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When it comes to making the fastest money as a Clickbank affiliate, most people will think of pay-per-click (PPC) marketing. And when it comes to PPC, Google AdWords is mentioned as the first choice almost unanimously. However, there is a relatively small group of marketers out there who have figured out that Yahoo’s search marketing platform, although generally less sophisticated than Google’s, offers certain advantages that allow greater overall profit margins for Clickbank affiliates. Much of this advantage is not so much because Yahoo’s system is better than AdWords, but because of recent changes to Google’s algorithm and the current status of the market. Here is a summary of why some people might want to consider using Yahoo for PPC traffic when promoting Clickbank products:

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Like all Windows operating systems, Vista has a registry that stores addresses of files and programs that are used on your computer. These records change whenever applications are installed, uninstalled, or significantly altered. Over time, without proper maintenance pieces of these entries may be left behind in the registry and cause problems, especially if you add or remove files frequently. Eventually things like slowdowns, error messages, system crashes, and even the infamous Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) may occur, causing you to experience a loss of productivity along with much frustration. If you happen to acquire any viruses or malware before symptoms become noticeable, this will further exacerbate the problem.

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Search traffic dropped off significantly this week, beginning on Thanksgiving day and remaining relatively low through the weekend. This is following the same pattern that I noticed last year; traffic is slowest during the holiday season but rebounds after the start of the new year.

Meanwhile, I am trying to focus my efforts on producing more keyword-targeted “money pages” that can actually generate sales or leads in addition to providing useful information. Income from this site is still pitifully low compared to the amount of content that I have, and I am keen to free up more time and money that can be used to expand my operations. My situation has reached the point where I really need to start outsourcing some of my most time-consuming activities, but I want to have enough cash flow in place to justify the additional expenses.

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The computer optimization site PC Pitstop is running a special promotion that runs through the remainder of this weekend. This particular PC Pitstop promo code allows you to instantly save 25% on all products from the site, including Optimize, Driver Alert, Exterminate, Disk MD, and Erase. In order to activate the code, click on the banner below, run a free scan, and use the code PCPERFORM at the product checkout.

UPDATE 12/14/08: You can now save 15% on PC Pitstop Optimize using the coupon code: JOY. This discount expires December 31.

Unfortunately, this particular coupon code expires after December 1. However, I will continue to monitor the program and update this page with any additional promo codes or special deals that become available in the future. I am planning to eventually write up a full review on PC Pitstop and its products, but for now enjoy the savings!

The finale to Season 2 of Sam & Max ends with a delightful romp through hell to right that which you have wronged. This guide will serve to help you solve the video game’s puzzles so that you can enjoy the whole experience without pulling your hair out. At the end of this article, there is a video review for those of you who do not yet have the game.

I will tell you that if you find yourself having a lot of trouble, you should make sure that you turn the hint level up all the way in the options menu. This will cause Max to give you hint statements anytime the game believes that you are stalled. They are generally crafted as a good middle ground for anyone who just feels stuck and needs a little inspiration.

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This article on student personal finances is one that I managed to find earlier today at a newly discovered site called DailyArticle.com. I could not find an author’s name to credit as the original source because it was purchased under private label rights, as is the case with most of the other articles from this particular venue. Eventually I will write up a full review of the site; it shows promise as a good place for webmasters to find original content of acceptable quality.

If you are just starting your college education, it probably has not yet hit you that for the next four years you will be poorer than you have ever been in your life. This is true for most students because usually parents will not send you much money for living expenses when you are in college, especially if they are struggling with money issues themselves. If difficult overall economic conditions are added to the mix, you will likely have difficulty finding a job since you have not yet graduated. Moreover, school can be very difficult and time consuming, putting further strain on your student personal finances.

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Private label rights, often abbreviated PLR, represent a license agreement which effectively provides the owner legal free rein regarding the use of an associated product. Technically, the original author retains copyright but under this type of license, the acquiring owner may alter the product in any way, including taking credit as the author. PLR products may include text, graphics, source codes, or software, but the most common form is written content organized into articles or ebooks.

Typically the original author of a written work will sell private label rights on it to another interested party for a fee. The author can then sell the same license to other parties as well, and eventually make more money than a regular ghostwriter would for selling a unique article.

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Yesterday I found a site offering free training videos for basic Internet marketing skills, most of which are essential for anyone who is just getting started in this particular field. These kinds of lessons may also be useful for those of you who are not necessarily looking to become experts in sales or marketing, but would like to know more about how to derive some extra income from your blogging or website development efforts.

After initially bookmarking the site, I spent some time earlier today going through all of the videos to determine their subject matter and learn anything that I did not already know. There are a total of 20 videos, each of them averaging about 5 minutes in length. Here are the subjects that are covered:

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Yesterday I received a contact form submission from someone named Desmond Solise, who apparently found this site using the keyword “internet marketing blogs.” He has requested publication of this “short article”, which frankly reads more like a long classified ad than an informational piece. In spite of its rather self-promotional nature, I have decided to go ahead and publish it anyway because the author’s offer may be of interest to other people who are near the beginning of their learning curve in this particular genre.

In effect, the author is offering a wide array of ebooks and other tutorial products in exchange for writing brief summaries of other documents. He does not go into detail about what the documents are, but my guess is that this a way for him to outsource some of his article writing or website content. It might not be a bad deal for those with little or no money as long as this person follows through on his end of the deal and can actually deliver the goods. Meanwhile, if any of you happen to have previous experience with this particular offer, you can let us know about it in the comment section.

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Although the week’s search traffic levels have not changed much, I managed to get a nice boost of traffic from StumbleUpon when my post on redundant words and phrases was submitted by jpearce01 and received four positive votes. Meanwhile, yesterday I managed to discover a plethora of Xbox-related keywords that show good potential for SEO and affiliate marketing. The popularity of console gaming and related issues is driving lots of traffic through the search engines as expected, but I was surprised at how many niche keywords in this genre still have very few competing pages listed. I wound up compiling such a long list of juicy keywords that I will probably not be able to cover them all with posts here without turning this site into some sort of gaming blog. Therefore, I will probably save most of these for one of my upcoming Blogger mini-projects.

This week’s sample of keywords is as follows:

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