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How did I earn...
October’s Income on InvestorBlogger
October 31, 2007 | Posted by InvestorBlogger | Be the first to leave a comment
The last three or four months have experienced a number of milestones in InvestorBlogger’s rise. Today, I’d like to report on a new milestone that IB reached today: $6,000.
Less than two months after passing the $5,000 mark, we’ve reached $6,000. I have already updated the sidebar with the new amount and the average per month, too.
Financial results are posted below:
Payperpost: $129.50
Google : $7.19
SR/ReviewME/Other : $64.48
Adlinks : $58.84
Stocks: $109.72
Hosting : $128.72
Bank A/C Interest : $20.71
Total: $519.16
Payperpost had a good month until Google’s PR update; and I scored several requests from LinkWorth. I also turned down quite a few posts on Sponsored Reviews, Payperpost, Blogvertiser, and Smorty, mostly for requests for not disclosing the sponsored nature of the post. This, to my readers, seems grossly unfair. I do try to disclose as much as I can.
Traffic results are as follows:
In October I added 75 posts including this one and a review that I will finish tomorrow. I’ve had over 1300 unique visits this month, showing 2,800 page views. Traffic from Google has fallen considerably since August, though other areas have picked up the slack. Google’s organic search results account for only 5% of traffic to this blog. Given the recent PR downgrades, it’s difficult to imagine that it would get much less. In fact, given Google’s poor showing on this blog, I’m considering actively removing my blog from their search engine (after all, if they don’t support me, why should I them?)
Also, in the past month or so, we’ve moved to a virtual server, which has really benefited the blog, after the down periods in August and September. The pages typically load very quickly now, and the blog themes and plugins have all been trimmed to the basics, to speed up the responsiveness of the blog. Managing the server is relatively easy, but not without problems such as these mysterious spikes that happen daily.
Also, some of my customers websites have done *very* well in many ways, including PR. One or two of my other blogs have had PR upgrades, but InvestorBlogger was downgraded.
What does the future hold under ‘Big Brother’?
I’m reconsidering the future of the blog now, after the PR downgrades. It’s been quite demoralizing to have a PR5 blog dropped to a PR2 grade, and lose over 30 PR rankings for internal pages.
There are three or four possible directions I could go in:
1. Just freeze the blog as is: simple effective and the resources are left as they are.
2. Continue posting and ignore PR and Google. Continue to build a blog and a reader base, despite the difficulties.
3. Sell the blog, the domain or both.
4. Just blitz everything, except the domain.
What would you do? Have you faced these problems? Let me know your thoughts. Your thoughts will shape my response… so let me hear!
10 reasons why Adsense sucks for your blog
October 30, 2007 | Posted by InvestorBlogger | Read these 24 comments
Adsense has been around since 2003 in its current form, and for many users represented the best option for webmasters to make money from their websites. For a long time, though, blogs weren’t permitted to add Adsense. Eventually, Google relented and a boom followed in Adsense. There have been a number of stunning Adsense success stories, too.
Now, though, after using Adsense for a number of years, I’m becoming rapidly disillusioned for a number of significant reasons. (As this story updates, and gets comments, I’ll be adding links throughout the story updating facts as far as I can).
1. Revenue per click is falling. While Adsense TOS prevents me from telling you what it is, I can tell you: From the first year to the third year, the revenue per click has dropped by more than 33% for my sites, AND IT IS STILL dropping. In the second year, it dropped by 10%, then in the third year, it dropped by nearly 27%. And since the beginning of the fourth year, it has dropped by a further 2% in only 3 months.
2. Adsense takes your advertisers and gives you pennies on the slot. For many websites, using Adsense allows advertisers to use your blog to reach your audiences rather than pay a lot more: in many cases, you can get your ad (albeit amonth others displayed for a few cents a click compared to purchasing a proper link or a larger ad block or image). It’s like a one-night stand, except in many cases, it doesn’t even last one night. It’s displayed and it’s gone. Many larger blogs now forgo Adsense because of these problems.
3. Their advertisers compete with YOU. If you are using your blog or website as a way to sell your own services or business or products, often you will find not just related products, but also directly competing products and competitors, who are paying you cents to steal customers who would pay you dollars. Does this make sense?
4. You don’t get paid when Adsense ads are not clicked, but the ads still get ‘viewed’ by individuals. In many cases, the ads are given prominent spots, but the reader doesn’t click. Does the reader see them or not? The readers have read many ads, but never clicked for a variety of reasons. But they have read the ads. You don’t get paid, usually. Occasionally, you will be paid for impressions, but not usually.
5. Clicking on Ads takes readers away from your blog. Do you want your readers to leave? Of course, you’d rather they didn’t, but if you place the adsense blocks in the ‘optimal’ positions, you are virtually guaranteeing that your readers will leave by clicking on an Adsense link. But usually readers won’t come back after viewing the linked site. They may, as I do, view the advertisers site, note the URL and either go to a search engine or close the window entirely.
6. For low-trafficked websites, Google Adsense just not generate anything more than peanuts for your traffic. With pageviews in the hundreds or low thousands per month, there is hardly enough traffic to earn more than a few tens of dollars per month. In fact, using the valuable advertising space for Adsense actually will not help to add value to your blog or generate much revenue.
7. Inappropriate ads often appear on your blog. On my ESL website, I’ve had links to all sorts of weird things; and on this blog, I still get weird links to websites completely unrelated to anything on the website page. I’m not talking pharma ads or adult ads, which Google prohibits. But still, the webmaster can’t choose what ads do appear on the website. This means that webmasters and site owners rarely have control of who is advertising. This is not a good thing.
8. Google is very strict on click fraud. To the point that one suspects they are even taking legitimate clicks and counting them as invalid. Of course, you aren’t able to monitor which clicks on your ads are invalid, or any statistical information, leaving you to guess about how many clicks are being discarded.
9. Google also bans Adsense publishers for instances of click fraud. Though many may deserve the banning, I’ve read of a few webmasters who would likely never commit click fraud, yet were banned for no apparent reason. Additionally, they weren’t notified of the particular infractions, discouraged from appealing, and the whole affair was conducted in secrecy, a secrecy that does not befit a major US corporation. Of course, when you are banned, you lose your account, your money, and your reputation is slighted. Google, of course, offers no proof. You are banned without a trial, or even a specific charge. And there are serious issues with the security of Publisher’s accounts.
10. It’s not smart to put all your eggs in one basket. Why? Because if you are serious about developing your blog as a separate income and business, you MUST develop multiple sources of revenue. Relying only on Adsense is perhaps the dumbest decision you can make, especially because you put your business at the mercy of just ONE supplier, Google. As many bloggers found out this week, this can have disastrous consequences when Google, who also provides search engine traffic, website rankings and a variety of other services, also provides a large percentage of your traffic. Many blogs were subsequently stung by Page Rank downgrades, resulting in lower earnings potential and possibly less traffic. In some cases, Google even deliberately removes websites from the rankings because they claim the website master is abusing the Google search engine.
Looking forward to your comments.
Disclaimer: This website currently uses Adsense on its pages, has about 5% of its traffic from Google and may utilize some other Google services, such as gmail, analytics and so on. But InvestorBlogger is seriously unhappy with Google’s recent performance on its Adsense, PR rankings, and the way that Google is becoming a ‘Be Seen to Do No EVIL’ force.
Google vs. You the User: Who’s working for whom?
October 30, 2007 | Posted by InvestorBlogger | Read these 3 comments
Is it time to be rethinking our dependence on Google? It might be… Why? The American model of capitalism tends to create giant behemoths in many industries. While this obviously makes some things efficient, it also generates a huge backwash of effects that are less obvious.
For us in the online world, Google’s Page Rank ‘bomb’ has devalued many of the links and online relationships that we have all spent a lot of time and money developing. Should we be helping Google take money out of our pockets, just to put it in theirs? Because to me that’s exactly what it looks like:
Don’t buy or sell text links (Except ours).
Don’t mess with your SEO (Or we will).
… and exactly why should we conform to Google’s will? Are you willing to pay for my server? Are you willing to handle the queries from my visitors? Are you willing to generate my content? Or do you Google just want me to slave away at my keyboard for sweatshop payments from your Adsense program which pays cents per click when you are generating dollars per click. (Can you sense if I’m angry or not..? 
) So let’s hear it here!
Let’s hear your thoughts in this discussion: What happened to your blog? And the PR? Do you care? Or not? Why?
BuzzFEST#8: Hunna’s Happenings
October 29, 2007 | Posted by InvestorBlogger | Be the first to leave a comment
This promotion has been going on since October 1st! I challenged myself to find 30 blogs for 30 days! It looks like this BlogFest is drawing to a close. I haven’t been inundated with offers! Which is surprising really especially after Google’s PR dithering and dunking earlier this week. Many blogs of note have been reduced by one or two or more PR rankings.
Anyway, I’m now posting what could be the last in the series of my Blogbuzzes, “Hunna’s Happenings“! Hunna was kind enough to host a PPP blog carnival ages ago, and she linked one of the carnivals to one of my posts! You’ll have to read the carnival to find out which one!
Anyway this is her blog and it’s very brightly colored with lots of purple! Now, I’m quite keen on purple! So the colors appeal to me. I was going to link to some categories or tags, but it seems there are none! So I had to go searching by hand: Sunset in Mexico, Where I Live, and she has a string of posts on dieting…! Though I’ve been quite unsuccessful on that score.
Good luck on your blog. We’ll be dropping by again soon!
If you’d like a blogbuzz, like Hunna’s Happenings, then hop on over to Buzz your BlogFest, read the instructions, and sign up today. There are only 22 buzzes to go, and 5 days! So hurry! I wonder if we can make 22 buzzes in 5 days! … Somehow, I don’t think so! But it’s been fun!
Sunday Reading: Blog Carnivals that feature InvestorBlogger stories
October 28, 2007 | Posted by InvestorBlogger | Be the first to leave a comment
I’d like to thank those editors of the Blog Carnivals (more)that InvestorBlogger has been featured on recently by driving some traffic to them! There’s some good investing and tech stories in each of the carnivals.
Tech News
Personal Finance
- Carnival of Personal Finance Blogs
- Carnival of Everything Finance
- How to solve Money Worries and Woes
- Carnival of Money Stories
Debt and Loan Management
Postie Carnival*
*What is a postie? Read more.
Happy reading through those carnivals. And thanks.
Blog Theme Problems
October 28, 2007 | Posted by InvestorBlogger | Be the first to leave a comment
I’ve been having problems with the blog theme that I use MistyLook 3.4 chopping the head off the first post on the index page. It happened occasionally. But today, I noted it as well. Don’t quite know what’s going on. I updated the theme, turned off the plugins, and removed all Javascript.
But the problem still persists. Looks like it’s time to change theme away from MistyLook. I’ll be running the theme that you see for the next few days while I choose a new one. It’s dull but it works.
[update: I’ve restored most features from MistyLook, but the bottom of single page posts isn’t perfect yet.]
Best Wishes
Kenneth
From TYTN to Taiwan: 5 Stories for bloggers and techies
October 28, 2007 | Posted by InvestorBlogger | Be the first to leave a comment
In this post, you’ll read about money making, Asus Eee-PC, Google PR, Hitech and Iphone Knock-offs.
To get rich sometimes doesn’t require the smartest of ideas, in fact, NicheGeek describes some ’stupid’ ideas that have made lots of money. Of course, I’d have to include the Pet Rocks craze as my number 11 on that list! It’s worth reading this Sunday. Anyway, if you’re interested, it’s called: 10 Totally Stupid Online Business Ideas That Made Someone Rich
Also, LaptopLogic.com has Real Pictures of ASUS Eee PC - LaptopLogic.com which I’ve been following. I’m going to have to take some time off work, and go looking for one! This device is going to invent a whole new industry of full feature subportable devices that are light, reliable and inexpensive.
On the recent Google PR update/fiasco, here is one interesting response: Blog police kiss my butt!
You know what really slays me? Okay, I’ll tell you. People that tell other people what to do with their blogs. I’m not talking about a solicited or requested blog review or something like that. I’m talking about people that keep their own blogs a certain way and wag their fingers at people that like to think outside the box.
It intrigues me that there are so many people out there who want to tell me how to run my blog! John Cow follows up with a good story: Our Blog Is Not Your Bitch | John Cow dot Com.
So you’re still hankering for an iPhone (or is it Iphone?). Bloomberg presents some ideas on where to get unofficial knock-offs in Taipei City.
At the end of an alley in Taiwan’s most violent city, a black Mercedes-Benz sedan blocks a sliding- glass door that opens only from within. Inside, technophiles can buy iPhone knockoffs for two-thirds the legitimate price.
Of course, you can’t wait for an iPhone, and dont’ want to buy a knock-off… Then, if you are looking for similar functions available now, you could do no better than Hitec’s HTC. Better still, it’s available outside the U.S. ; and it works with much faster networks. Still want that iPhone?
- High speed internet with worldwide 3G
- Full connectivity with Tri-Band UMTS, Quad-Band EDGE, Bluetooth® and Wi-Fi® Instant access to email
- Sliding keyboard for easy typing
- Secondary camera for video telephony
- Synchronised music and pictures for easy playback and management
After all, why buy an Apple iPhone when it’s not the best.
So that’s it for the roundup on InvestorBlogger this Saturday and Sunday 26th-27th October!
Taipei Trips: MaoKong via Gondola
October 27, 2007 | Posted by InvestorBlogger | Be the first to leave a comment
The word ‘gondola’ always creates a mystique and romance that is evocative of Venice. Of course, to engineers, it refers as much to a type of ‘cable car’ called a gondola lift.
So with romance in our hearts, Christine and I decided on a trip to MaoKong via Maokong Gondola : I’m including a video from YouTube. As a weekend trip would have meant hours of standing waiting for a gondola! Neither of us have the patience, so a weekday trip was decided upon.
I’ve included some views from the cable car but pictures were taken from inside the gondola so they aren’t so clear at times:
Christine and I are waiting to board the first gondola!
A view of the lines of gondolas heading up and down the mountains.
The line has 4 primary and 2 secondary stations on the line:
* Taipei Zoo
* Corner One
* Taipei Zoo South
* Corner Two
* Zhinan Temple
* Maokong
We rode from Taipei Zoo all the way up the Mountain to Maokong. We had intended to come back from Zhinan Temple station so we could see Taipei twinkling in the early evening … but we got lost on the walk from Maokong to Zhinan and ended up catching one of the numerous Maokong area buses that ferry people around the area.
It was a good afternoon in all… next time we go, though, perhaps we’ll do the journey in reverse: taking a bus up the hill, then riding down on the Gondola!
For those of you who are not in Taipei, I found this great 3D animation of the trip on Youtube
Happy Trips!