I’ve been updating my own advertising blocks recently with a variety of different means. I’d like to present a short summary of my impressions of what advertising works or doesn’t (this is third party advertising not advertising sold directly through my own page).

Here are some notes. I’ve accorded each a status out of five points to help you consider if you should try them on your website:

* works poorly or doesn’t work
** works but unsatisfactory
*** works satisfactorily
**** works well but have some reservations
***** works very well and is recommended.

1. Google Ads.
Setting Google to display images instead of text ads is improving my clickthroughs. I’m displaying three ad boxes on the columns on auto-rotation. It’s improving from running traditional google ads. Even if no-one clicks, it’s a little more eye candy. I’ve still to decide whether Adsense will be a permanent feature on this blog or not. Image Ads are saving their skin at the moment… but… So it’s still generating income, much to my surprise.
Status: Works OK. (***)

2. Real Traffic Exchange
Real Traffic Exchange is producing some nice clicks but my own ads aren’t converting at all. So I’ve got to tweak them. I haven’t decided to keep them permanently yet. Also, updates are very slow if you make any changes to the text. Very SLOW.
Status: Works. (***)

3. TopSpots
TopSpots isn’t an expensive way to advertise on my blog, and I’ve seen several new purchases this month. I had a fake transaction that showed up that wasn’t paid for, so I quickly removed that. I would also like a thinner widget as it is a little wide for this theme.
Status: Works well. (****)

4. TTZ Media Ads
The TTZ Media ads are causing a bit of a headache, not displaying properly at times, but things seem fine right now. Generally, they’re not producing any clickthroughs in the sidebar at the moment. I think they’ll perform better in the post or between posts.
Status: Oh, well. (**)

5. TLA – Sell Ads for Traffic
I’ve recently had two new advertisers show up on the right sidebar. If you’d like a special offer to buy advertising here or sell your own advertising, check out Text Link Ads. This generates a fair amount of the monthly income from this blog. But it’s not without risks and penalties.
Status: Works fine but some hesitancy to recommend this due to the nature of the advertising. (****)

6. SocialSpark and PayPerPost
Blog Sponsorship: I’ve added the Blog Sponsorship at the bottom and on the first visit. The service is provided by SocialSpark. I’m only running it to see what would happen, if it adds to the blog or detracts from it.
(***) Status: seems okay, but only from a lack of information.

Other than that, I’m not currently doing any advertising for either of these due to limitations on my blogs’ presentation and ranking and segmentation. You can read more about this in other posts. Search for Payperpost articles. There’re lots.
Status: (****) – I do have serious reservations about this kind of advertising, but it works.

7. NetAudioAds

Publish NetAudioAds Adlets

Earlier this month I removed the NetAudioAds software from the blog, after being strung along for months by their always coming notice. Though my account is still active, I have all but given up hope that this will turn into a viable long term income source.
Status: Works but unsatisfactory due to lack of real ads to show. (**)

8. Voxant
TheNewsRoom is a video based website that provides feeds that can be shared and can earn money for your blogs. The videos I found present a number of problems: the new code is difficult to place in posts, I find; the videos aren’t current to begin with; the videos get removed (leaving ugly big gaps in your older blog posts); and payout rates are well… poor to say the least.
Status (*) I’ve not added this to any posts of late. I would remove them from older posts but I can’t find them.

9. Affiliates: Dreamhost vs. BlueHost
Although this blog has been hosted by Dreamhost for as long as it’s been online (and I love them, they’re great MOST OF THE TIME!), their affiliate program has not worked for me at all. I’ve had thousands of clickthroughs and not a single sign up in more than two years. So I’ve switched one of the text links to BlueHost to compare the results. The difference: I can track exactly where links come from to see what performs and what doesn’t.
Status: Works but not effectively (**)… Let’s hope that it gets a three-star, soon.

10. Amazon: Still successful.
I’ve been selling books on Amazon for quite some time now, and I’m still surprised to see anything sell there, but they do. Since January 2007, I’ve sold over $379 and earned a whopping commission of about $15. So affiliate marketing does work. But I don’t know how.
Status: (****) – definitely needs more work to make this profitable. But if you can sell $300, $3,000 shouldn’t be so hard, right?

I’ve also tried AdToll which is still active, but not being used here right now; Adbrite which was a waste of time; PayU2Blog (which don’t do customer service well, and bloggers who advertise for clients are as much customers because they provide the adspace); and a whole bunch of others that I can’t remember.

I’m always heartened by doing a post like this as it reminds me what I have been able to do with such knowledge as I have. Do check through the sites I’ve linked to (affiliate codes are included for most). Let me know how’re your money making efforts going with these vendors? Let me know.

This post has already been updated.

In today’s email, Gordon from Customer Love at Payperpost ‘reached out’ to me with the following email:

Hi Kenneth,

I recently read your blog post titled, “payperpost and socialspark: is it time to give up posting for pennies?”

I wanted to reach out to you to see if you could elaborate on your problems/concerns. In particular, regarding your frustrations with getting your SocialSpark post approved.

Your feedback would be extremely beneficial, as we are always trying to improve our services and products to meet the needs of our customers.

Best Regards,
Gordon King
Manager, Customer Love

IZEA – Innovations in Social Media

I’m glad that Gordon and Izea are really interested in what is going on with their bloggers. At the risk of boring my readers, I’m recapping what has been going on:

Gordon,

Thank you for your email. I appreciate your interest…. I am afraid this is a rather long email… hope you don’t mind….

PPP Frustrations

I’ve been thinking about this for a while… I’ve not been successful in getting many opps at all under PPP recently despite having (at the time) a blog with Alexa est. 150K, Tech. 30K, PR2, and a REALRank of approx. 850. I have approx. 100 visitors a day and it’s doubled since last year. While I realize that there are a lot of good bloggers out there competing with me, I’ve just been experiencing too many troubles in finding any opps at all on PPP. In fact, I did about five since October 2007 or so. Part of is that I’m living in Asia (hence segmented out of most US opps despite (DESPITE) most of my traffic being US based (approx. 75% is based in N. America).

Other Streams

Naturally, I was happy to accept a recent advertiser that included an in-post advertising block. Since I hadn’t done any opps in a while, I felt this was okay. I actually forgot that it was likely against the TOS for PPP. Then in February/March, I had two opps rejected for that reason. I wrote and told PPP that it was a problem because I had an offer for advertising that included a three month period. Additionally, it came in at a time when I hadn’t done any opps for a while so I was glad to take the advertising opportunity, if only to develop the advertising side of my business and defray some of my hosting costs.

I then asked that my blog be temporarily removed from PPP at that point, because I was getting nothing despite being in hot segments of the market and my blog no longer ‘qualified’. When SS came along, I was excited to take part in that, because I thought it would be a maturer form of PPP, and I loved the community aspects. But for various reasons, the system is really only starting up.

I opted to try the sponsorships which seem to be running now. And I took and created a couple of sparks, too. Then I took a real opp for $5.50. I wasn’t so concerned about the amount of money, but I took a while to write it, added a couple of pictures, as well as the compulsory requirements. I wanted to try out the system.

SS: is it still PPP 2.0?

I forgot that the original TOS in PPP still applied and when it was rejected, I consulted the TOS (in SS – non-existent) and found the reasons:

• 1. in post advertising
• 2. in post distractors links (for the image credit no less)
• 3. quoting their website
• 4. an inpost link to an affiliate product
• 5. re-redesign my frontpage (which no longer includes full-posts for every item either).

While I could have removed 2~4 without difficulty, the banner rotator I’m using doesn’t permit post opt-outs, so I would have to disable the ENTIRE inpost ads for the ENTIRE blog thus invalidating part of my agreement with that advertiser. I’d have probably had to refund the money, too. Meaning that for a five dollar post, I would have lost much more than that. In addition, I’d have had to re-edit the post; remove the image; turn off my affiliate campaign for that keyword; submit a Ticket; and resubmit my post to await a final decision.

Is it worth the effort for me to do PPP?

Quite frankly, in addition to the time I already spent improving my blog, adding income streams, building traffic, it was NOT WORTH THE EFFORT! Seriously, I’m not kidding. I spent more than three hours alone redesigning the frontpage of my blog… and I’m gradually moving it towards a magazine format.

This doesn’t include any of the concerns about further licensing (and no-recompense) of my product WITHOUT my permission… but you can read about that in my post. In other words, I’d write that $5.00 post, I’d have to write two posts (before and after), hack my blog, allow it to be used again and again by the advertiser (with credit), as well as causing traffic to leave my website, risking PR again, … it just seem to work for me.

If there were more a stream of work, I’d consider some of the changes I mentioned, but for one opp in two months.

Change the TOS! Pretty please!

So, I’m afraid that unless SS modifies its terms somewhat from PPP, I won’t be much posting in future for you. My blog is no longer qualified, and it’s stuck somewhere between being a small blog (ideal for PPP/SS IMHO) and a major blog.

I will look for other ways in SS for me to earn revenue, keep your customers happy and increase the profile of both our companies. I’m doing the banners right now for the first time. Who knows perhaps some aspects of the SS program will allow more adventuresome advertising means than inpost advertising.

I really appreciate the work and effort that the staff at PPP have put in over the past years, and I can only say thank you for everything you’ve done. It’s been a real thrill. You can definitely count me as a satisfied customer. I’d have to give you all at least an A++ for everything…

It just seems that PPP/SS and InvestorBlogger are going in different directions right now… I hope that our paths cross again.

Best Wishes – Kenneth

I don’t expect to see any magic bullets, but we might see some discussion in the company about how to manage those blogs that fall between the cracks. Who knows?

Is anyone here a fan of CashFlow 101? Did you ever play the game before? I’ve been a keen player of the game for some time now. I’ve even introduced to some of my students over the years, even the younger ones enjoyed playing the game.

What is CashFlow 101?

Cashflow 101 is an educational board game designed by Robert Kiyosaki (author of Rich Dad, Poor Dad). The aim of the game is to teach the players about investing and making their money work for them. The game provides a setting that is challenging yet informal while helping players some basic lessions in financial literacy. In playing the games, players find it easier to learn and use the basic principles of personal financial management.

A Video Interview from the CashFlow 101 Game Designer

The board is divided into two stages. The first is “the rat race” in which the player is given a basic bank account, spending habits, personal and mortgage debt and a salary. As the game starts, each roll of the dice determines what opportunities you have or what expenses you must make. There are four sets of cards that determine different the assets and liabilities that you must take on. And each expense or income has to be adjusted. Players go around the rat race trying to accumulate the amount of money that will allow them to enter the fast track. The promotion criteria is quite simple: that passive income generated in the game must exceed the expenses of the player. Given the different jobs, salaries and financial pictures, this can be quite a challenge!

Personal Comments

Cashflow 101 is actually one great board game. While I won’t go into the rules, as other websites cover this well, I will say that is quite an educational game. I’ve found it quite instructional in a number of ways:

1. it can model our behavior patterns in a number of ways, esp. our spending patterns, our consumption patterns, our lack of savings as a financially less than capable society, etc
2. it can model changes in behavior as people try out different strategies, occupations, savings rates, etc.
3. it can show the longer term consequences of our actions by very quickly showing the results of our dependence on particular aspects of our financial management.
4. it can show people how to monitor and record aspects of their financial situation, their balance sheet, etc.
5. it is actually a lot more challenging to play than monopoly.
6. and, as if you needed another one, it is actually fun to play, we can share our own ideas about money management and financial planning, because, oddly , as our societies consume, it seems there is less and less discussion of the positive aspects of financial management amongst people, and muce more talk about consumption.

You can watch this YouTube video that shows a game being played (in Russian, I think) but the game is English and it shows you what the game looks like, and give you a sense of how it is played.

Suggestions, Notes and Improvements

There are some flaws in the game that need some working on:

1. you can ‘learn’ how to win the game, because you know which cards are likely to come up if you play this game more than a few times, there are fewer risks for those who gamble by borrowing money;
2. stocks are grossly overly simplified, as are houses. You can generally do well investing in stocks, if you know what cards are likely to come up. Again, being more familiar with the cards can help you analyze which cards, so when you hear the offers, you buy them;
3. there needs to be more challenge to the game for those who played more than a couple of times – so I’d suggest creating a book of separate missions that you can use to play your part in extending the games playability, perhaps increasing the difficulty of individual player’s positions by recreating real-life scenarios;
4. and, the fast track is spectacularly dull to play, there is little complexity or variety. I think the Rat Race is far more interesting to play.

Overall, though, it is an expensive game for people to play at nearly $220. If you are interested in playing, perhaps head on over to the Rat Race Players’ website for clubs near you. It’s worth a rainy or cool spring Sunday afternoon!

Have you ever played? What did you think about the game? Did you enjoy it? Why?