100k Job Blogging From Home

I’m directing this article to those who are just starting their eBay Selling Venture.  Whether you’re selling books, DVDs, CDs, collectibles or clothing, all things (with the exception of eBooks and services) need to be mailed.   And it’s the postage, handling fees and mailing that seems to cause a great deal of angst among new sellers.

You’ve heard the advice – don’t overcharge for shipping.  That is very good advice, indeed, as nothing turns off potential buyers like sellers who gouge you on the shipping costs.  It’s also a practice that can rack up bad feedback.

However, I’m going to play Devil’s Advocate here and suggest that you don’t go overboard and give so much of a break on shipping that you’re chipping away at your profits.  It’s good to remember the “hidden costs” of shipping:  bubble wrap to secure your breakables, tape, shipping envelopes, boxes, etc.  Then there’s the gas you put in your car to take all those trips to the post office.

You might think I’m being cheap, but, if you added up all your eBay expenses for the year (as some did for their recent taxes) you might be shocked to see how all the packing materials and gas for your car added up and took a little chunk out of your eBay profits.  And, believe me, they do add up.

Some people are even more surprised to find they underestimated the weight of their packages, causing their profits to shrink even further.

How can you be fair to both you and your buyers?

1.  Buy a scale.  It may sound simple, but purchasing a scale can save you a bundle in shipping.  If you’re just eyeballing the weight of the package, you can often times guess too low, and be in for quite a shock when you go to the post office and see the package is going to cost twice what you thought to ship.

2.  Know the dimensions of your packaging before listing the item.  Some packages cost more to ship because of their dimensions.  Knowing the weight alone isn’t enough.

3.  Offer the buyer a variety of shipping methods.  Some prefer speedy delivery with Express mailing, while some prefer to save money with parcel post even though the wait is longer. It’s always a good idea when using parcel post or other slower ground shipping to alert the buyer by email that it can take anywhere from 8 to 10 days.

4.  Save yourself money whenever possible by using boxes that have been used.  Most stores are more than happy to let you rummage through their old boxes and take some home with you.  But, do remember to choose boxes that are presentable, secure and strong enough for your items.  And, if you have breakables, don’t skimp on the bubble wrap.

5.  Give yourself a small handling fee that will cover your expenses.  Some sellers add on an additional $1 or $2 to the shipping fees for their handling fees (depending on the cost of the item and how much packaging you have to use).  I really advocate doing this because your expenses will add up if you do a lot of selling on eBay.  Be sure to be upfront with your buyers that you have a small handling fee so they can’t complain about it later.

Being fair to both yourself and your buyer will keep you both happy, and keep more of your profit in your pocket.

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Reasons for Replicating Data

According to a study done by Krishna Bharat and Andrei Brodner there are several reasons why data are replicated or why mirror sites are created – Load Balancing, High Availability, Multi-lingual replication, Franchises or Local versions, Database Sharing, Virtual Hosting, and Maintaining Pseudo Identities.

In load balancing, replication of data is done to decrease the servers’ loads. Instead of just having one server to handle all the traffic from web surfers interested in the data or content, the site is mirrored or the data replicated so that the traffic is split between two or more servers.

Virtual hosting also sometimes result in mirroring. This happens to services with different websites and host names but use the same IP address and server. What happens is the path to one site is the valid one while the path to the other site simply gives an identical webpage as a result.

Google’s Webmaster Guideline about Duplicate Content

Search engines are blatantly against replicated data so much so that Google even has a warning against them in their Webmaster Guidelines. Google’s Webmaster Guidelines were a list of Do’s and Don’ts that ought to be followed by websites to help the search engine in finding, indexing, and ranking websites. Following the Do’s will of course increase the chance that Google will list a specific website and ran it favorably as well. However, doing any of the Don’ts will of course detract from a website’s rank.

Valid Mirrored Sites

However, for valid mirror sites like those mentioned above (multi-lingual, franchise, etc.) there should be no worry since search engines have provisions for such things and take into account the motive behind them. You can help your mirror site by making sure that you follow all the other guidelines to get noticed and ranked by Google. Following the guidelines will surely help not only your ranking with Google but with other search engines as well.

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1. Decide on a stand alone domain name www.myblog.com or directory of existing site www.mysite.com/blog. Sub domain is also an option blog.mysite.com. Avoid hosted services that do not allow you to use your own domain name!
2. Obtain and install customizable blog software - WordPress and Moveable Type are my favorites.
3. Customize blog look and feel templates - aka design.
4. Research keywords and develop a glossary - Keyword Discovery, WordTracker, SitePoint, SEOBook Keyword Research.
5. Optimize the blog:
* Template optimization - RSS subscription options, social bookmark links, HTML code, Unique title tags, URLs, Sitemap
* Add helper plugins specific to WordPress or MT
* Create keyword rich categories (reference your keyword glossary)
6. Enable automatic trackback and ping functionality.
7. Create Feedburner Pro account and enable feed tracking.
8. Setup Google acount for Sitemap, validate and prep for future submission.
9. Identify authoritative blogs, web sites and hubs for outbound resource links and blogroll.
10. Format archived posts, related posts.
11. Submit RSS feed and Blog URL to prominent RSS and Blog directories / search engines.
12. Engage in an ongoing link building campaign.
13. If podcast or video content are available, submit to Podcast and Vlog directories.
14. Submit blog url to paid directories with categories for blogs - Yahoo, BOTW, bCentral, WOW, JoeAnt.
15. Optimize and distribute a press release announcing blog.
16. Request feedback or reviews of your blog in relevant forums, discussion threads. If you have a resourceful post that will help others, point to it.
17. Research and comment on relevant industry related blogs and blogs with significant centers of influence.
18. Monitor inbound links, traffic, comments and mentions of your blog - Google Alerts, Technorati, Blogpulse, Yahoo News, Ask Blogs and Feeds.
19. Make contact with related bloggers on AND offline if possible.
20. Use social networking services, forums and discussion threads to connect with other bloggers. If they like your stuff, they will link to you.

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There are times when a blogger, like any other writer, will ‘loose the muse.’ Every idea that comes to mind seems either trite or dull or, worse still, no ideas come to mind. What’s a blogger to do? Here are some tactics that just might clear away the cobwebs and allow you to find an inspiring idea for another great post:

Start with the news! Open up your favorite news page or open a newspaper and see what catches your attention. What are the politicians up to today? Any pending legislation that worries you or flat out scares you? Or perhaps someone is running for office or proposing a law that you may want to publicly support. Some celebrity is sure to be in trouble again; have anything to say about that? Maybe you have an idea about who should be dating or marrying who. Who died? A nice memorial post for a nice person may be in order. What happened “On This Date” in past years? Some past events are worth researching and writing about. Are you into sports? Many bloggers or blog readers are sports fans and they might be interested in your take on the playoffs or the players. Don’t forget to check the editorial page and the letters to the editor — do you agree with the opinions? Tell the world why or why not.

Read some blogs! Start surfing your favorite blogs. What are they talking about? You might have a different perspective on the latest hot topic that might just be interesting to your fellow bloggers or a perspective that might make them mad (BTW, never worry about making bloggers mad — most of them love having something to gripe about). If you can’t find anything that inspires you in your favorite blog, surf through some of those blogs that always make you mad; the ones that seem to promote everything that goes against your lifestyle. Anger is always a good blog motivator but don’t get so angry you get irrational. Comment on some blog posts and then expand your comments into a post on your blog. Also try logging onto Blog Explosion, Blog Clicker or one of the many other blog traffic generator programs — there are lots of ideas out there that are worth writing about from either a pro or con perspective.

What have you been doing? Your work place, your co-workers, you bosses, your home and your family members are all fair game for your blog — keep it short and amusing and you’ll have a great post. Once you introduce a particularly interesting person to your readers you may want to do some sequels. When was your last travel vacation — write a travelog about where you’ve been or do some research on some places you’d love to go to and write about them.

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Blogs may have originated as a means of online journal writing and community building, but the use of this model won’t accomplish much for the online entrepreneur.  Unless your cats are far cuter than every other bloggers’ or unless you are an amazingly interesting person with some tremendous writing talents, your personal blog will get lost in the chorus of voices that crowd the world of blogs.  In order to making blogging profitable, one must select a good topic upon which to focus.

Topic selection is at the very root of blogging success.  The idea is to choose a topic area in which you can be competitive.  Optimally, you can find a blogging niche that is underserved yet has a high level of interest.  This will allow you to attract a great deal of visitors more easily which, of course, translates into higher profit levels.

There are a few factors to consider when choosing the subject area for a “money blog.”  First, one may want to attempt to find a subject area in which they have a personal interest, especially if they plan on writing their own content.  This is because successful blogs require regular updates and it can become difficult to regularly produce quality information if one has no real interest in a topic.  If someone opts to hire a writer to produce their blog posts, however, this is a far less important factor.

Second, one should strive to find a topic area in which interest is at least relatively high.  You may be able to rule the search engines on the topic of “17th century wooden paperweights,” but there are so few, if any, people with an interest in the subject.  Thus, that number one ranking in Google will not produce the kind of traffic stream you will need to turn a healthy profit.  It may be more difficult to enter a more competitive marketplace, but the potential rewards are far greater, too.  The key to this element of topic selection, however, is not just writing a blog on a hot topic.  It is finding a field from which a healthy number of visitors can be culled.

Third, one will want to find a market that is underserved.  Basically, you are looking for a strong disparity in the number of interested parties and the amount of readily available information.  If you can find a topic in which many people are interested but that is not well-covered online, you will be sitting upon a potential blogging gold mine.  It is perfectly acceptable to build a wonderful blog and to expend the effort to compete in a more crowded area, but this does require much more work.  Finding an underserved niche and filling a hole in the marketplace is a much easier way to produce blogging revenue.

Choosing a topic for your moneymaking blog can be a challenging process.  This first step, however, is probably one of the most important.  The choice of a topic not only establishes the nature of the blog, it also (in large measure) determines its potential for success.

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I call these longer term methods because they require a greater work on your part, however they can result in great traffic results. One of these is article writing. Articles submitted to articles sites like goarticles, article fever, etc act as a magnet for search engines. Content rich and quality controlled if you get an article listed in one of these forums/ libraries you have the ability to have a constant stream of traffic through attached links. Why do you think I’ve written this article. To generate traffic. Yes I like helping and educating others and I do create not for profit websites and articles but most are to generate traffic. Another long term method is to contact and link to other similar sites. You can do this by requesting other webmasters to do this or create you own sites and link them to one another. Another long term method is to create an op-in e-mail list and encourage people from you list to visit your ‘great’ site with your ‘unbelievable’ offer. Creating a blog like this doesn’t hurt either. In summary I don’t reccommend any method over any other. Each has advantages and disadvantages. It can depend on what you are advertising. On the whole though I don’t think you can go wrong if you do all the above methods as a wholistic internet campaign. If you do over time your internet presence will increase as will your total traffic.

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Getting traffic to your site or blog is alway a priority for most people. One easy way to get traffic is through traffic exchange sites. However most surf traffic sites require you to click and surf before getting credits for others to hit your site. I decide to open up my own traffic exchange site which allows the gold members to surf without click and get credits easily. For a limited time, I’m giving away Gold membership for free (a $10/month worth). Get on board and start to increase traffic to your site/blog.

Here is my latest tool for you: Easy Surf Traffic Exchange.

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Cpanel or popularly known as hosting control panel system is the next generation web hosting system which is currently heading the list. Cpanel is a cheap hosting control panel for linux webhosts and managed dedicated servers. With its embarking into the World Wide Web, it has lent the power to accurately monitor your website. It means you can make changes according to your own liking and taste, not withstanding the requirements. It is the proven stability, easy to use feature; security and exceptional functionality which has made this hosting servicereally count its worth. Furthermore, you also get the advantage of friendly web based interface, adding up of parked domains, reading webmail, monitoring the bandwidth usage, addition of email accounts, moreover, you are also able to view your visitor statistics, and still many more to mention. The list of features is endless. In short a complete package one can ever dream off.

Herein you are in the total control of your website as you get access to your very own Cpanel with every Cpanel hosting account. Thus, it truly makes a lot of sense in managing your own website without any hassle. The core idea of this cpanel hosting is that it allows you to manage your domain through a web interface. There is also a feature whereby the transfer of the control and responsibility of managing your web site is made to you and you get to become the sole controller. It is the most advantageous web hosting serviceas you get to manage all aspects of e-mail, backup, files, CGI scripts and FTP. Not only this, cpanel hosting also allow you to take the entire backup of your website, managing cron jobs, protecting web directories, configuring http redirects and custom error pages also configure spam filters, accompanied with the viewing of disk space and allowing you to set up a shopping cart. What more, they all are available on a touch button system. It’s an enhanced servicewhich makes you control your website on your terms teemed with an array of features.

Cpanel also has an add on named as Fantastico through which you can install lot of ready to use free scripts at few clicks of your mouse.

This web-based control panel is comprehensively designed in a three-tier structure which makes web hosting quick and pretty simple. Using cpanel hosting; you will no longer need to go through hundreds of Linux-based commands just to be the admin of your server. It is loaded with every tool you need and now you can stay focused and pay more to your business instead of the server administration.

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You write a blog religiously every day or so. You provide informative, interesting content for your loyal readers. You’ve even got a couple of affiliate links in there, too. But is this enough to get great search engine results for your efforts?

Probably not. Sure, you’ll get listed with the search engines easily. But without a top twenty listing at one of the majors (Google, Yahoo! or MSN), you won’t have traffic, literally, banging down your door.

In order to get better search engine results you need to make sure you are using the right keywords (and know how to use them), have links pointed your way and regularly check the results of your hard work. Here’s how.

Putting Keywords in the Right Places

Once you’ve picked a keyword that applies directly to your blog, make sure to incorporate it into the following portions of one complete blog posting:

# The title;
# The first sentence;
# Each header (if you have any);
# Once a paragraph; and
# The last sentence.

If you have any links to outside sources, use the same keyword as your link text where possible. Also, for each blog posting, try and pick a different (but related) keyword to use. Feel free to reuse keywords every 30-45 postings.

Submitting to Directories

Your third step is to take these keyword optimized blog postings and post them to the article and blog directories. Most of the search engines determine the relevancy of your blog by how many outside websites link directly to you; therefore, posting your blog entries (with a link back to your site in your resource blurb) is an easy and straightforward way of doing so.

Checking Your Progress

It may take a couple of days to see any results, so try and wait a week before you take a look at StatCounter. Have your hits increased at all? Are there any new search engine referrals?

To track your blog’s ascent up the search engine rankings for any given keyword, try Digital Point’s free Keyword Tracker Tool (http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/keywords/). It is an excellent way of ensuring your blog positioning efforts are paying off.

With all blog postings, content is key. Without useful, interesting information that cannot be found elsewhere, your visitors won’t come back for more. Incorporate these simple search engine optimization techniques into your blogging practice however, and you’ll both keep the visitors you already have and dramatically increase your readership through high ranking search engine placement in no time.

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