Internet Business Daily

I was just speaking with one of my readers and he mentioned that my comment relish plugin was emailing him every single time he left a comment.

Basically, the comment relish plugin emails people a “thank you” after they have left a comment. It is used to increase RSS readership because it includes links to my RSS feeds. Since it emails people every single time I can see how it would be annoying.

That being said, is it annoying enough for me to remove the plugin? Unfortunately there is no way to change the settings to make it email only new visitors, or only first comments, so it’s either on or off. What does everyone think? Leave it or kill it?

I see many other blogs that report their revenue each month. It is a simple way to give perspective on the size of a blog and potential of monetization. I was recently asked in a comment to share my blog’s income, so here is my revenue for October:

• Private Ad Sales - $250
• Reviews - $150
• Google Adsense - $149.49
• Kontera - $42.69
• TOTAL - $592.18

Although this was not one of my best months I still am very proud at where my blog has come. An extra $600 per month is nothing to laugh at, especially since I had virtually zero costs to run/advertise the blog. I didn’t do any advertising at all this month and server/maintenance costs are minimal.

I am hoping to get my blog’s revenue up to $1000/month within 6 months. I haven’t been good at posting consistently lately, which I need to change. One thing that is always true about websites is: content is king. The more content you have the more traffic you will receive.

A while back I wrote a quick post about a record traffic day I had. At that time (a little over a year ago) I was extremely happy with nearly 400 unique visitors in one day. Looking back that seems like nothing:). Since then I have had many more record traffic days but yesterday was my greatest gain so far. Here is what yesterday’s stats look like:

Yesterday (Tuesday), I had nearly 1800 unique visitors to my site!!! Amazing. So far today I am already at about 1000 uniques (at 4pm). I started this blog about 2 years ago and it has come so far. From being impressed by 400 uniques in a day and averaging a few hundred, to 1800 in one day and averaging 1200 uniques. I will keep posting as long as everyone keeps reading:). I get comments on almost every post now, which is my favorite part of blogging.

This restaurant tries to hide its C rating in a very clever way. I doubt I would even notice if I were looking at this place. Is this even legal??

I remember when I first got the Nintendo 64. I was so excited I couldn’t even comprehend what I was getting myself into. The first time I turned it on I was in awe over the 3D graphics, which were pretty much the first of its’ kind. Although I was excited, I wasn’t quite as excited as this kid:

This was last week’s new episode of Family Guy and I don’t remember laughing this hard at Family Guy in a while. This is exactly why I love Hulu, 5 seconds of commercials with video on demand. The bird is definitely the word.

General
I have been checking out a new-ish affiliate network lately, T3leads. They mainly focus on financial programs from debt relief to auto loans etc. T3leads does not resell generated leads, but rather they directly cooperate with large networks of banks and other financial institutions to create the affiliate program. Just like most other affiliate networks, you get paid by each lead (CPA based).

Backend
T3leads has a very easy to use backend that allows for easy reporting and finding of new campaigns. The high quality of T3lead promo tools ensures high conversion rates in the affiliate network. They guarantee high conversion rates (1:6 and 1:9), but I have not had a chance to test this myself.

Payments
One of the best things about this affiliate network is the payment methods. In the past, I have struggled with shady networks not paying on time, giving very few payment options, and sometimes not paying at all. With T3leads, they give an assortment of payment options including: paypal, ePassport, check, wire transfer, and others. This is a huge plus.

Unique Feature
One thing that really stood out to me was their unique earnings system. Instead of giving a flat rate like most other networks do, they allow advertisers to bid on your leads in an auction-type system, which allows for maximum profit. Look at it this way, if another network is willing to pay $26 for a lead, there’s probably more than one other company willing to pay $27 for the same lead that you may never get to see. That lost dollar does not seem like much, but when you start delivering tons of leads it will really build up.

Bonus’
Just like other ad networks, T3leads gives bonus’ for their well performing affiliates. They offer everything from computers to iPods. I highly suggest checking out T3leads and giving them a chance. I know there are a ton of other affiliate networks out there, but it’s always good to try each at least once.

Try T3leads now!

I was doing some quick research into how Google determines the best colors, fonts, sizes, placement, images, and everything else they do on their search results pages to optimize them the best and I came across this image. A while back, Google did an experiment to test where people’s eyes move on a results page. The results of the experiment are pretty obvious but it is still cool to see how people’s brains work. This image also demonstrates the importance of having the #1 spot for a keyword. The difference between #1 and #2 is astonishing. Check out the image below:

Everyone knows eBay has been struggling lately. Between their new policies and business model shift towards sales instead of auctions, eBay is on shaky ground. This is why I cannot fathom the thought process behind banning 90% of the publishers in the ePN (eBay Partner Network).

For those who do not know what ePN is, it is eBay’s affiliate program. They give commissions on sales of items purchased by buyers affiliates refer. Each month, around the end of the month, a small portion of the partners get banned for “low quality traffic.” eBay is looking for traffic that is more engaged with their site, which just means buys multiple products. This month was different though.

A few days ago about 90% (my estimate based on eBay forum posts and friends of mine who run ePN) of the partner network had their accounts closed for this reason. I was lucky enough to escape with my account in tact, and I’m thankful because I have been using eBay’s affiliate program for almost 2 years now and it is my most successful online venture to date. Hopefully I can keep my account next time they decide to close another set of accounts. This is not the way to keep the people who make you millions upon millions of dollars happy. Get with the program, eBay.

Update: I lost #1 position, back to the grind.

I have finally reached the #1 position in Google for my name. My last post showed that Firefox and Safari were giving different results and I was #2 in FF. Now, I have reached the #1 position! I probably took over #1 because of the previous post. Here’s the screen shot: