Amanda's Online Money Makers

I wanted to write today about a website that has the potential to be HUGE, and is currently offering free shares in their company just for signing up, and extra shares for referring friends. What's even better is it's totally FREE! It's called Me2Everyone.

Me2everyone is going to be a cool new virtual world where you can meet friends, chat, shop, play, watch videos, create an art gallery, open a virtual newspaper, play the free inworld lottery and make money from your own online store! You and everyone you know make the decisions, shape the world, create real incomes and share in the profits. It’s a new place where you meet new people or invite your friends. Learn new skills or expand your business. Find the love of your life or help the planet. Membership is free and every member automatically becomes a shareholder in me2everyone Limited. Personally I have WRITE YOUR SHARES HERE shares in the venture and I am going to increase my shares very soon. This is an excellent chance for all of us to make some real progress in 2009 and beyond! Please do not miss it. If you are looking for something really good in 2009: something that changes your view on the world, then you really have to spend just one minute and look at this website.

Click here to visit Me2Everyone.

The title says it all. I just finished reading a really great e-book with some pretty cool advice in it.

Now, I am recommending it to everyone who comes across this post.

It's called the Need To Know manual by Paul Myers and is a 112 page book of advice, small and large, about having a successful online business. The e-book is FREE! Just subscribe to the newsletter and get the download link! I'm so glad I did!

You can find the book at this site.

That's all for now. Read that book in full. It's awesome! Some of those things are no-brainer things and some are simple, but nobody ever really thinks of them. Either way, it's worth a read and it doesn't take long to get through either.

Enjoy!

Many people have heard of blogs. A lot of people have their own. Then there are some people who aren't even sure just what a blog is.

For those people, I will first start by saying that blog is a shorthand way of saying Web Log. It is in essence a type of journal so to speak, where the author cann write whatever they want. You can make it private, for your eyes only, but then it'd be more like a diary. Rather most people decide to make their blogs public and share with the world.

Some blogs are general and just about whatever the author is thinking. Others, like this one, are more focused on a particular subject, or niche, as I discussed in a previous post.

Some people use blogs to network with other people who share their interests. Others use them to tell others about opportunities they have found or to warn about scams, and still others just use their blogs to rant about whatever is bothering them.

Either way you look at it, blogs are extremely popular, both to authors and readers. A new blog may take some time, even up to several weeks or months to get a steady flow of traffic, but if they are frequently updated with new content, the readers will come back and check on it, sometimes even subscribing to the feed.

Now that we all know this, it is clear that a blog can be an excellent promotional resource. Even if you're using it to promote things you are involved with, however, you have to take some time out to write posts like this one and my niche marketing one, which are not self promotional at all. I personally want to entertain and help my readers. I want to give them something they will enjoy reading and maybe even learn something from. If they happen to be curious or interested in any of the programs I discuss, I'd be more than willing to talk more about them. However, I'm not here to shove my self promoting bologna down anyone's throats.

That being said, if you post good quality blog posts and relatively often, you can get away with posting a few self promotional things that your readers might just be interested in.

I admit my first several posts were about the affiliate programs and such that I am involved with, but I needed to get some quick content and that worked, as well as being some programs that I am very supportive of.

I don't intend to have quite so many posts like those though, although if I feel a desire to discuss something about them, I definitely will, especially if I have a streak of success with something or think that something deserves mentioning.

Likewise, however, I will discuss scams if I find them. I am here to tell the truth about any money making opportunities that I try, no matter what they are. I'm not going to sugar coat anything and I'm going to be as brutally honest as I can to the best of my ability.

I urge everyone, whether affiliated with a home business, a GPT program, or not even anything money related at all, even if you just have a hobby you really like, to start a blog. Post at least once or twice a week and post quality stuff. Make your readers want to come back for more.

There's a good chance that if you are interested in something, there will be people who share your interest. If you keep posting, you will eventually drive in traffic, and there are several other ways to drive traffic to your blog, some of which I have mentioned.

In a later post, I will discuss the benefits of pinging and RSS submission.

Labels: affiliate programs, blog, interests, making money, networking

When selling products and services, most people have a specific target audience. For example, someone who sells wedding cakes will obviously want to appeal to those who will be married soon. Someone selling an eBook about home businesses will of course want to appeal to those who are in or looking to be in the home business industry. This is referred to as 'niche marketing' because it appeals to a group of people within a specific niche.

Now that you know what niche marketing is, how do you become successful at it? One of the best pieces of advice that I can give is to make yourself sound like a seasoned professional. This by no means implies that you should lie or provide misleading information to boost your image. This is a very bad business practice and should be avoided at all costs. Rather what I mean is to do some research in your particular nich and couple that with your existing knowledge in order to become more educated. This way, your customers will think you really know your stuff when asking you questions, even if you barely entered into the industry.

The absolute best way to start is to get into a niche that you already have interest in. For example, if you are interested in baking, then preparing cakes may be your niche. Chances are that if you have experience baking, you know a thing or two about cakes. Still, you will want to make sure you know more than you already do so that you can appropriately handle the queries of your customers. Since you already know a bit about cakes, it should be easy to find and understand additional information on the subject. For example, if it is cake making that you wish to get into, you should know what fondant is, even if you've never used it before.

Be sure that your information is coming from a reputable source. If you've never heard of a site, do some background searching if you feel it necessary. Even if you don't, this would be a good practice anyway. You need to make sure you are giving your customers accurate information. This coupled with the quality of your product will keep them coming back for more and referring you to their family and friends. Falsifying information, however, whether intentional or not, will ruin your reputation and cause your customers to tell everyone to steer clear of you.

And of course, always be gracious and courteous to your customers. Always remember that they have choices and feel privileged that they have chosen your product over another. Never give them a reason to change their minds. Also, if they do change their minds, don't harass them about it. Doing this will likely cause them to be embittered and spread negativity, even if they were reasonably satisfied.

Doing these things won't make anyone an overnight success, but it will help. Word of mouth is often the best means of advertising in almost any industry and it can either be beneficial or detrimental. Never forget this and you will do fine.

I just thought I would make a quick post about an awesome home business resource, the International Association of Home Business Entrepreneurs, or IAHBE. The IAHBE is a place where you can find a vast database of assorted resources to help your home business, whether completely new to the home business world or a seasoned home business owner. There is something in the IAHBE for everyone!

The IAHBE costs about $30 to join, and is packed with podcasts, ezines, seminars, articles, software, and much, much more! For that $30, you get a 30 day membership and access to the plethra of resources at your disposal on their site, as well as many coupons and freebies to help you get started.

The IAHBE also has a magazine and book of the month and they are constantly adding new things, so I can honestly say that you will never be able to go through everything on the site.

I have personally heard someone who's been in the marketing business for five years say that they always renew their IAHBE membership every single month because despite their experience, they find that they are often learning something new from the IAHBE, or getting new ideas they hadn't considered themselves.

There are ebooks and media from entrepreneurs all across the board, ensuring that there is something for everyone. It is neatly arranged into categories. If you want software, you look at the software section, if you're new there's a section for that. What if you just need help learning to advertise? There's a section for that on the IAHBE too.

For all of the things you get from the IAHBE, it's well worth the $30. Anyone in or interested in a home business should definitely give the IAHBE a look. If you'd like to read more about the IAHBE or purchase a membership, click here.

In previous posts, I have mentioned a website called Plugin Profits. Now I am going to give a little more detail of what this site is all about.

Plugin Profits, or PIPS, is a free to join site which helps you to promote multiple affiliate programs you may either already be a member of or may join from their signup page. They will build you a website for FREE within 24 hours which promotes all of the affiliate programs, inserting your ID into all links and banners so that you receive credit for them. All you have to do is pay for hosting with Host4Profit, a hosting company that is also an affiliate program and is promoted on the site. It is very reasonably priced.

Signing up with Plugin Profits is extremely easy and you are told what to do every step of the way. That being said I'm not going to give step by step instructions, but a brief explanation of what you do.

First, You'll need to visit:

Plugin Profits

Read through the page so that you can get a feel for what they do or scroll down and fill in the form. There is a list of affiliate programs and a link to sign up with them if you haven't already. Choose which ones you want to join and enter the IDs to each one in the respective boxes. For the ones you do not join, enter the ID that it specifies, which is the ID of your sponsor. Sign up for hosting with a domain related to affiliate programs, making money online, home business, or something along those lines. Mine, for example, is Home Business Ideas.

Enter your hosting information in to the field and fill out everything else on the page. Then submit the form and wait. You will receive an email notification when your site is built and ready to go or if there are any problems.

Once your site is up, you may customize it however you like. If you don't know HTML you can use Joomla or something similar to tweak it. Make sure to sign into your PIPS member area and read through the 30 Days To Success as it will contain valuable information. Keep in mind, however, that it is not necessary to do everything it says in there. For example, the co-op is a great resource, but it is rather expensive and most people starting out with a home business don't have a lot of money to spend on it.

Be sure to sign up on the forum. There are a lot of people on there that will help you out. Most of them don't give advertising advice or anything like that as if they did, the hot spots would be flooded with everyone advertising the same thing, decreasing their value. However, they will help you with general tips and encouragement and can be a great place to meet other PIPS members.

Explore your site and your member area as well as the forum and feel free to take advantage of anything you find there that could help you out.

Oh, and one more thing!

With your website that Plugin Profits builds for you, you also get a newsletter set up with some premade emails to get you started. If you can generate traffic and signups to your newsletter, you will have an improved chance of getting signups or making sales. In the 30 Days To Success, that is one of the things that is strongly focused on as list building is a very important part of becoming successful.

If you want to be successful with a home business, I highly recommend Plugin Profits. Even if you are a total newbie, Plugin Profits can help you get a great start.

Keep in mind, however, that NOTHING will ever happen overnight and you will NEVER get something for nothing. You must put forth the effort to build your business and make it flourish. It will take time, but if you stick with it, you can succeed. You can put in time, money, or a little of both. At least one is required, but you can put more of whichever one you have more of and get results. For example, I've got more time on my hands than money, so I put in a lot of time, building my business and watching it grow, and I see results, however small, daily. Plugin Profits will help you see these results too if you put it to good use.

Never give up and keep reaching for the stars! You never know, you may get there sooner than you think!

Most people who are looking to make money online don't have much money to invest into a business, if at all. For them, programs that are free or have very little startup cost are ideal. Today I am going to discuss one such affiliate program.

It's called SFI, a division of Carson Services Inc., a BBB accredited company since 2000. As I said, SFI is completely free to join and it is possible to make a profit without spending any money, however it will take more time. Still, by having the option to invest either money or time or even a little of both, SFI opens doors for all sorts of people, no matter what their financial status. This is great for people who are just getting into the affiliate marketing business. The fact that it is available worldwide makes it even better!

SFI is also very newbie friendly, containing training and resources all throughout the site. Most of the SFI affiliates are helpful and if you get into the right downline, you will find your upline to be an excellent source for hints and tips to grow your business. There's a thirty day training guide, an affiliate profile which helps their automated training program tell you what you need to do, as well as help your upline help you if you share it with them, the discussion board, an excellent resource for networking and getting your questions answered, on which Gery Carson, the president posts rather often, an affiliate to affiliate social networking site that is also free, and much, much more!

There are so many resources on the SFI site that I can't even begin to go into them all, but it is awesome for newbies and pros alike. It does take time to build your downline as well as generate sales, but if you remain determined and motivated, it is very possible to do it with little or no money out of pocket. Really investing in advertising may only serve to speed the growth of your business, but you can even wait until you have some commissions coming in and then reinvest them into your SFI business so you aren't really losing money!

One resource that many SFI affiliates use to grow their business is something I mentioned in earlier posts, Plugin Profits. This site contains a compilation of several reputable affiliate programs, most of which are free, which you can join to add to your income. Plugin Profits will build you a website that you then promote which advertises all of your affiliate programs at once! You can join as many or as few as you like. If you don't wish to join one, just enter the ID that it tells you to enter in place of your own. Then, your site will be built for FREE in the next 24 hours! You need only pay for a hosting service through Host4Profit so that they can set up your site, and since Host4Profit is an affiliate program in and of itself, it's a great deal! For every person you refer, you are paid $10 per month for as long as they use the hosting service.

Even if you don't wish to sign up with Plugin Profits at this time, whether for lack of funds or you just want to test out one program or whatever your reason, I highly recommend you at least try SFI, but do so with an open mind and optimism. A pessimistic attitude won't get anyone anywhere. Either way you go, SFI or Plugin Profits, or even something different still, I wish you the best of luck in whatever undertaking you choose!

Most people who try to build a business with affiliate marketing fail. Only about 10% of all affiliate marketers have success with their business. There is a very good reason for this, however, and if you know the reason, you can avoid it and learn how to achieve success.

The key reason why most affiliate marketers fail is very simple. They give up too easily! It's true. Most affiliate marketers don't make much, if any, money in their first month or two, so they decide to give up. It's not always because they aren't trying. They just don't see the results they want immediately and so they move on.

However, to make good money in any business takes time. You cannot expect to just sign up for something and suddenly start raking in hundreds and hundreds of dollars in a week or so! The one thing every business has in common, whether online or offline, is that it takes time. Offline businesses even often take quite a bit of money as well. With affiliate marketing businesses, you can invest either money or time or a little of both. It doesn't have to be a super expensive venture. However, it almost always takes time to see results.

Now for the key to success. It is true that to succeed in affiliate marketing, you often need to advertise so that you can make sales as well as refer others to the affiliate program and teach them to do the same. However, some of those things are easier said than done. One can advertise all they like, but they may or may not get immediate traffic, more likely not. Again it will take time to build it up though. The real key to being successful with affiliate marketing is motivation and determination. Even if you aren't seeing immediate results, stick with it and don't give up!

One great suggestion I can make to everyone who is starting out, and even those who aren't, is to make a journal of your activities to promote your business. Every single day, try to put at least one marketing method into action. Most of the time a single method can be put into action in less than thirty minutes. Of course if you want your business to expand more rapidly, you will want to put in more than just thirty minutes, but you don't have to. It will just take longer to do. Also, instead of investing heaps of money in methods that may or may not work, invest your time instead, into free or low cost methods of advertising and promotion. I will cover a few ideas for doing this in a later post.

I hope these ideas will help you out and motivate you. If you put your mind to it and stick with it, as well as doing a little something to promote your business every day, you can do it! Just remember to stay motivated! If you have to, make yourself a goal, a reasonable and attainable goal, for which you would like to reach, and then strive for it. If you don't reach it, don't give up! You will learn that even the most well known internet marketers started off spending a lot of time getting their business up and running before finally managing to turn a profit, and it took months or even years to achieve a six digit income. Stay focused and you can make great money from affiliate marketing!

Before I go, I will leave you with one great resource! This site is one I have discussed a little earlier, but one that I encourage everyone to join. They will build you a site which you can use to promote all of your affiliate programs, and they even have several of them that you can join to start generating streams of income. They also have a great 30 day training program and an extremely helpful and active forum! You will need to get a hosting service with Host4Profit, but they do everything else for you and you are then free to customize the site however you like! Host4Profit is also an affiliate program in itself!

The site I am talking about is called Plugin Profits and it is really a great resource! The training discusses both free and paid methods of advertising as well. Check it out!

Some people may have heard of the paid to post forum, MyLot, one of the most popular forums of it's kind. Well, if you are interested in joining but don't know where to start, here are a few pointers.

Before You Start Posting

Before you begin posting, it is important to know what kind of material is allowed. Be sure to read the Privacy Policy, Terms of Service, and Guidelines so that you can see what is and is not allowed. Keep in mind that these are not an entire list of Dos and Don'ts, but they'll give you a pretty good idea and a lot can be left up to common sense. When in doubt, don't post it or post but don't be surprised if it is removed and learn from your mistakes.

After you have read the Terms, Privacy Policy, and Guidelines, you will want to set up your profile and interests. Your profile is important as it lets other members know who you are and you can personalize it to your liking. It is also important to fill in the parts of your profile that other members don't see such as account and payment information, otherwise you will not be able to receive payments. And if you are wondering, MyLot does indeed pay. Your interests are not essential to fill in but it is good to start off with some. You can add them either by clicking the link in the top listing for each category or by clicking the word "add" and then it will display a text box where you enter each interest separated by commas. Interests can also be added later by clicking the "yes" or "no thanks" links after you have posted a response and submitted tags to a discussion in a category that is not already in your interests.

Once you have read all of the starting information and set up your profile and interests, you are ready to begin posting.

What Can I Post?

I will not go into what content you can post as that is covered in the TOS and Guidelines, however, there are a variety of different things you can post. You can start and respond to discussions on varying topics and there are lots of navigational links to take you to exactly the types of discussions you want to find. You can respond to pieces of news that are updated frequently. You can even comment on other user's blogs or link to your own blog, and if it has been up for at least 4 months and updated regularly, you can add it to the list of blogs that MyLot tracks so that users can access it easily. You can upload photos as well which you can put in your different interest groups. For example if one of your "Types of pets that I enjoy" is "Cats" and you have a cat, you can upload a pic of them to that category. There are other things you can do as you get more familiar with the site and your rank goes up. This is referring to the number that is next to your username when you make a posting. It will say something like 'sampleuser(25).' When that number in parenthesis gets to varying points, you are availed more privileges. For example, MyLot has emoticons you can put in your posts, but you can't do this until you have a 200 by your name. Also, to prevent bots, you cannot copy/paste in your discussions or responses until you have a 500 by your name.

How Do I Earn Money?

The question almost everyone wants to know, what they can do to make money. Well, I cannot tell you exactly what you'll make or how it is calculated as nobody knows the exact MyLot payment algorithm, and that's how they like it as you will see in the guidelines, but I can point you in the right direction. First off, when you start, don't start very many discussions. They are a lot less likely to get responses when you are new and nobody knows who you are. Also, don't go around adding everyone you can find as friends. It'll drive them crazy. Instead, wait for them to add you. Then, click on their name and check to make sure they start meaningful discussions before you approve them. Post lots and lots of responses and make sure they are
meaningful. If you don't have something of value to say, skip the discussion and move on to the next one. Make sure you can at least write three lines or so of quality response or don't bother. Your ratings will likely go down if you do this and you will make a lot less, and it will give other users a negative impression of you, which can be bad if you have lots of people that think you never have anything good to say. Lots of people go against this but you will discover that these people are usually the ones that make a lot less and complain that making money is too hard and also don't seem to have as many friends. Once you have gotten your name out there and people know who you are then start discussions, but make sure not to start too many at once. Don't sit there and start five discussions in five minutes or two or three about the same subject. That will get annoying and will only hurt your earnings and your ability to have fun on there because people will start avoiding you and thinking you are only in for the money. When you are able, as in have a high enough rank, you can start putting pictures and emoticons in your discussions and responses and this will help your earnings as well as add emphasis to what you are saying if you use them properly. Make sure that when you reach 500 rank and are able to copy/paste, that you do so in moderation and only small excerpts of things that are relevant to the discussion. Try not to insult people as it will do nothing but make you look nasty.

These are just a few pointers but hopefully they will help you out. As you post you will get into your own kind of norm and do your own thing but I am hopeful that these tips will be helpful in your first few days or weeks of using MyLot. As you post more and become more familiarized with the site, you will surely make some interesting friends and look forward to visiting the site and the money will only be a secondary priority, more of an added bonus. Have fun and happy postings!.

No matter what type of site you use to make money online, chances are you need traffic. If you have a home business, you will need to generate traffic to get sales. If you are an affiliate building your downline, you will need traffic to a page that makes the reader want to sign up under you. If it's a newsletter, you need readers. If it's a GPT site, you will often want referrals. Or, maybe you just want people who will read your blog.

Today, I am going to discuss two great sites for generating traffic to your website for FREE, provided it does not contain adult content or have sounds that play on load or any other offensive content. It doesn't matter if it's a sales page, an affiliate link, a blog, a newsletter, whatever.

The first traffic generating website is called Traffic Swarm. It is completely FREE to join, but it does also have a paid option. You earn credits for clicking on other user's links, referring others, and even loading your start page. If you make Traffic Swarm your browser's homepage, you can rack up credits really fast, especially if you are on the internet a lot! In fact, Traffic Swarm recommends that their users do this. You also get extra points for things like reaching 50 credits, the amount needed to activate your account. Did I mention you also get credits when your referrals get credits? If you want, there is also the option of purchasing credits. As a Pro member, you can post unlimited links that you want traffic to, while as a free member you can only promote ten sites. Still, that is usually enough to get started. If you wanted to upgrade later you could. Pro members are also allotted 2500 free credits per month and get a reduced price for purchasing credits, plus they get double rewards for referrals and such. Still, the free method is a great resource, especially if you don't want to invest money into it. That is most likely the best option for a lot of people getting started. Upgrading to Pro can come later when you are generating enough traffic/referrals to be worth it. If you want more information or wish to join Traffic Swarm, please click here.

The second site, Traffic Digger, I briefly mentioned in a previous post. Traffic Digger is a FREE to join website that uses viral marketing to promote your website. You create a free account and post a single free text ad. This ad is distributed to several websites, promoting your site. Then, if you refer others to join Traffic Digger under you, your text ad gets distributed to more and more sites for each person you refer. Your ad can be about almost anything and you can change it at any time. Have a blog and want traffic to it? Get enough traffic to the blog and now want to drive it to your affiliate link? Just log into your Traffic Digger account and change the ad. This is a great resource for anyone needing to promote a website of any kind for any reason.

These two websites are great resources for generating traffic to your website, an essential part of any successful home business or online money making program of any kind. I hope they help you! Again, the links to those two websites are:

Traffic Swarm
Traffic Digger

If you're looking for a way to make good money online, rather than just mere pennies, Affiliate Marketing is the way to go for sure! With affiliate marketing, it is pose to make residual and leveraged income work for you. You sell a company's products and recruit others to do the same. When you make a sale, you make a commission off of that sale.

Some affiliate programs, like SFI, even make it so if that same person buys something else, you still get credit for it! How cool is that?

Also, with affiliate marketing, your other goal is to recruit others to join under you and teach them to duplicate what you are doing. When the affiliates in your downline are successful, you are successful.

The only drawback to affiliate marketing is that it takes time and effort put in to really generate a substantial income. That is why a lot of people who attempt affiliate marketing fail. They just give up too soon or don't put in the effort. Nobody will be given money for doing absolutely nothing!

It is also essential to communicate with those in your downline and help them out when/if needed. Sometimes, it's even good to offer advice anyway. Every single affiliate who joins under me will get a personal welcoming message and can contact me at any time with questions. The same should apply for any affiliate and their downline.

Here is a site that has been an awesome resource for me! Stone Evans, of PIPS, or Plugin Profit Site, has been a HUGE help! He set me up a neat little website, which I still need to personalize, but he did all the legwork for me! It lists all of the affiliate programs I am in and a little bit about them. The site he created for me is Home Business Ideas, which will give you an idea what he does. However, there is a LOT more than that, but I will let you visit Plugin Profits yourself to find out more! You can join any and/or all of the sites listed or just one or two. It's totally up to YOU!

Again, if you become a member of my downline, you will be able to talk to me about anything you need, or even just shoot the breeze! I'm all ears!

Well, that's about it for now. Later I will discuss other affiliate marketing programs I have joined, as well as some of the little fun sites I do in my spare time for pocket change.

Go to Home Business Ideas to see the site generated by Plugin Profits. This is what your site will look like before being customized as well, but once it's up, you can customize it however you like!

Hello,

This blog is dedicated to sharing information about various ways I am making money online. Whether it's a fun site that pays small or a profitable site that can create leveraged and residual income, if I have tried it, you will find it here.

I will also offer some tips to help you make the most of these opportunities. However, if you want the big stuff, you'll have to check out some of my sites. After all, you can't expect me to give it all away, can you? If, however, you do use my advice and try any of these sites, I would be happy to help any way I can with information and resources.

Still, I will post about various opportunities I am involved with and I will NEVER post a scam! If I write about a scam at all, it will be to warn others to steer clear of it!

Now, this is just an intro post, but just to give you a little toy to play with, check out this site for FREE traffic to your website, blog, or any other site you wish. You can post a FREE text ad about your site and it is distributed to various websites. The more people you refer to the program, the more sites your ad will be published on, giving you more exposure! Check it out! There's nothing to lose because it is completely FREE!

Get FREE traffic to your website!