Blogging Blog

November of 2006 was a tumultuous month in the world of online income. There were a couple bright spots, but overall the picture wasn’t particularly rosy. Overall net profit took a nosedive - 26% to the south. Ouch. That’s a serious drop for one month. What contributed to the loss? Let’s find out.

Adsense took a very hard hit in November. While my traffic was similar to October, average earnings per click was down. Adsense across my sites saw a 26% drop ( which surprisingly matches my overall income drop. ) I am going to re-visit my Adsense strategy with the hopes of improving this. Adsense has long been the main portion of my online income, and it’s been very volatile for me. Adsense did, however, make up a slightly lower percentage of my overall income - 72% vs 78% last month.

Text link ads, another long time player, saw a very healthy increase of 50% income vs last month - impressive! Also, TLA made up 24% of my total income vs just 14% last month. Part of this is due to the TLA affiliate program, which I have lumped together with regular TLA earnings. Should I have it over on the affiliate side instead?

Chitika re-debuts after a month’s absence. The amount isn’t alot, nor is the percentage - but money’s money and I won’t turn it down. Just 4% of my overall, but hey who’s counting, right?

What you doubtlessly noticed right away is that I don’t have affiliate programs listed. That’s because I didn’t earn any money from my affiliate programs this month - in fact, I lost money - and not a particularly small amount. I expected this would happen when I started in the affiliate game, though I’m still not happy about it. I did learn some things though, and will hopefully post a profit in this area next month.

So, what are my plans for December? Well, I’m planning to shut down a few of my sites ( at least shut off the new posting ) and focus my energies a little more closely. I will be more cautious in the affiliate area, and make a concerted effort to turn a profit there. Once I can master this, I can reduce my dependency on Adsense, which will make fluctuations there less painful to the overall picture.

A well-commented blog is simply a forum where only the owner can create a post ( or thread in forum-ese ). There’s back and forth discussion, points and counterpoints, disagreement all over the place. What makes a blog a better form of website than a forum? Is it the fact that blogs posts are generally more formal than a forum thread? Or is it the fact that only the author can post? Forums have been around for ages, and blogs are the new kid on the block. Which one will win out? Do you own a blog or forum, or both, and why?

I’ve written before about the power of comments, and how they can have a very positive influence on your success as a blogger. The comments you leave on other blogs are your mark on the world - whether you write positive, useful comments or negative, trashy comments has an effect on your reputation. When you read a post that you strongly disagree with, you may be inclined to write a seething response and flame the author.

Feel free to do this! I won’t stop you. But, before you hit ‘post’ , take a moment to think first. Is this comment something that you will want to be associated with in an hour? A week? How about 2 years from now? Will it embarrass you or drag your name in the mud? If so, and if you care about things like that, maybe it’s time to rethink that comment. Free speech is a beautiful thing, but just because it’s free doesn’t mean it has no consequences.

Yes, I know it’s a great line from A Clockwork Orange, but I thought it would be a good way to say a quick ‘hello.’ I’m going to be posting something of substance here someday. I promise.

I’m incredibly busy right now and it’s not letting up much. In fact, I expect to get busier in the future and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. “Idle hands do the devil’s work,” right?

I’m curious, though: Would you prefer more frequent posting or less in-depth articles that are posted less often? This is a question that has been asked before, but I think it varies with the readers of different blogs. Let us know in the comments.

Text Link Ads, one of my favorite advertisers for my blogs, has been purchased by Medawhiz. From their announcement, it sounds like they’ll be adding some features in the coming months, including some CPA offers. I’m not sure how they would integrate CPA offers with the current TLA program, but they seem to be pretty smart folks so I’m sure they’ll figure it out.

As with any company that has just been purchased, TLA is stressing that there will be no changes ( except of course for the better ) , and all the current staff will remain with the company. Whether this will hold true for TLA or not is, of course, a question mark. It’s pretty much the standard announcement for this situation. Personally I think TLA should continue with what it does best - and not branch out into unfamiliar territory. Any thoughts?

It’s time again for my monthly earnings report. This month I feel obligated to change the name from Monthly Blogging Income to Monthly Online Income, since part of my income is now generated from ventures other than blogging. Now, on to the numbers.

October was a much better month than the disappointing September. Overall net profit was up 30% over September - a fantastic gain. What made up the increases? Well let’s take a look.

Adsense was particularly strong, with a 21% increase, even in the face of a pretty heavily reduced post count. Text Link Ads saw a small 5% increase - still moving in the right direction. Any positive is a good thing in my book. I don’t care if it’s 5% or 50%, as long as the arrow is pointing up.

The new addition to my income streams is participation in various affiliate programs. October affiliate revenue was solid, but my costs were high. My earnings charts represent net profit, so all comparisons are fair.

I’m very excited about what November has to offer. TLA may be off due to some advertiser fluctuation, but I plan to invest more in the affiliate business, and expect to see solid gains. I am very new to the promotion of affiliate offers, so I expect to have some ups and downs. I know my costs will be higher than I like until I truly get the hang of things - PPC is a tough game to master. Over the next few months I expect to see a much higher profit margin in this area, as I learn what works and what doesn’t.

Just a note if you’re a Wordpress user ( and most of you probably are ) - Wordpress 2.0.5 is out. There aren’t any major feature upgrades this time around - we won’t see those until version 2.1. This update is more of a security update - there are multiple security issues fixed, so it’s an important update. If you run Wordpress - get this update as soon as possible.

I’ve decided to get a little help here at Blogging Blog. I’ve asked Ray Dotson to write the occasional post or two here. Ray can be found over at Fresh Blogger. Ray is going to post as often as time permits ( which is hard to say, since he’s a pretty busy guy. ) I’m going to let him have free reign on what he posts about -I hate playing censor, especially when a talented blogger agrees to help me out on this site. So welcome Ray on, and please don’t mind the excessive posts about Viagra and various pills.

Would you?  If I wrote an e-book on how to become a successful and profitable blogger, would you buy it?  Imagine I put together all my tips and tricks into one feature-packed ebook, and outlined the way for you to make money online, quickly.  Now imagine that book was $99 - would you be interested?  No?  How about at $49?  $29?  What’s an e-book worth to you, anyway? 

Some of you may be saying, but Leroy, we don’t really know you - you’re not an expert.  And you’d be correct - I’m not.  But I’d wager that most of the people who buy ebooks buy them because they get sold - not because the e-book writer is necessarily an expert in his field.  It’s all about sales, and whether or not the writer is persuasive enough to convince you that you simply cannot leave without buying what he has to sell.  Do a good job selling, and not only will people buy what you are selling, but they’ll pay more. 

There are a lot of factors that determine whether or not you will be a successful, or even a professional blogger. There’s the number of posts you make, the quality of posts, your blog’s design, whether or not you get Dugg or Fark’ed, your marketing efforts, your marketing budget, and your ability to garner inbound links. The one factor that remains completely, 100% out of our control, is time. Most bloggers do not spend 100% of their time online, working on their blogging efforts. Most of us have lives, complete with family and careers. The time that’s left for blogging after all that is sometimes very, very small.

Given enough time, any idiot can create a successful blog. He can create more posts, and spend the time to do research to ensure his posts are high quality. He can spend tons of time marketing his blog through directory submission, article submission, forum posting, and networking. If he’s willing to spend the money, PPC is an easy way to get instant traffic. If you don’t have or want to spend the money, no worries. Enough time fixes that problem handily - with enough high quality posts, and a very focused, intensive marketing effort, any blog can and will be successful.

So what’s the problem? Well, most of us can’t ignore our family and quit our jobs to blog full-time. Silly things like bills and buying food get in the way. We cannot dedicate the time needed to be truly successful - and time is the one thing we need. In light of that, understand that you should be using your time to the fullest. You don’t have much of it, so be sure that you’re using it efficiently and productively. Remember, if you aren’t, someone else is.