Have I actually made any money?

If someone came across this blog today, they may think I’m a millionaire by now. I mean, look at all these wonderful articles I’ve written about money-making methods, techniques, and strategies. How couldn’t I be rich by now? Well, the truth is most of my plans, techniques, strategies, and ventures have fizzled out. I’ve lost time, effort, and even money to failed experiments. I’ve signed up to many “money-making” websites with nothing to show for it.

But, amongst all this failure, I have found one venture that looks promising. I’ve even earned some money from it. I’ve decided to abandon all other “money-making” ventures to fully pursue this one venture that has made me money. What is this venture? Well, I’m into voice-acting/narration. Believe it or not, but this venture has earned me $12 so far and it promises to earn me more in the future. I even have a few prospective customers lined up. It isn’t much, but it’s something. And after all my previous attempts at making money, this one has finally made me money.

Here’s a picture of my earnings on Fiverr thus far:

Why did I decide to take up vocal narration? Well, I had some decent recording equipment which I bought in the summer of 2012. It was just laying around, collecting dust. I also have a somewhat decent voice and I was already signed up to Fiverr. So, I decided to put these items and qualities to use. I put up a vocal narration gig on Fiverr and I waited. It took over a month to get my first job. Then I got another job, and then another. Currently, I’ve had three jobs on Fiverr. I left my customers completely satisfied. I also advertise my services on a forum I frequent. I’ve uploaded vocal samples to both Fiverr and the forum for my potential customers to view. If they like the samples, they hire me. As I said before, I always leave my customers satisfied.

How to create your own success

What can you gain from my story? You may gain success as well if you follow the guidelines below.

First, acknowledge this basic idea: In this world, you need to give value in order to receive value.

That means you must produce quality products or services if you wish people to pay you for them.

Second, discover what you’re good at. Take inventory of your skills and knowledge. What do you know or what can you do that is of value to other people?

Third, show potential customers samples of your work. Your future customers will want to know that you can do what you promise to do.

Join a forum, create a blog, create a web page, or join some service directory in order to show the world what you can do.

Forth, practice practice practice. Be sure you’re getting better at what you do.

And that’s it. You may want to add to these guidelines, but these four basic guidelines are a good start.

Now, get out there and make some money.

 

End note: I wouldn’t seem credible if I had a money-making blog and didn’t make any money…

It’s a good thing I finally found a way to make some cash.

Do the math

When it comes to making money online, it is likely that you will need to spend money in order to make money. Or, you may need to invest and manage the money you’ve already earned. It goes without saying that you’ll want to always make a net profit. For clarity, the formula for net profit is: total money made – total costs = net profit.

To further illustrate net profit, I’ll provide an example.

Say I have a lemonade stand. It took me $50 to build the stand, buy the lemonade ingredients, and buy all other supplies.

$50 is my total cost.

I run the lemonade stand for a day and I make $100. This $100 is my total profit.

To calculate net profit, I simply enter the numbers in the above formula.

total money made – total costs = net profit

$100 – $50 = $50

I made $50 running the lemonade stand for a day.

This is simple enough to understand without an example, but I gave an example just for illustration.

Unfortunately, calculating future net profit is always as the above example suggests. However, it is still incredibly important that you know you are making money, so always do the math.

Currently, I’m “doing the math”, and creating a strategy, for my Neobux venture. Admittedly, I should have done this a long time ago. I began Neobux without much of a strategy. Fortunately, it hasn’t cost me too much, but, while creating the strategy, I learned that I could easily make more money by using said strategy.

I haven’t completed my strategy, but, once I do, I’ll likely post it on this blog.

As I mentioned above, “doing the math” isn’t always easy since you may have to account for the unknowns. I’ve run into a few unknowns while creating my Neobux strategy. I’ve discovered that the best way to handle these unknowns is to assume the worst. To explain unknowns, I’ll use the lemonade stand example again. Let’s say I don’t know how much the sugar is going to cost me. So, I’ll assume the worst. I’ll assume that the sugar is going to cost me a lot, and then I’ll take this into consideration when calculating my net profit. If my calculations show that I’ll still make a net profit, even when considering the expected high cost of the sugar, I’ll know that I can afford the cost of the sugar. Now that I know I’ll likely be able to afford the cost of the sugar, I’ve prepared for the worst case scenario.

Doing the math relates back to my “stacking the odds” principle. When you do the math, you are stacking the odds for success in your favor. Additionally, doing the math helps to manage risk. There is always a risk when attempting to make money. By doing the math, you’re able to discover how much risk you are taking. Doing the math can also help you manage the risk, as shown in my explanation on how to handle unknowns.

Math is hardly my favorite subject, but I can’t deny its usefulness when trying to make money. So, do the math, and make some money.

Do you know your odds and can you beat them?

It’s no secret that gambling is popular on the internet. However, gambling isn’t the only venture that depends on chance. Binary Options, a still somewhat recent investment instrument, has exploded in popularity over the past year. Now, you may say that luck isn’t involved in Binary Options since an investor simply has to predict market outcomes to get paid. It is true that not every bit of investing in Binary Options relies on chance, but, ask yourself, what is the investor doing when he invests in Binary Options? He’s making a prediction on whether the option will increase in value or decrease in value. I’m not certain how he would know this ahead of time, so it may be safe to say that he’s relying on chance.

This doesn’t mean that Binary Options are a bad investment idea. There are many ways you can “tilt the scales” in your favor when investing in Binary Options, and most other things. That’s what this entire article is about: knowing your odds and how to stack the odds in your favor.

Discovering the odds

So, how does one go about “knowing the odds”?

You may want to watch these free videos on Youtube. They explain the basics of probability and you’ll likely find them valuable.

Okay, now that you’ve watched the entire series of videos on probability, how does one discover what the odds are?

The answer is observation.

Observe the likelihood of something occurring.

Say you want to know how many lightning bolts hit trees during an average thunderstorm in a particular area. Just look out the window during a thunderstorm, you likely won’t see many lightning bolts hitting trees. You may conclude that the likelihood of lightning bolts hitting trees is slim to none in your neighborhood.

This can be applied to many things.

Say you want to know of the likelihood of success on the pay-to-click site Neobux.

Read reviews on Neobux, read comments, actually join Neobux and discover how easy/difficult it is to earn money.

Now, you may notice something interesting. Different people may have had different amounts of success on Neobux. Why is this? Were some people just luckier than others? Or did the successful people do something to “stack the odds” in their favor?

Stacking the odds in your favor

There is a quote by Thomas Jefferson that I rather like. This is what he said:

"I am a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it."

Too better understand this quote, imagine this:

There are two men stranded on a deserted island.

One of the men decides to make a plan. He makes the plan in his mind and he decides to follow the plan. He gathers wood, leaves, coconuts, and an assortment of fruits and vegetables. He builds a shelter with the wood and leaves. And he digs a rather deep hole in the sand in order to gather clean, drinking water. He also does many other things to make his stay on the island comfortable.

The other man looks around, spots a boulder, then walks over and sits on the boulder. He decides to wait for a rescue ship.

The man who decided to just sit on a boulder died a few days later when he tried to quench his thirst by drinking salt water.

The man who made the plan survived for three weeks and, then, was rescued by a fisherman from a nearby island. 

 

Both of these men were subjected to the forces of chance. Assuming that they were in the same physical condition, either may have died from a heart attack or a stroke at any moment. However, only one of the men decided to increase his chances of survival while the other man decided to just sit on a rock and wait to be rescued. The first man took action and his actions increased his chances of survival while the other took no action (well, no action that increased his chances of survival).

Now, was one man “luckier” than the other. Yes, but his didn’t appear on its own. The man who survived tilted the scales in his favor by creating the conditions in which he would be the “luckiest”.

Using the lightning scenario again, you could increase the chances that a tree would be struck by lightning by attaching a lightning rod to a tree.

Similarly, you can increase the chances of becoming successful on Neobux by learning about Neobux, learning strategies, discovering how much you should invest, discovering if you should invest at all, discovering if you should use “autopay”, discovering if you should buy or recycle your rented referrals.

Similarly still, say you have to give a speech two weeks from now and you want to get a good grade on the speech. You can dramatically increase your chances of getting a good grade by practicing your speech, researching interesting topics, speaking slowly and fluently, etc.

There are few guarantees in life, and there are many, many unknowns. However, you can stack the odds in your favor by taking certain actions.

That is the central method behind all money-making: taking the right actions and increasing your odds of becoming a success.

 

If you ever want to be successful at anything, first discover the odds of success, and then discover and take the actions necessary to increase your odds of becoming successful.

Affiliate marketing: Spreading yourself too thin

A common mistake many novice affiliate marketers make is spreading themselves too thin. What I mean by this is that these marketers take on too many products at one time. They promote too many products at one time! Why is this bad? Well, first, it’s a waste of time and energy that could have been spent advertising one product on many different media. I’ve known marketers who would take a product, make a slideshow for it, upload the slideshow to a file hosting site, and then repeat this process with another product. Though, this isn’t an absolutely bad thing to do, there are more effective ways of selling products. Second, spreading your efforts too thin won’t get you any sales. Focus on one product, and hammer it on every media.

If you are a beginning affiliate, I suggest you take one product and market it using different media.

I think people underestimate the number of media by which a product can be marketed.

Here’s a couple of ways one product can be marketed:

• Make a Youtube video advertising the product
• Upload a product presentation to SlideShare and Docstoc
• Create a Twitter page for the product (I’m serious)
• Create a Facebook page for the product (I’m still serious)
• Advertise the product on existing Facebook, Twitter, etc. pages
• Advertise the product on any forum you visit
• Create a website and advertise the product (it’s fairly easy and cheap)
• Buy advertising space, on the web, for the product

These are just a few of the media you can use to promote your product. Click here if you want more information on affiliate marketing, advertising techniques, and advertising media.

So you want to become an affiliate…

Or maybe you don’t. Maybe  you don’t even know what affiliate marketing is. If that is the case, a brief explanation is due. Affiliate marketing is really quite simple in concept, but hard to pull off in practice. Well, hard for me anyway. So, what is affiliate marketing? Affiliate marketing refers to the practice of using affiliates to market products or services to customers. In simpler terms, an affiliate is a “middle-man”. The affiliate connects a potential customer with a product or service of a vendor. If the customer likes the product or service, he buys it. Being an affiliate can be very, and I mean VERY, lucrative.

But how is it lucrative? What does the affiliate get for directing a customer to a product?

An affiliate gets a piece of the pie. In other words, an affiliate gets a cut of the profit the vendor makes off of the sale. THAT is the lucrative part. These cuts can be HUGE, though, they often vary between 1% and 75%.

If you’re an affiliate and you “sell” a $100 product to a customer, you could get 75% of the money. That is, in this case, $75. That’s a lot of money for just having someone click your affiliate link and buy a product.

Oh, how could I forget about the links! An affiliate uses product links to direct potential customers to a products, again, if the customer clicks the link and then proceeds to buy the product, the affiliate gets a cut of the profit. These links could be put any where. They could be put on web forums, blogs, websites, documents, servers, any where  and every where.

Affiliate links are found on websites where users register to become affiliates. I’m an affiliate. The site I use is ClickBank. I registered there and I get my “promotional” affiliate links from the site. You may have noticed that I strategically placed affiliate links in some of these articles.

Being an affiliate sounds pretty great, doesn’t it? Well, it is great. But it’s tough to get people to click on your links and buy a product. Just because I placed my links on this blog doesn’t mean anyone will click them and buy the product.

So, how does an affiliate get people to click the links and buy the product?

How to get buyers

There are a few ways to advertise the products you are trying to sell. Here they are:

Friends and Family

This is a method, on the subject, that I haven’t seen any where else. It’s also a reliable and safe method, so I was surprised I didn’t see it elsewhere. Here it is: sell your product to family or friends. Seems simple, right? Well, it is. If you know of a family member or friend who want some kind of product, recommend a product from your affiliate products. Be sure to keep your ears and eyes. You’ll need to be ready to recommend a product. Or, you could just ask your friends and family what they like. Then, send them you affiliate link in an email. If you value your relationships, be sure to recommend products of good quality.

Youtube Method

One of the most common ways to promote both affiliate products and PPD links is by creating and uploading videos to Youtube. It’s rather simple, though it will be difficult to get views and purchases if you aren’t already an established member of Youtube. So, the method goes like this: create a video and upload the video to Youtube. Like I said, it’s simple. Make the video about the product you are promoting. You can review the product, test the product, or just give the product a shout-out. Be sure to put your affiliate link in the video description.

As I mentioned above, this method is simple, but it’s difficult to get views. I suggest creating multiple videos about the product. You could also buy views in order to get your video ranked higher in the Youtube index, but I wouldn’t do this immediately.

If you decide to review the product, be sure to give an honest review. Honest reviews, as opposed to exaggerated or dishonest reviews, tend to sell more of the promoted product. People will trust you more if you are somewhat critical of the product.

Blog Method

Create a blog or use an existing blog to promote the product you’re trying to sell. This method is also both simple and difficult. Here’s the method: create a blog about something in general (it could be about sports, gardening, social media, etc.) and put your affiliate links on that blog. I suggest first building an audience before you try selling them products. As you’ll likely discover, building an audience is the hard part of this method.

Website Method

Build a website around some general hobby or idea and include affiliate links to products that are related to that hobby or idea. This will cost a bit of money since you’ll need to pay your web hosting site, but it shouldn’t cost you any more than a few dollars.

Forum Method

If you participate on a forum, add your affiliate links to your posts. Be sure the forum allows you to post affiliate links.

Advertisement Method

This is the most expensive advertising method. Well, it depends on where you advertise. So, this method involves buying advertisement space on a popular website. Be sure you advertise a product site users will find interesting.

 

Okay, I’m going to end this article here, it’s getting a bit wordy. I didn’t intend for this article to be this long. Ha! Oh well…

Investment fraud article…

I found this article a few days ago. This article is just way too good. Generally, these types of articles give a few simple tips on how to avoid investment fraud. This article takes the same approach, however, it offers a ton of tips in comparison to other articles like it. I suggest you read it, and read it often.

Click here to read the article

I don’t agree with everything this article says, but it does give a lot of solid advice.

Banned from Bubblews…again

As the title states, I was recently banned from Bubblews…again. This is my 3rd or 4th ban from the site. I’ve tried to contact them about the ban, but I have yet to receive a response. To be honest, I think Bubblews is the most ban-happy site I’ve ever used. I’ve never had an account banned on the Internet and I mean, literally, never. So, this whole “ban” thing has left me a bit confused.

For those of you who don’t know what Bubblews is, Bubblews is a site where you can submit papers about almost anything. From beauty to politics, entertainment to fashion. The article variety is fairly large, though, the site didn’t offer many text enhancers i.e. different font size, bold, italics, etc. However, I wasn’t drawn to the site by its limitations. I was attracted to Bubblews when I learned that users were paid in accordance to how many views, likes, favs, etc. their submissions get. And the pay was pretty good. Before I was banned, I had made $1.25 from 28 views and a couple likes.

Back to me being banned, as I was saying above, Bubblews is ban-happy. If you ever decide to have an account with them, be sure you follow their terms of service to the letter. If you break a rule, you won’t receive any warnings, e-mails, messages, etc. You won’t even be told that your account has been banned. Do you want to know how I found out my account had been banned? I tried logging into Bubblews one day and I couldn’t access my account. I thought I was just typing in the wrong password, so I decided to have Bubblews help me recover my password via email. I typed in my email account’s name, pressed “Recover”, and received the message: validation.email.unique_key_exists. So, I took this to mean that my email, along with my account, had been removed.

So, yeah, I was banned. I’ve decided to stop creating accounts with them. It just isn’t worth the time to upload my articles if they ban me outright and without warning.

If you care to know, the articles I was uploading were from my blog, The Golden Byte. I think I know why they kept banning my accounts. They have a policy which states that submissions shouldn’t solicit the use of other services on the Internet. Perhaps this is what the site, or its owners, thought my articles were doing and, thus, banned me for it.

Additionally, I’ve heard that the site is a scam. Purportedly, they aren’t paying some of their users when they, the users, request payment. I’m not certain what to think of this. I’m not so certain they are a scam site. But, I don’t have any evidence one way or another. All I have is random, internet comments and we all know how reliable those are.

I’m not bitter about the bans. Bubblews lacks many features that I love to use in my articles. It’s also restrictive in regard to what it allows its users to say. I’m just too much of a wild card, I guess. I like to speak freely and criticize. I don’t think Bubblews would appreciate my above criticisms. C’est la vie…

In summary, use Bubblews at your own risk.

Fiverr: How to get noticed

I’ve been with Fiverr for around two weeks and one thing is just bugging me like crazy. No one has hired me yet! I only have a few views on my gig, and I’m sure most of those views are from Fiverr editors. Why aren’t people noticing my gig?!

Well, I know the reason. I’m competing in a heavily saturated market. The market I’m currently in is “vocal narration”. Do you know how many vocal narrators there are on Fiverr? A lot. I’ve searched for my gig on Fiverr and I’m at the very bottom of the vocal narrator’s listing. Well, this explains why I have so few gig views. Who really searches through all those vocal narration gigs to get to the bottom? More importantly, what potential buyer would choose an unknown vocal narrator over a well-known, experienced vocal narrator? But, that is a question for another entry. I’ll get to that question, and its solution, in a later blog entry.

Right now, I want to focus on how to get the most views for my gigs.

So, how do I get a lot of viewers. I have a few tips. They require work, but they will definitely increase your gig views.

Create multiple, similar gigs

Creating multiple gigs will definitely get your name out there. If you create a few gigs, you will likely receive more views than if you had just created one gig. I suggest picking a niche and creating multiple gigs with that niche. Note, these gigs can’t be identical, so make them similar yet different from one another. For example, your niche could be graphic design. For this niche, you could create three gigs offering different services and products related to graphic design. These gigs may be titled “I will create a custom character”, “I will create a custom logo”, “I will create a custom design of your choosing.” These three gigs would attract more attention than one gig. This leads me to my next tip.

Create an enticing and/or descriptive gig name

Catch a viewer’s eye with an interesting and descriptive name. Remember, viewers are likely potential customers. They are probably looking for a gig that suits their needs. So, make your gig name somewhat descriptive so as to pull those viewers into your gig. An enticing name only helps to separate you from the other gigs.

Participate on the forums

Yes, Fiverr has forums. Spreading your name, by participating, on the forums isn’t a bad idea. There are seller and buyer forums. You could participate on either. Feel free to recommend your services to buyers. Network with other sellers. Sellers may recommend you to buyers or the seller may purchase your services on your recommendation.

Work outside your niche

If you have any other skills you want to sell on Fiverr, create gigs for them. This will only work to your benefit as people who click on those gigs will also see your gigs in your primary niche.

Promote yourself

Upon gig creation, Fiverr offers you the chance to promote your gigs via Pinterest and Twitter. Personally, I’m not a fan of Twitter and I’m not even certain what Pinterest is, but use either to promote yourself to the best of your ability.

In conclusion

You need to make your gig stand-out among the hundreds of other gigs likely to be in your niche, so promote your gig in any way possible.

Once you complete your first few jobs and if you did a fine job, word of your services will spread on its own. The hard part is getting started and getting those first few jobs.

My first money-making ebook

Recently, I finished my first money-making ebook. I’ve already released this on HackForums and I’ve decided to put it on my blog as well. This ebook combines affiliate marketing and Fiverr services. The link to the ebook can be found below.

Link to ebook

What to consider when deciding whether to buy a money-making e-book

So, you have a little money and you decide to buy an e-book…WAIT! STOP! HALT! E-books, especially so-called money-making e-books, are notorious for being the weapon of choice in a scammer’s arsenal. Scams are incredible common in the online, money-making business. There is a bit of a joke going around. It goes like this: You aren’t a real online money-maker until you have been scammed. That’s how common it is. I think most people who have ever decided to make money online have been scammed at one point or another, yours truly included.

Fortunately, there are a few easy tips that will help you avoid the majority of these scams. Here they are:

1. Don’t buy e-books that make outrageous claims

If an e-book, or its owner, claims that you can make $200 a day with little to no work, it likely is a scam. Or it’s the best money-making e-book in the history of human civilization…More than likely, it’s a scam.

At the moment, I can’t even conceive of such a method. You could become a workaholic affiliate or have an excellent niche in PPD, but even these two methods don’t guarantee $200 a day.

Do not buy these kinds of e-books; they are likely scams.

It’s incredibly easy to be blinded by the promise of high profits. Resist this blindness with all your might.

2. Don’t automatically trust vouches

Most e-books today come with vouches from “previous buyers”. You should be extremely skeptical as to the authenticity, and honesty, of these “previous buyers”.

Additionally, you may see e-books being sold by high-ranking users on web forums. Other high-ranking users might vouch for their e-book. Be skeptical of both sellers and users who offer vouches. A high-rank doesn’t necessarily mean honest or trustworthy.

Honest vouches add credibility to an e-book, but not all vouches are honest.

3. Critically examine the e-book being sold

Examine the information provided by the seller. Ask for proof-of-payment, vouches (yes, still follow tip #2), and a general explanation of the e-book’s methodology (remember, the author won’t tell you the specifics of the e-book’s method). Make sure things add up. If the seller promises $100 a day and you know the method won’t reach that, speak up. Question the seller. Don’t just walk away. Cast doubt on the seller and his method. You could save a lot of people a lot of money.

An honest seller will answer your questions. Always be suspicious of a seller who doesn’t.

Additionally, if the author claims you can make $200 a day with the e-book and he’s selling the e-book for $25, question him about this.

4. Research the seller

Research and discover whether the seller has a good or bad history. If the seller has a bad history, explore that history. If the seller has a history of selling broken or impotent methods, don’t buy the seller’s e-book.

5. Don’t spend money you can’t afford to lose

This pretty much applies to any thing you buy. It’s fairly self-explanatory.

My general rule

I have a general rule about e-books. Whenever I’m trying to decide if I’m going to buy an e-book, I evaluate whether I can use the methods in the e-book to earn back the money I spent on the e-book (I’m essentially guessing about the methods in the e-book. Authors don’t tell you the e-book methods before you buy the e-book). If I think I can earn back the money, I usually buy the e-book. This rule hasn’t failed me yet.

Testing time

Put these tips to the test. Evaluate this e-book. Do you think it is legitimate? Do you think you can use its methods to make the amount of money the e-book claims you can make?

I’m not going to speculate on whether the e-book lives up to its claims. I want you to do it. After all, these tips are for you, not me.

Neobux account update

I didn’t mention this in my review of Neobux, but I intend to create “status updates” on my Neobux account. These “status updates” will be created from time to time, and they will likely mark account “milestones”. In other words, I’ll just post these updates whenever I feel like posting them.

Here is my account summary I posted on the Neobux review article:

 

And here is my account summary for today:

A few things have changed. I’ve added 90 more rented referrals to my account and I took money from my Slicethepie account and added it to my Neobux account. Those are the most notable changes. Right now, I’m just waiting to earn enough money to purchase a one-year Golden Membership. It will be a while before that happens, so I’m just kicking back and managing my referrals at the moment.

I also purchased a rather good book on common Neobux mistakes. It gave me some easy tips on how to avoid common Neobux mistakes. It was cheap enough, so I thought “Why not?” when I bought it. You can find it here. I think it was worth the few dollars I paid for it.

I’m earning some good money now. A few dollars a day is good money considering I used to make only a few cents a day. It’s odd, it feels like that was so long ago when it was only a few weeks ago.

Yep, that’s all I have to say for now…Oh Wait! I almost forgot. I recently purchased this book which explained how to gain a lot of direct referrals. As you can see in the above account summary, I haven’t used the method yet, but I plan to use it soon. Likely tomorrow.

How to increase your blog’s traffic

People create blog’s for a variety of reasons and most of these people want traffic on their blog. They may want traffic for a variety of reasons, but, since my blog is about making money online, I’ll limit the reason to making money.

So, how can you attract more traffic to your blog for the purpose of making money? Use the following techniques to increase the amount of people who view your blog:

Technique 1: Post Frequently

Frequently updating your blog will not only rank your blog higher in a search engine’s index, it will create a larger blog with a larger amount of words.  A larger amount of words will make search engines direct people to your blog who entered a certain keyword into the search engine. For example, if you use the keyword “Banana” in a specific article on your blog, search engines are more likely to send people to your blog (if those people searched for the word “banana”). Additionally, the more times you use the word “banana”, the higher your blog will be ranked in a search if a person searches for the word “banana”. Additionally, using a large variety of words also increases the chances your blog will be found, depending on the keywords in your blog and in the search engine.

Posting frequently also helps in maintaining any kind of audience you’ve already acquired.

Technique 2: Use Keywords

Given the preceding paragraph, you may have seen this technique coming a mile away. This aside, if you want people to come to your blog, use certain keywords. For example, if you want music fans to visit your blog, use keywords like “music”, “songs”, “rap”, “rock”, etc. I don’t always use keywords, but keywords are a way to increase the chances of someone finding your blog.

Technique 3: Write quality articles/entries on your blog

This relates more to keeping an audience, but it can also help you build an audience since well-written material on your blog may convince your current audience to recommend your blog to friends and acquaintances. So, how do you increase the quality of your articles? It’s easier said than done. Here are a few tips:

• Write about interesting things
• Use pictures, especially high quality pictures
• Use proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation
• Make your blog as easy to read as possible

Let’s face it; writing well is difficult. Currently, I’m struggling to write this article. Writing is a skill and, like all skills, it needs to be practiced over and over again. In time, and with much practice, your writing abilities will improve. So don’t worry if your first few articles are perfect, you’ll improve with practice and effort.

Technique 4: Have your blog focus on a particular niche

This is a good way to retain your blog audience and attract new visitors. Your blog audience expects something consistent from your blog. Whether it is articles about sports, bead-work, music, etc., your audience wants it. Make sure it’s a niche you care about or writing about it will be a pain.

Certain niches, more than others, will attract a large amount of traffic. If your blog is all about cars, you’ll likely have a fairly large audience. But, again, be sure to choose something you have some interest in.

Technique 5: Network with your peers

Network with your fellow bloggers. If you have a blog on cars and you know someone who has a blog on cars, have your blog brother give you a shout-out. Get to know other bloggers in your community, especially if those bloggers discuss blog themes similar to yours i.e. sports, cars, etc.

Network with your friends. Ask your friends to check out your blog or ask your friends if they can refer others to your blog.

Technique 6: Advertise your blog

If all else fails, buy ad space for your blog. I don’t think this is necessary to have a successful blog, but if you’re desperate, you might want to at least consider it.

 

Since I’m all about making money (this is a money-making blog after all), I recommend this book to you. It will give you tips and tricks on how to increase your blog traffic and capitalize (profit from) that traffic. I use many of the techniques discussed in the book on my blog. I found it worthwhile to buy the book; you might find it worthwhile too.

Qmee: A quick and easy way to make $0.50 a day

Is this method as easy as the title suggests? Yes, it is. How do I earn this money? You download a search extension, search for popular items (cars, auto insurance, vacations), and click any ads that appear on the left side of your computer screen. And that’s it. You make between $0.05 and $0.15 depending on the ad. So…what are you waiting for? For instructions, read the guide below.

WAIT!!! Before you read this guide, read the warning at the bottom of this article.

Here’s what you do:

Step 1: Go here.

Step 2: Click “Get started NOW!”

Step 3: Create a Qmee account or sign up via Facebook or Twitter.

Step 4: Confirm your details.

Step 5: Download the search extension.

And you’re done. You can now browse the internet for common/popular items (cars, insurance, vacations, health, finance, fitness) and click any ads that appear on the left side of your browser. For a more illustrative breakdown of this process, click here.

Warning: These are the permissions the search extension requires:

If you are comfortable with Qmee accessing this data, scroll back up and read the guide.

Where to put PPD links

I’m just getting into PPD and I’ve realized that I’ve run into something of a problem. I somewhat solved the problem, but I haven’t solved it completely. But, before I get into my problem, I’m going to run through what I’ve accomplished so far with PPD.

As you may have guessed, I am a member of the pay-per-download site Sharecash. I just recently signed up and I’m very excited to begin the PPD journey. Here is my journey thus far:

1. Signed up to Sharecash

2. Created and uploaded my first file to Sharecash

3. Got the link to my file

4. …and here is where I ran into the problem and it was, and still somewhat is, a big problem.

Well, here it is…

I had the links to my files on Sharecash, but I didn’t know what to do with them!

At that point, I realized that I hadn’t fully thought-through the whole PPD thing.

So, I did a bit of research on what to do with the links. Oddly enough, there weren’t too many resources on what to do with PPD links. That is part of the reason I’m writing this blog entry. I want to distribute the information on where to place your PPD links.

So, here’s where you can put your PPD links:

Website: You can put your links on any website that will allow you to add PPD links. You could probably add a PPD link in the comment section of The New York Times or The Wall Street Journal. I suggest getting an account with either of the aforementioned sites.

If you own a website, all the better. You can make your own PPD section.

Blog: You can put these links on blogs you either run or participate on. For best results, make sure that the blog is fairly popular. If you can find a blog that accommodates PPD links, that’s even better.

Web Forum: Put your links on a web forum that you participate on. It would be ideal to add your links to a forum, or an area of a forum, that allows PPD links. It would be even better if that forum was themed around your niche. For example, if you have PPD links to an article about a famous baseball player, place the link on a baseball forum.

Or you could just settle for putting the links on an anonymous forum, since you wouldn’t have to create an account in order to post the links on the forum.

BitTorrent (or any other peer-to-peer network): Peer-to-peer networks, especially BitTorrent, are famous for quickly spreading information. I suggest putting your links in a file, and sending that file out into a sea of peers. The laws of probability suggest that if enough people are exposed to your file, at least one person will click the links in the file.

Youtube: A common way for people to market their PPD links is to create Youtube videos. The steps are simple: create a video advertising your niche, put link to niche in the video description, and… that’s it.

Though the steps may be simple, getting people to see your video and click your link is definitely a challenge.

Facebook: Put your PPD links on your, or someone else’s, Facebook page. Be sure to add a little description. For example, I’ll post a PPD link for a baseball article on a baseball Facebook page. The description next to the link will read: Latest news about [insert popular baseball player here].

Additionally, be sure your link delivers what you promised. Many PPD sites are cracking down on fraudulent links. Additionally, make sure you have the rights to whatever files you upload to a PPD site.

Twitter: Have a Twitter account? Post a few PPD links on it. Just don’t annoy your followers.

Well, that’s all I have for now.

Also, check out this cool, new method for earning cash on Slice the Pie.

Clixsense: Can you make money from it?

In short, yes, you can make money from Clixsense. Clixsense offers several ways for its members to make money. In this review, I’ll list the ways Clixsense members can make money and how lucrative these ways are. I'll also give something of an account of my experience with Clixsense.

Before I begin, I’m going to state that I, personally, don’t like Clixsense. I’ve never been able to make a lot of money off of it. But you may be able to make some cash.

So, how does one make money from Clixsense?

As noted above, Clixsense offers its members several ways to make money.

These ways are:



Viewing ads: Members can view ads hosted on the advertisements page. The payout depends on the ad. Some ads pay $0.001 per click, other ads pay $0.005 per click, and some ads pay $0.01 per click. Viewing ads is likely the easiest, and most consistent, way to earn cash at Clixsense.



Play ClixGrid: As explained in the above image’s text, members can click the boxes in the grid for a chance to win a prize of up to $10. Please note that the entire gird isn’t shown in the image.

I’ve never won anything from ClixGrid. Personally, I don’t think it’s worth the time it takes to click the boxes.



Completing Tasks: Completing the tasks listed on Clixsense is another good way to earn a little cash. Clixsense offers a fairly large selection of tasks. Sometimes, the offers require quite a bit of work to complete. Only you can decide if the cash is worth the time it takes to make it.





Completing Surveys and Offers: Clixsense hosts both surveys and offers that members can complete. On their faces, these offers appear to be quite lucrative. However, take these offers with a grain of salt. I’ve tried to take numerous surveys, but, after completing twenty questions in the survey, the survey decided that I was not eligible to proceed. There’s nothing quite like spending 10 minutes on a survey only to learn that I’m not eligible for it.

You can take a profile survey, which purportedly filters surveys for you (so you don’t have to click through dozens of surveys you aren’t eligible for), but it doesn’t seem to increase the chances I will find a survey I’m eligible for.

So, yeah, be skeptical with these surveys and offers and be aware that these surveys and offers may ask for personal information i.e. e-mails, names, addresses, social security number, etc.

Be very, very careful about what information you decide to disclose.



Direct Referrals: The above image pretty much says it all. You can refer people to the site and you gain commission off of most of their activities i.e. clicking ads, buying ad space, completing tasks, surveys, and offers, etc.

To be honest, I would use Clixsense much more often if they allowed their members to rent referrals.

End Note:

Overall, Clixsense is a reliable and trustworthy site. However, don’t expect to make a lot of money there unless you know of a way to gain a lot of direct referrals; quickly complete offers, surveys, and tasks; and/or find a way to “beat” the ClixGrid.

Click here to visit Clixsense.

Fiverr: Sell your talent for cash!

Do you have a special skill or talent that others are willing to pay money for? Perhaps you don’t think any of your skills are valuable or marketable. But there is a market and demand for almost any skill or talent. And you’re likely to find this market on Fiverr.

Fiverr is a site designed to help people buy and sell their special talent. Since The Golden Byte is dedicated to making money, I’ll only be focusing on the selling part.

So, how is it done?

The image above explains it as simply as possible:

Step one: Create a gig and advertise it

Step two: Sit back, relax, and wait to be contacted

Step Three: Deliver your work and collect your money

That sounds almost too simple, doesn’t it? Well, the above image may somewhat mislead folks. It really is as simple as the above image depicts, but, don’t forget, you need to create your gig, advertise your talent, and do the work when your talent is ordered.

To make this even simpler, I’m going to do a step-by-step guide for part of the process. I’m going to create a gig. With pictures, of course.

Begin the gig creation process by creating a gig title. The title should be somewhat descriptive, but don’t make it incredibly long. The title in the image above is the perfect length.

Next, you’ll want to select the category in which your service falls. My service was vocal narration, so I chose “Music and Audio” and, then, “Narration & Voice Over”.

After choosing a category, select a picture or two that suggests what you’re offering. Since I’m offering a voice over, I chose a microphone.

Provide a short description of your service. You will want to list anything that concerns your offer. In my description, I stated the maximum amount of words I would say, my reason for keeping the maximum word-count low, my equipment, and negotiable factors. Obviously, you don’t have to list what I listed. Just list anything that relates to what you are offering.

Also, in the above image, you can see I listed some tags that relate to my offer. These tags will help willing buyers find my offer.

Next, select the maximum number of days it will take you to complete and deliver your offer. You’ll also want to list any specific instructions for your potential buyers. What do they need to tell you or give you in order for you to complete offer?

After you’ve completed the above tasks, you’ll be asked to submit a video file. The video you submit should relate to your offer. For example, I submitted a video that showcases my vocal talent.

You don’t have to submit a video, but submitting a video will attract more buyers.

As the above image shows, you can select whether you want to charge extra for shipping if you’re shipping a tangible product.

When all of the above tasks are completed, click the green button to publish your offer.

Before you publish your offer, you may want to preview the final offer page. You can do this by clicking the “Preview” link at the bottom of the above image.

Once you’re satisfied with the “Preview” of your offer page, you can click the “Finish” link at the bottom of the above image.

You can also use this page to advertise your offer via Twitter or Pinterest.

The above image shows the final offer page. Notice that everything I inputted on the previous pages shows up on the final page, so be careful what you decide to add on the previous pages. You don’t want your potential buyers seeing anything questionable.

And…you’re done.

Once you’ve created your gig, all you have to do is sit back, relax, and wait for an offer. You can choose to do a little extra advertising via Facebook or any other marketing site, but this isn’t necessary.

The offer rates differ on Fiverr, but the minimum amount you can charge is $5. You may wish to include additional offers, on top of the original offer, on Fiverr. You can also charge for these additional offers. For example, my standard voice over offer rate is $5, however, I'll double the maximum word amount for an extra $5. Potential buyers can choose whether to stick with the standard offer (which would cost them $5) or they can go with both the standard and the additional offer (which would cost them $10).

If you want to visit Fiverr today, click here.

Sharecash money-making method

Okay, so I couldn’t wait any longer to upload this method. It seems like I pass this method every day on Hack Forums. This method is from Zephyrean on Hack Forums. Here’s a link to the thread the method was posted in. The method is posted below:



I have yet to check out this method, but it seems legitimate on its surface. Evidently, this is a rather old method, but, purportedly, still a good method that will earn you a modest amount of cash.

I’m going to try it out one of these days. Neobux and slicethepie are keeping me busy, for the moment.

If you can’t use the above links, click here to see the original thread.



(10/17/2013: I just learned that Sharecash doesn't allow for the use of microworkers, so keep this mind if you use this method.)

Empireoption: A site for those savvy market investors

From the website:

"EmpireOption is the most advanced and secure trading platform on the market that is designed exclusively for private and institutional investors all over the world.

The objective of our company is to provide you the opportunity to operate in the financial markets in the most secure, intuitive, and dependable way possible.

Our platform has a large selection of assets available and we offer unique characteristics and tools that help the investor maximize their gains at every possible opportunity."

Now, that is a serious piece of marketing.

EmpireOptions offers many ways to invest your deposited amount. The minimum deposit depends on the source. For example, you can deposit money onto the site via Payza, and the minimum deposit is $100.

But what can you do once you've deposited some money?

EmpireOption has a few investment tools with which you can make some money. These tools are:

Binary Options: A trading system where you can invest some money in a specific asset and predict whether the price goes up or down. You will be paid in accordance with the accuracy of your prediction. In other words, the more accurate your predictions are, the more you are paid.

Options Builder: Similar to Binary Options, Options Builder allows you to construct a portfolio of assets and adjust exposure (the higher the exposure; the higher your profits, but the risk increases the higher you raise your exposure). You adjust exposure for each of your assets in the portfolio

One Touch: You can make a great deal of money with this tool, up to %500 in any type of investment. Additionally, this tool is designed to operate when markets are closed, so you can use it whenever you want. Essentially, you estimate the price of a certain asset, if that price is met, you are paid a large sum depending on your initial investment.

60 Seconds: This is probably my favorite tool. You can make a profit in as little as 60 seconds. It's simple. You select an investment, estimate whether the price will increase or decrease, wait 60 seconds, and you are paid in accordance to how accurate your estimate was. The greater the accuracy, the greater the payout.

There is a variety of investments you can make. Depending which of the above tools you use, you can invest in currency, commodities, bullion, stocks, indices, and pairs.

Resources

You may not be interested in this, but their are a few resources on the site which can help you make money. Okay, so you might be interested in this.

Asset indexes: Lists the available assets on the site, trading hours, expiry rates rules, and general information about assets.

Online Seminars: It's in the name. You can take online seminars which will teach the tricks of the investment trade.

Protrader: This tool allows you to save your investment if the trend isn't working out i.e. your estimate was wrong. It also displays highly detailed trend graphs.

Click here to visit EmpireOption!

Bitcoins: Are they worth it?

Well, are they? It depends on who you are and what you possess. For a guy like me, who only mines them at a rate of 70 mega hashes per second, they aren't worth it. 70 mega hashes per second is nothing, at this point. I could mine for a week and only walk away with $0.50. This is clearly not worth the resources I'm putting into mining. So, for me, it isn't worth it to mine Bitcoins.

Is mining Bitcoins worth it for an established miner who mines them at a rate of 180,000 mega hashes per second? I'd say it is. If I were mining at that rate, I'd mine forever or at least until Bitcoins became worthless.

The price of Bitcoins, currently at $124.4, has remained steady and it still is slightly increasing over time.

If you're just learning about Bitcoins now, or you're just getting ready to mine them now, look at your equipment. How many hashes does your equipment generate? Is it worth it to you?

The reason I'm asking these questions is that I don't want anyone to rush into Bitcoins and buying a bunch of mining equipment, at this point in time. I don't want beginner miners to spend a few grand on pieces of equipment that will take many months to be delivered, if they are delivered at all.

They will likely never make that money back. They won't generate enough Bitcoins to cover the cost of the equipment, let alone make a profit.

It's a lot of risk with a very low chance at a profit.

However, if you already have the equipment, go for it. But for the beginners who don't have the equipment, I warn you to stay out of the mining business. At least, the Bitcoin mining business.

For you beginners, and you grizzled pros, I suggest another option. Look at Litecoin. Is it a bad investment? At the moment, Litecoins are selling at $1.94 a coin. If I had the money, I would drop $20 on Litecoins. I haven't researched this, so this is just hearsay, but I've heard they are more stable than the other coins (Namecoin, PPCoin, Devcoin, etc). They are also popular, second only to Bitcoin.

Litecoins may increase in value dramatically or they may decrease in value dramatically. I don't know. I'm not an alternative currency professional. So, recognize the risk. I'd gladly risk $20 on Litecoins...

Now, if only I had the money...


But, for you beginners and (perhaps) for you experts, mining isn't the only way to acquire Bitcoins. Check out these sites:

(Please note, I haven't thoroughly researched all of these sites. Payouts for some of these sites may be unverified. Use at your own risk. Just don't give out any personal information i.e. SSN, PIN, even your email address.)

FreeBTC4all
Bitcoinspain
TheBitcoin
Bitcoins4free
Bitcats
FreeBitcoins4u
ThefreeBitcoins
FreeBitcoins
BTC4you
Fr33bitcoins
BTCmine
Virtualfaucet
Bittrivia
SrBitcoin
Bitcoinsurvey
Free.BTC.pt
Bitcrate
Bitcointree
Bitcoinforest 
Runbunnyrun

Were you scammed? Well, what are you gonna do about it?

Were you scammed recently or have you ever been scammed? It sucks, doesn't it? There are no shortage of scams when trying to make money on the internet. These scams come in all forms, but I want to focus on a specific type of scam: the money-making e-book scam. Not to long ago, when I was first learning about how to make money online, I naively bought a rather pricey e-book. This e-book promised great returns:

I foolishly thought I was getting a good deal...

I spent $40 bucks on a broken, money-making method. This method had a few minor flaws that I could work around. But it also had one major flaw which, to get around it, would cost me nearly $200. I decided to cut my losses and drop the entire e-book.

This incident made me extremely cautious when dealing with e-books, namely e-books you have to pay for.

I put in quite a bit of effort before I learned about the major flaw in this e-book. So, was it all for naught? Could I salvage anything from this mini-disaster?

Now, what I'm about to tell you next applies to any sort of scam you've ever been the victim of. It also applies to any money-making method that isn't necessarily a scam, but it just doesn't live up to your expectations.

After a while, and after a bit of reflection, I learned that I learned a few things from this e-book.

I realized I learned a few, very valuable, things. This e-book introduced me to affiliate promotion, taught me how to manipulate search engine results, taught me a bit about affiliate strategy, taught me how to use keywords to my advantage, and more. 

So, if you've ever been scammed, ask yourself this: Is there anything I can learn from this? Is there anything you can learn from the broken method you were provided? Is there anything you can learn from the scammer's techniques, methods, tips, or tricks? 

More importantly, is there anything you can learn from this incident that you could use to earn yourself a bit of cash? 

Now, that is the question...

I still use e-books. But the e-books I use are provided free of charge. I get them from this site. The link I provided leads you to account registration. You'll need to create an account to visit certain areas of the site. Don't worry, it's free to create an account. Once you have an account, go to the "Money" tab. From here, you can roam freely. Perform your own investigations into monetization and money-making. And, remember, always be careful with whom you deal. 

And, no, the owner's of the website are not paying me to promote their site. Though, I wish they were...

Slicethepie: A quick and clean way to make $20 a week!

The title says it all. slicethepie is an easy way to make at least $20 a week. You make money from writing reviews about different songs. The longer and better your review; the more money you get. Here's what you need to do to get started:

Step 1: Go here

Step 2: Sign up

Step 3: Proceed through the short questionnaire

Step 4: Finish the questionnaire

And...you're done.

From here, all you have to do is log in and begin.

When you log in, you'll be brought to the scouting page. From this page, you'll listen to a song, rate it, and write a review about it. Once you're finished writing your review, just click submit. And, just like that, you'll have earned a little bit of cash.

Okay, this isn't for everyone. It especially isn't for people who don't like to write reviews. And, let's face it, writing reviews can be tough. So, to help you along, I made a review-writing method. Follow the method below and, before you know it, you'll have written your first review. (Additionally, feel free to amend my method in any way that suits you and, remember, when writing your reviews, be as descriptive as possible. The more words you write; the more you get paid. A solid grasp of basic grammar helps as well).

Step 1: Listen to the song.

Step 2: While listening to the song, begin to write your review.

Step 3: When writing the review, focus on these areas:

•    Introduction: How is the song's introduction? Fast? Slow? Is it a good introduction?

•    Hook: Does the song pull you in and grab your attention? Or is it rather bland? 

•    Rhythm: Does the song have a good rhythm? Is it fast? Slow? Does the rhythm fit the song?

•    Melody: What is the melody like? Is it sweet and light? Dark and heavy? Does it fit the song?

•    Vocals: Can you understand the vocalist? What does he/she sound like? Does he/she have the right voice for this type of song? Should there be more/less vocals?

•    Harmony: Do the instruments in the song blend well together? Or do they clash? Is this a good or bad thing for the song?

•    Lyrics: Are the lyrics well-written and meaningful? Are they shallow and superficial? Should there even be lyrics in this song?

•    Pace: Does the song have an even, steady pace? Is the pace uneven and bumpy? What kind of pace should this song have?

•    Ending: How does the song end? Is it a gradual ending or an abrupt ending? Did the ending leave you feeling satisfied?

•    Commercial success: Do you think this song has the potential to be a commercial success? If no, why? If yes, why?

(You don't have to use the above formula; it's only there to help you write reviews).


After you complete your song review, make sure you've rated the song, and submit your review.

Payout rates: 

As mentioned above, the amount of money you get depends on the quality and length of your review. However, what I didn't mention is that, for each review you write, you gain a bit of experience. This experience effects the amount you are paid. The higher your experience; the more money you get per review. Experience is gained by writing quality, lengthy reviews.

When you first begin, you'll receive around $0.20 for a three-paragraph-long review. So, remember, keep your reviews long and descriptive. Additionally, decent grammar only helps your cash flow.

I've been using slicethepie for a while now. I recently withdrew my earnings.

I was recently paid by slicethepie. Proof of payment below:

Click here for a short-cut to slicethepie!