Have You Tried Pay Per Post?

Pay per post is one way, of many, that bloggers turn their hobby blogs into money producing blogs. It is pretty much exactly what it sounds like it is. Companies who are trying to promote their products post opportunities on websites for bloggers to apply for. If your blog meets the criteria that the company has set forth you will be given the opportunity to write a post on a certain subject for a fee. Many bloggers do this over and over again and make some extra money.

What kinds of companies do this?

All kinds. Kmart and Panasonic recently launched campaigns utilizing this technique. But many of the companies that do this are smaller internet based companies that are looking to get a little notoriety with certain groups of people. Some of the posts out there are from other blogs that want some exposure. Some are for different selling websites like netSpray. Others are companies asking for product reviews for customers to find online. There are numerous opportunities on the web as long as your blog meets the requirements of a company.

How much can you make?

Most pay per post opportunities will pay you around $4-$5 but there are some that will give you upwards of $15 and surely more. It just depends on the site you are looking at and the deals they have. Some companies offer a base fee and then a certain amount for every page view that you get of that post. For instance a company could give you a $5 base fee and then .02 cents for every hit on that page. If you get 1,500 hits you would end up with $35. If you were willing to write about anything all the time you could surely make a decent part time income doing just that.

Is it good for your blog?

This is a debate that rages across many fields and blogs. I personally read a sports blog that at times will post about some product that has nothing to do with sports. It honestly makes me never want to read it again. So I would say that you have to be careful not to alienate your readers. Remember that your readers are the only reason you are eligible for some of the opportunities. If you lose your readers cause they don’t like you peddling products and services that don’t pertain to your blog you probably won’t get too many more chances to make any money.

Become a Better Photographer With the Nikon d80

Have you ever thought that you might be the next great photographer? But it seems so hard to get everything you need to get started right. I mean how are you supposed to know which lens' to buy or what cables or straps you might want?

Well there is a seller on netSpray that is making it easy for you. For $850 you get a Nikon d80 (which is usually a $400 dollar camera by itself) with 2 lenses, rechargeable Li-ion battery, battery charger, multiple cables, straps, covers, and Nikon Picture Project software. If you get a nice kit like this you will get more for your money instead of buying all those pieces separate.



But is this the right camera to buy? Well in its class it is often rated as good as or better than many of its competitors products like Canon. There are numerous reviews out there and many are very useful. Here is one that I used. While this review put this camera second it was only because the camera the reviewer chose was priced much lower than the d80 but he hadn't used the other camera full time yet.

This camera has been on the market a while but it is still a highly rated model and company.

Oakley Sunglasses on netSpray

For only $100 you can get yourself a pair of Oakley sunglasses with mp3 capabilities. All you have to do is hook up the built in mp3 player to a computer and upload your favorite mp3's. Then you can be outside playing basketball in the sun with good music and protection from the sun. The glasses were mainly developed for athletes to have music easily accessible when they are outside training.

Think about it. Have you ever been out running or biking and wanted to listen to music but didn't want to deal with hassle of grabbing your mp3 player and finding someplace to put it? Well with these glasses you wouldn't have to. You just have to remember to upload your music and then you would have up to 6 hours of playback.

Just click on the link below and buy the glasses and in a few days you can be training without the hassle of finding some place to keep your mp3 player.

netSpray.com">

The Long Tail Approach

Some of you might have heard the term "long tail" used around the blogosphere and wondered what the length of an animals tail had to do with the internet. Well okay maybe you didn’t wonder that but you might have. Sorry that was a poor attempt at humor.

But seriously, do you know what “long tail” means?

To put it as simply as possible it is a method or way to maximize a search which in turn maximizes a products popularity and worth. The theory goes that if your search has more terms then it will bring up more results and it will also bring up more specific results. And in turn if your blog or post has multiple keywords than it is more likely to come up higher on searches.

The system was really perfected by online retailers such as Amazon who used it to get people more aware of items available. There are so many types of books by so many authors that many people don’t even know stuff is out there. So by using the long tail approach Amazon was able to get some of their low selling inventory sold.

Since then it has become an important tool of online merchants (such as netSpray users) who want to get their products sold. Bloggers also use the approach to get a higher ranking and listing on search engines which in turn brings more traffic to their sites.

So you see the length of an animals tail really doesn't matter at all. It is just a tool (or strategy) to make your post or site more popular on the search engines such as Google.

eCommerce & Affiliate Marketing a New World?

So, I'm putting together my first ever SlideShare presentation. Exciting hu? I think so. Anyhow, I'd like to have the slideshow cover affiliate marketing; and eCommerce. My objective is to have...fact, to present facts or proof about affiliate programs, and eCommerce in the year to come.

In my effort to do so, I've stumbled upon a little research that hopefully will help me get there. Below you'll see a slide show that I thought was worth capturing concerning the cross roads of eCommerce and the social web.

Ecommerce & the Social Web: Why it matters. What you can do.

View more presentations from suttonhoo. (tags: experience user)

The above slide show is rich. I really like slide number 28, which illuminates the potential direction that customers might flow.

In the next slide show authors provide some interesting questions and a fact or two about affiliate marketing.

Affiliate Marketing Survey Report 2008.

View more presentations from guestc5bb1f. (tags: affiliate marketing)

I'd still like to find more about each of these subject areas, especially hard facts or numbers. Ideally as I continue searching I'll come up with some hard numbers. Then, I'll create my own presentation and be sure to share it here.

(wink).

Dave White's eBay and Beyond Radio (scratch that) Video Show

I listened to the eBay and Beyond radio show (video show) today and thought I'd share a little of what I found. 

The show is hosted by a man named Dave White. Dave is an expert in online sales and appears to be selling in a number of places beyond eBay. His website has widgets for Bonanzle, netSpray, and OnlineAuction. Online Auction is a favorite of Dave's, he even hosts the OLA radio show. 

One thing that was impressed upon me today in listened to Dave's show was the importance of providing a seller with a sense of place. What I mean here is that at Online Auction, buyers can browse the seller's items. At Bonanzle, sellers have what is termed a booth. Both of these situations allow a buyer to look at a seller's complete inventory and can likely help increase the number of items being sold. 

• Sellers want to feel like a website is theirs ~ ie. we want a personalized area. 
• A seller's profile and a chance to see their complete inventory in one place is important.
• We don't want a lot of work in setting up our profiles/ area, but enough opportunity in them to be creative. 

In this week's show, Dave spoke with well-known super seller Marsha Collier who also is a former eBay specialist. Marsha writes books about selling on eBay, in addition to being a genuine eBay seller herself. She also hosts her own radio show and writes a blog about computer technology. 

The program was fun and lively as Dave brought in audience members, like John Lawson, aka ColderICE who was promoting his new program about Internet marketing. Bit of a side note, John recently interviewed Jay Berkowitz who is a nationally recognized Internet marketer. Jay's claim to fame is the 10 Golden Rules of Internet marketing book, he's used to land speaking gigs and notoriety. 

What are your thoughts? Are you a seller that likes to have a sense of place with your online ecommerce website? Does it matter to you if a website mixes your product in with everyone else's? Would you prefer to sell on a site that allows a potential buyer to see all of your items in one location should they desire to do so? 

Weekly Update

ChannelAdvisor offers multi-channel online sales platform and recently releases "new" ideas about how to manage customer needs.  

NetSuite (retail, full-package ecommerce solution company) recently published news about it's multi-channel retail management suite. The company provides full-scale service solutions to retail companies and would likely be stiff competition to other companies looking to service ecommerce needs of large (more than 5 mill annually) companies doing business online. They have a list of customers and success stories on their website. They provide back-end and front-end services, and presumably are a SaaS company.  

netSpray innovative online sales platform brings together Internet marketers and online merchants to increase visibility and conversions is expected to announce the new design of their website. Word is the company has entered a new round of funding and will roll-out a new web design over the coming weeks. 

Internet Retailer (online trade magazine) provides an article this week detailing trends in e-commerce platforms. They highlight three main models: (1) SaaS or on-demand where vendor hosts the software being used; (2) hosted or managed model where customized technology is hosted by the vendor; (3) the licensed model where retailer licenses technology from the vendor, modifies it and supports it in-house. 

Using Forrester Research data IR points out, "  Core capabilities for retailers include managing product catalogs and content, customer data and orders, including shipping charges and taxes; search and browse capabilities; payment settlement; and reporting. " 

The article also provides a link to the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide  (<- a paid catelogue of the ? top 500 online retailer with case studies)