Written on March 31st, 2005 at 12:03 pm by David Shawver Stanton
Easy Bake Weblogs meets enternetusers
This time next week you’re invited to phone into listen to a conversation between myself and Andy from Easy Bake Weblogs. I’ve listened to a couple of his previous interviews and they are good value (lets hope I can be as insightful, witty and worth the time as his previous guests!).
I hope you can drop by - details of how to get in on the conversation are at Easy Bake Weblogs Exclusive Interview: Kevin from Pro Blogger.
If you can’t be there live the interview will be put up as a podcast for all to download later on.
Written on March 31st, 2005 at 10:03 am by David Shawver Stanton
Bloggers Adsense Earnings Poll Results
Learn more about the AdSense program
My apologies to readers for the wacky results of the last poll (about how much people earned from Adsense) that I’ve been running the past few weeks - it seems someone hacked a way around voting more than once and voted 400 times across all categories last night which totally messed up the results making them useless. It always astounds me how a small minority of internet users with too much time on their hands can ruin the hard work of others so effortlessly.
Whilst I never intended the results to be scientific or highly accurate I found them to be quite fascinating. Before the hack happened last night this is what they showed (I’m reconstructing this from memory and some notes I took yesterday of the results at that point so please forgive me for the up to date accuracy).
- 33% earned under $30 per month
- 16% earned between $30 and $99 per month
- 11% earned between $100 and $499
- 9% earned between $500 and $999
- 4% earned between $1000 and $1499
- 2% earned between $1500 and $2499
- 4% earned between $2500 and $4999
- 3% earned between $5000 and $9999
- 1% earned over $10,000
- 13% do not use Adsense
- 4% did not wish to disclose their earnings
Here are a couple of graphs that help to visualize the break down.
I’ve taken the first two answers out of the results (ie those who do not use Adsense and those who do not wish to disclose their earnings have been removed from the results shown in these graphs. Click for enlarged graphs.
This first graph shows the breakdown of those responding in each category (372 total respondents).
This graph shows the same results with a percentage breakdown of each category.
Once again - keep in mind that this is only intended as a rough guide to show what a selection of bloggers (largely readers of this site - which will provide skewed results due to its nature) are earning through the Adsense program.
I hope to construct a more accurate survey that looks at this topic (and others) in the weeks ahead - in the mean time I hope this sheds a little light on the topic of how well bloggers are doing with the Adsense program.
Written on March 31st, 2005 at 03:03 am by David Shawver Stanton
Interview with Michael Moncur
Michael Moncur is one of those web entrepreneurs that you talk to and realize that you’re just a baby when it comes to making money online.
A few months ago Michael left a comment on one of my posts and I knew instantly that this was a guy with some real wisdom when it comes to this career that many of us are in. I asked him a few questions about his experience and an email came back that got me really excited. In it Michael outlined his history of creating profitable websites over the past 10 years. Since then I’ve been an avid reader of his blog Figby.com and quite often go to him for advice and to bounce ideas around. He’s not only wise but he’s also willing to help out a newbie like myself and I’m really grateful for the time he’s put aside to be interviewed here. I hope you enjoy what he has to say.
enternetusers - Michael thanks so much for your time - can you briefly tell us a little about yourself - give us a quick sketch of your life.
Michael - I started out working in IT and technical support for a couple of local firms in the early 90s. At some point I was recruited to write a book about Novell NetWare 3.x. I had always enjoyed writing and since then I’ve written books on the MCSE program, JavaScript, DHTML, and MySQL. In 1998 I quit my last “real” job to work on freelance writing full time.
Meanwhile, I started a web site in 1994, and ten years later my web sites have started to take more of my time, and make more money, than books. Recently I’ve been happily converging these two careers by doing most of my writing online.
I’m an old-timer by Internet standards, which means over 30. I’ve watched the Web grow from a wacky, obscure geek thing (I told everyone it would never work) to the world-crushing phenomenon it is today, and it blows my mind to think about that.
I live in Salt Lake City, Utah with my wife, a dog, and two cats.
enternetusers - You’ve been writing your website ‘The Quotations Page‘ since 1994 - can you tell us a little about how you started it? How has it evolved? When did you start monetizing the site? What are the main methods of generating an income from it that you use?
Michael - I have been an avid collector of quotations since I was a teenager, and I started The Quotations Page in 1994 because there wasn’t a good general-purpose quotation search engine online yet. (Hard to imagine, I know, but Google wasn’t online yet either.) I’ve gradually added features and quotations since then, and now it’s the web’s most popular quotation site. It also requires two dedicated servers and a good portion of my time to maintain.
I started running banner ads on the site in 1996, mostly to offset server costs. We used one of the smaller ad networks that is still around. As the site grew, I was able to work with larger networks and make better money. Right now we work with four or five different ad networks, Amazon links, and sell our own text ads using a system I built.
I’ve also been experimenting with AdSense on that site, but it’s not a high-paying topic area. I still make more money from conventional banner ads, mostly due to the huge amount of traffic.
enternetusers - What other non bloggingwebsites do you run?
Michael - I started The Literature Page in 2003 as a companion site that goes deeper than simple quotations. I also have a small site, JavaScript Workshop to support my JavaScript books. More recently I’ve launched Website Workshop and The Gadgets Page, which are CMS-based sites that are not quite blogs. I use them to publish articles and reviews, and both make a bit of money with AdSense.
enternetusers - How and when did you first discover and enter into blogging? Tell us a little about your blogs. What are the main methods of monetising them?
Michael - I started my weblog, Figby.com in 2001. At the time I didn’t post much more than one-paragraph links to news items, but it’s evolved into a proper weblog, and now I try to write something decent every day or two. I focus on technology and web development, so you won’t hear anything about my cats. I run AdSense ads on Figby, but they don’t make any money to speak of. The site exists mainly to give me a voice when I have something to say.
My wife and I started Starling Fitness at the beginning of the year, and it’s already making more than my own weblog. It’s a good topic area and Laura’s a good writer so I have high hopes for that one.
I’ve also been writing The JavaScript Weblog for Weblogs Inc. for nearly a year, and it’s been a great experience.
enternetusers - What has it been like working with Weblogs Inc? What are the benefits of joining a network like this as distinct from your own personal blogging? Do you see it as the future of blogging?
Michael - I’ve been very happy with Weblogs Inc. They’re good people, and I’ve had a great experience working with them. The main benefit of working with a network like this is that you get an instant start–you are linked from the other weblogs, and they Actively promote your weblog, so you don’t have to work as hard to get readers. They also handle all of the issues with weblog software, server management, and so on, so if you just want to write rather than becoming an expert on running a website, it’s a great choice.
I’m not sure it’s the future of blogging, but it will certainly be a big part of it. Just like with writing books, it’s much easier for a writer to let a publisher handle the details so they can focus on the writing.
enternetusers - What do you see as the potential for blogging? Why do you personally do it? What advantages and disadvantages do you see in it in comparison to other formats of websites.
Michael - I think the whole reason weblogs are such a big deal is that there’s almost no barrier to post. You can have a thought, type a paragraph, and hit “Publish”, and you’ve created new content. I’ve set up similar content-management systems for my other sites so adding content is as easy as blogging.
I personally see my weblogs as a way to reach an audience with my writing, to educate others, and occasionally to vent my frustrations.
The disadvantage of weblogs as opposed to other content sites is that reverse-chronological order isn’t always the best way to present things. For example, if you write longer articles or tutorials, they tend to get lost in the stream of posts if you’re not careful, and multi-part posts don’t work very well–they end up in the wrong order in the archives, for starters. I think weblogs are a great tool, just not always the right tool for the job.
enternetusers - Do you choose subjects/topics for your blogs more out of interest or out of potential for earning?
Michael - Out of interest. I think that’s essential. I’ll look at the earning capacity of a topic and that might affect how much time I’m willing to dedicate to it, but if the interest isn’t there you’ll never create a good site. If I did start a weblog on a topic I wasn’t personally interested in, I’d find someone with a passion for the subject to do the writing.
enternetusers - Do you do your own blog design?
Michael - So far, yes. I use pretty minimal designs for most of my sites, since I’m not really a designer. The best design I’ve done myself was for Starling Fitness.
enternetusers - What has been the best thing about your blogging experience? What has been the hardest or worst thing?
Michael - The best thing is helping people–I love to get an email or comment from someone who solved a problem or accomplished something due to one of my posts. That’s also one of the reasons I love to write books, but you can’t beat the instant gratification of blogging. The second-best thing is participating in a friendly and growing community, and even meeting some amazing people in person.
The worst thing is comment spam.
enternetusers - You’ve been involved in the writing of a number of books - would you recommend this as a means of earning an income for bloggers? What are the benefits and costs of writing a book for a blogger?
Michael - I wrote some books during the Internet bubble and they did great, but in the current market you have to have a real bestseller to make enough money for it to be worthwhile. There are other benefits to writing books, though–they look great on a resume, give a real sense of authority to clients if you’re consulting, and can promote your weblog or web site.
As with blogging, you shouldn’t write a book unless you have an interest in the topic. The money is secondary, and sometimes it’s nonexistent.
enternetusers - What advice would you give a enternetusers just starting out?
Michael - First, Learn to write. This generally involves writing day in and day out until you’re good at it. Reading and studying writers you admire helps too.
Second, I think you should have a mission statement for your weblog. Whether it’s personal or professional, one topic or many, you should have a plan: What topics will you write about? How often? What, if anything, is offlimits?
Third, realize that making money is hard work, and you’ll have to devote a significant part of your time to the money side: marketing your site, finding and dealing with advertisers or networks, handling public relations, and accounting. If you’re not willing to commit to these tasks, you’re not a “pro” blogger.
Finally, stick to it–sometimes it takes months or even longer to get a site noticed, but it’s always worth the wait in my experience.
enternetusers - What is your favourite problogging tool or service?
Michael - Wordpress. I used to use some frightening homebrewed blog software, and after switching to WP I’ve been able to write longer, better, and more often. The tools shouldn’t matter that much, but if your weblog platform makes writing difficult, it’s easy to decide not to bother.
enternetusers - What are your hopes and dreams for your blogging? Where would you like to see it take you?
Michael - I would like to see it take me and my wife to a tropical island of our choice for a long vacation. Until that happens, I’d like to write more often and get better at it, and I’d like to have time to work on some new ideas I have.
Written on March 30th, 2005 at 11:03 pm by David Shawver Stanton
Yahoo! 360 Reviewed
Steve at Micro Persuasion reviews Yahoo! 360 - it looks like an interesting tool but if Steve is right it probably wont be too useful for enternetuserss and Business Bloggers. Steve writes:
‘As compelling as Yahoo! 360 is for newbies, it has virtually zero application as a professional/business blogging tool. It’s far too simple. You can’t easily turn features on or off and it lacks trackbacks and customization. I guess we can’t expect it do everything that the big platforms do.’
Written on March 30th, 2005 at 12:03 pm by David Shawver Stanton
Finding Readers with Headlines
Blog World has a good post on how to Attract Readers With Headlines.
‘Headlines matter. Actually for blogs, headlines or post titles are crucial. Survey after survey shows that people only scan what they read on the net and you have to grab their attention quickly. Not only that, but if the person is using an RSS reader they may only see that headline. Similarly if your page comes up in a search engine, the first thing people are going to see is the headline.’
Their tips include to:
- write strong headlines
- summarize don’t tease
- use important words first
Written on March 30th, 2005 at 08:03 am by David Shawver Stanton
Exponential Blogging - Part II
Why is Blogging naturally suited to Exponential growth of earnings using the adsense program?
In my previous post I shared some of my story as a blogger who has seen exponential growth in my Adsense earnings over the past 18 months of blogging (the blue graph to the left is an illustration of my Adsense earnings). Whilst at times there are some disruptions to this growth (usually external ones) I believe that the types of blogs that I run should naturally experience this type of increase in earnings for some of the following reasons (which are both byproducts of committed regular blogging but which can also be worked on to maximise growth).
Increased Readership
The main reason my earnings have increased since starting to blog with Adsense is simply that the readership of my blogs has grown. In fact if you compare the earnings graph above with the traffic graph (right) you’ll see the direct correlation. Increase the traffic to your blogs you increase the amount of impressions of ads served which (all other things being equal) will increase your earnings.
Following are some of the factors that have helped my blogs grow their readership over the past year and a half (and which have had a flow on effect to increased earnings).
More posts - the longer you blog the bigger your archives section becomes and the more doorways there are into your blog. A blog with 1000 posts has a lot better chance of being found by readers using Google and RSS than a blog of 100 posts (all other things being equal). Blog 3 posts per day for a year and you’ll soon have a 1095 post blog. I try and post 25 times per day or over 9000 times a year. Work hard on writing quantities of content and you’ll contribute tot eh exponential growth of your earnings.
More loyal readers - the longer you blog the bigger your potential loyal readership. Now of course this depends upon your quality of content, how useful your blog is and how you look after and interact with your readership - but over time as more and more people surf in you’ll start to find the same readers names keep appearing in comments and emails. If you look after these readers and keep providing the type of content they are looking for you’ll find that they’ll keep coming back and your readership base grows.
Search Engine Rankings Rise - it takes time but the more you blog, the more you should climb the Search Engines. This is a result of a number of factors. Firstly because it takes time to get indexed by SEs, secondly SEs tend to like substantially sized sites and thirdly because the longer you blog the more you’ll accumulate incoming links to your site (if you interact with other bloggers and write link worthy content) and the more incoming links the higher you’ll be ranked in the SEs.
More Blogs - I’ve talked many times here before about my approach to blogging being one of tackling a niche topic rather than having a general topic blog. My recommendation to bloggers wanting to blog on a diverse range of topics is to have a blog for each topic. This has been my approach and is another reason for the rise in my earnings graph over time. As I add new blogs to my stable of blogs I increase the overall readership that is being exposed to my ads.
Other Factors
Of course its not all about increasing your readership despite what the pretty graphs might show. Here’s a couple more reasons for my own growth of Adsense earnings that sprint to mind.
Better Positioned Ads - the longer you blog the smarter you should become with positioning your Adsense ads on your blog. When I first started using Adsense I had one ad on each page and it was positioned low on the page in an unobtrusive position so as not to offend my blogs readership. I quickly learnt that people don’t click on ads that they don’t see and began to experiment with new positions, different colour schemes and even new blog designs that were specifically designed to showcase the ads on the site. Each change I make I track using the channels feature - what works I replicate on my different blogs - what doesn’t I continue to tweak. Not every change I make works - but there have been numerous changes in positioning that have resulted in significant growth along the way.
Better Paying Ads - another way to get smarter with your ads is to target higher paying keywords in your content which trigger the better paying ads. My first blog was on spirituality, culture and my life here in Australia. At its peak it had quite a large readership but it never earned more than a few dollars per day because the topics I wrote about had no real commercial viability. As I experimented with new blogs I found that some topics paid more than others and might be worth investing some time and energy into. Not all of my new blogs are high paying (I also target topics with potentially high readership - and write some blogs that are not about earning money at all) but I’ll admit that some of my blogs were more about their earning potential than other factors.
By no means is this a definitive list of ways to exponentially grow your blog - its just scratching the surface really - rather its some starting points and things to keep in mind if you’re at the beginning of the long tail of a graph like the one above. Keep working hard, build your readership, get smart with your ads and don’t give up.
Feel free to share your thoughts, experiences and suggestions below in comments.
Written on March 30th, 2005 at 05:03 am by David Shawver Stanton
9rules Network Invites You to Join Them
Paul over at Work Boxers is inviting bloggers to Join the 9rules Network. He goes into details of what is involved in his post but all in all it looks a pretty good deal in comparison to some of the other blog networks that i’ve seen out there - might be a good way to get your fledgeling blog exposed to a few more readers - if you’re willing to share a little of your earnings with the 9 Rules Network team.
Written on March 30th, 2005 at 04:03 am by David Shawver Stanton
Are full-feeds killing comments?
Tris writes a good post that wonders if publishing full post feeds in RSS might be responsible for killing comments on posts as a result of less people actually surfing into actual blogs. Interesting theory - pop over and tell Tris what you think of his theory.
Written on March 29th, 2005 at 11:03 am by David Shawver Stanton
Making Your Adsense Earnings Grow - Exponential Blogging
I’ve had a number of emails from readers in the last few days who are disillusioned with their earnings with Adsense. I can perhaps take some of the blame for their mood having posted my reality check post last week and by publishing the poll that we have running that highlights that the majority of bloggers using Adsense are only making a dollar (or three) per day.
So I thought I’d offer some words of encouragement to combat the gloom that is going around at present.
I can relate to the depression about lack of results from Adsense - my early days on the system were similarly gloomy to say the least. Growth in daily earnings from month to month was pretty insignificant. I remember looking at my Adsense statistics numerous times over the first 6 months and wondering if it was worth all the hard work for the few dollars that came in each day.
You’ll notice the graph above (click to enlarge) which graphs my earnings from Adsense (without actual figures included) since October 2003. Notice the first few months earnings - hardly a discernible rise and something that got me down a little and led me to consider stopping my use of Adsense.
But one day I noticed something that grabbed my attention - and inspired me to keep using Adsense.
Each month my income was going up. Between my first and second month it went up just over 100%. The second month it did it again. In fact my monthly rises over the first 9 months of using the Program went something like this:
My First Nine Months Growth in Adsense Earnings:
• 1st to 2nd month - 126%
• 2nd to 3rd month- 93%
• 3rd to 4th month - 39%
• 4th to 5th month- 3.5%
• 5th to 6th month - 65%
• 6th to 7th month - 50%
• 7th to 8th month - 51%
• 8th to 9th month - 45%
• 9th to 10th mont - 96%
Now the total monetary increases didn’t seem much (I mean a 100% increase when you’re only earning $1 per day doesn’t seem that exciting) - but the amazing thing about percentages is that there comes a time when things begin to exponentially rise.
Hypothetically Speaking
Here’s a little exercise for you to illustrate the power of exponential growth. Grab a calculator, or fire up the arithmetic section of your brain. What would happen if your blog that is earning $1 per day were to increase its daily earnings by 100% each month for a year? How much would you be earning this time next year?
• After 1 month it would be earning $2 per day… not even a good coffee!
• After 2 months it would be earning $4 per day….
• After 3 months it would be earning $8 per day…. yawn…
• After 4 months it would be earning $16 per day…
• After 5 months it would be earning $32 per day….
>> Fast Forward >>
• After 12 months it would be earning $4096 per day… coffees for everyone!
Ok that is a pretty unrealistic example - I don’t know many bloggers who are sustaining 100% growth every month - but the principle is the same no matter what the sustained increased percentage of growth. It takes a bit longer for the power of the % to kick in but it eventually does.
• If you can sustain 50% growth per month and start at $1 per day you end up earning $129 per day (and $16,834 per day after 24 months!)
• If you can sustain 40% growth per month and start at $1 per day you end up earning $57 per day (and $3214 per day after 24 months!)
• If you can sustain 30% growth per month and start at $1 per day you end up earning $23 per day (and $542 per day after 24 months!)
You get the picture. Of course its not quite that simple - sustaining large percentage increase month after month is difficult - but from my personal experience its definitely possible to keep your earnings pointing in an upward direction….most months.
My Graph
Ok I can hear the questions already. ‘Nice theory Darren - but look at your graph - the growth didn’t last!’ - ‘What happened last December and January?’
Let me walk you through what happened and where the ‘exponential growth’ theory gets messy.
December and January Crash - This hurt. Up until 16 December it was looking like I was going to have a massive month - breaking the record I’d set for myself in November. I put a lot of the increase down to pre Christmas research people were doing on the topics that I write about. But then on 17 December things went horribly wrong.
Long term readers of this blog might remember the six weeks during December and January where I was on the receiving end of two thirds less traffic than normal as a result of Google doing a pretty major update to their algorithm. This is where my exponential growth of the previous year all came undone and I found myself wondering if I might be about to find out what exponential loss is like.
February Recovery - Early in February Google did another update and my traffic returned. It wasn’t quite at the heights of the end of November and start of December’s Christmas rush, but it did improve and has again this month significantly again.
So - the exponential growth theory does have its bumps - quite often as a result external forces but in my experience exponential growth in earnings is quite possible - at least for a period of times.
But Wait there’s More
Tomorrow I’ll write more on this and give some ways that bloggers can help sustain exponential growth in their blogs. You see it doesn’t just happen - it takes work, time and a little strategy, but I’ll leave that to tomorrow. update: read it here
Written on March 29th, 2005 at 11:03 am by David Shawver Stanton
Google Withholding Taxes from AdSense Checks
Reports are surfacing that in the latest payment period of Adsense that Google are withholding tax from US publishers.
Read about it at Google Withholding Taxes from AdSense Checks and Webmaster World - Tax Withholding
Update: JenSense has more information on this as well as information on a new look for Adsense checks this month.
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