Are You Just Another Dumb Blogger? @FoxNews Might Think So!

Have you ever stopped and thought about what people outside of the blogging world might think about you and what you are doing online? As bloggers ourselves we understand that power and influence that we have online, and some of us have even built profitable brands and businesses out of what we have accomplished online. However it’s important to remember that we are just a speck of sand compared to the outside world who is used to working for the man and running 9 to 5 jobs.

So the question is…

What do NON bloggers and internet users think of bloggers?

It’s an interesting question to ask ourselves. When is the last time you ask someone what they did for a job? In most cases you probably have an idea of what their do and maybe even how their day to day operations take place. Now flip sides and think about all the time someone asked what you do, then you go on to talk about blogging and internet marketing… most times they will have no idea what you are talking about.

P.S. please wait a few seconds to pass the silly ads!

Last week I had the privileged of speaking at BlogWorld in New York City. This was the fifth time I’ve spoke at BlogWorld and it’s definitely one of my favorite events to attend. It’s more than just blogging, and it also brings in a whole new world of attendees and speakers together. I was also fortunate enough to catch up with Fox News on the exhibit floor and do an interview with them, which aired earlier this week on The O’Reilly Factor on Fox News network.

Fox News went on to interview a few attendees and exhibitors at the event, then they put together a fun little sketch for the show. Instead of focusing on the benefits of what BlogWorld has accomplished over the years, and the potential in making a side income and business through internet marketing and blogging, they decided to “spin” the story in a slightly different direction.

While being interviewed I was asked a multitude of questions, everything from blogging, to making money online, how technology will influence us in the future and of course politics. I know I have legitimate answers to all of my questions, and I’m sure others did as well, however Fox News made a spin out of it that bloggers were more of the basement dwelling people who have no knowledge of the world around them.

Going back to our original question… as a blogger what experiences have you had with talking to people outside of the internet world and getting their reactions to what they believe blogging and internet marketing really is?

It was awesome to be interviewed by Fox News and get exposure on national television again, and I truly appreciate it! I really would have just liked to see blogging and BlogWorld placed in a better light. If you feel the same way, be sure to visit the Fox News web site and watch the full video, then shoot Bill O’Reilly an email at oreilly@foxnews.com and let him know they missed out on a great opportunity to make a positive and influential story for their audience, instead of just a humorous segment that will be forgotten by the average viewer.

Famous Bloggers is Back!

If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook you probably already know that FamousBloggers.net’s domain name was stolen from my GoDaddy account. After four long days of pain. Finally, FamousBloggers is up and running, thanks to God and the great blogging community, without your support; this story would have been written in a completely different scenario, and the hard work we put together to build this site could become history.

Domain name theft is not new, it happens everyday, crackers are out there hunting domains and blackmailing site owners.

What Happened?

According to GoDaddy, the domain thief hacked my GoDaddy account, he logged in and did a transfer to two of my domains names to another registrar Active Registrar Inc.

Right after that, he sent me an email telling me he purchased my domain names, and he is offering them for sale, he asked for 999 USD for both. (so basically this is a blackmail).

I have exactly 31 domain names with GoDaddy, the strange thing is I found out that only two domain names was stolen FamousBloggers.net and ThesisAwesome.com, so it appears that the domain thief picked only my valuable domains and left the rest. He also didn’t change anything in my account at all. However, I didn’t get any email notification of domain transfer, which doesn’t make sense, and also GoDaddy can’t explain it, which lead me to think the same way Gerald Weber pointed out on his comment (Is it possible that this thief has someone on the indside of Godaddy helping him make the stealing of domains easier?) which also keep me wondering… Is GoDaddy’s the two-step authentication safe?

How he got my account password?

I am not sure, and I really don’t know! But I can say that no one hacked my Gmail email as the account activities show, I just think that my GoDaddy’s password wasn’t strong enough. So, I admit it, I am sharing part of the responsibility.

Also, I use to Sucuri.net to monitor my hosting and DNS changes on almost all my sites, but for some reason I didn’t check their latest warnings, maybe because JectPack plugin (which I am installing on my blogs) do a lot of changes to their scripts and this leaded to several email notifications by Sucuri, so I just didn’t pay attentions to these notifications in the last coupe of months. (my bad)

Now, let me tell you how I actually got my sites up and running in only 4 days, and got a deal with Active Registrar Inc. (the gainer registrar) to request a reverse of domain transfer back to my account.

How I got my Domain Names Back

I’ve got a lot of requests from my friends and fellow bloggers to tell what I did exactly to bring back my domain names so quick, so I will try to make it short and straight to the point, hofully the steps I’ve taken could help someone out there, and save them some time!

Here is the steps I did when I first heard that someone else is taking over my domain names:

1. I called my domain registrar by phone, which was GoDaddy and reported to them.


2. They asked me to file a Request for Dispute on Transfer Away.


3. I started to read about other domain stolen cases. Make sure you read this ICANN page.


4. I took the whole story to the public, published about it, and share it everywhere!


5.  I asked my friends for help, advice and spread my story.


6. I was reading and studding every single advice was given to me in comments & social media.


7. I reported to the FBI (fbi.gov)


8. I filed a dispute to Active Registrar Inc.


9. I report abuse to dnsadmin@afraid.org (free DNS service that my domain names was pointing).


10. I kept updating my post with hourly break down of events. (I almost didn’t sleep for 4 days)

Documents I needed I provide to Active Registrar Inc.

1. Scanned copy of my valid driver license and ID.


2. Copies of domain purchase orders and payment proof.


3. Emails that were sent to me from the domain thief.

Things that helped me to speed up the process

• I sent a link to my blog post to all involved parties to show them how serious this community is.


• The social media buzz (an average of a tweet/10 minutes was made to @GoDaddy from my fellows)


• FBI report was a good idea (maybe they can put the thief behind bars)

Just for the records

GoDaddy failed in reaching Active Registrar Inc. on their first attempt, Active Registrar Inc. have told me they received  only one dispute request from GoDaddy.

This could cause a tragedy!

Anyways, when GoDaddy told me they have to wait for 5 days to heard back from Active Registrar Inc. I decided to contact Active Registrar Inc. by myself because I am not stupid to wait for 5 days, plus I can’t play the waiting game for 5 days!

That’s why I felt that GoDaddy’s staff are way far from being professionals in solving such problems, at least this is what shows in my case.

Special thanks to everyone who supported me!

To everyone who supported me in this hard time, I really can’t thank you All enough, I know who you are, without you I couldn’t make it!

Thanks to all those who provided me with honest and helpful advice.

I couldn’t hold back my tears when I saw your comments, tweet, shares.. pushing  and encouraging me to continue my fight!

You are just amazing… Amazing!

Special thanks to Active Registrar Inc.

I can’t thank enough the team over Active Registrar Inc. for their understanding, timely respond, and effective decisions.

• In 24 hours the domain names was suspended!


• In 48 my domain names was pointing to the correct DNS.


• And, a domain transfer reverse was placed!

Read the full story and hourly breakdown of events.

How my Business and Sites were affected?

It seems that 4 days down time is not that bad, but I can tell that my online business was affected so badly in the last 4 days when my domains was stolen and sites were down, I can’t afford to have my sites down for 4 days, this is too much time, really!

Speaking about Business…

By looking to my income reports, I estimated my loss to something around $1600, needless to speak about the lost opportunity and those deals I were working on with some partners (which I’ve already lost).

How this affected my site traffic and rankings? Is it coming back?

I can clearly see that Google dropped a huge percentage of indexed pages during the last 4 days, this wasn’t good because FamousBloggers.net gets more than 50% of its traffic from search. So, this is a huge traffic loss.

Here is a screenshot of FamousBloggers stats today (Monday, July 30, 2012):

FamousBloggers has exactly 1,233 posts at the time of writing this post. It’s hard to tell at this point if traffic is coming back or not, I see that Google started to re-index the dropped posts again, but now I am not sure if the boots will reach deeper and re-index them all back.

Speaking about rankings, I see clearly that I’ve lost almost all my best ranking posts and reviews, which will affect my income in the coming couple of months or so, I hope it won’t be a big loss.

My PayPal account is on hold!

I Just got off of phone call with PayPal, I just found out that my account has been under attack, so PayPal locked it so quickly. They’ve told me that someone did several failed trying to login to my account, so the system locked it till I can verify it. And guess what?! Even the customer service can’t verify my account!

PayPal customer service told me that: It looks like your account was on hold at the maximum security, so the only way to verify your account is phone call verification which can be done through a land line. (who still have one of these?!)

Now, I am forced to apply for a land line to verify my PayPal account. I called ComCast and ordered the land line, but appointment is set for next Friday, what a nightmare!

The results is I won’t be able to pay any affiliate commissions for ThesisAwesome.com affiliates till I solve my PayPal issues and remove the account hold! (thanks to the cracker)

Is GoDaddy Secure?

The short answer is “Yes”, how? simply because they have two-step authentication, which was not enabled in my account that time when my account hacked, and probably that’s why the domain thief (the Cracker) was able to hack my GoDaddy account and figure out my password.

Why I will Move From GoDaddy?

Note: What you are about to read below is only my personal opinion based on my bad experience with GoDaddy.

I will move my domains and cancel my hosting account with GoDaddy for several reasons, the most important reason is they didn’t really help me out getting my domain names back, yes they did what they can, what that wasn’t good enough!

If you follow my story, you will see clearly that GoDaddy:

• Didn’t protect me as a client!


• Didn’t show any responsibility!


• Didn’t take a quick action (I was much faster than them)


• They fail in making the first dispute reach Active Registrar Inc.


• Complicated things (they work officially but unprofessionally)


• Didn’t respond to my request to provide required data to Active Registrar Inc.


• Was about to delay the whole thing for months.


• They were “almost” about to take it personal (because Active Registrar Inc ignored their late request).


• They were the last who knows that I got my domains back! (Really?!)

Here is some other reasons why I will move from GoDaddy for good:

1- Their support sucks

I’ve been with GoDaddy enough to tell that their support really sucks compared to other web hosting companies.

FYI, I have worked with HostGator and BlueHost a lot in the last couple of years, and I am able to solve 90% of my clients’ issues without having an access to their hosting accounts. How?

I contact their support, I tell them about the problem, they simply respond and solve it! (It’s not a rocket since, it’s business)

Dealing with GoDaddy’s support team is a different story, NOT all the team members are qualified to provide a proper support for clients, if you are lucky enough you will make it from the first phone call, but in most cases it takes more than one phone call to solve a simple problem.

2- Almost 100% of GoDaddy’s employee can’t make decisions or take actions

You see, in our speedy world, I think companies tend to give more power to their employee and encourage them to make business decisions and take quick actions. The age of hiring dumb people who just made to be followers ended a long time ago! Now, companies seeks people who solve problems.

Personally, I never met someone at GoDaddy who can take a decision towards the client’s business or provide a good solution for a problem, I met only with those who give excuses, apologize a lot, and say “they can’t do anything about it”.

3- Their marketing guys make me feel sick!

Once I got contacted by email from one of GoDaddy’s marketing managers, he mentioned an exclusive discount for FamousBloggers’ readers, and try to convincing me to work with them on the affiliate program to promote GoDaddy’s domain names. I decided to discuss with him because I like to give discounts and free stuff for FamousBloggers’ friends and readers, and because he promised me a big exclusive discount especially for domain names.

I thought this will be easy because he is the one who contacted me, so he must give me a good offer. Needless to say, our discussing took more than two weeks of ping pong emails because each time I sent him an email, he reply to me that he have discuss with his manager and get back to me (WTF? I thought he is a manager from the title in his email signature)

Latter, I discovered that he was offering me the same discount that GoDaddy give to all affiliates. So, I told him if you can’t get me in the exclusive discount coupons for domain names then we better end this discussion. What a time waste!

Why you offer me something that you can’t give?

4- Too much upsells and tons of promotions hit you on the face.

Yes, they can give you good domain prices, but it’s insanely crazy how they designed the checkout process, how many times you have to say “NO” to the stuff they push on your way just to simply checkout and leave?!

Also, it’s well known that when you search available domain names in GoDaddy today, in some cases you just find them unavailable in the next day, you will be surprised that you have to pay extra to get those specific domain names. Some people think that GoDaddy do a trick to charge you more money to get those domains you were looking for. This happened with me, and also to other people who I know.

5- They suspend your hosting for whatever reason!

Basically because their shared hosting is one of the worst ever, and of course because shared hosts has 100 to 200 sites on the same server, you could easily get hurt by any bad code on any of those sites who share same space. When problems happen you will discover that you must to take off your shirt to get GoDaddy’s attention!

At the end all what you get from GoDaddy is: “This is not our responsibility“!

Where I will host my domain names?

I won’t put my domain names in one account anymore, I will probably have more than one registrar, I am between NameCheap, and Active Registrar Inc. (Let me know which domain registrar you recommend, I am hearing you).

Soon, I will transfer my domains away from GoDaddy.

Who shared the story?

A few of my fellow bloggers shared the story of my stolen domain names, and provided great advice and tips for blog owners to help them secure their domain names, web hosting, and their valuable business. I am so thankful!

1. Famous Bloggers Founder Loses Domain Names - SmallBizTrends.com


2. Blog Stolen from GoDaddy Account - JustinGermino.com


3. Think Before Buying or Hosting your Domain on GoDaddy! - PratikDholakiya.com


4. Is GoDaddy still secure? - ToStartBlogging.com


5. Protect your Domain Name From Low Life Thieves - LetsBuildWebsites.com


6. Stolen Domains: A Horror Story of Being Hacked - ITPixie.com


7. A Shout out for FamousBloggers - IBlogZone.com


8. How to Increase Domain Name Security : Avoid Domain Theft - WPHostingDiscount.com


9. Domain Theft: Is Your Domain Name Safe from Hackers? – BloggingTips.com


10. FamousBloggers.net is Stolen - PRLInternetMarketing.com


11. Hacked Account - Lawmacs.com


12. Enable 2-Step Authentication on GoDaddy to Protect your Domains - TechWalls.com


13. Domain “Famousbloggers.net” Hijacked Over The Weekend - NetProEarnings.com


14. @hishaman @FamousBloggers Net Nightmare Over! - Dave-Lucas.blogspot.com


15. One Man’s Fight for his Stolen Domains - HajraKvetches.com


16. How To Make a Better Password - VinnyOhare.com


17. The 10 Things You Need to Know to Secure Your WordPress Site - ManageWP.com

The story was shared and mentioned through social media extensively, I imagine the reach went to more than a Million people who knew about this story (because I can’t really calculate it), but here is a quick reach stats based on TweetReach.

So, that’s only Twitter, I can’t measure other social networks, private shares, emails, word of mouth… etc.

What I’ve earned!

You see, I now believe in the blogging community more than ever, it doesn’t matter what I’ve lost, really! Because what I’ve won and eared is much much more!

I just can’t explain it with words, only my tears can tell, it’s more than love!

Stay safe.. and.. a BIG…

Image © Subbotina Anna, Lina_S - Fotolia.com

CommentLuv Premium Discount

Hey everyone, this is really exciting news from the CommentLuv Premium author Andy Bailey, if you haven’t got a premium version of CommentLuv yet, then this is you best chance! Next week you will be able to get CommentLuv Premium for big discount, yes… CommentLuv Premium will be yours for a very low price, only $21 for multi licenses, so you can use it on all blogs that you own.

CommentLuv Premium Discount

The reason for this big CommentLuv discount is celebrating the premium version’s anniversary, so yes, it has been a year since CommentLuv Premium has been released.

CommentLuv Premium Discount

You got to see this awesome video by Andy telling the story of CommentLuv, announcing the exciting news, and the coming big discount.

The Story of CommentLuv

Click below and signup for the early birds discount

CommentLuv Premium Discount

Image © Brad Pict – Fotolia.com

Google’s New App Developer Rules: No more room for Spam or Malware

Attention all computer monitoring software and cell phone spy apps! For happy days are gone now and gloomy nights are here again!

Google altered its rules to a great degree regarding app developers that they must follow while submitting mobile applications to its app store “Google Play“, most of the issues being centered on addressing spamming and malicious attributes concealed within apps.

The updation by Google regarding the new developer policies is meant to cut out spam apps from Google play app store.

Android Central published an email, in which the Google Play Team clarified that its updating efforts were meant to change developer policies such that unhealthy behavior is dealt with. Such behavior includes spammy notifications and app names that were intended to be deceiving.

Apps and Ads…rules are rules!

Several changes have been put forth and amongst them are the recent restrictions placed on the icons and names of apps that resemble too closely some other apps, in order to avert confusion and while bringing safety, clarity and confidence to the users.

Furthermore, Google play team said it is providing a lot more detail on each kind of app that will not make it through to Google including the ones that expose personal information of the users without their authorization.

Google explains how it is giving additional examples of ways in which the spam policy is violated, as expounded in the email. The company is also adding a new section addressing the same behavior in applications. Initially, it is made clear that the same rules are applied to the application as well as the ads. Additionally it is also significant for the company to make sure that ads do not affect the user experience by deceiving them or stymieing their access to apps and linking up to other ads thereby make use of disruptive methods.

Caught and Crucified

“Find and Call” is one of the apps Apple and Google got rid of their app stores, in July after it was realized that the app was sending users contact information to its server remotely located in order to spam those contacts with a plethora of messages. On the other hand the claim made on the flip side by the app was that it was constructed such as to aid the users in terms of the organization of the address book.

Google has been playing the tech superman for quite some time now, in that, it also successfully warded off the early reports in July about an Android botnet spamming its several innocent victims after learning about the issue from blogs by researcher from Microsoft and Sophos. Google also ellucidatedin response that these spammers were making use of infected PCs and fake mobile signature for the purpose of bypassing anti spam features for email.

In any case, it’s a must that you protect your self by download cell phone spy software. For example, if you are using blackberry then try the blackberry spyware.

Google puts forth the rule (among others in its policy) that the applications should be prohibited from collecting information on the user without user request and that bthe applications must be non-malicious. Apps will also be banned from sending texts, emails or other messages on the behalf of the user without the user’s confirmation regarding the recipient and the content.

Final note: for any further queries,  resource link.

Arab Countries Boycott Google And YouTube… The Search Engine

It’s heating up all over the Islamic World these days regarding to an offending short film called “Innocence of Muslims“ that mocked the Prophet Muhammad (p.b.u.h.).

The low-budget film has been produced and hosted recently on YouTube in the name of “freedom of speech”.

Activists called on 1-month boycott of Google and all its services hoping they can cause a huge revenue loss to Google, and hoping that Google shares the would see a decline.

Organizers said they:

” expect that Google will lose about $210 million in revenues if Internet users in the Arab world boycott its search engine and that its stock price will drop.” (Source)

It looks like there is a big respond -from what I see- on Facebook and especially Twitter: #BoycottGoogle, however there is also people who do not agree with the boycott and describe it as a waste of time. (I personally agree with the second group).

Google and YouTube Boycott

Google and YouTube Boycott started yesterday September 24th and will ends today 25th, 2012, and the main reason is that Google refused to the request of removing the anti-Islam film, which proof the YouTube double-standard community guidelines.

Google should also know that the end date to this double-standard has just been defined and therefore compliance is a most for Google and its services to continue to exist as a reputable and responsible business! (Source)

I personally (disliked and reported) the film because I think that it tells 99.99% lies, and I couldn’t agree more with Hillary Clinton when she described it as a disgusting film.

Google’s respond to the boycott

In response to the boycott, a Google spokesperson told Al Arabiya English on Monday:

“We believe in everyone’s right to express themselves freely, but at the same time, we know that users are aware of the role Google plays giving them universal access to information.” (Source)

Interesting results in Google Stock

The really interesting thing is that Google stock hits all-time high yesterday, and it’s still going even higher today:

It seems that Google received an unexpected huge benefit from the boycott campaign!

Internet Usage in the Middle East

The explanation for this is Internet Users across the Arab countries are around 3.3% of the World Internet Users according to InternetWorldStats.com:

The number of boycotters could stretch across the entire Muslim world however, with Muslims in Western and Asian countries also taking part, according to social media users angered by the film. Arabs and Muslims account for about 8 percent of internet users in the world. (ICT industry expert who spoke to the Jordan Times).

Perhaps putting a dampener on the boycott, the analyst forecasted that the planned move “will not have an impact on Google,” adding that less than 0.5 percent of Google’s profits are generated from the Arab and Muslim world.

The Question is…

Well.. actually I have more than one question…

Why you care for a stupid low-budget film that won’t change any fact?

Why would you cut a valuable source of information while you actually need it?

Why don’t you try to find other solutions rather than the boycott that doesn’t work?

Google is Winding Down AdSense for Feeds, No More Profit from FeedBurner AdSense

Google is winding down some of its features like AdSense for Feeds, so no more FeedBurner AdSense earning starting from Oct. the 2nd, 2012.

For some people, this is really bad news, especially for those who are making profits from displaying AdSense in their blogs feeds, as they will see a drop in AdSense revenue next month. But, well… Google says they want to focus on what matters, so they will be taking off a few services in the coming months.

From the Google Blog:

• AdSense for Feeds was designed to help publishers earn revenue from their content by placing ads on their RSS feeds. Starting October 2, we’ll begin to retire this feature—and on December 3 we’ll close it. Publishers can continue to use FeedBurner URLs powered by Google, so they won’t need to redirect subscribers to different URLs.


• Classic Plus is a Google Search feature that lets people upload or select images to use as a background on Google.com. Users won’t be able to upload new pictures starting from October 16, and we’ll turn the service off in November 2012. You’ll continue to have access to any images you’ve uploaded.


• Google storage in Picasa and Drive will be consolidated over the next few months, so users will have five GB of free storage across both services. If you’re paying for storage, your free storage will now be counted towards your total. So if you buy a 100GB plan, it will give you 100GB of total storage instead of adding to what you already had. We believe this approach will make it much easier for users. For both free and paid storage, people at or near their current storage limits will have the same amount of storage after this change.


• Spreadsheet Gadgets were designed to allow people to add customized features to Google Spreadsheets. But most popular gadgets have now been added directly into charts in spreadsheets. So we will slowly start turning off Gadgets in Spreadsheets next year.


• Starting on October 15, we’ll stop issuing and displaying Google News Badges, as well as showing Recommended Sections. People can still tailor their Google News experience by adding custom sections or adjusting the frequency with which news sources appear.


• We’ve merged Insights for Search into a revamped Google Trends. You can now see search trends and compare search volume patterns across specific regions, categories, time frames and properties in a single place: google.com/trends. We will no longer support Trends for Websites, which allowed people to compare traffic to and audiences of different websites.


• Places Directory was an Android app that helped people find nearby places of interest. We’ve removed the app from Google Play and are taking down the Places Directory site because users can find everything in Google Maps for Mobile, which offers a much better user experience.


• We introduced +1 Reports in Webmaster Tools to help publishers measure +1 activity on their pages. Given that webmasters now use Social Reports in Google Analytics to get a wider view of social activity (including +1’s), we’ll be discontinuing the stand-alone +1 Reports on November 14. Measuring social media remains a priority for Google Analytics, so stay tuned for future improvements.

The questions is

Knowing that: Whenever Google decides to drive the final nail in the service’s coffin, it will hopefully make it easy for publishers to switch away, but it will probably be a pretty painful process. (TechCrunch)

When Google will turn off FeedBurner? and how this will affect bloggers and publishers?

Should we start looking for FeedBurner Alternatives?

Black Friday and Cyber Monday 2012 Deals for Bloggers

Hey all, we are getting ready for the Black Friday and Cyber Monday, I hope you are too. While people planning to go out to purchase their targeted products and enjoy discount and big savings, you can get all you business goodies without leaving home, this is what I enjoy most.

I remember last year, I brought a lot of products during the Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Good Deals for Business!

It was really good deals because I’ve secured some awesome themes membership and a few plugins that I wanted to have access to, even though I didn’t have any particular use for these products the time I made the purchase, it came pretty handy today as their prices went higher, and now I am using most of them on my sites and some of my client’s sites as well, that’s because I go always for the best value, mostly a developer membership or option.

This explains how important is it to be ready for the Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals, it’s the right time to purchase your business needs.

Product Deals and Recommendations

I will take you now to the page I’ve prepared for the discounts and deals… I am sure you will say…

Here is where you can access the best Black Friday & Cyber Monday sales and coupons.

P.S. I will be updating this page with more awesome products and great savings, so make sure to visit it over… and over, you will be surprised!

Are You Visiting Any Pro Blogger Events in 2013?

Being a professional blogger is unmatched among the jobs of the world, allowing you to work from home amid comfort, family and friends, and a real lack of common stress-creating circumstances found in more traditional workplaces.

That’s not to say that hard work isn’t involved, though, and one area where effort is extra important is in staying ahead of your peers and competitors in order to offer readers the kind of content that encourages clicks, subscriptions, and return visitors.

Give yourself an extra weapon as you battle the millions of bloggers vying for the public’s attention by making travel plans that include professional growth – check out one or more of these four pro blogger events in 2013:

1. New Media Expo 2013

No matter why you blog, new media is your platform, making NMX 2013 in Las Vegas a perfect way to start your year of blogging off on the right foot! A huge event that draws thousands of attendees from all over the world, there isn’t a single subject that won’t be covered by someone at NMX, giving you the opportunity to rub shoulders with colleagues from every facet of working on the web, including designing, writing, marketing, and everything in between!

Whether you’re well-established online or just starting out, you’ll find the workshops, lectures, educational tracts, and networking opportunities here unbeatable and more than worthwhile, allowing you to leave refreshed, inspired, and with all of the new tools that you’ll need to make 2013 a memorable one for your business!

When and Where: As if you need an excuse to visit, NMX will take you to Las Vegas, Nevada from January 6-8, 2013, giving you the backdrop you need to kick 2013 off right in every way!

2. TBEX Canada ’13

Promising to be the largest gathering of travel writers, bloggers, and industry-related media designers in the world, TBEX is absolutely unmissable if you are a blogger in the travel niche. This two-day conference will feature a series of workshops and educational sessions that will focus on how to be successful in the niche, whether you’re a blogger or a web-savvy agent.

Learning opportunities aside, there isn’t a better place on Earth for travel bloggers to get to know one another, setting the stage for an endless array of potential partnerships and collaborations, and helping you to leave with the new goals and the new contacts that you need to take your web endeavors to the next level.

When and Where: The AllStream Centre in Toronto, Ontario will play host to TBEX Canada ’13 on June 1-2, 2013, giving you an opportunity to experience the great white north during its glorious green summer!

3. BlogHer 2013

Women in the blogosphere are a quickly growing force, unleashing a torrent of fresh, new ideas onto the web and making their contribution known to all. In order to meet other like-minded ladies for technical chat and valuable educational opportunities, the BlogHer Conference brings female bloggers together for learning, sharing, and growing to be had by all.

While the focus here is female bloggers, their male counterparts are certainly welcome to come take it all in, as well!

When and Where: BlogHer 2013 will make its return to Chicago from July 25-27, 2013, giving you a beautiful place to explore over the course of the three-day event. Need accommodations? Check out Chicagohotels.org for great rates around the city!

4. Fitness and Health Social Media Conference

If you blog under the fitness and health category, consider paying a visit to the American Midwest in order to meet your colleagues and learn from the best of them in this highly focused four-day event that promises to help you to take your blogging and social media game up a notch.

When and Where: The 2013 edition of the Fitness and Health Social Media Conference will run from September 26-29, 2013, in Boulder, Colorado.

Coffee Addict Starbucks Cake, Want Some?

Hey everyone, we are about to enter a whole New Year. I personally had a good 2012,  and I hope you’ve enjoyed big success in business, and on the personal side as well.

I wish I could meet all of my online friends and fellow bloggers in person. I would love it if we all live in one big city. I remember when I first moved to the States, I had no friends that time being in a new country, and doing my work from home office, so there is no much for me out there, but I couldn’t handle it for so long, I felt the need to change my mode and work atmosphere, probably the whole work space. That’s how it all started.

I used to hangout by myself twice a week in a near by Starbucks to have my triple espresso and enjoy a sunny day.

Just like any other online social network we know, I think of Starbucks as a social network, the only difference is that it’s an offline social network. So, I’ve decided to move my work space over there whenever I feel to. The good thing is I had the chance to meet with some cool people, I work, and enjoy my addiction to coffee.

Coffee Addict?

Not sure if you know this, but I am a coffee addict, I never say no to a good cup of Turkish coffee, but because Starbucks doesn’t offer it, I go with three shots of espresso as it’s the closest thing to what I am used to.

Oh, and speaking about coffee, you should check my friend Danijela‘s blog CoffeeStylish.com, it’s all about coffee.

Anyways, to cut it short, here is your share of the Starbucks cake

Starbucks Cake

Yes, that’s what I am talking about

Yesterday, I had a nice Starbucks cake with my offline friends haha, I’ve ordered it especially for that night, so basically it’s a custom made cake, and it taste coffee. Anyways, nothing is left, so don’t get excited.

Want some? check out these pics and imagine you was there, that’s the beauty of the internet

Shots has been taken by Trevor Stockman‘s Camera.

My wishes for more success at 2013.

4 Top Industry Tricks to Increase Your Website Traffic

If you have a website, you know the most important thing is traffic. You need people to come to your website.

Whether you have a blog and need readers or you have an online store that needs sales, traffic is the measure by which a website’s success is measured.

Every day online businesses are competing by researching and experimenting in new ways to increase traffic. Here are some top industry tricks of the trade, you should keep in mind.

Add Content Consistently

 

Once you have your website up, that is not the end of the line. You need to make sure you are always adding content. This can be extra product pages, blog posts, or any other type of information.

Search engines rank websites with new content higher than those who haven’t had anything added for a while. This means you will get more people to your website.

Additionally, if you have people who regularly visit your website, they are more likely to keep coming back if there is something new to draw them. Most importantly, keep your site alive! Take time each week to post current, up-to-date articles.

Social Networking

Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn are only a few social networking sites you should utilize. These sites help you put your name and your website out there. On social networks, you can promote the site, update users about new content, and even post sales or coupons.

Another great reason to use social networking is it helps contribute to word of mouth. In the age of the Internet, word of mouth no longer means simply telling someone about a company but also “liking” and “tweeting” them. When someone likes a post or sale you have on a social network, their friends will see it. This helps you significantly.

Videos

Search engines love videos. In fact, they are likely to rank videos higher than other content.

Because of this, it is important to get videos on your website. What you want in a video depends on the type of website you have.

Informational videos and funny videos are two popular choices. If you have a website that sells products, you can do a tutorial video on how to effectively use the products. If you have a blog, consider doing a video-blog once in a while. This will help keep your content fresh, as well as giving you the added benefit of having videos on the site.

Sales and Freebies

Any tips on how to increase sales on your site will tell you that one of the best ways to get people clicking is to give something away. Having freebies on your website is not always an option, but it certainly is a great way to get a ton of traffic.

Another option if you simply can’t give something away is to have a sale. Post a coupon code online, and watch the revenue come flowing in. This can be a percentage off any sale, buy-one-get-one-free, or even a certain dollar number off a sale. People love good deals, and when you have a sale, they are more likely to spend money on your site.

Running a website is a full-time job. Many don’t realize the work that goes into having a successful site. If you keep up on your content and marketing, you will soon see your traffic increase.

Resources:

• 10 Proven Ways To Market Your Website (forbes.com)


• How Badly Does Your Business Need a Web Site? (bbb.org)


• How to Increase Website Traffic (wikihow.com)


• How to Drive Traffic to Your Website (foxbusiness.com)


• How to Get Traffic to Your Website for Free (seo-theory.com)


• How to Add Useful Content to Your Site (searchenginejournal.com)

 

Images via Public Domain Pictures by ~ Petr Kratochvil,  Flickr by Gavin Llewellyn,  Flickr by jm3,  Flickr by the UMF

7 Steps to Attract More Advertisers for Your Blog

Ad selling is an important aspect that every blogger explores and wants to learn more about. Advertising a page or blog is not a very easy proposition. The advertisers visit tens of blogs before deciding on where to invest based on a number of relevant factors.

All the bloggers employ various techniques to attract the advertisers. However, uniqueness and appeal of a blog is what sets it apart from the rest. Your goal should be to strongly attract the advertisers’ attention and bind them to your blog. The difference that you portray in your advertising offers is what matters the most.

Here are some of the tips to increase your blog’s advertisement appeal and enhancing your money making prospects via selling ads.

1. Highlight your Blog’s Reputation and Statistics

The reputation and statistics of your blog may be of great appeal to the advertisers. Highlight the good reputation as well as the statistics of your blog in the blogging community.

The statistics such as blog publications, reader count, etc. can greatly engage an advertiser into thinking that your blog is worth trusting.

2. Always Offer Realistic Prices

Do not set unrealistic prices for posting ads on your blog. Prices whether too high or too low can create a negative impact on advertiser’s considerations list.

The price should be attractive and according to advertiser’s budget and expectations. Giving extra offers and discounts can also raise your business prospects sky high as every business entity would love extras and discounts.

3. Bonus Offers

Give attractive bonuses for advertising with your blog. The advertisers, like other professionals, get excited when something is rewarded as a bonus. You can propose propagating the product on other blogs for free or creating a promotional video for advertiser’s products. Such bonuses are really helpful in converting potential advertisers into customers.

4. Free Giveaways

Free giveaways also entice extra attention from advertisers. You can gift a free giveaway e.g. a valuable and costly eBook, software or video to the customers in a particular niche.

This would help you gain considerable attention but make sure that the giveaway you are offering is worth it.

5. Showcase Past Performance

You can also opt to place a video about how other similar product(s) in the past have gained huge sales by posting their advertisement on your blog.

This video can show graphs and interviews from the previous advertising product’s owner. This would definitely attract the advertiser’s attention and they would instantly want to do business with you.

6. Social Media Advertisement

Social media has become a huge aspect in a product’s advertisement simply because of the number of users it possesses. Show the potential advertisers how you can help their product get promoted and advertised on the social media.

You can offer to launch an attractive poster, game, application or fan page for a product and all this can be provided at affordable rates. Advertisers would really admire and get attracted to the opportunity of advertising on more than one platform with a single blogging entity.

Show how you can do the same for them at affordable rates without any need of employing a separate advertising agency.

7. Guarantee Results

You can provide a guarantee of results to your advertisers buying ads on your blog. This can be done by offering to refund them their money if they do not achieve a specific number of sales and hits from your blog. Such guarantees add to customer satisfaction as every business entity gives a lot of focus on guaranteed investments. This can instantly convert the advertiser into a customer of your blog.

What technique do you use to attract more advertisers to your blog? Share your ideas via comment below!

Image © Ben Chams – Fotolia.com

6 Ways to Make Money from Your Blog

Just a decade ago, blogs were created as a way to release creativity and to share your ideas with others. While much of the content was valuable, few people dreamed that they could make money by sharing their ideas. Today, there are thousands of blogs out there, and some writers are working off of their websites part-time or even full-time.

Before you get started, consider the top six ways you can possibly make money from your blog.

Choose a Professional Venue

Nothing screams amateur more than a subpar website. At the same time, you don’t want to shell out thousands of dollars to a web designer. This is especially the case if you are just starting out and haven’t made any money off of your blog yet. By choosing a professional website builder, you can rest assured that you will have the templates to enhance your quality content.

Choose Automatic Traffic

Another perk to choosing a website builder is that the venue can automatically help increase traffic to your blog. These companies already have relationships with internet marketers, so they can help create ways to enhance traffic to your site based on keywords and your overall content.

Allow Ad Spots

Ads are another primary method of making money with a blog. By featuring national ads on your blog, you can earn some cash every time a reader views the company’s products or services. While the percentage might be minimal at first, the earnings can add up as your blog and web traffic grows.

Solicit Local Ads

If you have a more specific niche, you might consider soliciting local businesses to advertise on your blog. Generally, this method is utilized by more seasoned bloggers because local businesses are more interested in spending money on more established online publications. By keeping your content fresh and relevant, you can create a sizeable portfolio that will eventually convince businesses to advertise on your blog.

Affiliations

Another money-making method is to allow affiliate links on your blog. For example, if there are books relevant to your niche, you can work with the publisher to create an affiliate link on your website. Every time one of your readers purchases the book, you get a percentage of the cut.

Your Own Goods

Are you the author of a book or an e-book? Do you craft your own goods? Then by all means, add these links to your website!

You will find that both your blog traffic and other business ventures grow stronger when they are connected together in this way.

It takes time to make a web presence with your blog, and this isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme by any means. However, with a little bit of time and perseverance, it is possible to make a part-time income off of your quality blog. All you have to do is learn how to match the right money-making opportunities with the great content you write.

Photo Credit: Svilen Milev

Top 5 Video Learning Resources From Tech Entrepreneurs

I’m a learning geek and a fanatic consumer of educational material – especially the stuff from successful entrepreneurs.

Why? The best lessons are usually from folks who’re actually playing the game – and doing it well.

Below is a list of video resources that I religiously follow:

1. Foundation

URL: Foundation.kr

Description: Hosted by Kevin Rose, Foundation is a video series wherein Kevin interviews influential founders, entrepreneurs and business leaders in the tech community.

2. eCorner at Stanford

URL: Ecorner.Stanford.edu

Description: Imagine being enrolled in Stanford university and walking in a class where successful tech entrepreneurs are sharing their lessons and talking about their stories – this is the experience you’ll get at Stanford University’s Entrepreneurship Corner. They offer over 2000 free videos and podcasts, featuring entrepreneurs and thought leaders from Silicon Valley.

3. Mixergy

URL: Mixergy.com

Description: Hosted by Andrew Warner, Mixergy is a show Andrew interviews other successful tech entrepreneurs and gets their story about how these guys build their business and what lessons his followers can learn from their experience.

I’m a premium member at Mixergy (highly recommended – it’s an absolute goldmine!)

4. Rise To The Top

URL: TheRiseToTheTop.com

Description: If you’re an information marketer, you’ll love this show. Kinda similar to Mixergy, David Siteman Garland interviews people who’re succeeding at building successful online businesses.

5. Startup School

URL: StartupSchool.org and Justin.tv/startupschool/videos

Description: Startup School is an annual event organized by Y Combinator. Their past speakers include the likes of Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Ben Silbermann (Pinterest) and Joel Spolsky (StackExchange). Check the two links – the content is awesome.

What are your thoughts on this? Do you have other favorites?

Sell Products to your Readers instead of Selling your Readers to Advertisers

How are you currently making money from your blog? For many bloggers — indeed, too many — the answer is CPM ads. These are prominent throughout the web. Load up any random blog, and chances are you’ll see many 300-by-250 rectangle display ads, along with the occasional banner, skyscraper, or leaderboard. There is a good reason you see so many blogs employ these CPM ads as their primary source of monetization.

They are easy to implement

It takes such little effort to slap some CPM ad spots on your blog. You just sign up with a service such as AdSense, fill out some basic information, create the ads, and then copy some code onto your blog. There is a downside, though. Nothing good comes easy, and this applies especially to CPM ads. With few exceptions, you won’t make much money off CPM ads. The old guard refer to AdSense as webmaster welfare for good reason.

Stop Selling Readers

It’s easy to think of a blog’s content as its product. After all, the blogger creates the content and then the reader consumes it. But the reader does not pay the blogger, except in the rarest of cases. In some cases this is the end of the transaction. The blogger writes out of pure enjoyment and hopes readers share in that enjoyment. For the majority of bloggers, though, there is a monetary aspect to consider.

If readers aren’t directly paying the blogger for the content, then the content is not the product. With CPM ads, the monetary exchange occurs between the blogger and the advertiser. The advertiser is paying for the blogger’s audience. Therefore, the readers themselves are the product. The content is merely a vehicle for attracting that product. The blogger is, in essence, selling his audience to an advertiser.

Bloggers who have not thought about the blogger-reader-advertiser relationship in that manner might feel a bit uneasy at first. After all, we all value our readers. Unfortunately, by monetizing our blogs with CPM ads, we implicitly devalue our audiences. We allow advertisers to value them, while we the bloggers value the advertisers for the income they provide us.

If you’d like to change this paradigm, you are not alone. We can create a better environment, both for ourselves and our readers, if we cut down on the level to which we sell our audiences to advertisers.

Start Selling To Readers

People don’t pay for blogs, because they are a dime a dozen. Even if your blog stands out in your niche, chances are you can’t put up a paywall and start charging readers. Only in the rarest cases is this possible, and it usually comes from bloggers who already posses unique knowledge of a niche. The rest of us have to look for alternative methods for income generation if we want to avoid selling our audiences to advertisers.

The answer lies in the the age-old profession of sales. Instead of using our blogs as vehicles to attract an audience, which we sell to advertiers, we can use our blogs as vehicles to attract an audience, to whom we then sell products and services — directly or indirectly. This works out in favor of both bloggers and readers.

It works for bloggers, because we retain more control over the situation. When we place ads on our blogs, we are dividing our audiences’ attentions. The more they pay attention to the ads, the less they pay attention to us and our content. By offering the products and services directly, we retain control over the audience’s attention.

It works for readers, because they are no longer bombarded by often-random advertisements. Instead of receiving a message from whatever advertiser that chose to pay for a certain spot, they receive 100 percent of the message straight from the blogger. That is, there is no third party involved. That makes life easier for the reader.

How can you start selling to your readers? The process is anything but simple, but the payoff will prove worth the effort if done properly.

Types of Products To Sell

At this point many bloggers will find themselves baffled. They merely create content. How are they supposed to start selling products? Again, the transition is anything but simple. You can’t just slap product endorsements on a site, as you would CPM ads. It takes some finesse and skill. The first step is identifying the different sales methods available.

1. Affiliate Sales. Affiliate marketing has been a buzz word around the net for several years now. The industry can feel intimidating, because many of its biggest players have been in the game for over a decade at this point. But that doesn’t preclude new entrants.

The model of affiliate marketing is quite simple. Retailers want to attract the largest possible audience, but don’t have the resources, in terms of both time and money, to market to niches. They can focus only on the mass market, which will bring them the largest number of sales. In order to reach niches, they offer a commission to third parties who market their products. Bloggers can jump on this by marketing these products, inciting readers to click coded links that tell the retailer to pay the blogger a commission.

2. Product Resales. Chances are you won’t be able to manufacture or even store your own products to sell. That’s just too large an operation. But you can take advantage of wholesalers that allow third parties to resell their products. This works in a similar manner to affiliate sales, except it places more of the burden on the seller. But with this additional burden comes additional revenue opportunities.

When affiliates sell products to readers, they redirect those readers to the retailer’s website, where the entire transaction takes place. When bloggers act as resellers, though, they control the transaction. They market and advertise the products, they secure the sale, and they take the customer’s information. The only place they’re not involved is with shipping, because any wholesaler worth doing business with offers drop shipping. Interested bloggers can browse sites such as Top Ten Wholesale to find wholesalers to work with.

3. Direct Sales. Yes, bloggers can create their own products to sell directly to readers. These typically come in the form of information products: books, videos, audio programs, and other methods of disseminating information. This content comes at a premium; it is not information they can find easily on blogs, and it is usually presented in a novel format. While direct sales take the most time, since the blogger has to invest in both product creation and marketing, the reward potential is much higher. Save for a few transaction fees, the blogger keeps all of the revenue.

What You Need

If you want to change the paradigm and start selling to readers, rather than selling your readers to advertisers, you’ll need a few things before you start. These typically aren’t difficult to find or obtain, thankfully.

• Affiliates will need a source of companies that offer affiliate programs. Many of them offer directly on their websites, but others go through affiliate exchanges such as Commission Junction.


• Affiliates, Resellers, and Sellers will all need a few lessons in content marketing. There are some differences between blogging for entertainment and blogging for marketing. Services such as the Content Marketing Institute can provide valuable content lessons that will get you on your way.


• Resellers and Sellers will need a transaction processing system, such as an Intuit merchant account. This is how they accept credit cards and other payment forms.


• Sellers will need content creation mechanisms, such as word processors and PDF compilers for ebooks, audio software and microphones for audio programs, and a video camera for videos.

With these items in hand, it’s time to get started changing your relationship with your audience. Sure, there is still a time and place for CPM advertising. I can provide a nice supplement to income earned in other ways. But for bloggers who want a real monetization method, look to sales for the answer. The hurdles will prove more difficult, but the payoff will be greater for both you and your audience.

Image © momius – Fotolia.com

Turning Your Blog into an Online Store

Blogging is a great way to share your ideas, knowledge and experiences for the world to see. It’s a fantastic way to build a personality around a brand or product as well. But part of creating a brand is having a marketable product. Whether that product is something you have created yourself or something you review on your site, using software like Amazon’s ecommerce platform makes it easier than ever.

If you’re looking to sell your products, whether they’re materials reflecting your brand, your book, handmade goods, etc., here’s a breakdown of what you need to make your online store successful.

Necessary Features

1. Search Box: It’s important to make it as easy as possible for customers to find what they’re looking for on your site. A search box allows them to quickly refine results.


2. Featured Products: You can attract visitors’ attention to specific products by featuring photos and information about them on your home page.


3. Tip: You can push multiple products by showcasing them in a slide show, so customers don’t have to click through each one.


4. Related Products: Up-sell by showing customers what others bought with the products they’re interested in.


5. Product Photos and Zoom: Online shopping is a different experience than going to a physical store, because the only way to judge a product’s quality is to look at it. It’s crucial to display quality photos that viewers can zoom in on to see details of your products.


6. Customer Login: To make it easier for return-customers to check out, allow them to create usernames and passwords so they don’t have to enter their information every time.


7. Privacy and Return Policies: Customers will gain peace of mind about the reliability of buying from your store if they can read your policy of protecting their personal and financial privacy. Also, if you offer a return policy for your products, they are more likely to buy in times of indecisiveness.


8. Payment System: Obviously you need a gateway to receive payment, so it’s important to show icons of accepted means of payment, and a clear checkout section (like a shopping cart). You should also send a confirmation/receipt to the customer’s email.


9. Social Media Links: You’ll get more traffic on your site if you have a presence in social media, so show customers where you can be found and encourage them to “Like” your page.

Customer Perspective

It might help you to look at your store through the eyes of the customer, and focus on the things they want in a shopping experience. These are some things that online shoppers like to see.

 

1. Design/Easy Navigation: It’s inconvenient to have to click all over the site to find one product they’re looking for, so organize your products in an easy-to-find design. Pick a theme or design that really creates a good balance between design and ease of use. There are plenty of free website templates out there, so don’t settle, pick one that meets your needs.


2. Easy Checkout: The same goes for checking out. Minimize the number of steps buyers have to go through to make their purchase so they don’t change their minds out of frustration.


3. Contact Information: If a shopper has a question or issue, they need access to someone who can help. A good way to offer help is to display contact information or an online chat.


4. Now you have everything you need to start making those sales!

 

Image © rangizzz – Fotolia.com

Do Facebook Ads Work?

Many people -especially internet marketers- are curious to know whither Facebook Ads work or it’s just another way of wasting money compared to Google Adwords, which proven it works.

Facebook’s strategy is based on the premise that “social” is the future of online advertising. It’s the idea that recommendations from friends and companies alike are going to be more effective than traditional display advertising at driving consumer behavior.

That’s the theory, anyway. But is it true?

Do Facebook Ads Even Work?

I actually don’t know, but I would love to discover the truth, especially that I see many people claim to make money on Facebook.

I found this infographic that shows Google Ads vs Facebook ads, looks like both advertisement platforms works, but which one is better?!

What’s your experience?

Have you tried Facebook Ads or Google Adwords ? What’s your experience?

The Use of Social Media for Financial Services Companies

We have all heard of the power of social media to transform internet start-ups into online juggernauts, and the far-reaching impact of a proper social media platform on a company’s brand cannot be denied.

Consumer brands have fully embraced the latest trends, but can the same be said for financial services companies?

Benefits are difficult to measure

As the benefits are much more difficult to measure for financial services companies, more and more companies are being asked to truly explain the effectiveness of social media.

The hesitation in adopting a more sustained social media strategy, in part due to the fact that tangible results are difficult to define, is widespread among many financial services companies. Companies that may have tried using Twitter or Facebook to build brand recognition are now abandoning those strategies and turning back to more traditional forms of communicating with the public.

There are countless stories of inappropriate pictures or tweets from companies that use social media, and these miscues can be crippling for a company looking to build a consistent image. The public will always remember the mistakes a company makes and rarely recognize the good messages that are communicated.

As a result, companies are more wary of minimizing their downside risk with any missteps and instead focused on communicating a single unified message.

One real benefit that social media gives a company is…

A wide range of statistics and information related to company reputation, brand image and performance measurement.

Many of these statistics are completely foreign to traditional competitive intelligence departments and a consistent data mining process is now needed to properly digest this plethora of information available.

The real challenge of financial services companies

Perhaps that is the real challenge of financial services companies – being able to develop a corporate strategy to consistently track and retrieve information gathered from benchmarking statistics related to social media.

A company deciding to implement a social media strategy must first ask itself what the benefits might look like. If they are not able to track and measure those benefits, it is ineffective to employ such a strategy. Not only will results be difficult to measure, even if a strategy is effective the company will have no way to understand and track what the benefits of such a strategy would look like.

With proper analysis more and more firms will be able to answer whether or not social media is a worthwhile tool or merely a passing fad.