The timing could not have been better for this theme as I finally got around to setting up one of my favorite affiliate site ideas yet, that is Miche Bag Reviews. I’m confident exposing this site because it is a niche that is a personal passion of mine and I don’t think anyone would be able to match that, even if they decide to get into this niche.

Anyways, back to my review of the In Review theme. Just as all of the other themes from Elegant Themes go, this theme was simple to install and use. I prefer to upload all of my themes through FTP, so that’s how I installed it. I don’t know about you, but whenever I try to upload a theme or a plugin from my hard drive, I seem to run into problems.

Once uploaded, I had to change the logo on the theme for the header, I just used their blank template and typed in the name of my site using Gimp.

Then I went an updated my options through ePanel which I’ve shown here. Through the ePanel, you can pick and choose which pages are shown in the main menu of the site. You can also add Adsense code which would be shown on each page. Instead of using Adsense code, I decided to add a banner into this slot instead. It shows up right above the comments at the end of each post.

I also changed the navigation menu in ePanel to not show any of the categories in the navigation bar. I did this because I was getting duplicate navigation bars at the top of the blog and it looked real silly. One thing I could do is show my pages in the nav bar at the top of the blog and not show any categories, but for right now, I’m real happy with how things have turned out. Epanel is also where you would change the main color of your blog if you’re interested in that as well.

One thing I would like to point out if you are planning on using this theme, is you will need to add a thumbnail to every post in order to use the Timthumb script which is integrated right into the theme. This is real easy, all you have to do is add a custom field called “Thumbnail” at the end of your post, then enter the URL of your picture. If you choose not to use the thumbnail option, then this part is not necessary. Just like all of their other themes, this one is very well documented and I highly recommend reading through the help docs before getting too far into using this theme. They were very helpful for me. Otherwise, the forums at Elegant Themes are a great way to get answers to your questions as well, I have found it extremely helpful.

If you can’t guess, I would give the In Review Theme 5 stars if I was using it here at this blog. It is an excellent way to set up a review site if it’s in your plans for the future. AQ2BYRK9E73X

Originally posted 2011-05-14 14:45:36. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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1. Upgrading to the Interphase Theme
2. My Wizzley Review

One blog that particularly comes to mind is Vic’s internet marketing blog at Blogger Unleashed. Vic would post almost everyday with a great tip about how to make money online and truly cared that people make it. One day Vic didn’t post and someone got pissed about it. Come on people, he was giving you his secrets for free and you were getting pissed about him not posting. This truly hurt him which is why he took his teachings to a private forum at The Affiliate Academy. Unfortunately, I had to move on from his private forum, but I really did learn a lot from him and I really do appreciate it. The story I just told is just the tip of the iceberg, the whole situation really stressed Vic out and eventually made him very sick.

If you can’t tell by now what I’m getting at then I’ll just spell it out for you. The main reason that a lot of the good info about how to make money online is charged for is the people giving out the information are not appreciated when they give out their secrets for free. The other main reason is to weed out the people that are just looking for a free ride or think that they are can just put a website up and bing they are rich. If you are willing to pay $29 for an ebook or $39 per month for a membership site, then you must be somewhat serious about starting an online business.

It saddens me to say that charging for information does not weed out all of those that are looking for a free ride to working at home; these are the people that will shell out their money and two days after finishing the book or reading through a membership forum they are yelling scam because they don’t have $5,000 in their bank account yet. If you are one of these people that thinks this way, please just keep working your 9-5 job everyday and don’t even try to get your online business started.

While it is true that a lot of the information about how to make money online is available on blogs and websites for free, it will take you a lot of time to gather all of this information together and then make any sense of it to put it to good use. So if you truly believe that a membership or ebook will help you, then by all means spend the money on it, but I beg you to put the information to good use to make sure you are not throwing your money out the window.

This is just a little rant that I’ve been meaning to write about for a really long time now.

Originally posted 2009-09-20 18:42:49. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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1. What Is One Week Marketing? Can You Make Money With It?
2. Should You Build a Free Page or Your Own Niche Site?
3. My Making Money Online Quote

What I can’t understand is why Google would want to allow a software on its browser (it’s great, I highly recommend it) that would kill the bulk of their business. As an investor in Google, I’m not real happy about the loss in revenue. So what if I make money from you clicking on an add that appears on my website? Would you rather have me charge for my services? If this software is successful, that’s the way the web is headed.

That’s all I have for now.

Until later,

Originally posted 2011-02-15 21:25:37. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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One of the things that I love about OWM is the fact that you don’t have to do it in one week, I highly recommend working through the checklist for each niche you choose as fast as you can so you can start earning money, but if you work full time or have other commitments, you can definitely take your time working through the checklist for each niche you choose. I cannot recommend it enough for people that work because of the simplicity of the entire course.

I do not recommend One Week Marketing to those of you who may be looking to make money tomorrow without lifting a finger. I also cannot recommend OWM if you are already familiar with how to build a web property and get traffic to it. You may learn a thing or two, but I do not think it’s worth the money for the intermediate to advanced internet marketer. If you have found yourself in the boat where you have some knowledge, but are looking for the pie in the sky, take what you have learned and put it to work. Just start experimenting and you should have some success and STOP SPENDING MONEY ON MORE EBOOKS.

if you are still reading this, then I’m assuming you have determined that OWM may be right for you to start making money online. Follow the steps that are put in front of you in the course and you can make money. However, some things have changed since One Week Marketing first hit the market and I would recommend some small changes be made in your efforts while you are going through this step by step course.

Since I’m getting a little long winded already, I’m going to save my recommended changes for future posts over the next week or two. To make sure you don’t miss any of these suggested changes, I recommend subscribing to my blog, which you can do along the right hand side of the page. Not only will you be notified of new posts, but you will also receive a free ebook about building an optin list. You may not be quite ready for a list, but it will be a nice piece of information to have when you are ready.

Also, if you are on the fence about One Week Marketing, make sure you download this free Squidoo Guide and the first 18 pages of OWM to get a flavor of what you will be learning.

Until later,

Originally posted 2010-08-27 07:07:18. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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2. Did Squidoo Kill One Week Marketing?
3. Make Money Online Information – Why It Is Difficult To Find For Free

I’m not going to rehash what they wrote, you can read more about the Blogpress SEO plugin scam at their blog.

If you are using WordPress, make sure you disable and delete this plugin right away and follow the instructions given to you at their website. Keeping WordPress secure is difficult enough, we don’t need to be letting the hackers in voluntarily.

That’s all I have for today, but I should have a lot more good stuff coming in the near future.

Until later,

Originally posted 2010-11-13 15:32:31. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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In case you are skeptical, I will not be charging anything for the setup services, as long as you sign up through one of the links offered on the page and then let me know that you did this through my contact form. I will make money as a commission from your monthly hosting fees, but I will never ask you for anything to set your site up.

As of today I have added Wealthy Affiliate as an option for my services. In case you didn’t know, WA offers hosting with their monthly fee and if you are a member, to not take advantage of the hosting services offered is just crazy since you are paying for it.

That’s all I have for now, I’ve been pretty busy working on a couple of projects, but I will make sure to post when I think of some other worthwhile subjects.

Until later,

Originally posted 2009-08-22 12:28:56. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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The dying off of traffic and the Google changes have really hit me hard. I was on a role of publishing a new lens or hub every 2 days (almost to my goal of 1 a day), but then this change came along and really made me start to rethink everything. When this happens, I become almost frozen, not doing a darn thing online or even at home because I have once again taken a hit in traffic which turns into a hit on my income.

This isn’t the first time something like this has happened to me. Remember when eBay went from a per sale payout to a pay-per-click payout? That change really hit me hard because along with that change came a rule that you cannot use EPN affiliate links on a site that you do not own. I had to change about 30 lenses that were using EPN links from my own to Squidoo’s. My income took a dip by a ton. Once again, I was frozen not wanting to publish anything because my world was upside down.

My whole point of this is change happens fast in the affiliate marketing business and you need to be able to deal with change in order to be successful. If you can’t deal with change, then you should find a different way to build your online income.

I have started to add more content to the lenses that have taken a hit. This whole task is really daunting, I have 157 lenses and at least half of them need some editing to bring them up to par. This daunting task is what has frozen me which is why I needed to come up with a new action plan. I am more productive when I’m producing new content and then the editing comes easier, so what I’m going to do is get back on task to building a new page every day and then once I’m done, I’ll move on to editing my old content. I will also start to look for new opportunities to build my own websites because relying on what someone else owns is not a good idea.

Have you ever had a problem dealing with change in AM? How did you handle it? I’d like to know.

Until later,

Originally posted 2011-03-18 06:55:29. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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One of the people I have met online over the last three years is Josh who is now the CEO at Echelon Media. When I first found him, he had just started his blog, Unconventional Marketing.

Josh is now starting an experiment and writing a book about it. His social experiment is called “Will You Be My Friend” and he is going to try to befriend as many people as he can and then cultivate those relationships into real life friendships. At the end he will try to visit the top 20-25 friends in real life and see what happens. You can read more about Josh’s experiment on his blog post, Will You Be My Friendand if this sounds like something you would be interested in you can follow Josh on Twitter at @TheRealJosh and you can become Josh’s Friend on Facebook as well.

I’d like to wish Josh well with his idea as it is really unique.

Originally posted 2010-05-17 07:16:11. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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icanhascheezburger.com

Everybody that is trying to make money online knows the story of YouTube. Three guys start a website from scratch where users can share their videos with others online and two years later (a very short time span in the business world) the site is purchased by Google for $1.65 billion in stock options.

I think many people starting out online have delusions of grandeur that their site is going to be the next YouTube, when in reality these stories are the exception and not the norm. There is a misconception that if you build a website then you will receive traffic and then you will get rich is totally perpetuated by those that are in the business of selling every make money online business in an ebook that is released to the public.

If you would like to be knocked down another peg, please read Seth Godin’s post, Hope and the magic lottery. Don’t take either of us the wrong way, we’re both just encouraging you to avoid shortcuts, but keep building on what is working for you. If you are constantly chasing the magic lottery, then you are not working on building your business which is what really matters most.

The harsh truth is, you can make money online, but it does take time and effort. You are not going to be able to just put up a WordPress blog, slap a couple of posts on it sprinkled with Adsense and get rich overnight. If you start your affiliate marketing journey in this fashion, I would put money on the fact that you are going to fail. You will get frustrated and give up because your site is not receiving any traffic which means you are not making any money.

If I haven’t burst your bubble yet, then your mindset is right to start an online affiliate business. I can guarantee you are going to fail along the way, but that is the only you are going to learn. By all means, if you have the skills, connections and know how to start the next YouTube, please go for it. If you are just an average Joe that doesn’t even know what HTML is, please get started, just be realistic.

Until later,

Originally posted 2010-06-19 22:38:07. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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First of all, I’d like to state that the owners of Squidoo are just protecting their site and it’s value. They have seen the effects that bad writing has had on its site and realized that they can no long sit back and defend the junk lenses. This was kind of what I was getting at in my recent post about the difference between spam and poor or promotional writing, many times the two were getting confused and people were calling the junk spam and vice versa. What Squidoo no longer wants on their site are pure copies of sales pages for products or lenses that link to the same site 800 times within a lens as well as lenses on some certain subjects which I’m not going to go into detail about here. Visit the Squidoo policy update lens if you’d like to read more about what will or won’t be allowed.

When Potpiegirl wrote One Week Marketing, I’m pretty sure her intentions weren’t for people to go out and create a bunch of cookie cutter lenses with the same content that were overly promotional. She never did say if you don’t know something about a subject, just copy and paste it from somewhere else or go and get some PLR and reuse it directly on a lens. If you are building lenses with useful content written with your own voice, then you should be fine under the new rules. This is where their policies should help you; Squidoo killing off some of the junk lenses should make their site more valuable in Google’s eyes which will hopefully make it easier for your lens to be indexed. I don’t know about you, but I have been having a hell of a time getting a new lens indexed lately and my opinion is this policy update should help this problem. Of course, I could be totally wrong here too.

If you don’t think you can write your own useful content, then cut Squidoo out of the picture all together and find another free site you can use in its place, keeping all of the other steps the same. Build a blog on Blogger or sign up with Weebly. If you’re not comfortable writing good content, say away from Hub Pages, you will be eaten alive there. The best ideas are either build your own site on  your own webhosting service or learn to write. I know the idea behind OWM is making money online using free services, but the other idea behind it is to work towards owning your own sites; build your own site like you would build your lenses and then use the OWM techniques to drive traffic to your own site. Sorry if I sound a little harsh, but there is no quick way to making money online and you need learn to evolve or you will always be dreaming instead of doing.

Are you going to have to change the way you do things because of Squidoo’s new rules?

Originally posted 2009-06-19 07:08:06. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

Related posts:

1. What Is One Week Marketing? Can You Make Money With It?
2. 4 Day Money Making Blueprint – The Missing Link for One Week Marketing
3. How to Get Started on Squidoo