Google AdSense has stated that you should not do the following:

1) Put pictures next to ads, since it may be misleading to visitors, and result in not-so-valid clicks.
2) Make sure your ads stand out from your content, so visitors are not duped into clicking them by accident, resulting in MORE no-so-valid clicks.

And then, today, on the Google AdSense blog (http://adsense.blogspot.com/) they have the following article: Building With AdSense (http://adsense.blogspot.com/2008/03/building-with-adsense.html)

Ok, so they site is nice, OK, whatever. I'll probably be back to browse through the various projects they have listed there.

My point of contention is as follows: They included a link to the site owners wifes website, and from the look of it she is clearly in violation of both of the above guidelines.

Now, I know, some may argue "Hey! Maybe she is a premium publisher, who Google lets break the rules!" and I have seen sites like that. But they are usually larger (say something like About.com) sites, with higher volumes. Actually, I have no idea what the site traffic volume is for her site, so I'll bite my tongue here.

When an AdSense publisher sees a site like hers, they can think one of two ways:
1) I can do that too!
2) I can't do that because my site/traffic sucks.

You either have to be negligent of the TOS, or feel inferior.

The site does good, at least that is how I feel, by not having ads on the front page:

And the sub-pages are laid out nicely, except for the clearly not right ad layout:

Misleading or artistically laid out? You tell me. They are making money, that's for sure. I know WHEN I put up a site like this, I will expect Google to be on-board with it also. It's only fair.

Maybe Google needs to issue a disclaimer graphic for sites like this: "I AM GOOGLE AND I APPROVE THIS WEBSITE AD PLACEMENT." :-)

So, Operation BootCamp is hot as the latest thing in exercise, but unless you live in the metro Atlanta area and Knoxville, you are out of luck!

OR ARE YOU?

There are many local bootcamp style exercise businesses you can join. Some have a military slant, others are for teens.

If you want to bootcamp in the privacy of your own home, try one of the following:

Get out there, and GET FIT!

Boot Camp Exercise Related News:

• in the service - South Coast Today
• The team from 'The Wire' takes on the Iraq war - Boston Globe
• Cooney graduates from boot camp - Reporter-Times
• Father of the bride boot camp - Chicago Tribune
• Michael Vaughan gets knee injection ahead of South Africa test - Sunday Mirror
• Veterans' Financial 'Boot Camp' Prepares for Financial Security - Tri State Observer
• Choi Hong-man to Return to Ring - 코리아타임즈
• FitLinxx Puts Customers Through Training 'Bootcamp' With Brainshark - Market Wire (press release)
• Crested Butte Mountain Resort Gears Up For Next Winter - ropeways.net
• The TAC Report Lists Findings From the School's Attorney - RedOrbit

This is a great example of linkbait.

It draws you in with its tabloid-style headline, seemingly going to tell you that Nicholas Cage and a pregnant teen are in a movie together.

The tabloid-itis part of us sees 'Nicholas Cage Gets Teen Co-Star Pregnant.'

While, if you take care to notice the comma, it is actually saying 'a movie Nicholas Cage is in and a movie about a pregnant teen are hot items in the theaters right now.'

Crafting titles such as the example in the heading of this post is a skill that take some practice. Once you have attained the level of deception required to harness this skill, you will be able to create this sort of crap easily.

I call it crap because that is what it is. Crap. Pure and simple.

Maybe the title above was not meant to be linkbait-sounding, but it is, at least to my jaded ears(eyes?).

Most likely, if the article was titled "Nicholas Cage Film And Movie About Pregnant Teen Top Box Office" and I was any of the following, I would have read the article anyway:

1. A Nicholas Cage fan
2. Interested in a movie about a pregnant teen
3. Interested in what movies were at the top of the box office

But alas, many who are none of the above will read the article to see who got knocked up and what is going to happen! They want the bloody car crash, the failed plastic surgery, the "Britney 'Wigs' Out" news. Is it news? No, it's pop culture gossip and trash. My god, that bores me so these days…

Ok, off my soapbox.

I have been known to try some linkbait titles before, but I don't believe I have ever tried to insinuate a troubled affair such as mentioned in that article.

When writing your linkbait, think about how it could be taken by those who read it. Negatively that is…

Here are two forum signatures that Russell Brunson recommends to use to give away his new FREE report: The IM Myth.

#1

#2

Which one do you like more?

I'm going to read the report soon and I'll let you know what *I* think of it.

"Brick walls are there for a reason. They let us prove how badly we want things."
— Dr. Randy Pausch

I'm not dumb. I'm not dense. I just have a hard time understanding some things without concrete explanations and examples.

I received an email from MS AdCenter today regarding one of the campaigns I have had running for, say, 9 months…

The part that I can show speaks for itself:

Account: Xxxxxxx
Campaign: xxxx Campaign
Ad group: xxxx1

xxxxx xx xxxx ????? zzzzz
xxxxx zzzzz xxxx xx xxx xxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxxxx
somedomain.com

Reasons for rejected keywords:
aaaaa zzzzz

* Landing page content not relevant

bbbbb zzzzz

* Landing page content not relevant

ccccc zzzzz

* Landing page content not relevant

ddddd zzzzz

* Landing page content not relevant

eeeee zzzzz

* Landing page content not relevant

61 of 76 keywords did not meet Editorial Guidelines.

Just to give you an idea:
????? = variable keyword
zzzzz = common keyword
aaaaa - eeeee = other variable keywords that are NOT mentioned on the page or in the ad, but are related.


I have always known the rule:

Make sure your keyword/phrase is in the title of the ad, in the ad, possibly in the display URL, in the URL path, in the page name, in the TITLE tags, in the H1 tags, in the 1st paragraph, in the last paragraph and at the bottom of the page, not to mention gingerly applied throughout the content of the page.

But in this case it was a quick setup many many months ago, before I knew all that…

Time to go back and revamp that campaign and landing page… err…. landing site (soon to be!).

Sometimes you just have to try to do things that you may not think will work. Like this free website offer that can make you money.

How will it make you money? Well, instead of researching all the products (probably from ClickBank) that convert well, they do it for you, offer you a website that you promote, and then you get a cut of THEIR commission. At least that is the way most of these sites work.

Is that bad? I dunno. That's why I am testing this. I have and still sell a number of ClickBank products, some are more successful than others. It is hit-and-miss. But the time it takes to find a product and then create a landing page/site/whatever for it may not be worth it, if this test ends up working.

Look at it this way: You can't go wrong, you only loose a little affiliate commission. Like the folks who put their products on eBay via the UPS Store, and the USP Store takes a percentage, they are still making sales, and paying someone else to do the dirty work.

Sounds good to me! I'll update this post when/if I get my first sale. Now… I have to go and to promote my store…

Ok, deep breaths. In - out - in - out… repeat until calm…

Sorry about that, but I am freaking out a little today. My Google AdWords campaigns are basically not moving (spend of $0.06 when I should be at least $10.00 by this point today) and that translates in less traffic to my AdSense pages, which should be around $20 or so, at the least… If not for some MSN traffic, it'd be a bust today!

I don't know what happened. I am not a spammer and not a slogger. My account has not been canceled, no warnings, nothing.

Just BLAM-O!

I emailed Google to see if they could tell me what's up, and will wait to see if they can help.

I know some had been discussing the $10/click update that happened, but that was a few days ago, and I was fine up to last night.

Good thing I have been diversifying some! Not enough, but started at least…

I'll post whatever I find out… IF I can find out anything…

I wonder if I have that site had been added to someones blocking list… Not good…

Ok, first a quick story:
Yesterday I was driving to work on the freeway, and traffic was slowing down. I was about a car length from the car in front of me. We were stopped. From the right side of the car I saw a motorcycle zoom between the cars, riding the line and cut right in front of me. I honked at him, and he shot me the finger. Not just once, but held it there, waving it around. He didn't even look at me. This went on for about 15 seconds, and he decided to take off, going between stopped cars, and ride the line at least half a mile up the freeway.

Now I was steamed. WHY did this JERK think he was better than the rest of us. Yes, he had the ability to zoom in and out of traffic, but it is illegal to do that. I remember back in the 80's there was a big movement: "Kill a biker, go to jail!" While in general I agree with this, because you should be more cautious around a motorcyclist, THEY need to give you the same respect. This guy clearly didn't give a crap about anyone else.

I would not have minded sitting in traffic longer that morning, due to a semi vs motorcycle accident… Mean to say, but I would have no sad feelings for that jerk.

Ok, story over. Why the story? Well, I received an email this morning promoting some software that would build niche sites in minutes. Sounded interesting, but I am very sceptical. I do a quick search for the exact phrase that is the name of the product, and end up with 111 english pages. Looking at one of the links, the blog posting announcing it was made back in March of 2006!

The website the email that I received THIS MORNING had a video that showed how the software worked, and the copyright on the software was 2005! So, a niche site generator that uses PLR articles from their database and sticks AdSense code on the pages that has not been updated since 2005 is being pushed as a product NOW? After all the changes that Google has made, 90% of what the software would do for you, let alone the duplicate content penalty using 2-3 year old articles make this software not only ineffective, but a danger to your AdSense account!

Maybe I am missing something, finding years-old products to push to your list is not the way to operate. I signed up for a free email course from a 'guru' and what did I receive? I was started on the same autoresponder he had been using for over 2 years. THE DATES IN THE EMAILS WERE FROM WHEN THEY WERE ORIGINALLY WRITTEN! He 'taught' lessons that have been of no use for over a year!

Needless to say, I unsubscribed to the 'guru's list, and the one I received that crappy email from this morning.

Treat folks nice, people. Have some respect.

Well it's been awhile since you saw me last, and many things have happened. A couple of Share A Sale offers have made some money, and I added some banners for a certain JoeBucks site to a related site of mine.

I have also kicked a few more niche topic web pages out, via a WordPress post, and pointed some AdWords at it to see if I can get some traffic that way.

I was looking around yesterday and this morning and realized that I have done a lot of keyword research and found some good niches (or at least I think they are!) but have not acted on them yet. Why? Lazy I guess. Always wanting to do everything JUST RIGHT…

Procrastination sucks. I can spend 6 hours on a weekend watching movies with my family but cannot spend half that time trying to make more money for the same loved ones.

I tend to (probably in error) think that the 'time value of money', to me, is that it is worth not making more money if I get to have time with the family. I know it sounds like bullcrap, and maybe it is, but that is how I justify not making more progress than I have.

Anyone else lacking motivation or have 'reasons' that they cannot dedicate more time to their endeavors? Talk to me!

Update!
Now Wal-Mart in Texas has issues a beef recall for 40,000 pounds of pre-packaged beef.
This Wal-Mart Beef Recall effects North Texas!

————————————————————————————

The news below is starting to make pork, chicken and other poultry sound safer to eat. At least for now. Mad Cow could be heading your way, so eat chicken! [grin]

The ground beef recall affects Albertson's, Grocery Outlet, Fry's, Save-A-Lot, Save-Mart, Smart and Final, Smith's, and Stater Bros. The affected stores are in Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, Wyoming and Montana. The packages have a production date of April 20, 2007, a sell-by date of May 6, 2007 and a freeze-by date of May 7, 2007.

If you have meat packaging with those markings, or just to be sure, bring it back to the store you purchased it at to verify if it is part of the recall. You can also call United Food Group's 24-hour toll-free hotline at (800) 325-4164 if you have any questions.

About E. coli:
E. coli is a type of bacteria found in the lower intestines of animals(mammals). Some E. coli strains are harmless, but others can be deadly, or can cause violent stomach cramps, diarrhea, and slight fever. The symptoms can show up within 2 to 4 days, but can also show up 1 to 10 days after eating the ground beef.

News About Beef Recalls:

• Nebraska Beef Recall Blamed on Unsanitary Conditions; Not the ... - Newsinferno.com
• July 06: Feedback from newspaper readers - Daily Press
• Ground Beef Recall - WOAI
• E. coli Outbreak Leads to Massive Beef Recall - eFluxMedia
• Nebraska Beef expands ground beef recall - The Money Times
• Dillons stores voluntarily recall some ground beef - Kansas.com
• Recall alters Fourth of July traditions - KSN-TV
• Kroger Reassures Customers - FOXBusiness
• Beef Recall Expands - KHBZ
• Nebraska Beef Recall Expanded to 5.3 Million Pounds - Consumer Affairs

from: here

Open Source Web Design - Download free web design templates.
Open Web Design - Download Free Web Design Templates
Download free CSS templates - Free CSS Templates
Open Design Community - Download Free Web Design Templates - OpenDesigns.org
The CSS Tinderbox - Open Source Web Design Templates
Open Source Templates | Free CSS and XHTML Website Templates
Free web templates by Art for the web
Free Website Templates, Free Photoshop Web Templates, Website Design
Free Web Templates | Free Flash Templates | Premium Web Templates
http://www.dezinehub.com/
Free Website Templates

I will add more later…

Some Article Directories:
GoArticles.com | ArticleDashboard.com | ContentDesk | SubmitYourArticle.com

Google™
Yahoo™
MSN™
Overture™
AOL™
AltaVista™
Lycos™
AllTheWeb™
HotBot™
Froogle™
Accoona™
AskJeeves™
DogPile™
GigaBlast™
InfoSpace™
Kanoodle™
Looksmart™
MIVA™ (formerly FindWhat)
Netscape Search™
WebCrawler™

Nothing official yet from Google, but according to JenSense, Google AdSense disabling arbitrage publisher accounts as of June 1st.

Webmaster World has this thread, but it looks like they are only going by what Jen said.

And Eric Giguere over at Make Easy Money with Google and AdSense says this.

Here is Shoemoneys' take(video embedded below) on the latest 'adjustment' Google is making to their AdSense service. Adjustment is the wrong word when they talk about killing whole accounts! (Adjustment is MY take on it, and it sucks!)

What does all this mean? I dunno yet. We will have to wait and see what the fallout of this action will be. For the time being though, be safe and careful!

Jill Whalen of High Rankings reveals the nuts and bolts behind the "duplicate content" myth.

I have read the newsletters from Liz for awhile now. I know she is a very prolific writer, and has many great products. That's how she makes her money, right?

WRONG! That is not the ONLY way she makes money. She has revealed in a FREE video how you can make good money via RSS feeds like she does.

Free video? Free as in 'give me your email so I can market to you later, but it is oh-so-easy to unsubscribe' free. Sounds pretty good to me!

Here's the "down and dirty steps" to creating a content site using nothing but RSS feeds.

1. Pick your niche

2. Find RSS feeds by searching RSS feed directories, article sites, and blogs. Make sure that you do have the right to use the feed though. Some sites don't want you to use their RSS feed.

3. Use an RSS aggregator to turn your RSS feeds into code that you can place into your website.

4. Build your site and place the code your RSS aggregator generated and place that on your site to fill it up with content. Add other resources to your site to make it look nice and add value to your visitor.

There's a lot more that goes into it, but that's the basics.

You can get a free step-by-step video tutorial HERE that will show you have to do all the above and more!

Once you've got your content site setup, you'll want to monetize it in some way. Be it Adsense, YPN, other PPC networks, selling links and/or ads, affiliate programs, etc.

RSS Cash also covers the monitization aspects of building these easy content sites too. Head over there right now, and grab the free video tutorial. There's hardly any catch. It really is a free video tutorial. You'll get the full tutorial, all the resources, and more and it wont cost you a dime!

Good Luck!

Interesting video about keyword research using blogs & forums.

I signed up for e-junkie.com today. Seems sorta like Clickbank (digital products) but no way to tell what sells good from what I have seen so far…

We will see….

Affiliate Login

[ Update: Seems Michael Gray had issues with this podcast and the statements also. See his blod post. ]

I love WebmasterRadio and enjoy listening to many of their shows. I have heard much good, and much bad, and often conflicting statements within the same conversation on shows.

One recent example was on Rush Hour, hosted by Neil Patel & Cameron Olthuis, and now cShel. While discussing the latest conference they attended(SESNY), and specifically discussing a panel that Neil was on, comments were made by Cameron regarding information given by Michael Gray (Graywolf).

During this panel, Graywolf talked about monitoring your competition's activities. He even suggested that you could submit a Digg with something your competition created, but with a bad title, so it would not get votes. Beat them to the punch, as it were.

Cameron had an issue with this, but he did not stand up and mention it during the panel. On Rush Hour, he said:

But later in the conversation, he says:

And even Neil got into it by saying:

Now, Cameron first says Social Media Marketing(SMM) is trying to fight off the spammy reputation, but then he says there is a big difference between spamming/gaming and harming competitors.

Neil seems to agree this this, by saying "…this is what I'm probably going to end up doing…", talking about 'friending 10k - 20k people on del.icio.us and hopefully a good portion will friend you back" so your stories will get on the popular page.

Now, maybe it is just me, but it seems that they want their cake (a non-spammy reputation) yet want to eat it too (SPAM!).

That, to me, is talking out of both sides if your mouth.

It is on par with the priest/minister/rabbi that says 'be good' and then proceeds to do evil themselves. Just not quite right.

Pick a side and then stay on it. John Kerry had that problem during his bid for the presidency, flip-flopping back and forth on the issues. That's not really the case here, as there is less/no flip-flopping, but more wanting it both ways at the same time, which are not compatible with each other.

—

Now, I want to note that I am really turned off by this whole 'social' wave that is the current rage, but I do like listening to Rush Hour, and the other Webmasterradio.fm shows. I am in no way picking on Rish Hour, Cameron, Neil or anything like that.

This is actually a first for me, picking out the important parts of a podcast, to highlight them, and embedding them within a post. Not the easiest thing to do, but I had not tried it yet. So there. It's done. Expect more in the future. Hopefully.

Comments are appreciated. Oh, and I know the site sucks for the most part. I'm working on it. As Shoemoney says, just get out there and do it! So I did it. :-)