Ask Me Why… Work From Home

Starting immediately, you’ll get more than just a 24-hour ad spot when you advertise with me on ANY of my four blogs.

Here’s what you get.

When you place your first ad on one of my blogs, I’ll record the purchase price on a spreadsheet. Once your ad is completed, and I’ve been credited with my 25% share of the cost of that ad, I’ll place 25% of that amount into a pool. That means if you pay 80 credits, I get paid 20 and I’ll put 5 into the “Ad credit pool”.

When that pool reaches 200 EC, I’ll hold a drawing and award the lucky winner all 200 credits. Then, the pool will start again. All the names will remain in the pool. That means when you advertise more frequently, your chance of winning is increased.

Beginning with the second time you advertise on the same blog, I will refund 10% (rounded to the nearest credit) of your purchase price, once the ad has run. That means if you place a repeat ad on one of my blogs, and it cost you 75 credits, you’ll get 8 credits back from me.

Once you’ve advertised 10 times with me on ANY of my four blogs, you’ll earn a spot in the blogroll of your choice.

This program only works for you when you are a member of Entrecard. To enroll, go to Entrecard.com. There is no referral program, so no need to hunt around for a special link.

Here are my current stats.

“Success Notes“, a blog about my BookWise business, found in the category “Books”. Ad cost is 123, and as of right now, you can get immediate placement. Yes, it’s before the “Ad Loyalty Program” kicks off, however, I need to “beta testers”, and you can become one. All aspects of the program apply. This site is getting just under 100 visits per day at this time.

This blog will cost you 75 credits today, and yes… you can be a ‘beta tester” here, too. It’s located in Category “Internet Marketing”. This site is getting nearly 90 visits per day for the month of January.

“Ask Shari About PGA Tour Fantasy Golf” is located in the “Sports” category, and will cost you 49 credits today. I need “beta testers” here, too. At the start of the current season, this site is currently averaging 45 visits per day.

“Shari’s Gone Country” is in the category “Personal Diary” and will cost you a mere 33 credits. “Beta testers” are welcome here, too. This site averages about 77 visitors per day.

I look at it this way. When you advertise with me, you show confidence in my ability to improve traffic to my site. I am rewarding you for that effort.

As the traffic increases, you’ll get more bang for your EC. Should the cost of the ad go up, you’ll still get a 10% discount, as well as a more frequent opportunity to win and extra 200 EC, and also a spot on my BlogRoll.

Advertise with me. Tell your friends. After all, the more folks advertising, the faster the “Ad Credit Pool” grows.

With this new program, the “ad rejection” policy is changed as follows. I’ll only reject a site if it contains material not suited for a 7-year-old’s eyes. When you’re in the ad queue and I approve you, your price is locked in.

Yeah, looking back at my last four posts (three weeks time), it appears I’ve been obsessed with Entrecard. Well, yes… I have, but now I’m over it and ready to move forward.

No, I’m not leaving Entrecard, I’m simply working it “smarter”… and you should, too.

I’ve been slapped to my senses by some good friends at ChainDrop. Dane got slapped, and he’s forwarding the favor… so Dane, I’m doing my part.

It’s a case of remembering how your mother always hounded you to send “Thank-you notes” for gifts you received, and deeds done on your behalf. Ya’ know, that applies even more today, as we’re constantly bombarded with rudeness, apathy, and downright ignorance.

What’s that got to do with Entrecard, and my BookWise business?

Everything. Let’s see if I can keep this promise. I’ll lay it out here to show accountability.

I have begun responding to ad requests on my blogs through Entrecard with a personal thank-you note sent through the system.

I’ll also be thanking regular card droppers. Who knows, they may be readers, but the stats won’t tell me. I can see the “Top Ten” regulars, and I can also see the sites (Top Ten) that sent the most traffic by way of my purchased ad on their site. They’ll get notes, too.

Now that I’ve been with Entrecard for just short of a month, I’ll be passing out more frequent “link love” by way of site reviews (especially if you’ve ended up in my favorites folder), and sites that reference very handy tools.

Entrecard, another one of those programs I heard about at least two weeks before I got around to looking at it.

I got my first icon up for Shari’s Gone Country on Dec 20, a mere 10 days ago. So far, my I can see from cPanel that I am getting about 20% more visitors. What’s really nice is the time on my site… 24% spend more than 30 seconds and the average is 370 seconds… over 6 minutes.

My second icon went up for my BookWise blog… Success Notes on Dec 21. This is a very new site (old domain name… gathered up my “lost traffic”). The response is even greater here, as Entrecard is the “primary” traffic driver. Average daily visits have doubled, from 25 to 50 and the average time on the site is 313 seconds… over 5 minutes.

The Entrecard for this blog went up on Christmas Eve. Again my average traffic doubled from 30 t0 60 average unique visitors per day. One visitor liked the article on “Chat Netiquette” so well, he “Stumbled” it… and that resulted in a spike of another 175 visitors. Even with that, I have better than 20% who spend more than one minute and the average is 248 seconds, or just over 4 minutes on the site.

My latest blog… a fun one just went up on Dec 28. It’s a blog I’ve maintained “off and on” for the past two years. This is where I report my PGA Tour Fantasy Golf results. I love the statistics of golf, and really enjoy the challenge of playing fantasy golf. Since it’s on a “blogger” platform, the stats will record differently. At this point, it’s too early to report any meaningful statistics.

So, what can I do with all this increased traffic?

It’s my responsibility to provide my readers/visitors with quality original content. Each blog is specific.

Shari’s Gone Country journals my life here with three other “boomer” women as we labor to build our little homestead in the desert. I’m using it at the basis for a book I’m writing… blog-style, called “Four Country Gals“. I know… it doesn’t have an Entrecard icon and I’m not sure it ever will… if you want to read it, be sure to bookmark the link, and then grab the feed.

Success Notes is where I can elaborate on my BookWise business and experience. It’s where you can get a more in-depth look at the business, as well as where you can pose questions for me. I want it to be interactive… BookWise is as much an experience, as a business.

Of course this blog, Ask Me Why… Work From Home is my commitment to you. I didn’t come out of retirement on a whim. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my life… it’s what Zig Ziglar says… “If you help enough other people get what they want in life, you’ll have more than you could ever want in your life.”

That is why I am committed to sharing whatever I find with you. From time-to-time I’ll share an affiliate link (and please… honor it if I do). Often I’ll simply post a root link, as I’m not here to “make money off you”, rather, to “make money with you”.

Ask Shari About PGA Tour Fantasy Golf is just plain fun! I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. Yes, I have “monetized” it using Google AdSense, but that’s more to make the template “balanced” than anything else.

Now… one last thing… when you run across the little “Buy Me A Beer” icons, if you like what you’re read, learned and enjoyed, please… take the time to buy me a beer. I promise not to drink and drive.

It’s that time of year when I look forward to the next year. I take the time to analyze what worked this year ( and am therefore keeping), and what has not worked this year. Yes, I give things a few months to show signs of life before moving them off my site.

First, things that are going bye-bye…

Blogrush, I’ve given you the benefit of the doubt. I know, I never referred anyone, but how could I… you’ve yet to really get going. I’ve given you prime sidebar real estate that can be better used this next year. So, over the next few days, you’re being eliminated from all my blogs.

“Help me Blog for a Year” may have stimulated some return traffic… but the contest is ending on December 31, 2007. I got a late start and was reluctant to stomp around at Blog Catalog where the obvious leader had established her territory. I’ll be finishing in 30th place, and happy that I got that far along, having had a mere six months to do what others have done over the past 18 months.

BlogSkinny… maybe you’re good for someone… but I can’t figure you out. Every time I go there I have to request my password. I can’t find my stats… You are next to impossible to navigate… and that’s not something my readers like… so, you’re going bye-bye.

So, who stays?

BlogCatalog stays. They are awesome! I’ve gotten meaningful traffic, and have gained much knowledge over the past months. The site is well-run, the widget works as advertised, and it looks good on my blogs.

Entrecard is a recent addition. This one requires work on my part… but ya’ know what? I’m enjoying it! I’ve met many other bloggers I’d never had seen if it weren’t for the “drop cards” requirement. I’ll be writing more about this traffic tool in time.

What’s coming?

I’m restarting “Shari’s Golden Nuggets”. This is a newsletter I maintained for 5 years prior to my retirement. It’s on a “blogger” platform, but I think I’ll move it to a wordpress platform… not sure yet if it rates it’s own domain name. Plans are for me to write a monthly (just like I used to) newsletter that covers just two or three things in greater depth. It will also allow me to publish quick bulletins as necessary

Ezine Director is my newsletter provider and I am able to segment my list. That’s good for you as it lets me make sure you’re getting what you want… and no more.

I’ll be continuing my presence at MySpace, BizzyBlog, and working to figure out FaceBook. At this point, it’s too early for me to write anything really coherent about these experiences.

I’ll be writing about how to work highly targeted forums through posting and commenting. This is a very viable method as long as you are contributing in such a way as to establish yourself as an expert on something. That doesn’t mean you’re always leaving a “sales message”.

Will I be doing audio and video? Probably not. I know, it’s all the rage… but being from the “old school” I’ve learned that just because something is the rage doesn’t make it right for what I’m doing.

Don’t look for any auto-loading audio or video here. If I do that, it will be at MySpace, or maybe BizzyBlog.

You’ll see more posts here about network marketing as I move forward with my BookWise opportunity. I’ve been doing a lot of work in the background with my sponsor. We’ve updated our business opportunity sites. I’ve created a specific blog to augment the business site. The guys at corporate are working feverishly (involves leaning really hard on some vendors) to get to phase two and three… that’s when the good stuff shows up.

I’m not yet ready to talk about what comes in phase three, since they’re relying on third-party services. There’s just not enough control for me to be comfortable promoting something coming in the future… but, ya’ gotta know… I’m riding the BookWise business until it fades into the sunset… and that’s gonna be a long ride!

Way back in about 2001, I first coined the words “chat netiquette”. No I didn’t bother to trademark it… I wanted it used.

As of today, I googled for the term and came up with over 600,000 references. Many of those are actually “rules for chatting” at various venues.

What I wrote then, is even more valid today… therefore, rather than allow what I wrote to die in the “big bit bucket in the sky”, I’ve salvaged them from an old domain and am reprinting them here.

10 Unwritten Chat Room Rules for Successful Business Chats

You need a few rules to enjoy and profit when utilizing Chat Rooms as part of your over-all marketing strategy. Here are the 10 most important rules for you. Adhere to them and you will benefit greatly. Ignore them and every other businessperson in that room will ignore you.

Rule #1 — There are no rules on the Internet! That’s right, no rules, just “Terms of Service” and “Privacy Policies”. Every business program, chat program, mailing list group, newsgroup, etc. has a “Terms of Service” and Privacy Policy. You must read each of them in order to have a clear understanding of the “rules” of the group.

Rule #2 — Think of a chat room as a gathering place. It might be your favorite pub, or clubhouse. It might even be considered one huge party. With that in mind, consider how you act when you enter into that scenario. Do you SHOUT your arrival? Probably not. You generally ease into the room and LISTEN for a short while before you strike up a conversation. It’s the same way in an on line chat room.

Rule #3 — No one really cares about your business opportunity. I know that sounds incredibly harsh but that’s the truth. Especially in a business chat room. You can expect that if you’re involved in a certain home-based business, there will likely be several others there who are in the same or similar business. So, DON’T START ADVERTISING YOUR BUSINESS! All that will do is make the other chatters angry and you’ll be ignored for the rest of your time in that chat room.

Rule #4 — Private conversations are just that. They are entered into by mutual consent. NEVER INVITE TO A PRIVATE CHAT WITHOUT FIRST OBTAINING PERMISSION!

Rule #5 — Because there are no rules, you must rely on the basic “Golden Rule”. That means: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” That means if you are annoyed by a particular action, then don’t perform that action upon others. Treat others with respect and you will be treated with respect.

Rule #6 — It is not in YOUR best interest to speak negatively of other’s business. This will ALWAYS cause you grief. Chat rooms are not the proper place for such playground activities as “mine is bigger than yours”. The consequence of that activity is to be placed on ignore status.

Rule #7 — Your font (size and style of your printing) must be legible but not OVERPOWERING to the other chatters. You also should refrain from using light colors, as they cannot be easily read on many screens.

Rule #8 — TYPING IN ALL CAPS is a written way of SHOUTING. Learn to use capital letters properly and you’ll get along well in a chat room.

Rule #9 — There are many shortcuts in the “chatter’s language”. Use them sparingly and a lot more chatters’ll understand you.

Rule #10 — In a business chat room it is NEVER appropriate to ask “a/s/l” which means “age, sex, location”. Save that jargon for the personal chat rooms and you won’t look like a total jerk.

Follow those 10 “Unwritten Chat Rules” when you come to a business chat and you’ll be welcomed into even the most seasoned group.

Choose to ignore those rules and the majority of the chatters will ignore you. Bad news is that you may not even know you’re being ignored.

With the excitement of a web site launch behind me… yes everything launched on time; it’s now time to get down to the really “hard work”.

What’s the hard work?

It’s writing great headlines and ad copy.

It’s finding the right places to advertise.

It’s setting up the tracking so you can analyze what works and what doesn’t.

Oh, and before I settled in to doing that, I took the time to upload several banners across the traffic exchanges.

I chose to focus on the great discount offered by BookWise… up to 42%. With the economy in jeopardy this year, I believe price competition will be attractive to new customers.

So, back to the headline business.

Here’s a tool I use to evaluate my headlines. It’s free, and if more people used it, we’d have more effective advertising. It may take you a while to get the hang of it… but keep working. While most professional copy writers strive for a 30-40% Emotional Marketing Value, I prefer to keep only those headlines with at least a 50% EMV.

Another handy download is the Free-Ezine-Directory. This is a compiled directory of a lot of credible ezine advertising opportunities. Having the list in one place, is really sweet when you’re choosing your advertising placements.

When it comes to link tracking, you have three viable options. You can either go with a third-party service, you can purchase a system and upload it to your server, or, if you are working from your own domain, you can create your own tracking system.

Here’s a good article which explains how to create your own system. While this will work for a while for you, at some point time for analyzing results will overwhelm you and you will want to move on to a paid solution.

Ok, time for me to get back to work. Let the tools make your job easier and more effective, too.

As of this morning (Thanksgiving Day in the US), I have 17 friends at MySpace.

The Alexa stats have once again been updated. Current rank is 3,511,258.

I have three people on my little mailing list… and they’re about to get a sneak preview of my new business.

You still have time to get on my list if you hurry… I’ll be sending out the preview links later today.

If you want to watch things change… go to 123Go4Success.com. That is where you’ll see things unfold over the next few days. No, I don’t reveal the business there right now… only folks ON MY LIST get the links today… and therefore the opportunity to start their Christmas shopping from the comfort of their own home.

How do you get on my list? See the sidebar? See the “Contact Me” page? Fill in the info, and I’ll be sure you get the news before anyone simply reading this blog.

Until later… and Happy Thanksgiving!

Shari

Since I’m going to be using Web 2.0 techniques, I spent a lot of time doing some “social networking”.

I set up my MySpace page. I’ve had an account for some time, but never bothered to fill in my profile, or go exploring. So, I’ve now done that. In the past 4 days, I’m up to 7 friends, have joined a couple of groups, and am still pretty clueless about what I’m doing.

I revisited a program I’ve been in since 2001. It has always been about traffic generation as well as how to create viral buzz. I spent several hours updating (and cataloging in a spread sheet) the traffic exchanges I belong to… that will help me quickly adjust start pages as well as know where to insert banners, etc.

I added this blog to BlogCatalog, the hottest bloggers community around. They were named #1 blogging community at the recent Blog Expo World in Las Vegas. It’s beginning to attract some readers.

Oh, and I spent an hour or so in the evening, when I was watching TV, surfing. Before you say that doesn’t work… stay tuned for the next post and I’ll explain why it has to be a part of your overall strategy.

Since I’m literally starting over in the network marketing business, as well as the Internet Marketing world, I’ve agreed to share the steps I’m taking.

My goal is to help you learn how to build the business of your choice… that doesn’t mean you have to join me in my business. I will most likely post links that provide me gain (as in downline) or credits of some kind. That’s the way business gets built.

When I first got online in the mid-90’s, I quickly came to realize that online business should be based on referral… in other words, no matter how you find a link, it should provide gain for the one who owns the link.

Ok, return often… subscribe through FeedBurner. Do what you gotta do to keep updated as I build my new business, and share the process every step of the way.