Ask Me Why… Work From Home

Here’s why I love working from home… it’s called FLEXIBILITY.

Having spent more time relieving the folks at the Senior Center, and getting a very clear understanding of their position, I’ve been encouraged to plan for their retirement, and for me to take over the account.

The main question of whether my body will stand up to the work load has been answered with an affirmative, especially when I know I have to very able assistants.

That means I’ll be resigning from the BookWise opportunity. I’m doing this as I feel I can’t really juggle the farm, a network marketing business, and writing “our story”, as well as working three days a week.

I am continuing to maintain an online presence, mostly through blogging.

With all the changes in EntreCard, rather than try to completely update with “old stats”, I’ll comment more on the updates and changes… all for the betterment of blogworld.

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.

After just over two weeks, things are finally coming together for me. I’ve spent countless hours dropping cards, reading other blogs where folks are discussing various Entrecard systems, and analyzing ad results.

Here’s what I’ve come up with. It will work for me for a while until it becomes time to tweak. If it works for you, great. I’m happy to share the information.

I run four blogs. I believe that when you have more blogs you can drive more traffic. Do you need four? Probably not. How many are too many? If you can’t keep adding fresh, original content on a regular basis, to each blog, you’ve got too many.

I’m still struggling to develop a “quick” way to drop cards. I go to Categories, first selecting my own category and visit all my “competitors”. Then I go to closely related categories and do the same. In the very large categories, I alternate starting at the top of the list, or the bottom of the list, or in the middle. My goal for each blog is to drop a minimum of 100 cards.

I do not “chain drop” by clicking on the ad on any given site. My personal position is that leads to “inflated ad returns” and dilutes the quality of the traffic. I’ll discuss more on this later.

Thanks to some other bloggers, I’ve discovered it’s acceptable to transfer credits from one account to another. Therefore, I’ve now begun moving my credits each morning to one of the four blogs.

Since two of the blogs are about my business, I’ll be transferring two days of traffic to each of them, and then one day each to the other two blogs. That leaves me one day’s traffic that I’ll probably use for my fifth blog.

With this new pool of credits (in excess of 500 daily), I purchase first from “the most popular list”. Then I go to my own niche and purchase the highest value ads possible. If I run out of ads (small niche, like “Books”), I purchase from closely related blogs.

I do keep an eye on the “most recent” list, although I’ve learned to take the time to investigate them for quality just as soon as I make a purchase. There have been a few times when I’ve canceled ads after looking at blogs. Either they’ve been very low quality (splog type), or have contained content that offends me (not in violation of the TOS).

For accurate analysis, I’m using Google Analytics. I’ve found that by drilling down, I’m able to get statistics at the advertiser level. There is a minimum of 24 hour delay, but I’ll get used to it.

If you have “systems” that are working for you, drop your link here, and maybe we can help each other (as well as our readers). My goal is to make Entrecard work for me. By that, I mean drive quality traffic to my blogs, which in turn will lead to sales and associates in my BookWise business.

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!

Like I said earlier, I had retired. That being said, I still have tons of things circulating about the Internet. I’m talking about things that probably aren’t even valid, today.

So, I’ve forced myself to learn a little bit about how to get a rope around it and pull the visitors to current, valid information.

By using the “redirect” process on the .htaccess page, I’m now re-capturing search engine traffic and showing visitors current information. Thanks to J. Walker for the very understandable tutorial on Basic 301 Permanent Redirect.

If you’ve landed on this page thinking you were going to something either at “123go4success.com”, or “AskShari.com”, that is because those sites are being completely re-done with current information. I’m doing my part to clear the clutter out of the big bit bucket in the sky.

Now, in time… I’ll get all the data tested and uploaded again, so we can all go on making money… that is what you want, isn’t it?

Right now, you can grab a big brass ring just before it swings into momentum…  it’s called BookWise, “The most intelligent home based business in the world”.

I’m not big on calendars and “to do lists”, meaning the one’s you fill in… somehow I feel like a slave to them.

However, since I’m coming out of retirement, for a while, I’m using some tools to help keep me organized.

Since my favorite (means I use it 99% of the time) browser is Fire Fox, and my e-mail client is Thunderbird, the “Outlook Calendar” no longer works for me. So, I’ve had to go hunting.

I have begun using “gmail” for certain applications, and have had both an AdWords and AdSense account forever, so I guess it’s logical to use the Google Calendar. The first thing I did, was download the Google Desktop application.

I found I can “hide” it so the shared computer I use doesn’t show anything different on the monitor. Using Google Gadget, I searched for and found a way to incorporate my Calendar directly to my FireFox browser.

Now, I also needed a “to-do list” and settled on “Toodledo“. By using another Google Gadget, I can now access “Toodledo” from Firefox either on from my FF toolbar, or from my calendar.