I am pleased to say that the actual percentage I achieve has been on average 14% for every month.

Thank YOU for coming over and dropping by.

Thank YOU for commenting.

Thank YOU for Tweeting and Digging and all that other social bookmarking malarkey.

I only wish you could Stumble (this site is banned – click on this link and see my Banned by StumbleUpon post).

Every time someone comments or tweets or diggs or…it feels as though it has all been worth it.

I hope some of you have found my advice helpful and continue to come back and share my site with your friends, if you feel it’s worthy enough.

You can always subscribe so you get instant access to the content I provide.

You can also subscribe through email by adding your email below and clicking the Subscribe button:

___________________________________________________________________________________________

If you really want to share the love around you could cut/paste the following into your Twitter account:

“Follow me and subscribe to WeBuildYourBlog.com http://www.webuildyourblog.com/”

___________________________________________________________________________________________

And don’t forget to download my free guide “How to make a Profitable blog in 45 minutes”. Not only do you get my multi-media guide, there are a few extra surprizes as well. Simply sign up here:

FREE Guide
Build Your Own Profitable Blog In 45 Minutes

I hate spam
as much as you. I will never rent, sell or otherwise share your information
with anyone! You can unsubscribe at any time.

In summary, THANK YOU. I couldn’t do this without you.

If you want to know how to increase your blog visitors read this post: Increase blog traffic

All the best and I hope to see you again very, very soon.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________

Post from: Blogging Guide

Thank YOU for all YOUR support

It’s easy to use. I have loads of friends and I like sharing lots of different sites.

And the knock on effect is that it brings traffic to my site.

A few months ago StumbleUpon suddenly banned my site, this site. Friends were telling me they could no longer ‘thumb up’ blog posts on WeBuildYourBlog.com.

I was gob smacked!

I contacted them and asked why.

They said, “I’ve been spamming and someone complained”.

I thought, “I don’t spam, I’ve never spammed.”

Let me tell you a story….

A few months ago, a professional writer friend and I started another blog, www.TheDigitalArchives.com (an article writing service).

My partner is the writer and I’m the technical one.

We launched the site and I shared it with my stumble friends saying, “What do you think?” or words similar to that.

From one Stumble ‘friend’ I received a lot of abuse.

“Why didn’t I start a business with him?”

“He could write for me”

I’ve omitted the abusive swear words.

I ‘un-friended him’. He was no longer a StumbleUpon friend and I moved on.

Two days later my site is banned.

I have no proof he complained. I have no proof my site is banned by StumbleUpon as a direct result but it’s a pretty big coincidence, don’t you think?

This week, a few months later. I thought I’d ask StumbleUpon to see if they would lift my ban and asked again why my site was banned in the first place.

This is what I asked:

_____________________________________________________________________________________

My site, http://www.webuildyourblog.com has been ‘banned’ by StumbleUpon for several months now and I still don’t understand why.

Could someone please explain and take my site off the ‘banned’ list?

Thanks.

Andrew

_____________________________________________________________________________________

This is what they said in reply:

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Hello Andrew,

Thank you for contacting us.

When a site is excluded from our service, it will be for either technical reasons, or because of a breach of our Terms of Service. We reserve the right to do this, and any such exclusion is permanent.

Having reviewing your account history, Andrew, it appears that you’ve repeatedly submitted content from one or more sites in particular, which is technically a breach of our Terms, and I would ask you to ensure that you have read these: http://www.stumbleupon.com/terms/

If you’re interested in using StumbleUpon to advertise a Web site, please look into our Advertising program:

http://www.stumbleupon.com/ads

I hope that this is helpful to you.

Regards,

_____________________________________________________________________________________

It wasn’t helpful at all.

”It appears that you’ve repeatedly submitted content from one or more sites in particular”

Since joining StumbleUpon, I’ve ‘thumbed up’ 9,184 different blog posts.

I have 169 blog posts on this site and I would estimate that I have stumbled approx 10 before getting banned. So if 10 out of 9,184 is “repeatedly submitting content”, then all users of StumbleUpon better watch out.

What about those ‘friends’ that send me 3, 4, 5 or 6 blog posts from the same site begging me to ‘thumb up’, Digg, tweet and Reddit?

Are they being monitored and banned?

I doubt it!

I did write back but I am still awating a response.

I feel I am being fobbed off by StumbleUpon and think I will just have to accept that my site is banned for ever.

Ho hum!

What’s your view of StumbleUpon? Share your experiences in the comments below.

____________________________________________________________________________________

Post from: Blogging Guide

StumbleUpon bans my site

If you are on Twitter, here are some Twitter tools that will help you manage your tweets and bring more traffic to your site.  Enjoy!

1. TweetMeme Retweet Button

This has got to be one of the best tools around for encouraging visitors to tweet your posts. See the green button at the top of this post. This TweetMeme Retweet Button plugin simply and easily adds that button and visitors can easily retweet your blog post.

2. SocialOomph

With SocialOomph you can:

Schedule tweets: You can spend as long as you want creating Tweets and schedule when you want to tweet your tweets!

Auto Follows: This will auto follow anyone that follows you

Auto Un-follow: Simply un-follow those who un-follow you

3. TweetDeck

Takes all the information from twitter (tweets, mentions, direct messages…) and shows it to you in one organized screen. Saves hours especially if you have more than one Twitter account.

4. Twitter Karma

This application fetches all your friends and followers from Twitter when you click the “Whack!” button. You can bulk ‘un-follow’ those who are not following you and you can bulk ‘follow’ those who are following you. It helps you get through the 2000 Twitter followers bottleneck.

5. Twitter Tools

Twitter Tools is a plugin that creates a complete integration between your WordPress blog and your Twitter account. You can actually:

Create a tweet on Twitter whenever you post in your blog, with a link to the blog post

Create a blog post from each of your tweets

6. Twitoria

How many friends are you really following? Twitoria finds your friends that haven’t tweeted in a long time so you can give them the boot!

7. Twitter Keys

Enhances your Twitter conversation by enabling UTF8 symbols.

8. TwitterLink Comments

This plugin will add an extra field to your comment form so a user can add their Twitter username. A user configured ‘follow me’ link is then displayed along with their details on all their comments.

9. Twitrans

Translates your Tweets into different languages.

10. Twellow

Helps you find fellow Tweeters in the same niche as you.

So which ones do you use to gain more followers?

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Post from: Blogging Guide

Increase your Twitter following with these top 10 Twitter Tools

That should be the first stage of your affiliate marketing strategy.

In this article we shall cover how we approach strangers!

Writing to strangers hoping they will sell hundreds of your products is EASY.

Writing to strangers hoping they will sell hundreds of your products and getting a great positive response is HARD.

Just because you are offering a high percentage doesn’t mean they are going to be on board and start selling for you.

First of all every potential affiliate is thinking “What’s In It For Me?” when they read your email.

That means they don’t care about how much it will help you for them to promote your product. They are only interested in what’s in it for them.

The prospective affiliate has three concerns (in no particular order):

1.    Will their customers thank them for recommending such a great product

2.    How much will they earn

3.    How much effort is needed in order to sell this product

The email you write has to succinctly cover all 3 areas.

If you write and simply only talk about the money, then it might attract some affiliates but not many.

Similarly if you write and only talk about the little amount of effort required or their customers will thank them.

The email has to be persuasive, believable and to the point.

You often hear some ‘Internet Gurus” say you must tell them “how wonderful their site is”, or “how much you like their site and how much you loved their blog post entitled xxxx”.

RUBBISH!

If someone writes to me like that, I know they are just sucking up.

Get to the point. If you want me to sell your product, don’t try and butter me up first. Just tell me how it is.

So don’t ramble on and on. Get to the point, fast!

After testing what works and what doesn’t work here are my rules for ‘cold calling’ affiliate emails:

1.    Personalize the email. Use their name in the subject line and in your opening.

2.    Keep it short. Cut out all unnecessary ‘flannel’. Only keep the sentences that earn their place in your email. You’re writing to busy people, so keep it short and simple.

3.    Get to the point, FAST!

4.    Use specific numbers when possible. What conversion rates has your site tested at?

5.    Remember the three motivations. They want more money, they want to look good to their customers and they want to do it with as little effort as possible. You need to mention all three points.

6.    Include a free copy of your product. Any good affiliate marketer will always want to see your product before recommending it to their list.

7.    Mention the tools. Banners, emails, ads and offer to work with them and write bespoke emails if necessary.

8.    Provide contact information. Make it easy to contact you.

Now you may be thinking that’s quite a lot to cram into an email. We want it short, to the point but mention all these points.

How?

Here’s an example:

Subject: Name, Affiliate Proposal

Hi (Name):

I noticed on your site that you promote XXXXXX type of products.  (XXXXX is the type of product)

I’ve just created my brand new product, PRODUCT TITLE at SALES PAGE DOMAIN NAME. This product is totally unique in the marketplace because of XXXXXX.

I am running the program through ClickBank and the sales page is currently converting at 3.5% and for each sale you’d make 75%, which is $30.

I think your list would love it. They get a great deal, AND they’d thank you for recommending such a product.

You can download the product here: DOWNLOAD DOMAIN NAME

You can get your affiliate link and affiliate tools including banners, emails and text ads right here:

AFFILIATE DOMAIN NAME

I’m more than happy to work with you to write specific bespoke emails, etc for your list.

Please let me have your thoughts.

Andrew

http://www.webuildyourblog.com/

When a ‘cold’ Affiliate proposal email doesn’t work…

No matter how good your email is, the vast majority of your ‘cold’ affiliate proposal emails will simply not work.

If you have no relationship, then your chances of a positive response is low.

It’s similar to the response you may get from your sales pages. Are your sales pages converting at 2%? Expect similar with your cold affiliate proposal emails. For every 100 emails your send out, expect only 2 to reply. If you get more you can ‘jump with joy’.

How can we boost our results?

It’s simple. If you want a higher conversion rate you must build a relationship.

You could start by commenting on some of their blog posts. Become a regular blog commenter.

Start Tweeting their blog posts.

Offer to provide a guest blog post.

Do whatever you can to build that relationship.

That way, you are bound to have a much more positive result when you ask them to help sell your product as an affiliate.

What tips or advice do you suggest and have worked for you?

Post from: Blogging Guide

Want to make even more money selling your products?

So now you have chosen the topic you wish to blog about, what are you going to write?

You may have chosen one of the “hot topics” like recipes, but what exactly will you write about “recipes”?

Will it be about the utensils required? Cakes? Healthy eating? 10-minute dinners?

Once you have decided on a specific subject matter, what information do you want to share?

Here are some ways you can generate ideas…

Ask your friends

We all have opinions on certain subjects so ask for your friends’ opinions. What would they like to know about ‘recipes’? What are their ideas and suggestions?

You may be surprised with what ideas and things they come up with.

Start collecting ideas

You could be walking the dog, traveling to work and suddenly, a bright idea about a blog post pops into your head.

Are you going to remember that idea or do you need to write it down?

You could always carry a small pencil and paper with you, just for those situations.

Then when you get somewhere where you can add a few more notes, just spend a couple of minutes doing so. Those extra notes will help when you come back and refer to your notes.

And you don’t have to use that idea that day, that week, that month.

I have a folder just on ideas of what to write about. When I want to start writing, out comes the folder with all my previous notes, which may have been written down months ago.

Use your own childhood memories

It depends upon the subject you choose to write about as to whether you have any related childhood memories.

But if we stick with ‘recipes’, you could write about the great times you had with your parents cooking or making up your own recipes or just having fun in the kitchen.

Perhaps, even write about the cooking lessons you had at school and how much has changed over the years.

You know, “When I was young, we didn’t have microwave ovens or fancy things like that. We had to…”

Make a mind-map

Without going off too much on a tangent, a mind map is a graphical way to represent ideas and concepts. It is a visual thinking tool that helps structuring information, helping you to better analyze, comprehend, synthesize, recall and generate new ideas.

Here is a compilation of mind map tools

By using mind maps, you can easily generate numerous ides.

Ask your blog visitors

Conduct some analysis with your blog visitors.

Take a poll.

Do a survey.

Ask them questions.

You can even let them ask you questions.

Gather all the information and you’ve got some great ideas from your visitors.

Read and collect

Read a great article about recipes in the newspaper or magazine?

What ideas did that give you?

Write the ideas down and file away in your reference folder.

Even better, write the ideas down and file away in your reference folder AND cut out the article and file it away for future use.

Powerful tip: Visit a bookstore or a library or a magazine stand.  Read through the books and magazines that are related to your chosen subject. I guarantee you come away with at least 10 ideas.

Search the internet

Of course, you have all information you need, right here on the internet.

On the internet there are forums.

A forum is basically a virtual meeting place for people with the same interest, who post messages and questions on the subject of that forum.

So do a Google search for your subject, for instance ‘recipe’ and then add the word “forum”, so you end up searching for “recipe forum” (by the way at the time of writing, there are a few!)

Then when you enter the forums, you can observe and study what the participants are discussing.

Forums are places where people look for advice, ask questions and air their concerns.

Using these methods, you’ll never run out of ideas.

How do you generate ideas?

Post from: Blogging Guide

How to generate ideas for your blog posts

So I thought that’s a good cause, I shall. So I did!

Then I start getting some complaints back from my Stumble friends.

Asking why I am sharing such rubbish, etc. But the web age associated with the ‘complaint’ was a page I didn’t recognise. I simply replied, “I didn’t share this…sorry”

Then I receive a few more. I was confused.

Than I received some who were ‘un-friending” me!

Then it clicked!

My only recent share was the “Missing Person” website.

I re-looked at my Stumble Favourites and there it was in black and white!

I had shared some ‘spammy’ rubbish.

So apologies to everyone.

But if you receive a similar request, check that it is genuine.

I have written to StumbleUpon to let them know.

Post from: Blogging Guide

I’ve been Stumble Scammed

Establishing a credibility as an internet marketer depends on many components.

I’ve previously spoken about how your credibility starts with your name and your expertise levels.

Another area is your presence in the social media space. It is vitally important who you hang out with and how you interact with people.

As a very simple example: imagine yourself at a conference you are attending as a delegate. You see the list of speakers and you notice that predominantly they are together. There is a kind of aura of expert knowledge attached to them. Then there are some people that are not speakers but also socialise with them.

What do you think of the people that are friends with speakers but are not speakers themselves? You tend to think of them as having similar expert status. In the same way, you as a delegate meet up with other delegates and people who did not attend the conference will automatically think of themselves as not as knowledgeable as you.

Why do people fight to get to study at Harvard rather than the University down the road? It is because the association with this name provides you with un-quantifiable extra points. It gives you a momentum that you would not get from the learning institute near you.

The same applies in the online community. In fact probably slightly more so. It is so much more difficult to acquire credibility online. You are not a physical presence, people cannot look you in the eyes and have an opinion of you as a person. They depend on a whole lot of other clues to evaluate your credibility.

One of these vital clues is who you are associated with and who associates with you. With other words who is following you on Twitter could be as important as who you follow on Twitter.  Who your StumbeUpon buddies are could be vital to whether you are considered credible or not. What about your activities on Digg?

It’s important to see what material you bookmark and comment on. What bloggers do you read and support? Where do you leave comments? What kind of comments do you leave? Who do you praise? In fact how do you comment? Are you one of those people who only finds things to criticise or do you encourage and support?

How do you behave on forums? Do you ask relevant questions? Do you answer and help other forum members if they have a query? Do you come across as a credible person or as an arrogant know-all? All of these different activities add to your online presence and determine your credibility over all.

When you look at this picture it becomes obvious that whatever you do online has to be based on a consistent view point, a moral code so to speak. An image of what you wish to be seen as. If that image does not fit into your internet marketing strategy you will need to change the image.

Above all else, you need to remember that the internet has a very long memory. What you say and do online stays around for a very long time. So be careful. Be sure that the presence you have online is good for your business, whether online or offline.

Post from: Blogging Guide

Your On-Line Credibility Depends On Who You Hang Out With

Adam Wong is a typical example of how anyone, regardless or age and experience can realize their dreams if they simply just use the right strategies and take massive action.

In his early years, he invested in himself and attended several ‘Wealth’ programs.

But Adam didn’t do what 99% of individuals do when they finish learning about a topic. He did what only 1% of the population do…he took took massive action and applied everything he’d been taught.

He did not hesitate at all. He decided that he did not want to get stuck in a normal 9am-5pm job like everyone else and eventually decided that he would become an entrepreneur as an Internet Marketer.

When he applied himself wholeheartedly, the results he got were truly inspiring. Within two weeks of launching his business, he generated US$10,011 worth of sales. Within a year and a half, he hit a record US$21,154 a month in December. He continued to build his online business until today, it generates a six figure income while he just works four hours a day from his home.

Grab The First Chapter Free

All his friends call him a LUCKY BASTARD to have such a great life with a great income. So, he decided to write a book (which honestly is a VERY GOOD READ) to teach people exactly how he did it and how anyone can achieve the same success he has on the Internet.

A few months a go, Adam gave me a ‘draft’ copy of his book to read. I couldn’t put it down. I know Internet Marketers who charge $2,000 a month to tell you the same stuff as what Adam has included in his book, Lucky Bastard!

And right now, Adam is giving you the chance to download the first chapter right here:

http://www.webuildyourblog.com/luckyb.html

Although I will say that Adam is a LUCKY BASTARD (he won’t mind me saying that!), he is also a very clever one.

Read more about my thoughts on Adam’s new book:

http://www.webuildyourblog.com/luckyb.html

Post from: Blogging Guide

The Lucky Bastard!