Try Marketing

Writing by Nick Stamoulis

I’m amazed at how many people get so fixated on seeking high search engine optimization Google rankings that they completely forget about Yahoo!, MSN Live, or Ask.com. Or even one of the thousands of other smaller search engines.

I’ve seen healthy traffic come from places like Dogpile or some obscure search engine that I’d never heard of and didn’t exist (and have often wondered how I got listed there in the first place).

Don’t get me wrong, Google will likely be your main source of traffic (if you do your SEO right). But there’s no rational reason to not attempt to get listed and ranked everywhere you can. You can still pick up a good 20% increase in search traffic just by having moderate to high rankings in the next three highest traffic search engines - Yahoo!, MSN Live, and Ask.com.

Search engine marketing and optimization is not an exact science. You can target one search engine and still find yourself listed higher in another. Be vigilant about checking your rankings in all the search engines and if you don’t see your website listed in a certain search engine after awhile

Take some time to submit your site to that search engine or find out what it takes to get crawled by its robots. Don’t get so fixated on Google that you forget everything else.

Blogging is all the rage these days for many different reasons. For one thing, it’s a lot of fun to be able to express your opinions about something or share information with people all over the world.

You also have to remember that the people who visit your blog  are often ready and willing to spend money! Use these 5 ways to cash in with your blog to add some padding to your wallet.
 
Cash Tip #1: Put Your Ads Where People Can See Them
 
Bloggers often make the mistake of slipping a tiny affiliate link in somewhere on the blog. These will rarely get found and clicked on! Now, you don’t want to be annoying with your ads, but if you have found something that is relevant there is no reason not to display it proudly so your visitors see it and click on it. It’s hard to make money if no one knows you are selling something.
 
Cash Tip #2: Build a List
 
Focus on building a list of people who are interested in your niche topic. That way you can tell them when you create new blog posts and let them know about special offers you think would be of interest.
 
Cash Tip #3: Sell Advertising
 
Once you get to a relatively high level of traffic it’s a great idea to sell advertising spots. Companies are ready and willing to spend money on this form of advertisement and you can often make more with these direct deals than you can by going through an affiliate organization that takes a cut.
 
Cash Tip #4: Create a Product
 
After you’ve had your blog running for a while you’ll hopefully have developed a loyal following. People see you as an expert in your niche and they want to hear more of what you have to say.

A great way to cash in on this is to create your own ebook, videos, audio, or a combination. This is easier to do than you think, and you can have a great, passive income once the product creation phase is over.
 
Cash Tip #5: Split Test
 
You might have heard about split testing as a great way to figure out the best format for sales letters, but did you know that you could split test ads on your blogs?

There are plugins and blogging software packages out there that can present one ad to one group and another ad to another group. That way you can cash in even better by knowing exactly what it is that your target audience responds to best.
 
There you have it! These are five tips you can put to use today to start seeing a return in profits on your blog tomorrow. There is nothing better than knowing that people out there are not only reading your content, but adding to your income as well.
 
Tomorrow, I’ll tell show you how to choose top converting  blogging affiliate programs for your blog! Stay tuned…