A quick hello to those readers in Greece. Thanks for reading.
I started this blog mostly with the intention of documenting the highs and lows of being in the internet marketing business. I figured that I make enough mistakes that I can make it a positive experience and share it with those that are trying to eek out a few bucks here and there. Plus it helps me to understand what I’m doing by writing my activities and thoughts down.
Despite the efforts of PLRPro, Affilorama and SEO2020, I still find myself floundering most of the time. I would prefer to be able to take the PLR articles that I get each month and just make a quick site, trade a few links and be done with it. I don’t know how people do it but they make that model work. Sites that I build like that just flop around like a fish out of water until they expire.
Dr. Andy, writes one of the very, very few newsletters I subscribe to anymore. In his last missive he discussed posts from his forum and emails he’s received concerning those who create quality hand written sites versus those sites that are just built with PLR or scraped articles. They indicated that those that are hand built do far better for those folks than auto generated sites. Examples, numbers, etc. were given.
On the other hand, I decided to purchase Website Content Wizard which seemed like a decent enough tool to change up my articles so I can fly under the duplicate content radar. The creator of this tool says he makes a nice six figure income using this tool to change up articles, or even write articles, and then post them to his site with his auto site generator tool, Website Article Wizard.
Now, I’m not bashing the programs. But it’s these complete contradictions that drive me insane. One guy makes money with quality hand written sites and says that you won’t do as well if you stick to auto generated/PLR sites. And another guy says he does just fine using PLR and making changes to avoid duplicate content filters.
And yet here I am still making a few bucks with my last remaining portal sites. Certainly enough to pay for my gas to and from my cubicle each day. ha
I feel like someone has run me up the flag pole and the wind dictates what direction I’ll be blowing that day.
The thing is I have the plan in front of me. It tells me exactly what to do. But I want it quick and easy. The simpler the better. The least amount of time involved.
Affilorama tells me it doesn’t work that way. The Master Plan says there is way more work involved in this gig than what I’m putting forth.
But honestly, I find it all so boring. There it is. Grinding out website after website on topics that I have zero interest in. When I built junk sites with robo-builders it was simple because I didn’t have to think about it. Now with the move toward quality, it takes time to research, build, trade links, write articles, etc. How can you possibly do that for more than a few unless you outsource?
So despite knowing what I should do I still look for shortcuts. Like WCW. Here’s a little mini-review:
- If you can re-write an article under, say 15 minutes, do it and skip the tool. Unless you want to make tons of copies for whatever reason. Then you can change 25% of the words with something similar and spam the article directories and web with your new articles. I doubt I’ll ever spend enough time “tuning” it to get much use out of it. The more you use it the quicker you can get to “auto-allocate” which is where the real push button magic is. Prepare to spend considerable time up front preparing phrases and adding synonyms to your thesaurus. I think if I buckle down and just re-write I’ll be able to go quicker for each article than having to find appropriate words and then having to read through it to make sure it reads correctly. The program is quality. No doubt. It’s just another one of those shortcuts that I’m not sure is going to be worthwhile to me. I hope I can be more positive after fumbling around with it in the weeks to come.
Anyway, I spent the last week writing articles and submitting them to PLRPro’s Traffic System and continuing to build out my Health and Fitness site. I added a subdomain, pilates, to the site. I have more planned over the coming weeks.
And my online income is stagnant and maybe a bit lower. Adsense is not paying me as much in the last few weeks. I would love to remove that distraction off all my webpages. I will be making concerted efforts to ramp up affiliate programs.
I asked Mark Ling to review my Pilates site and he was concerned about my keywords and how I expect people to find my site. I plan on studying The Master Plan some more this week and utilize the keyword and site building techniques to make some improvements.
For the foreseeable future I don’t see me doing much more than building out the health and fitness site. Creating relevant subdomains and writing and rewriting articles and link submissions will take up most of my time. I want to see how far I can push an “authority site”. I may consider outsourcing the link submissions.
Update: I snuck in some extra time at work today and reviewed The Master Plan, in more detail, and most of the posts in the private forum and I must say…I am screwed. My sites are less than siloed. The health and fitness site will have to be reworked quite a bit if I am going to follow TMP. That will be the focus, and I don’t know if I can redo it 100% as XSP doesn’t really lend itself to a silo type of site very well. I knew the keywords were pretty bad but now I have massive amounts of keyword research to do…or pay out the wazoo for ThemeZoom. sigh
21 responses so far ↓
TranceMaker // Sep 5, 2006 at 4:16 pm
This is so amazing; I had many of the same thoughts this weekend.
First, your health websites are beautiful. Nice layout, color schemes, etc.
Second… like me, you are all over the place with this.
What I mean is, in my own case, I:
* Have PLR articles out the wazoo and have started, stopped, started again, etc.
* Joined Affilorama
* Got the Master Plan
I even have WCW, but I can’t get it to work on my computer yet (but, Dave is wonderful in helping me with his tech support).
Anyway, if you think about it, we are both doing the same thing:
Too many directions, spinning our wheels.
I have been trying to figure out how to do the Affilorama plan, incorporating the jillions of PLR articles I have all the while putting the Master Plan in motion.
I can’t imagine that will happen as all three don’t mesh so well.
Now, the PLR stuff *can* be incorporated as content for the Affilorama plan or the Master Plan sites. However, I don’t see how to mesh Affilorama and the Master Plan.
Can it be done?
So, I need to make a decision. Which direction do I move toward?
Affilorama? Master Plan?
Or, am I missing something altogether?
My thinking is, if I just do ONE THING and do it WELL, I will start to make money in all of this.
Mark Ling? Charles? Am I missing something or CAN both programs be meshed together?
This is exhausting.
Bryan
Splork // Sep 5, 2006 at 5:49 pm
Bryan, thanks for the nice words about the health and fitness site. It’s a super competive topic so it will take even more work than most niches to get it to work.
David Watson is one of the good guys. He’ll get you squared away for sure.
I have way too many PLR articles as well, but an interesting thing is happening. I’m starting to get similar articles from the various PLR memberships I’m in or have been in. Now I just take the articles and mash them together from two or three separate PLR sources. I’ve decided to only make sites for those topics where I can do a mash-up for the different article sets. Makes rewriting a bit more bearable.
I think there is room for both Affilorama and TMP. Affilorama will teach you how to promote affiliate programs. I think Affilorama goes into more detail about building opt-ins, promotion, etc. TMP is what I’ll use to build the actual site. Create the silo.
I think both programs are geared toward building quality authority sites. One shows you how to build it. The other shows you how to promote and monetize it. With adequate overlap for both. Throw in PLRPro and you’re in good shape I think. Content, how to build, monetize, afiliate program, prmotion, article submision, etc. I think the three mesh real well.
It is exhausting. Sometimes I think it would be better if I just cut grass for some extra scratch.
TranceMaker // Sep 5, 2006 at 9:13 pm
Well…. here’s the thing. I am trying to just begin and get momentum.
Now, I haven’t gone through many Affilorama videos since I am doing this week-by-week, so I am really not sure all it covers.
I’d love to hear what Mark and Charles say about this. (I think they are traveling now, aren’t they?)
Bryan
Jeff // Sep 6, 2006 at 7:00 am
I’m afraid you’re never going to reach a point where everyone agrees on the one single most effective method for building sites and making money. Find a method that seems to make sense to you, bite the bullet and stick with it. I’ve found that flittering around between different approaches with no direction is as bad as procrastinating, you tend to spread yourself too thin and never step forward on any front.
I also saw Dr Andy’s comments about site content. I suggest the reason the software produced sites don’t make the same in comparison, is because there’s no TLC. If you write the articles yourself you’re more likely to take time with title tags, headings, descriptions and other onsite SEO. When you just fill in a box in a program, it’s easy to not take the same care. Personally, I don’t see how a well written PLR article can do any less well than an original article if the web site development is the same.
I think the reason that David has done so well using WAW, is because he doesn’t use it out of the box. If you watch the tutorial videos you can see clues of how he tweaks the project setup to make the articles more effective in the SE’s even though they’re the same ones that many others may be using. The thing is it takes time to set this up, time that most people won’t want to give. Everyone’s just looking for a quick fix.
Good blog, keep it up!
Regards,
Jeff.
Mark Ling // Sep 6, 2006 at 11:58 am
Hey Bryan,
Greetings from New York!
The afforama 90 day plan is just 1 plan of MANY that work well. I could just as easily create another dozen, all of which are vastly different, yet achieve a similar income outcome. I just didn’t want to confuse people by having too many options in there.
For instance, if you have money, you could create 12 ppc optimized sites in 12 weeks and be earning over 2 thousand a week in 12 weeks (perhaps I should add that 90 day plan to affilorama for those who have the money to invest in such a plan).
The Master Plan is a VERY GOOD plan, I suggest if you want to marry up affilorama with the master plan, that you create your own 90-180 day plan from them both and message me on the affilorama members forum and I’ll critique your plan (I’m sure charles would do the same on the master plan forum). Then once you’ve developed your own customized plan for the next 90-180 days, get to it! And take action!
All the best!!
Mark
Splork // Sep 6, 2006 at 12:48 pm
Jeff, nice comments. It would be great to have all my sites be perfect little silos but that is not going to happen. I think if I can come as close to good site building techniques and keyword research that are outlined in TMP, I will still be much better off than not trying at all.
But yea, I’m kinda glad as I haven’t really deviated from my plan which I latched onto upon joining Affilorama and PLRPro. Just finding time to do it and staying motivated seems to be my only issues at this point.
Rhonda // Oct 1, 2006 at 5:47 pm
Your website healthinfo has excellent content. Some things are missing. I would stop building pages and get your on-site optimization up to par. Do the simple things first. Question why did you use subdomains instead of directory folders. Is it because that is the only way you could do it with XSitePro?
Splork // Oct 1, 2006 at 8:11 pm
Hey Rhonda. What things am I missing? Your input would be appreciated. You wouldn’t be driving by just to leave a link to your product would you?
I’ve used subdomains and folders both and it didn’t seem to matter either way. I don’t think XSP cares either way although I’ve never tried to use folders with XSP.
Thanks for reading.
Thomas Salathe // Nov 28, 2006 at 12:36 am
Great site and the talk of Greece reminds me of Kalymnos, where i had a perfect Greek Climbing holiday in October. You and I are the same, confused and finding a focused path very difficult to find. At present I am doing the Beta coaching with Charles (really good but he is difficult to get hold of!). I will keep you posted and follow this blog. I am a cat vet in the UK and we are working on a new site ref cat behavior, bit of luck TMP based on cats!!!
thomas
Rebecca // Dec 28, 2006 at 1:04 pm
I can relate to the bit about being pulled into too many different directions. I started a few different sites, and registered a bunch of domain names, but I’ve also decided to just concentrate on building up the sites I do have, get a certain level of things done with them - directory submissions, yahoo dir listings, a good amount of content, an ezine in place, some ebooks, etc, then go and do the same with my other domain names. I think outsourcing is a good idea, especially for article marketing, provided you find good writers that also reflect your own style of writing ie provide the same depth of information that you would, in a similar way you would. They can be found
Elance is great if you pay anything from $8 (for bulk) to $20 per article. Does it add up? Yes, but so does the return, at least if you have the other stuff in place IMHO.
So, that’s my ‘plan’. I haven’t bought the Master Plan yet, though I will, it looks interesting. Rapid Niche Websites have a module that helps you silo your site. I will probably hold off making any changes to my existing sites and test the Master Plan on some new ones. As they say, if it ain’t broke…
I also use XSitePro - how did you get it to work on subdomains? Do you just build up each subdomain as though it were a unique site, then link them together from the main domain?
Rhonda - I think subdomains can be a bit easier for larger sites built in the ‘authority’ mode - plus it helps keep each subdomain niched. Search engines look at subdomains differently than they do folders on a site, so I imagine it would help keep theme relevance, though as I say, haven’t read the Master Plan, this is just garnered from what I’ve read about them elsewhere on the ‘net
Splork // Dec 28, 2006 at 2:04 pm
Rebecca, on my subdomains, I very rarely link them together. I consider each one a stand alone site.
Arindam Chattopadhyaya // Feb 22, 2007 at 1:07 pm
This is exactly my condition.
I purchased instant article wizard. used PLRPRO for 7 months. Themezoom for 3 months, TMP and revenge of mininet contradicts, Tried keyword elite …
Which worked - developing sites as per Dr. Andy’s niche blueprint using site build it. I set up a minisites of six using blogger blogs, wordpress blogs and small sites hosted in other places surrounding my SBI sites.
20 adsense sites usng PLRPro gave me nothing but ONE site in SBI gave me more following niche blue print paid me well.
TMP did not work in my case . Its a big mistake from my part. I have a serious doubt on TMP linking structure.
Jeff // Mar 3, 2007 at 7:26 am
What an interesting discussion here. Hmmm, it seems that building tons of niche sites isnt effective and only leaves a hole in the pocket..?
I better just build one with everything I have ..D
Jose // Mar 9, 2007 at 12:27 pm
Hi everyone,
I just discovered this blog. I completely understand what Splork and some of you are going through.
Last year I joined Article Underground (no longer a member). Something that Mark Liebner always emphasized was to modify the articles to make them unique (since you are getting the same article as 300 other members). It would take him about 15 minutes or less modifying and publishing an article. Guess what? It would take me minimum 2 hours!
It wasn’t long before I got sick of it.
Now I am looking into Website Content Wizard to research and re-arrange PLR articles. But then I start feeling guilty because I am not offering nothing original or unique. But…I am not a writer. I am a Internet Marketer and as such, my main focus should be to advertise and sell goods and services.
So… do I try to be original an unique? Or do I set up a “Canal Street” like shop offering low quality “knock-offs” that people are willing to buy?
Splork // Mar 9, 2007 at 4:02 pm
Hey Jose. Thanks for reading. I am of two minds. Confusing minds even, about this whole thing. I despise spam. I cannot stand to come across these crap websites that have been built with article spinners clearly built with Adsense in mind. However, they make money. I have a few leftover RSS scraper sites that still make a few Adsense pennies. It clearly works. And actually I think from time to time that I would like to sling out some more. There are some fabulous tools to enable you to build as many crap blogs and sites from RSS feeds as you can stand. I thinking of RSS Magician and Evolution. Also ContentSupreme. I haven’t bought these yet but they seem pretty cool if building RSS sites is your thing.
I’m sick of re-writing articles. But I also don’t want to mess around with spinner software either.
I’ve been concentrating on keeping a few, what I call high-quality blogs (you may call crap), going to see if I can make a go with legit blogs. I still dabble with PLR blogs and the like but mostly I am doing original blogging like Lost Ball. That may change soon as I really like those tools above.
Sam // Mar 9, 2007 at 9:03 pm
Dear Splork and other smart Contributors,
I am having the same problem as Jose with the Article Underground which I joined at the recommendation of Michael Campbell through his affiliate link
Another one is Keyword Avalanche, joined again at Michael’ s suggestion and again I am totally
flumoxed with the time consumption and poor understanding of the concepts and no rewards.
Then there was “Amazing Site Builder” from Len Thurmond and Carl Galletti which was a huge disappontment and expense. Len’s video
training was mostly incomprehensible and
fragmented audio with “Oops, Mr. Murphy (from Murphy’s law fame) strikes again” chit chat. In the end, it was a lost cause costing me $1,200 for 6 months when I finally gave up.
Does anybody here has/had even modest success with these high priced programs just enough to pay $100 to $200 per month fees? How about Traffic Geyser? Any one had any luck or good experience with it?
My credit cards are bloating with high balances and my income and hope is getting lower by the day.
Just in case you are wondering if I am like Forrest Gump, no I am a retired M.D. in the internal medicine field. I was hoping to keep active and earn a little side income to supplement my pension. I do like to write articles, slowly and not in an automated way.
What programs do you recommend?
Please HELP with some practical advice other than the usual:
“Get started,
Keep on keping on,
Napoleon Hill’s T. & G.R. !
The Law of Attraction and
The Secret”.
Thank you for reading and your advice.
Sam
Splork // Mar 9, 2007 at 9:22 pm
Sam I’m with you. Part of where this blog came from was my frustration at paying a so-called super underground guru $5K, yes five thousand dollars for training, that he just stopped giving. Just freaking stopped. So I’ve been there. I’ve also bought crappy memberships and programs. At this point I have tried to stop the expensive purchases and just focus on building decent blogs.
Really the formula for success is simple in my mind. But we just do not want to put in the work I guess. I’m guilty of it. So I think I’ll blog about it.
Barry // Mar 22, 2008 at 1:01 pm
My Name Is Barry Cohen and I have a big problem. Early this morning March 22 2008 I paid Vis Your Website to send Website Content Wizard to my webmaster Devon at devon@positronicdesign.com He never got the software and I am pissed off about this! I have two receipt numbers but no software! They are ID# 10C55568NK403901W and ID 4705-8057-2963-5823. Also your support contact links are not working! I want the software but I will reverse the charge if you do not send the software QUICKLY!. Call me direct if you can to tell me what is going on. I am in the USA in Colorado and my phone number is (removed).
Please act FAST!
I Don’t Want To Do A Charge back! I Want The Software!
Barry Cohen
Splork // Mar 23, 2008 at 9:07 pm
Barry, I don’t know if the owner of WCW reads this blog. I hope he gets the message and helps you out. I removed your phone number. I doubt you want those few readers of this blog calling you.
I submitted a help ticket on your behalf to the site so hopefully something good will come of it….oops, his support thing is screwed up. So I guess it didn’t go through. Dunno what to tell you. I always assumed Watson was a pretty good guy. I don’t know if he’s still in business or not.
Barry // Mar 24, 2008 at 5:55 pm
Hi guys, this is for Sam.
Sam,
You must determine how and what you want to sell before you spend any money. These two topics are intertwined.
1. AdSense. People click on the icon and make you a few pennies. Figure out what you need to do to attract targeted visitors to a site so the people who show up are interested in the icons that Google puts on your site.
2. Resale of guru products. Join the latest PLR etc tidal wave. Sell for Mike Filsiame and all the others. Peddle all the guru crud to people just a little lower in the food chain than you are. To do this, you must become the master of the endless hype page in 10, count ‘em 10, dazzling colors.
3. Real affiliate products. Look at ShareaSale, ClixGalore, etc, and find products to sell. Build a site around what you know and love. Then branch out to related topics or to other topics you know. Learn to be rejected by the hot areas because you aren’t in Telecomms or your email isn’t linked to your site name.
There are other strategies, but you get the idea.
With each strategy, there are high-priced sources of guidance and there are free sources of guidance. I use the free or very cheap ones, the ones that fit my way of operating and thinking.
Splork is a good source of ideas. He has some sources that make sense and don’t cost a lot, Teli Adlam is a good example. I bought Rosalind Gardner’s Super Affiliate Handbook. Both of these ladies take a long-term view of the business, they aren’t in it to Make $549,000 by This Weekend. Both of them state right up front that it is a business and must be approached as such.
My psyche dictates that I try to sell real products to real people. This is a tough proposition, but if I can crack it, then it will work for a long time and pay me a decent wage. I may sell some soft products in the same areas, but I won’t be a resale site for all the guru offerings. That’s too much like MLM.
One way to sift the wheat from the chaff is to sign on with a guru’s free product and see how well he supports it. I’ve tried three times to get through Shawn Casey’s 27 days to glory, but he peters out around day 14. Tells me a lot about him.
Sorry to take up so much space and time.
Barry
Idea fry // Nov 19, 2008 at 1:52 am
Is there any tool which can build my sites according to my chosen layout,using my content and upload to ftp servers?
If you dont have passion for the work,you wont get anywhere.You may not have a passion for every niche.But you must have some interest in tweaking with words atleast.
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