The Pros of WidgetBucks

- Widgetbucks offers a $25 signup bonus, and as Bill Murray said in Caddyshack,

“So you have that goin’ for ya”

-  Widgetbucks allows unlimited ads on your site or blog, unlike YPN and Adsense. They don’t seem to have issue yet with inflating their advertisers costs (apparently). We’ll see how long that lasts.

- Widgetbucks login area is VERY simple to use, and new-comers to blog monetization will love the simplicity of their ad layouts, and options.

- The Widgetbuck ads look great and they certainly attract the user’s eye balls. However, perhaps a little too much – as I found my peripheral vision taking in the movement of the ad as I was trying to proof read one of my posts.

- Widgetbucks is new so bloggers can take advantage of refferals. They have an affiliate program so you can get in on that as well.

The Cons of WidgetBucks

- Widgetbucks has only a scant few advertisers at launch which really cuts down on the type of blog or website you want to use their ads on. Right now WB only has the typical advertisers in the electronics, video, ipod, etc., category. This is where all ad networks have trouble getting off the ground. Diversity (not an old wooden ship)  for the niche builders is essential if an advertising network wants to grow in great leaps and bounds.

- WB was initially included twice in this WordPress theme page template (which I mention here), and my pages were loading like tractors. Therefore, I would not run more than one of their widgets per page.

- WB is really a new gig and whether you make decent money is yet to be seen. If you run a website a website or blog that is in the computer and electronics niche, you could do very well I’m assuming. Not that the people in that niche are hurting as it is!

Widgetbucks Short Review – In Conclusion

If you have a site or a blog that gets a ridiculous amount of traffic, Widgetbucks might pay as the gadgets being advertised are very popular in the online shopping game. Or, as stated above, your site or blog is in the electronic gadget niche you could do well by running WB.

It’s unknown how the Adsense team feels about running Widgetbucks ads on the same page as your are running Adsense ads, so this is a very important factor you want to consider. I won’t be mixing ads, save for example purposes like the above ad.

If you don’t fit into one of these categories, you will likely want to wait and see of Widgetbucks is able to sign up a large and diverse number of advertisers. I’ll update this review as time goes on.

Terry

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We’ll see….. So far you have seen how to attract the potential customers to your site. You must also learn to keep them interested and not turn them away after giving them useful information and quality products. Do you know that happens? Yes, when you use pop-ups, visitors are annoyed, distracted and will not take your offering seriously. Therefore get rid of any pop-ups on your site. There was a time when pop-ups were considered another major attraction for your web site but with each passing day pop-ups have lost popularity. Internet users are no longer interested in pop-up ads. They rather consider it as an annoying factor. Imagine you are reading a very interesting book and suddenly there is a pop-up in the form of a unconnected page. How would you feel? It’s the same with any pop-up you employ on your website. So follow the dictum – do unto others as you would have others do unto you, and stop annoying visitors with pop-ups. Pop-ups used to raise the interest levels of the visitors. But now the internet users are sick and tired of using spam filters, pop-blockers to avoid such disturbance. No visitor wants to waste his/her quality time on annoying pop-ups. Most users will leave your site and find good information elsewhere on the Internet. If you continue to use pop-ups you will ultimately end up losing your good prospects. The impression you built through your web site stays longer on the visitor’s mind than these pop-ups which just act as distraction. Take for example a salesperson who instead of offering you something real shows all the nonsense which just quirks you. You will never be interested in buying a product from such a fellow. The same applies to the web sites. The more real and quality material you offer to the visitors the more they will be interested in your web site. If you want that your web site be taken seriously for its high quality content and fine products then use them for your marketing instead of using anything fake. The visitor will believe you and will be interested in buying products from you only if you offer legitimate products. Earn the confidence of your customer with genuineness and not with advertisements.

Time to let the pop-ups go extinct, much like dinosaurs.

Desmond Mantor works with Have Traffic.

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As an internet marketeter, what do you want? More visitors or more customers? The answer is quite obvious. You need to question yourself if you are making the effort needed to convert visitors into customers. You must identify the reasons for low conversion, what is lacking in your site?

You might have optimised your site through use of good key words, got a high position on the search engine but if your sales and profits have not increased then you need to check whether you are working in the right direction. To start with it, you need to take a close look at your web site. Well the first point you need to check is whether you have made your web site search engine friendly or reader friendly. Most of us make this mistake of optimizing our web site for the search engines. The search engines are however not going to buy your products or services, you want a real buyers for it. The search engines only provide you a platform where you can display your web site and its products. When you optimize your web site keep the reader in mind and not the search engine.

Quality information with relevant content always make the visitors ask for more information about your products and services. Over selling on your web site will never help. All the sales pitch that you use will not hold the visitors on your web site any longer than they wish to stay. Only by providing quality content you can catch the attention of your visitors for a longer period. You must identify and answer all probable questions that visitors may have and then subtly present your products and services. Believe very strongly in the adage “Content is King”.

The purpose of an online business is to sell. If you want to have a very successful business then you must understand your customers’ requirements. Study the keywords that they used to search for your products, whether they are finding solutions to their problems. You must also check which pages they are visiting most and from which pages they are leaving your site. With some research you can find out whether you are making it easy for the customer to navigate your site or whether you are frustrating them with unnecessary detail.

The moment you find out the problem with your site, make the corrections immeditely. Keep monitoring your web site on a regular basis and make it user-friendly. When you follow a consistent process of self analysis and improvement of your web site you can expect good results in conversion of your visitors to customers.

Dan Lambart is the Director of Sales and Marketing for AB Traffic a company providing a high quality targeted traffic service for for commercial web sites.

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I noticed during the test, that I really hated the look of the ads on my home page. Just because of the layout and the choices I made (as pointed out by someone in the comments area), but because I realize that I just can’t stand advertising on my home page. I run Adsense on my permalink pages of course, and there are affiliate links sprinkled where they make sense, but I just don’t like any money making links on the main index page. I know I would make more if I exploited the home page, but so much that I want to ruin the look of the blog.

Did you notice that my index page loaded slower? Well it did for me. That alone is reason enough to keep the javascript ads of your index page. We want the fastest possible rendering for our home pages in order to keep weak Internet connections on board for loading.

So it was fun little test, but it’s on to the next, and the next. I’ll be back posting on this blog a few times this week. I’ll be busy building a blog for a friend in Saskatoon. The blog is www.mariebrenton.com. Hopefully she finds using her blog easy and worthy of her time. Most people who start blogs post for a short time and then they stop or fade away. It’s too bad, because a wee little blog can grow up to be a fat old blog with floods of traffic, and great streams of income.

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Bidvertiser is claiming to pay much more than they used to pay, so let us see for ourselves shall we. I noticed that there are not nearly as many companies using Bidvertiser, but their control panel was easy to use, and apparently they pay their publishers on time. (which is a big thing for me)

Just so you know, you can’t use other contextual ads (such as Bidvertiser or Ads by Yahoo) on the same page that has Google Adsense on it, so watch that you don’t do that.

I had a Bidvertiser banner on Zulit yesterday, but pulled it off again today. I just have trouble with anything that flashes too much. When I see a site that flashes things at me, or pops things up at me, I’m gone and gone. I will use Google Ads on other websites if the ads look like they will take me to what I’m looking for. This is why contextual ads are king these days. (can’t see that form of advertising going down the tubes any time soon)

Let me know your opinion on the Bidvertiser ads now presented on this home page. Curious to know if they are making my precious blog UGLY!

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This makes sense to publishers who use contexual advertising and have trouble making sizable profits. This makes sense if you are able to convince your visitors to enter their information into your online form. I agree that their methods have merit, but I don’t believe inexperienced Internet business people will succeed using these ideas. I think beginners are still better off to stick with contexual advertising along the lines of Adsense, Ads by Yahoo, or Chitika.

John Reese and his associates went as far as to state that most people using contexual advertising only procure a click through rate (CTR) of 10% if they are fortunate. They also mention that most Adsense clicks only pay 10 cents. They used these numbers as an example of course, and in many cases they are correct. However, I know from my own experience that creating profits from data entry forms is not as profitable as contexual advertising. This sounds like a bold statement as well, but it’s only based on my experience in my chosen markets.

The truth is that the methods discussed on John Reese’s teleconference are subjective to the market. Some markets will always pay more using Adsense only. Some markets will pay more with lead generation. For John Reese or myself to make a sweeping statement one way or the other would be irresponsible. Every web site owner must ultimately test all methods of profit generation, and use the method that creates the highest net profit.    

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The reason Internet publishers are using Google Adsense is because it pays. Google always pay at the end of the month via cheque or direct deposit. Their ads are almost always relevant, and the publisher can make money without having to sell a product, or convert a sale.

The problem I see is that consumers of the Internet will be over-exposed to the familiar “Google ads” and simply see any kind of contextual ad as advertising. Their eyes will see the ad, their brains will register that they have seen an ad, and they will ignore it. In essence, they will be blind to it.

For example; I’ve noticed that all my blogs that primarily focus around the subject of Internet marketing (like this one), have extremely low click through rates on ads of any kind. The CTR is low because Adsense savvy individuals see Adsense ads and rarely click them. They know that I get paid from those clicks, and they know they are going to be led to a web site that wants to sell them something, or wants them to take some kind of mouse action (like clicking another Adsense ad). This is the problem that I’m seeing with Adsense monomania prevalent on the web today.

You’ll notice while using your favorite search engine that you can be swept into what I call the Adsense whirlpool. The shopper of the information or product using a search engine types in their querie; they are presented with a host of natural search engine results, and of course the sponsered links (usually found at the top, bottom, and right sidebar of the screen). The user then clicks on a link to the web site that appears to have the product or information they require. When they enter that web site they are presented with onlyAdsense ads. They then see an ad link in the cluster that promises to give them the information they need, which takes them to another site that only has Google Adsense choices.

Eventually the user experiences the Adsense whirlpool so many times they vow to never click on an ad again. This is all speculation on my part, but I have a sneakin’ suspicion that this is going to be a big problem in the future for the Google Adsense team. Google may become victims of their own success. More on this in other posts.

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Should You Be Monetizing Your Blogs?
There was a time when blogging was never considered an advertising medium whatsoever. In fact, there is a large population in the blogosphere that believe blogging for money is an insult to their art. I can understand that view of course, but the reality is that humans want money, need money, and prove time and time again, they will even go as far as killing for money. It was inevitable, and I give credence to the fact that if there is a way to make money, people will line up to pay for the resources to do it.

I am not ashamed to state that when I began pubishing on the internet, my ultimate goal was to make money (enough money to make it my full time job). It has been a blessing to say the very least. What I discovered through out this process and journey, is that I enjoy writing. I discovered that making money via the internet can be fun. I never imagined that working 8 hours a day (at anything) could be fun! So I’ve made it clear that I am barefaced, unabashed, and quite brazen about making online income for myself and my famliy.

When Should You Start Monetizing Your Blogs?
There are different opinions, and sometimes theologies, regarding this question. Some bloggers say never, some say only after 6 months of consistent posting, while others say right away. My opinion is that it makes no difference at all. Some bloggers, webmasters, and SEO specialists, believe that a web site or blog that has advertising via contexual ads, banners, affiliate links, and ecommerce checkout scripts, can hurt initial search engine rankings. I’ve even read articles written by bloggers who believe that having affiliate links and ad script code in their template code will ensure their blog’s sentence in the dreaded so-called Google sandbox will be longer. I emphatically state that line of thought to be invalid.

If you are serious when it comes to professional blogging, you undertsand that what the search engines want is high quality and original content. Their algorithms, and bots, want to see this kind of content added to a web site, or blog, frequently. (I discuss Schedule of Writing in the previous post) When you understand this you realize that all the theories of what works in the search engines don’t add up to diddly. If you publish content as mentioned above, you will rise up in the search engines with impunity.

So in conclusion, my advice is to do whatever you want. Monetize your blog right out of the gate, or don’t. Either way, it won’t make any difference 6 months later. You will succeed or fail based on your content anyway. I present ads as soon as I launch a new blog just for layout purposes. I know that monetizing my blog won’t make any real money for months, but at least the banners and ads offer choices to my visitors, and at the same time, enhance the look and feel of the raw template.

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