The Ramblings of a Moaning Online Old Git!

For a while now I have been surfing on traffic exchange sites & have come to the conclusion that although I am generating traffic to my site, I am not receiving targeted visitors, (what a surprise I hear you say) so I decided to have a little fun with them.

What I did first was to place referral links on each site to see which performed the best, what I found was very interesting!

One site advised me to join as I had referrals, (this cost me almost £20.00 – yes GBP!) after paying this MONTHLY FEE & logging in to my account I found I had NO REFERRALS! This monthly fee was cancelled before it was due to be renewed!

Another Traffic Exchange site did the complete opposite! I found that I had 4 referrals but they did not notify me about this. I will mention this site later as I believe they are a honest bunch.

Back to the fun stuff! I had been advertising my website for absolutely ages & not getting anywhere so I decided to have a laugh, I have a free ebook area on my site which IS FREE - no signups required, just download them & don’t even say thank you. So I decided to make a new text ad on these Traffic exchange sites – it reads, (and still does until they catch me) “ Fart Like an Angel & receive free Ebooks!” – what a laugh I had while writing this ad, I had tears streaming down my face through laughter!

I’m not sure if other people have the same idea, but I have come across two other websites which have a quirky squeeze page, one says “Nothing Here” & the other one says “Apache is functioning normally!” (I’m pleased to hear that!, saves a visit to the doctors!)

But what is the purpose of these Traffic Exchange sites? Are you building your own online business – or someone else’s? Are they only there to lower your Alexa Rank through hours of surfing?

Another thing I found is that all websites must be in English, but you can upload a URL to them and after it is accepted you could change the language and re publish the page which is normally hosted on your own site. Don’t get me wrong, I believe everyone should have the chance to make a living online, I just don’t like clicking on English written links & visiting a page I cannot understand.

Yet another thing – Why do people advertise a referral link on the same Traffic exchange site? Surly you are actually preaching to the already converted!

That’s it, I’ve got it out of my system & no longer feel stressed or have my dander up over advertising other peoples businesses. Thanks for your time for reading my ramblings, all the best,

Tiny, (ossface.co)

P.S. The HONEST Traffic Exchange site I found is Click Voyager – plus I like their games of Hangman & their slot machines!

Our Free Ebook Area, (don't worry - like i stated earlier - no sign-ups required)

Making Money with Articles: Using the Yahoo Search Marketing Tools to Retrieve Free Keywords

When making money with articles, you need to find the perfect keywords to make your niche sites a success. However, many times it is expensive to utilize paid keyword search tools. For this reason, some new marketers may prefer to try and find their keywords for free. One of the best ways to do this is to use the free Yahoo Search Marketing tools that you can find on their website.

First, go to the Yahoo website and choose Search Marketing under Yahoo Advertising Solutions. Scroll down to and click on Sponsored Search. You will see a section that says “How many searches can your business get?” where you will type in the main keyword of your decided niche. This will bring up a list a of words that have your niche subject in them and tell you how many people searched for that particular word the previous month.

To get an idea of what the competition is like, take each word that had a substantial amount of searches and input it into the Yahoo search engine using parenthesis. This will give you a good idea of how many people search for a particular keyword and how many sites you will be in competition with for the top spots on the first two pages.

This will of course take a lot more time than a paid software program and it may not give you all of the great ideas that a program might. On the other hand, it will be free and give you extra funds for other parts of your website.

If you can do this for free on your own, search engine optimize your site on your own, and write your own content, then the only thing you will have to spend money on is a website URL and web hosting. This is a great idea for those who have little to no start up cash, a lot of time on their hands, are quick learners, and can wait for the profits to start coming in (which will pretty much be pure profit).

However, if you prefer to go the easy route and utilize a keyword generating software program, you can find many online. Some are more popular than others and have been a proven way for people to dig up valuable keywords for their niche sites.

Free Online Video Websites That Aren’t Really Free!

Are you an avid online shopper? If so, there is a good chance that you have come across a number of different deals and discounts online.  Similar to those deals and discounts is the ability to obtain something online without paying a fee, those items, products, or services are commonly known as being free. Unfortunately, you will find that when it comes to being free, not all free things are actually free. One of those things is online video websites, not all of them are as free as you would think they would be. 

Before examining online video websites that are classified as being free, you first must understand that you may have to pay a small fee to view their online videos.  Most of the sites that are labeled free online video websites are free to join. Essentially, this means that you do not have to be considered a paid member just to join the site. By creating a free membership program, there are many online websites, including online video websites, that are able to claim that they operate and run a free program.

With most online video websites, you fill find a wide variety of free videos.  These types of videos have been found on almost all types of video websites. Free videos are, in most cases, considered homemade videos.  Homemade videos are made by internet users, just like you, who have little or no experience creating professional videos. Many of the free, homemade videos that you can find online include comedy skits, unprofessionally constructed music videos, how-to videos, and funny, but unscripted recordings.

The video types that you may have to pay for include popular television show reruns, professional music videos, celebrity interviews, children’s television shows, and much more. Most online video websites, if they charge for these types of videos charge only around two dollars for each video, sometimes even less. Google Video is one of those websites.  Depending on the type of video website you are at, you can typically view this video more than once, after you pay for it.

While you may assume that it is a pain for pay for online videos, it is something that needs to be done. In fact, these small fees are, often times, the only legal way to watch your favorite television shows or music videos online.  This is because the content is owned by another individual, often a television producer or a record label. With these types of video, most video owners need to receive reimbursement for their work; thus the payment.  Unless permission is granted by the individual or company who owns the video rights, it technically illegal to have videos, whether they be music videos or television show reruns, available online free of charge.

In addition to legally viewing videos, you will also help to be generating income for someone else.  For instance, if you purchase the right to download or view a popular music video, it is likely that the artist or group you are watching will receive a small amount of compensation for their work. This compensation is often what keeps the television, movie, and music industry going in full swing.
As previously mentioned, you may find it inconvenient to have to go through the process of buying an online video, but it will be worth it in the long run, often in more ways than one.  You are encouraged to remember that the next time you go searching for an online video in an illegal matter.

Why There Are Free Podcasts

Podcasting, unlike other media forms, almost never has
charges for services, and the vast majority of feed
producers distribute free podcasts. This puts at odds
with, say, online radio stations, news sites that offer
media to subscribers, or the online music industry
general. Even though podcasting has very direct
correlations with industries like news and music that
have strong business models, podcasting differs.
Podcasting does not really have a business model, and
hardly anyone is podcasting in order to profit from it.
There are some businesses and news sites that podcast,
but they do it as a way to supplement their companies
and to gain technological geek credibility, not to make
money. This is an odd thing, but explainable in light of
what podcasting is.
The free podcast problem is not difficult, and
podcasting differs in several key ways from other media
areas. First, podcasting involves the physical transfer of
a file from the host to the users computer. An online
radio station does not do this; all that they provide to
their listeners is a streaming sound file that cannot be
saved without difficulty and work. If someone did
manage to do so, the station would have strong grounds
for suing them since they were never given the rights to
keep and store the files. By podcasting the complete file
to the users computer, express permission is granted the
user to copy and use as they wish. Second, the podcasts
are, for the most part, made by individuals who have
low costs involved in creating and distributing the files,
as opposed to a news broadcast or song by a music
company. These individuals have little reason to charge
for their work since there is little cost to them to do so.
Because the files are distributed in a way allows their
copying and does not control the media, and since
podcasting is a very low cost media outlet, feed
producers have little reason or ability to charge for their
work.

Finding Free Podcast Videos.

Finding Free Podcast Videos
Anyone can easily find free podcast videos online.
There are numerous podcast directories online that can
help you find feeds to subscribe to, or you may find a
feed thats available from a site you enjoy. After looking
through the directories and finding a feed you want to
download, subscribe to it using one of the many free
podcast clients available. The podcast client will
automaticall download a small file called an RSS file,
which stands for Really Simple Syndication. The RSS
file tells your podcast client when there is a new file, in
this case a video, to download. Depending on your
client, the program will notify you or maybe even
download it automatically. Once the file is on your
computer, you'll be free to listen to it any time it is
convenient.
Soon you'll be on your way to downloading some of the
free podcast videos available online. Feeds are available
that publish on almost every topic, from independent
news shows to experimental videos, to scientific
information. Some colleges and universities even
podcast their most popular lectures so that students will
have a chance to watch and review from the comfort of
their computer chair.
The best part is that these free podcast videos, are of
course, free. All of these feeds are easy to find, and the
publishers, for the most part, do it simply because they
enjoy it, and are glad to give it away.

Downloading a Free Podcast.

Downloading a Free Podcast
Its easy to find and download a free podcast. The best
way to find free podcasts is probably to check a podcast
directory. A podcast directory is a listing of many,
sometimes thousands of different podcasts. The podcast
directory will usually organize the podcasts by topic and
genre, making it easy to find the type of podcast that is
sought. In addition, podcast directories often allow the
visitors to comment on the podcasts listed, and provide
a list of the favorite podcasts on the site, making it easy
for users to find the best podcasts available. These
podcast directories can be used to browse through,
introducing users to many different podcasts they
otherwise would not have found.
Once a podcast has been found that interests the user, it
is necessary to download the free podcast. The vast
majority of podcasts will be free, but there will be a few
that may cost a small amount of money. The process to
subscribe to and download the podcasts is the same in
either case. First, a podcast client needs to be found and
installed. There are many free podast clients available,
all providing a slightly different user interface and range
of options. They come with many different names, such
as Podscape, or Nimiq, and searching for 'free podcast
client' or something like it will turn up many
possibilities. When the podcast client has been
installed, inputting the feed address will allow the
podcast to be downloaded. The podcast client will
check the address given for a small, machine readable
file called an RSS file. This file will contain
information about the podcasts, perhaps some text
about the individual episodes, as well as the location of
the episode file. Once the podcast client has been
located the file referred to in the RSS feed, it will be
downloaded and stored on the users computer until the
want to view it.
Sometimes, of course, access to a personal computer is
not available, but it is still necessary to check a certain
podcast. Fortunately, many podcast directories offer
built in podcast readers in the site. Not only do they
often show each recent episode that is available, they
may also offer a way to view or listen to those podcast
episodes from within the site. By using the viewer
contained within the site, it is no longer necessary to
even download the podcast episodes. However, the
ability to move and share the episodes after
downloading is one of the wonderful things about
podcasting. The files can be placed on almost and
media player, ranging from iPods to the new Play
Station Portable. This flexibility is one of the reasons
podcasts have succeeded, despite other technologies
like streaming music and video. The desire of
consumers to have control over technology cannot be
over estimated.

Making Money with Articles: Free Article Content.

Some webmasters try to use articles from free content directories to get visitors to their site and make some money. This is mostly important for those who have just begun working as an affiliate for several companies and do not yet have any funding, yet need to built small niche websites to visitors to their site so that they can begin making revenue.




Although this can sometimes be the only option for those who are running on a non-existent budget, it is not a way that will effectively build your website or revenue. There are a few potential reasons why this may be detrimental to your business building efforts.



Problem #1 - Search Engines



Search engines will only look down upon your site if it has the exact same duplicated content than other sites. The more sites that share your content, the less it will help you achieve good search engine rankings.



Good search engine rankings are essential in getting visitors to your sit so that they have a chance to click on your affiliate links. If you cannot even get visitors, then will never make an revenue. Working on the search engine optimization of your site so that you will eventually be high enough in the results to get customers, should be priority one.



Problem #2 - Getting visitors to click



Although getting your site high on search engine result pages and acquiring site visitors is hard work, unfortunately this is only half of the battle. You must also be able to convince those visitors to click on your affiliate links. If your visitors see the same content they have seen on a multitude of other sites, they will be least likely to click on your links. This is because most people want to buy things that are recommended by people that they trust or whom they feel like are an expert on the subject.



If your content is just duplicated from other sites, you will be exposed as someone who does not really know what they are talking about and therefore will not look heavily on your product recommendations. This will reduce the number of website visitors who will be willing to click through.



Problem #3 - Author Bylines



Most free content is only given to you if you agree to place the authors byline under the article (you can get into trouble if you try to use it without following the stipulated rules). This poses a problem because most author bylines include links. When a reader gets done reading a really intriguing article, there is a strong possibility that they will click on the author’s byline link rather than your affiliate links. This is the entire reason why these authors offer free content to begin with, so that they may get their name and links out there to the public. Using this type of content may mean shooting yourself in the foot and losing possible profitable website visitors.



Once you put these three problems together, you are looking at a serious decline in revenue simply because you used free website content from article directories. Although it may be the only option for some, if you have the funds to buy your own original content, then you should go this route. If you don’t have the finds, however, you may be better off writing your own content and then hiring professional services once you have made a profit to work with.