Search Engine Optimization

What is SEO? We hear this acronym a lot. Well, it means Search Engine Optimization. Basically once you have your blog up and running (See Where do I Start) you would naturally want people to drop by and gain something from your blog.

People discover sites using search engines; personally I am a Google person. You may be a Yahoo person,
whatever it is, Search engines are very critical in getting your blog out in the wind. And it would be especially useful if your site pops up on relevant keyword searches.

I have to say the blog world is a really crowded world. You would want to stand out and be heard. You can follow these tips to make your fruit of labor stand out from the crowd.

Now for the Tips:

1. Make use of Long Tailed Keywords

We know what keywords are but Long Tailed Keywords? Well, they are keywords formed in a string of words typed in by search engine users when they are scouting for information.
For example if you want to search for “Blogs that makes money” you would tend to key in the entire string of words.

What does this mean? To get good hits you’d need to use as much of these strings as possible and there are tools on the web that allows you to look at popular keywords and how current readers finds
your page.

I am using Sitemeter: It is a counter and also allows you to check visitors by referral which shows you were your users come from. If they’ve come to your site via a search attempt then you can see what Long Tailed Keywords they used.

Mybloglog has a feature that tracks where readers came from (Under the search section)
Google Analytics has a similar feature as well.

So what do you do with these keywords? Try to repeat or mention these keyphrases every now and then so that you get constant ranking in those searches. If you note a particular key phrases that brings people to your site, try to talk about it more- maybe worth an entire post on the topic..

2. Outgoing and Incoming Links!

Traffic comes from someplace and the doorways to traffic are links. How do you build links? There are many ways you can do this. Try to write “Link worthy” posts (often these are “DIYs” How-To’s, Strong opinions, controversial discussions, Tips, 101 list which has to be relevant to your blog. Drop some breadcrumbs, drop some quick-links in comments on other blogs with have similar topics. You can write reviews to get backlinks. ReviewMe is offering solutions for these aspects. Backlinks are incoming links to a website or web page. The number of backlinks is an indication of the popularity or importance of that website or page and usually search engines crawl for these backlinks to determine your popularity. Try to exchange links with relevant blogs by writing to the blog author and request a link exchange.

3. Enrich your blog titles and URL’s with keywords.

Blog titles are very important, the more it contains searchable keywords, phrases that summarize the post’s content the more likely your blog will turn up on searches. So what keywords should I use? Try these free keyword suggestion tools:
Overture
WordTracker
Brandon Hopkins showed how the Wordpress Post Slug can be used to get the some great SEO results

4. Use and Optimize Images

For the past 3 months one of my sister site (http://fishforfood.blogspot.com/) has been getting 60% of it’s traffic from images.

Besides making your blog look cool and arty images can also be used to help you in your optimization efforts.
Here’s how you can optimize your images:

If you are using Wordpress maximize the title tag feature when you upload images. Keyword suggestion tools
can also help you what descriptive keywords to use in labeling your images.

When you upload your images, most people tend to use free hosting sites and usually these sites will change the
image name to some nonsensical codes. That’s not a good thing. If you’ve uploaded an image of Me and Paris Hilton.jpg you want to keep that file name so it pops up on the Search Results Page when someone searches for Paris Hilton... get the drift?

Don’t upload posts that are too huge that it becomes a drag to download your blog which has them. It will annoy readers.

If the images you use are your own, learn how to get credits and traffic by using some simple image editing
skills.

Google also suggests one way to get your images optimized well for their search engine, opt-in to their enhanced image search.

I hope the above will help you quickly get your site out there to the masses. Good luck. Money Shiok let’s make money.

UPDATE: If you want to check your Google ranking try this Google Positioning tool!

Technorati Favorites Exchange

This is my Technorati Favourites Exchange post and the goal is simply to increase traffic and try to break into the Top 100 favourite blogs on Technorati. More exposure is always welcomed.
Getting into the Most Favorited list doesn’t depend on any other variables like the link count over time, only the number of favorites each blog receives.

This in turn can be used as a social proof on your blog's popularity and hence increase the attractiveness of your site to blog readers and of course advertisers.

It also expands your blog readership. You’re more likely to receive visitors from Technorati if you’re listed in the Top 100 Most Favorited list. The visitors are bloggers, and potential subscribers if you have good quality content.

The Moneyshiok Favourites Exchange is open to ALL Bloggers regardless of your country, blog topic or language.

I WILL exchange favourites will all of the interested parties in this simple project.
SO Why wait? Come and join in the project.

Here's how to participate:

1. You'll need to have a Technorati Account. If you do not already have one, please sign up here for free.
2. Favourite Moneyshiok by clicking here to add me to your Technorati Favourites.
3. Leave your Technorati Username and a link to Favourite your blog in the comments page.
4. I will reciprocate and add your blog to my Technorati Favourites when I see the link in the comments.
5. My username is Gonefishing
6. Provide a "Link Back" to this Blog post within your blog (You can create a similar post to this) about this Technorati Favourites exchange project.

Here are the procedures:Create a post on your blog announcing that you’re exchanging Technorati Favorites. Prominently include a link to this post to indicate that there is a Technorati Favorites and link exchange going on here. Leave the URL of your post in the comment page and I’ll do a link exchange to your blog.
By linking here, you’ll send your readers to participate in this experiment and when I link back to you, the readers of this blog can visit your blog to trade favorites with you as well.
This is a mutual arrangement that allows us to share traffic and readers with each other, and really boost your Technorati rankings!
If you feel uneasy leaving links in the comment page, you can email me anytime .

These are the Blogs I have added to my favourites: (Do Fav them and get a return fav)
1. http://vocino.com/
2. http://elgiganteverdoso.blogspot.com/
3. http://www.cymru66.com/
4. http://pointlessbanter.net/
5. http://sfhuang.com
6. http://bloodycomputer.blogspot.com
7. http://ashish028.tblog.com
8.
9.

AdSense in YouTube?

There is an interesting "rumor" going around about Adsense in Youtube videos according to this page on YouTube, certain sites can now embed YouTube players that contain an AdSense unit above the clip. Which means you could soon make money by embedding YouTube clips in your site.
The page, spotted by ProBlogger today, doesn’t yet provide a way to sign up for this, and I can’t find any mention in my AdSense account. However, it does display a new type of embedded player that’s long enough to accommodate the ad unit. It also mentions that the player is customizable.
The results could be interesting: if these are the typical Pay Per Click ads (probably a safe assumption), revenues will be low. If they are pay-per-view, however (click the banner to view a video ad in the player), the results could be better.
They also seem to be dodging a bullet: putting these ads on just any old videos would lead to YouTube paying publishers for distributing potentially copyrighted content. That doesn’t appear to be the case; instead, they’ve signed up a number of premium content providers who are happy to have their content shared in this way.
Has anyone seen these players exsist in nature?

WHERE DO I START?

Initially this site is made to focus on AdSense optimization and SEO (Search Engine Optimization) However, I have been receiving emails asking me how does one even get started with a site that can generate income. Hence my topic of "How to get started?"

Let's not even go into Ad affiliates or Tips to get sites ranked or listen when you do not even own a site yet.So here's how to get started. What is a BLOG? A blog is an abbreviated word that stands for weblog. A weblog is a web-based journal in which people can publish their opinions and thoughts on the Internet. Almost anyone can create or start a blog. It's not only easy but in most cases with no cost!
The first question you should ask yourself is which tool to use? There are many blogging services available with a variety of different features. Most of them are free, available as an open source, others require some from of programming, configuration, HTML knowledge to get them up andrunning.

For new bloggers who are not 100% sure it's going to work for them or if you are just trying out blogging then Blogger is the tool for you. It costs absolutely nothing, very stable, extremely easy to use. To use this free service, just sign up and you will be guided with the options available.

If you've had a few blogger blogs and wanted to do up a blog with more features but still do not want to invest heavily in technology- go to Typepad. It provides a little more options than blogger- specifically track backs and categories. It costs more than Blogger.

The Steps to get started..

1. Decide which tool to use for blogging. Here are some service providers: Blogger.com, MuseCrafters.com, Livejournal.com, JournalHome.com, WordPress.com, TheDiary.org, Mindsay.com, Blog.com, Diaryland.com, Blogdrive.com, or Xanga.com. Most of these sites have ready-made tools and templates so just pick one and sign up.


2. Once you have signed up, you'll be prompted to select from a range of ready-made templates, pick one that is suitable. However note that templates can be changed later on and there are many free templates for download. Then personalize your blog by adding name, images, interests etc.


3. Now that you've got your blog framework up, you can start adding nice freebies and widgets on your blog. E.g Images (Note copyright issues), Tagboards, Shoutbox, imoods,guestmaps, guestbooks, site counter, and comment boxes.


4. Decide on whether or not you want your blog to be private or personal: do you want any anyone on the internet to be able to read your blog, or do you just want to limit access to friends and family ? Many blogging sites allow you to set password to your blog so only authorized visitors can read your blog. If you want to monetize your blog later, this may not be something you want to do.


5. Most often the pre-defined templates work nice, but once you've started to meddle with the internals of the blog you want to change certain things. Blogger allows you to modify the color schemes and layout of your blog really easily.


6. After you've set up your blog, create a few posts to test it out, and make any fine adjustments to the color scheme or layout as you deem fit. At first, it will seem tough to figure out what to write, but once you get into a routine of daily blogging, you will find it addictive. If you notice there are different kinds of blogs out there, some are generic where like a journal people blog about their daily lives- some can be interesting especially when you are a public figure but otherwise blogging about what you had for breakfast may not entice readers. You may blog about current affairs, a niche topic focusing on a niche market like Auto modification, Sports, Fishing, Health, something which you have passion for really works.


7. Even if you may have 2-3 posts, it's never too early to START building a blogging circle. visit other similar blog and leave comments. when you leave comments, add your blogging address so they can visit you too.


8. If you want to make your blog look more attractive, there are some sites up that have many "skins" and templates that might make it look better. One example is blogskins.com, which also comes with Photoshop and HTML tutorials.


9. Market your blog by forwarding the URL to your friends or publish the URL on your othre websites. Add the URL to posts you make on other blogs. Join Blogging directories, submit to Google serach. (There are more topics relating to Site optimization and SEOs). You are Done with the First STEP.

Notes...

• Content is King- and frequency of posts too.If you update your blog frequently, more people will return on a regular basis to read it. By establishing a returning reader base will give you more motivation to work on you blog.


• Integrate Blogging into your lives, look at things and think about how you can "Blog-it"


• Look at other blogs- pretty blogs always catches the eye.. learn from other bloggers.


• Google for similar blogs, get interacted with these bloggers and share thoughts and comments. E.g. if you are blogging about Sports fishing- google for "Fishing Blogs"
  
• Just like anything- it has to be interesting to pull in crowds. As I have mentioned, not many people would want to know that today you saw Jimmy eating an apple in class. Write about your views, suggestions, or even share Tips.


• Always spell check your writing before posting.


• DO NOT be discouraged if your blog does not receive too many hits or visitors, it often takes some time before your blog gets noticed and start attracting more visitors.


• If you want a broad (international) readership, do not use too many abbreviations or slang terms that might not be easily understood by people who are not from your country/area. In my case I'm using the word SHIOK in the title and I took the effort to explain themeaning of this word.


• Get interesting news from Yahoo Oddly Enough..., other Yahoo stories, Crayon.net and other websites that you frequently read.


• I find Niche is always best. So remember to pick one topic that you are really passionate about. Note that if you want to monetize your site soon you do not want to create a blog that has offensive contents

Making Money Online is not a myth

Many people I know tend to dismiss money making opportunities on the web as hog wash. I do not blame them a bit due to the amount of scammers online. Let's not mix both of them up for a while. I myself have been a skeptic! I have been duped with get-rich-quick scams... So I spent considerable amount of time researching. Ad networking and affiliates seems to be the most reliable way of making money online. It's like any magazine you'll find out there and if your readership is high, you'll be getting good money for pixel real estate. As an example here's my second cheque from AdSense, due to the TOS I am not able to disclose the amount, let's just say it's enough to fuel my ride for 3 months. For people who want to know more about how you can start making some cash - contact me or hang around this blog.... Good luck!

Monetize with Videos

Ever thought of sharing your videos or some other videos you come across and make money at the same time?
Well, Revver is basically a YouTube with monetization


When viewers watch the video you are sharing (and also the embedded ad), you get paid 20% of what the advertiser pays to Revver.
If users click on the Revver link at the end, you split the proceeds 50/50.

Secret ways to enhance traffic...FREE!

Okay, Now that i got you in here... noticed how i got you to this post in the first place? Work your Titles smart...(e.g Post titles, or Title Tags)
1. Use enticing keywords like FREE!, Secrets or Wow in your title -- it sure does attract traffic
2. Use an indication of cost : FREE, 50% cheaper ...
3. It's okay to use one word that's capitalized ...

Widget Bucks (New Advertising Network)

In this site, we have introduced several ways of monetizing your site, be it through networking or pure advertisement space. Recently we have noticed a new player in the market ... called WidgetBucks .

What's great about this is that unlike GIF animated banner, we have more enticing animation and buttons a widget would have in it's advertising.
Just like any other widgets they are available in different ranges and colors can be customized to match your site. They will also alow you to target 13 different categories (Sub categories are available for each category) you have a choice to manually decide on the category or let it run in contectual mode just like AdSense. They call it MerchSense.

Show me the money

So how does one make money from WidgetBucks ? Well you earn money each time someone clicks on a WidgetBucks ad widget on your site, also called pay-per-click, or PPC. You can also earn money by referring people to WidgetBucks . According to them a number of publishers have successfully making $3-$6 CPM. Payment is via Check but you need to hit $50 before you trigger your first payment.

How much you earn depends largely on your site's traffic and content.

You'll also be making money by referring publisers to WidgetBucks... you get $5 but that's when they have hit their first $50 payout. .

Great News!
It's giving out $25.00 as a signup bonus. How do you get the money into your pocket? Well make the rest of the $25.00 to reach $50 and your cash register will be ringing.

Overall, I like the concept, the design, amout of customization allowed, it's very clean reporting and how can I not mention the attractive grapics!

I just got mine and I am already loving it... why wait... Go get your own WidgetBucks

Improve Traffic

Ultimately without traffic to your sites, you won't be making anything out of the different campaigns and advertisement you have on your site. Here we will try to list out all possible avenues to increase and improve traffic to your blogs. This will be updated constantly.

Hub Pages
I noticed that hub pages tend to get pretty high ranking in google search results. Thus logically by creating your own Hub Pages it will draw more traffic to your blog.
Go to Hub Pages and sign up for an account. Create your own hub pages, and soon you will see it brining in more customers to your site and hopefully pushing up your page rank.

Yahoo Answers
As they always say ... Help others and you will be blessed. Now, here's a method that allows you to help others and simultaneously increase the traffic to your blog. Go to Yahoo Answers, log into your Yahoo account and search for an appropriate category related to your blog. Using advanced search tools you can search for users looking for answers. Once you answerd their query, put a link on that post. If you have been providing pertinent answers, and people find your blog relevant, they will tend to go back to your blog and you can get repeat visits and loyal readers. In this way you can build up a readership. Please note that Spamming will get you out the door sooner.

Set Pings to YES
One simple way to help build traffic to your blog is to ping blog update notification services to inform them that your blog has been updated. This is done so that they will crawl and update you blog. It used to be done manually however the new blogger has a feature of pinging updates automatically.
Go to blogger SETTINGS > PUBLISHING and set "Send Pings" to YES

Addthis Bookmarking Widget
Addthis has a bookmarking widget that will help your visitors bookmark your website or blog, and promote it to the social bookmarking services, sending you back more traffic.

Get Listed on search engines (Google Sitemap)
The Sitemaps Protocol allows a webmaster to inform search engines about URLs on a website that are available for crawling. A Sitemap is an XML file that lists the URLs for a site. It allows webmasters to include additional information about each URL: when it was last updated, how often it changes, and how important it is in relation to other URLs in the site. This allows search engines to crawl the site more intelligently. Sitemaps are a URL inclusion protocol, and complement robots.txt a URL exclusion protocol.
Learn more here

Get Good Quality Linkbacks
In general, webmasters can improve the rank of their sites by increasing the number of high-quality sites that link to their pages. So search for relavant websites, forum, blogs etc that has good content and ranking. Contact the webmasters and ask for link exchanges.

Submit URL to search engines
You can also submit your URL to search engines, but I hear they may not help much. Anyway, here are the links to the sites where you can submit your URL to search engines:
Submit your URL to Google
ExactSeek - Add your URl
Submit URL to Yahoo
MSN URL Submission

Submit site to Directories
We talked about getting and generating inbound links from good websites with good ranking and one of the quickest was is via directories.
Since submission to all sites are relatively similar it would help if you carefully prepare in advance, a title and a short description about your blog which you can then use for all the directories. The best directory to get listed on is the Open Directory.

Google, and many other search engines, uses the data of the Open Directory Project. In fact, Google's Directory is taken from DMOZ, that means if you get listed in DMOZ, your site will also be listed in Google Directory. This also translates to 2 high PageRank and authoritative sites.

I must stress that is is very very difficult to get listed in Open Directories. Try your best to get listed in DMOZ.
However alternatively, start getting listed in blog directories :
Blog Catalog
Blogarama
Blogwise
Globe of Blogs
Bloggernity
Bloghop
Bloghub
Blog Universe

Get Noticed

Get Noticed! Get Listed...
Now that you have made your blog and things are in order ...How do you attract more readers and visitors to your Blog ? To increase the visibility of your blog usually the first thing you wanna do is to submit your Blog URL or RSS Feed to as many good Blog directories as possible. There are hundreds of websites touting themselves as blog search engines, blog directory hosts, traffic exchanges, and feed aggregators. We all knoe there are a few of those website creators that are out to make a quick buck, selling their sites and member database on eBay the moment they attract sufficient traffic.

Blog Directories
Blog Digger
ReadABlog
Blogarama
Globe of Blogs
Kmax Blog Links
BlogDex
BlogUniverse
BlogSearchEngine
BlogHop
BlogWise
EatonWeb
PopDex
Blizg
Blo.gs
BlogCensus
BlogTree
BlogStreet
BritBlog
BlogLines
Bloogz
Australian BlogDirectory
BoingBoing
RootBlog
WeblogDirectory
BlogoSphere EcoSystems
BogMatcher

Blog Syndication
BlogRush Syndication

Start Making Money!

How do you make money? Well the easiest and quickest way you wanna get started with is by affiliate programs and advertising networks.
Get started now with these recommended service providers:

Google AdSense
The best place to start is Google Adsense, it's like the bread and butter of blog monetization. Google displays simple ad units (image and text) on your blog that is targetted based on the content of your blog. Google has been extremely consistent in their services. So far I have received about 2 checks from Google.
Sign up for AdSense Now!

Kontera
A contextually relevant keyword that is discovered in real-time on a web page . They will read your post and convert certain key words into an ad. link. This highlighted keyword becomes a link and there is a bubble pop-up when you hover over the link. Usually Kontera requires a site have a minimum 500,000 page views per month before being accepted into the program.
Sign Up for Kontera

Text Link Ads
Text Link Ads is one of the more popular ad network. They allow you to run text linking campaign. One thing about these link ads is that they are not intrusive. However the price for each links is determined by Google Page Rank, Alexa Ranking the number of RSS Feed subscribers etc.
Sign Up for TLA

AuctionAds
AuctionAds is an eBay affiliate. Publisher will place contex based ads on their site and when users buy products from ebay - you make money.
Sign Up for AuctionAds

ReviewMe
I'm sure you've seen the funny logo of ME with hands and feet... That's ReviewMe...
It allows you to make money by Reviewing and promoting products.
It provides an avenue for advertisers to buy sponsored reviews on your blog. Review prices are based on your blog’s Alexa, Technorati and estimated RSS subscribers. Publishers can also call for their own price if they do not want to go with what has been set by ReviewMe.
You will be paid $20.00 to $200.00 for each completed review that you post on your site.
Sign Up for ReviewMe

FeedBurner Ad Network
FeedBurner offers CPM ads for both blogs and RSS feeds. The CPM rate can go as high as 10 Dollars and publishers get 70% of the earnings. Ads are targeted by content channel.
Sign Up for FeedBurner

AGLOCO
Becoming a member of AGLOCO is as simple as completing a brief sign-up page (name, age, location and email address.). Once you’re a Member, you will be asked to then download the Viewbar™ software. (Note: the Viewbar™ software is currently unavailable, as it is in closed testing. It will be ready for public download in a few weeks, and members will be notified when it is available.)
Read about AGLOCO

Bidvertiser
Bidvertiser, a CPC ad network that go head on with Google AdSense. It is quite attractive for beginners since it has a low payout of 10Dollars as opposed to Google AdSense's 100Dollars.
You get paid for every visitor that clicks on an ad. Their goal is to enable you to make as much as possible from your advertising space, by letting advertisers bid on your ad space. They pay monthly, either by check, or instantly through PayPal with a minimum of only $10.
Bidvertiser ads may be displayed on the same page as GoogleAdSense.
Sell your ad space with BidVertiser

Adsense within blogger post body

Please click on the image for enlarged version.

About Money Shiok

Money Shiok is the brainchild of a simple dude who wanted to share tips and
information on how anybody with internet access can quickly and simply start a blog, a website and start monetizing it. It may seem intimidating and hard at first but once you've made the first step you start to see money flowing in. Wouldn't it be nice to have a second line of income? Keep your day job! Unless until this line of income can sustain your lifestyle comfortably which is not too far fetched. This is not a get rich quick mumbo jumbo... There isn't such a thing. This website will explain how you can start making a decision to explore multiple stream of income... why wait? Take the first step now!

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Removing Blogger's Nav Bar

Wanna get rid off the ugly Blogger navigational bar hanging on top of your blog
and making it look more like a website?
Just add the below in template header (Template tab -> Edit Html -> under Head before Body)

<!-- moneyshiok http://moneyshiok.blogspot.com: Start of remove Navbar --><br /><br /><style type="text/css"><br /><br />#navbar-iframe {<br /><br />height: 0px;<br /><br />visibility: hidden;<br /><br />display: none;<br /><br />}<br /><br /></style><br /><br /><!-- moneyshiok http://moneyshiok.blogspot.com: End of remove Navbar --><br /><br /><br /><br />