What to Do When Your Blog Goes Down

I was involved in a crash on the information superhighway. Translation: My blog is inactive over at wordpress and there's not a darn thing I've been able to do about it -- yet!

As many of you know, I migrated this blog from blogger to wordpress on 4/30/08. I'm waiting on a response from their Help Desk, but as you can imagine -- I'm frantic and have been all day.

How to Respond When You're Involved in a Crash on the Information Superhighway

So, what should you do if your blog goes down? Well, there's always CRYING, which I was almost at the point of when I first discovered it was down. RAGE is good -- especially when you can't get anyone to get back to you and you have paid advertising out there. DRINKING -- I considered this, but have client copy to get in, so didn't want to chance any drunk ramblings.

So, what THIS blogger did was go back to any old standby (blogger). Thank goodness the migration is less than a month old so readers still look for me here. Now, as I promised in my post last Thursday-- which I would like to link to but can't because the dat blane thing is down (I reposted that day's post here here cuz it just bugged me to death not to be able to link to it) -- here's my promised topic today.

Why I'm Making More Money with AssociatedContent (AC) Since They STOPPED Paying For My Content

I used to recycle my blog posts with AC. Meaning, once I wrote my posts, I would then sell the content to AC. I would receive anywhere from $4 to $9 for each recycled post. Then a few weeks ago, AC stopped paying for recycled content. At first, I was hopping mad because I had been pulling in an extra $20-$40/week selling my blog posts. This was residual income for me.

BUT, a funny thing happened on the way to the forum -- ah, I mean, during this transition. I reminded myself that AC has the right to set the rules as they see fit. One of the reasons I like freelancing is that I get to run my business the way I want to. And, that means being able to tweak the rules as my business needs change.

So instead of getting mad, I checked myself and changed my mindset. Instead of viewing AC as a direct income stream, I focused on using it as an indirect income stream. How?

How to Use Associated Content to Make Passive Income

When AC changed the rules, one of the things they allowed you to do is publish content just for page views only. They offered this all along as well, so now I focus solely on my audience at AC. Let me explain.

Building an Audience is to Your Benefit

Even though the upfront payment was nice, AC also offered page view performance payments (PV Payments). For every 1,000 page views your article receives, they pay you $1.50. This month, I received my biggest PV payout ever -- a bit more than $40. Now even though this isn't a lot, remember, it's money I didn't have to do anything for.

And not for nothing, but those $1.50 payments add up fast -- especially if you have other products you want to introduce your readers to on the backend.

As of today's date, I have 108 subscribers to my content on AC. Now that I'm not searching for titles to write about just to pick up a few bucks (which I handn't done for a while anyway), I focus only on what these subscribers want to read -- freelance writing related content.

In the past, I'd written about everything from the best flowers to plant in spring to deodorant reviews. Although the majority of my articles have always been freelance writing related, subscribers could never rely on receiving this type of content 100% of the time. Now they can.

Because subscribers know that that's what they're going to be getting from me, they're much more likely to read and recommend my content -- leading to more subscribers.

Social Bookmarking: So, my advice to anyone who wants to submit content to AC "for free" is to change your mindset about it. Think of it more as a social bookmarking site than an "online community news site," as they like to market themselves.

Why You Shouldn't Depend Solely on Other Sites for Your Traffic -- 2 Lessons Learned from This Experience

1. No matter what site you decide to get involved with online -- focus on building a community there. For, the rules of the game may change from site to site, but if you've built up a loyal base, a good portion of them will follow you.

2. Build your own online presence -- so you have somewhere for subscribers to still reach and follow you if the rules do change on some other site/community.

Happy online marketing -- and I hope your Monday has been a mite bit better than mine,

Yuwanda

3 Ways to Double Your Website Traffic in 30 Days & a List of Freelance Writing Jobs

This week is hell week. Remember final exams in college? It was a week or two of sheer hell – back to back exams, papers due and projects to finish. It meant a week of dressing in sweats, pulling all nighters, forgetting personal grooming and throwing your social life to the wind.

Well, that’s what this week is like for me as far as work. I’ve already warned my fiancé, sisters and group of friends – I’m unavailable until Friday at 5pm.

So, why am I telling you all of this? Because I could never abandon you, my highly valued readers. So instead of longer posts, which I’m quite fond of, I will be dispensing a series of “Quick Tips for Freelance Writers” this week. They will be highly useful and relevant – things you can implement or act on right away. And, of course, there will be job listings.

Today’s Quick Tip for Freelance Writers is inspired by the post, Three simple actions that doubled my website traffic in 30 days from Adrian W Kingsley-Hughes of pcdoctor-guide.com. It was posted on Problogger.net, a blog I read often.

To quickly summarize, Adrian says that he made use of Technorati tags and trackback links to popular posts, and leveraged his existing website. Read the entire article to see how he did it.

The Secret to Using Popular Social Bookmarking Sites to Increase Blog Traffic

Just to give my 2 cents on this, I can second these, especially making use of Technorati tags. Technorati, in essence, does your homework for you. Because it tracks “112.8 million blogs and over 250 million pieces of tagged social media*”, it lets you know what’s popular in your niche, without you having to do the homework. [*Source: Technorati.com]

You can use this principle to track what’s popular in your niche across all popular social media outlets (eg, StumbleUpon, Del.icio.us, YouTube, etc.).

Even though this post was written in December of 2005, I still don’t think most of us (and I sooooo include myself in this group) are aware enough of web technology to take full advantage of it. But, a simple tip like this can make all the difference.

So, log on to a site like Technorati and pull up some popular blogs in your niche. What tags are sticking out there? They will tell you what content users are dying to read. Then, you produce it and you’ll have a popular blog before you know it.

FYI, don’t forget, I will be releasing two new ebooks within the next couple of weeks -- How to Find Unpublished Freelance Writing Jobs and How to Start a Popular, Profitable Freelance Writing Blog. View all of Inkwell Editorial’s current titles on freelance writing here.

I still haven’t completely found my motivation, but the work has found me – so I’m along for the ride. Have a great Monday everybody! (Access list of freelance writing jobs below)

Yuwanda Black, Publisher
http://inkwelleditorial.com/
http://inkwelleditorial.blogspot.com/
http://seo-article-writer.com/
http://seo-articles-for-sale.com/
How to Start a Successful Freelance Writing Career Newsletter
P.S: Want to learn how to make at least $250/day writing simple 500-word articles? Read how here.
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Today’s Freelance Writing Jobs / SEO Writing Jobs
Note about job listings: I list positions that offer immediate work – and future work. Keeping your pipeline full requires taking a long-range approach and thinking out of the box (eg, sending in your credentials to FT postings). That's why explanations are given w/some listings.

Freelance Writer for Nutrition Newsletter

Article Writer for 50+ Short Articles

Freelance Writer for Casting Website

Editor/Writer (Academic) (good opportunity to get your credentials on file, as if you have the background they’re looking for, it’ll be easy to snag assignments)

Grant Writer (gosh I wish I had this type of experience!; grant writing is an evergreen niche; keep this in mind as you grow your freelance writing career)

Freelance Blog Writer

Copywriter for Golf and Baseball Products Catalog

Ad Writer for Legal Website (If you have samples in the area he alludes to in this ad, this would be a great way to approach him with the idea of writing the ereport/ebook for his site)

Contract Writer for Insurance Industry (if you have experience in this niche, send in a few samples (create them if you don’t have them) outlining what you bring to the table and pitch them on some projects – eg, newsletter articles, website content, client tip booklets, etc.).

Freelance Writing Jobs from the Public Request Section of Constant-Content.com (Read more about this here)

Title: Barack Obama
Description: Grassroot Organizations in CT and PA Women for Obama People of Faith for Obama Seniors for Obama
Price: $20-30
Article amount: 3
Content length: 200
Subjects: Barack Obama

Title: Articles on Short Story Comps
Description: Details and hints on how to win short story competitions. Different areas of this type of writing can be discussed.
Price: $10-20
Article amount: 10
Content length: 500
Subjects: Choosing a good title. Having a believable ending. The importance of pace in short fiction. Hooking the judge with the first sentence. Any variation of the above plus other areas will be considered.
Notes: Full rights will be required.

Title: Website Content
Description: we are looking for long term relationships with content writers. we design websites are looking for a few people to outsource work to.
Price: $10-20
Article amount: large number - over 100
Content length: 100 - 400 each
Subjects: law firm websites eye doctor websites real estate lawyer websites real estate title company websites more
Notes: please respond and then we can always use private request if you like. we only want high quality writers!!

Title: Looking for a internet person that has inside knowledge of paid online surveys.
Description: Some one that has had problems with paid-online surveys, but has learned all the secrets of making money with online surveys in complete detail. This article will be placed on my website.
Price: $40-50
Article amount: 10
Content length: 400
Subjects: Paid on-line survey problems and how to make money.
Notes: None
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Read Freelance Success Stories! There are freelancers who make very good livings at what they love. Inkwell Editorial's newsletter features these successful professionals who put to rest the phrase, "starving freelancer." Subscribe to read this, and all previous, issues.

Previous Issue: Interview with author and freelance writer Misti Sandefur. Also, info on 4 quick, simple things I do on a daily basis to increase traffic to my website and blog (and you can too!); how I made $4,000 in 30-days from one client -- and a whole lot more!

Current Issue. Spotlight on How to Make Money Online: An interview with internet marketer Pat B. Doyle. Pat shares tips on how to make passive income online via affiliate marketing; some common mistakes online entrepreneurs make; and some free and low-cost methods to make money online. There's more also. Subscribe to read this, and all previous, issues.
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