Ugh oh… not another one of these “self motivation” posts. When is he going to talk about making money? Well, believe it or not, this is the core of making money online, or becoming a successful blogger. Goals. It has become more clear to me that without goals, you are going to be lost at sea. To the people who know, one of my goals is to break six-figures online this year. Big goal right? However, there are steps I need to take to achieve this goal. Yea yea, enough about me, let’s get to the core of this post. When you have goals, you have something to base your progress and success off of. We all have long-term goals, and short-term goals, but what about the “step by step” goals we need to take to achieve our greater goals?

Why having goals help

They provide inspiration

When you have goals, you are obligating yourself to work for something you have not achieved yet. When I discussed bloggers overcoming the disease of bloggers doubt , in the discussion the community and I had, I came to see that one of the reasons was lack of inspiration. When you have inspiration to do something, you are more eager to strive for your goals. One of the things that keep pushing me each and everyday is the goal of six-figures online, that’s a $8,500+ month salary I need to earn. My motivation is to keep pushing myself to work harder and harder until I accomplish this goal.

When you don’t have goals, you are at a lack of inspiration. It’s basically the same thing as getting into a car but having no idea where your going to go. Sure, driving around ending up in places you don’t know can be fun, but are you really accomplishing anything? This concept applies for blogging, use your goals to define the reason you are blogging and what you are aiming to achieve.

They are the building blocks of your real dreams

As I said… My goal and dream is to break six-figures, but now me “wanting” six-figures isn’t going to make it come true right? You need to break down exactly HOW you are going to do this and making mini-goals for yourself. For example.. For me I want to earn X,XXX by the end of March, and X,XXX by the end of April… and I’m going to do this by _______. These are things you need to think about when you are focusing on your long-term desires. Start breaking them down into smaller things.

I watch people fail at achieving their dreams because they never take the time to look at the details of the painting. You can’t paint a colorful pictures without having all the colors right?

Once you meet your goals, don’t stop climbing

So many people will just stop because their goal was achieved. Maybe they achieved it early, or maybe they achieved on time. However, once it is achieved they just stop. Once you reach your goal, make ANOTHER goal, never stop climbing. Once I reach $100,000 a year, I’m aiming for $200,000 and then continuing. After I reach 10,000 email subscribers, I’m aiming for 20,000. It’s a never ending goal. The same should go for you. As Michael Jackson would say, don’t stop until you get enough.

Group Discussion

I’ve ranted about the importance of goals, but what do you think? We all have goals, but will we achieve them without creating smaller goals? Are stepping-stones that outlines are road map to success? If you’re lacking inspiration and being diagnosed with the disease of bloggers doubt, it’s time you start laying out your goals and identifying your true desires.

Need help? Let me know.

Share your thoughts

Bloggers doubt is what I like to think of is a disease. The death of many bloggers careers and preventing them from living the Internet lifestyle. First off, let me explain what bloggers doubt is. Bloggers doubt is doubting your true blogger abilities, simply throwing in the towel before the game has even started. I have seen so many bloggers quit blogging because of bloggers doubt, and the sad part is… they have so much potential.

I must admit… I’ve had bloggers doubt before, but I’ve overcome it. So now, I’m going to share with you how to overcome this nasty disease.

The cure to bloggers doubt

Understanding that overnight success does not happen

Overnight success does not happen, unless you hit the lottery. It takes months for many people to start seeing results online. This concepts applies for making money, readership growth, traffic growth and more. The average website takes around 6-12 months before results are being shown. And that’s 6-12 months of work, not putting up your blog and expecting to see results.

When I was listening to Nathan Hangen’s podcast the other day, he brought up a great point. He explained how a man worked 11 years of providing genuine free content to his readers and watching his list grow, then he launched a paid product and did well with it immediately. Now… I’m not saying you need to work 11 years, but this is just to show you that most examples of “overnight success” come from previous months and possibly years of hard work.

You must take action to see results

Another common symptom of bloggers doubt is bloggers mad that they are not seeing results.  This symptom is mainly caused by bloggers that do not take action. Let me share with you a story that happened to me recently… I was dealing with a person who was asking me about affiliate marketing and I must say… out of everyone I’ve encountered through my career this guy pissed me off the most. No matter how many times I repeated myself he did not understand that you must take action before you can expect to see any results. If you want to see results, take the dam time and take action. Seeing results online are scalable to the amount of work and time you put into seeing them. And remember, it also takes time. Their have been weeks I have put in 100 hour work weeks to see little results. As David Risley said, 80% of your results come from 20% of your efforts.

Group Discussion – How do you overcome bloggers doubt?

I’m sure this has happened to us all at one point of time during our career. So how did you overcome it? I’ve been seeing the bloggers doubt disease spread rapidly like cancer and it’s not good. Tons of bloggers quit blogging right when their about to hit the home-run in their career because of bloggers doubt. What are some of the steps you taken to overcome bloggers doubt? When you feel like just giving it all up… what do you do to keep going?

Photo Credit: Daniel Y.Go

This week here at Robswebtips, I’ve been talking a lot about making money online, and the journey I’ve taken to make money online. Many people want to make money online for different reasons. Some want to escape the 9-5, some need the income to survive from being kicked-out on the streets and others, just want to make an additional income online.

Regardless of our situation to make money online, how will we approach doing this? Will we ‘try’ and take a faster route by ’scamming’ people with products you don’t know anything about? You just want to make a quick-dime? Or, do we want to build respect from our readers and promote products that we believe in?

The power of the “truth” VS “the money”

Today… I want to play the devils advocate, I want to argue both sides of this debate as I also want to get a good debate running.

The power of  the “truth”

As many of you know by now, I only promote products I firmly believe in. I will not sell a product just because it has a good commission. When you are working online, credibility is by far the most vital-aspect of your career. If you don’t have trust from your readers, they’re not going to trust you, read your content, and they are not going to buy from you.

A comment I love referencing to, that continues to show me the power of “keeping it real” is from a dedicated, and valued reader of this community.

Tycoon cashflow – Man i wish marketers would stop the hype filled looking titles, not to mention the oh so pretty landing pages; oy. Honestly? I’ve clicked off that page more than a dozen times; now I may take a serious look since you do it and recommend it.

- Dennis Eddel

If I were to promote every last product I saw, or came across. I’m more than sure, his comment would not say those words.

The power of “the money”

Let’s face it… for many of us, the word “money” sparks attention. Especially if you’re in a situation where you lost your job and needed to turn to a new income stream. In the mindset of many people who do take on this kind-of approach for the “lets scam people, and make money online faster” it’s easy right? Slap up a quick $150 sales page, add in a opt-in form and charge people $50-60. Make your sales copy sound convincing enough.. you probably charge more, and get away with it..

Here’s the catch to this.. After you click “buy now” you’re not going to get the product you were promised. They took your money, and your now short $60.

Side note: I’m totally against this concept, I’m just playing devils advocate.

Time to debate

I’m interested to hear what you guys think about this? Should we tell the “truth” and earn money through our honesty and credibility. Or should we play “the money” role and hop right into scamming people?

While you are answering also think of this… you get a call saying “your fired” and you have only 6 months before you next “big” bill is due…  and you don’t have the funds to cover it. What’s your next move? A great friend of mine Pat Flynn was in the same situation.. he had 6 months to make a living online, and he did it honestly. Now he is making over six-figures.

Think about all this.. and as your answering, don’t just tell us “yes this” and “no that” go ahead and share WHY. I’m interested in hearing what everyone has to say.

Everyone have an awesome weekend!

Derek Jay & Adam Horwitz were two regular teens trying to find a way to make money online… After they did some serious research about affiliate marketing, they found out some killer tactics to boost their income from it. Long story short… Adam & Derek found a way they can make money from affiliate marketing. After they found a way they can bring in passive income from affiliate marketing, they ended up quitting their jobs for a six-figure income online. After they realized what they did worked for them, they took everything they learned and put it into a course called Tycoon Cashflow. When I came across Tycoon Cashflow I will admit… I was skeptical at first, but I joined. With my goal of making six-figures online I was open to learning new ways to achieve this goal. So I signed up. Instantly after joining the course, I fell in love. And just like any good blogger would do, I’m sharing with you guys this wonderful course I found.

If you haven’t noticed, I’ve been promoting Derek & Adam’s course Tycoon Cashflow in some of my previous articles, and I’ve gotten a lot of questions on how it has helped me. So, I’m going to share with you my thoughts about this course.

My thoughts on Tycoon Cashflow

When I first signed up for Tycoon Cashflow I was presented with several modules that breakdown the process of what Derek & Adam did to make six-figures online. The first thing that caught my attention was the course was done in a video series. What a relief that I didn’t have to read through a million and one pages. Honestly though, the visual aspect of the course was beneficial because it breaks down step by step how things were done.

How this course helped me as an affiliate marketer

This course is dedicated to people who are, or want to be affiliate marketers. Tycoon Casfhlow taught me some kick-ass techniques to promote my products on auto-pilot. All my affiliate marketing was done online, and a lot done through my eCourse and email marketing. Tycoon Cashflow taught me how to make money through PPC marketing (Pay per click), and even how to promote products offline. After I joined the course… I started seeing affiliate sales come into my Clickbank account the next day. That was a big surprise for me.

The only thing I didn’t like about this course

If I’m sharing my thoughts on a product, I’m not going to bullshit you, if there is something I don’t like about it, I will let you know. The only thing I did not like about this is that they did not emphasize the importance of promoting products you firmly believe in. The techniques they share with you, you can get away with promoting products you know nothing about… But just ask yourself, do you want to sell others products that you know nothing about just to make a quick buck?

How Tycoon Cashflow can help you

If you want to make money online from affiliate marketing, then hands down I’d say this course is for you. Even to those who do not have an established following or credibility online, if you follow the things Derek & Adam teach you…you can still earn a decent income online. From newbies to gurus, I firmly believe you will gain something out of this course. It has helped me beyond my expectations, and I’m more than sure it will help you as well.

Do not waste your time with this course if…

… You are not ready to take action. This rule applies for almost everything you do, if you’re not going to take action don’t do it. You’re wasting your time. I don’t want to see you waste your time and money into this course, if all you’re going to do is watch what they teach you and leave with nothing. I will be the first person to vouch that this course is worth every cent you pay, and more… Because I’ve seen results, and I know you can too if you are a person that takes action.

Is Tycoon Cashflow for you?

Tycoon Cashflow worked wonders for me and has put me 10 steps closer to living the six-figure lifestyle. Tycoon Cashflow is great for people wanting to become a better affiliate marketer, or become an affiliate marketer. However…So weigh the options, look at the profit that you can make if you put 100% effort and ask yourself, “can this work for me?” With all my rambling set-aside, what are your thoughts? Do you think Tycoon Cashflow is for you?

Check out Tycoon Cashflow

I‘ve talked about what I do to make money, I even shared how much money I make online. But what about the road I have taken to get there? Did I just wake up one day and decide to make a full-time income online? Did I magically learn some technique that took me from $0.00 to a full-time income online? The above answer to all of that is no. My journey to making a descent income online was not easy, but with work, countless attempts of trial & error I was able to accomplish it.

Now it’s time I share with you the road I was on before I started living the Internet lifestyle.

A Hard Road To Make An Easy Living Online

The lessons learned….

When I first started online, I stumbled across Google AD sense. When I heard bloggers were making full-time income from Google AD sense I told myself… I’ve hit gold! Signing up for Google AD sense and plastering ads all over my site, I was convinced I was going to be making thousands immediately.  Couple weeks passed… Still under the $100 mark for Google AD sense. I slowly started realizing that I was not making the income I wanted from Google AD sense. Not to long after, I got banned from AD sense. At that moment, I felt as if my online career was in hell. No AD sense = no income. At least, that’s what I thought.

What I came to realize from this mistake was… Making money from AD sense is not a walk in the park, it takes a lot of traffic and audience in order to do well with AD sense.

After AD sense, I was still feeble minded. I believed that I could make money overnight, and that I was going to do it. Stumbling across a ton of these “Get rich quick” Internet marketing sales pages… Knowing me at the time, I certainly did join. One by one, they all misleaded me. But did that paint a picture in my head? Nope. I continued joining and buying the books, and courses until I drove myself into debt. Being only 14 at the time, I wasn’t in the worse condition considering I did not have many bills to pay.

For the readers that do follow me, they will know I only promote products I’ve used, and firmly believe in. And my journey that drove me debt  is why. Because I refuse to watch another person go through what I went through. Now, reality is I cannot prevent everybody from making the mistakes I did. But believe me, I will do all I can too prevent the people who visit my site, and talk to me, from this happening to them. A perfect example of why you should be honest with your readers and promote products you believe in is, they will trust you. When I was reading a comment on my blog from one of my readers, it really showed me the power of keeping it real.

Tycoon cashflow – Man i wish marketers would stop the hype filled looking titles, not to mention the oh so pretty landing pages; oy. Honestly? I’ve clicked off that page more then a dozen times; now I may take a serious look since you do it and recommend it.

- Dennis Eddel

After failing with AD sense, going into debt with misleading courses, I was still determined to make a living online. (Feel free to call me crazy by now) I found other services such as AD sense, and started victimizing my community with banner ADS. Something I’m highly against now. Everywhere you looked, you would see an AD on my site. If you look left, right, up or down… trust me, you would’ve seen an ad. After months of victimizing my community… I did not earn much of an income, and I lost a lot of my readers.

How my failures led me to live the Internet lifestyle

After countless attempts of my mistakes, the picture started painting in my head. Making money online wasn’t easy. I have built a income for myself online, by keeping it real. I don’t deceive my readers, and I don’t promote every product I see. Only products I’ve used and liked. Which were not many… On top of keeping it real, I never gave up. Yes, I drove myself into debt, yes I failed many times. But I never gave up.

Most of the stuff I’ve learned… Was through trial and error. I also owe a huge thanks to all my readers, and friends who have helped me travel the hard road to living the Internet lifestyle. The two eCourses and books I’ve used though, that have contributed a great deal of help to my income and knowledge are… Tycoon Cashflow which has taught me some killer steps to achieving my goal of six-figures online through affiliate marketing, and Darren Rowse’s 31 days to become a better blogger.

Group Discussion

In my eyes… The road to success is never straight. But what about you? I’ve encountered numerous of readers and seen thousands of bloggers who have given  up because of one mistake. But are you going to let a couple mistakes keep you away from living your dream?

An obligation I try to commit to all my readers here at Robswebtips is to help them in every way possible. So if you have questions, need help or anything. Let me know, I’m here to help.

Photo Credit: L.L Geoff

Hey everyone, today I have the first ever podcast interview for Robswebtips. I’m here with a friend of mine Danny Dover from Seomoz. Danny is a SEO specialist and he is going to be sharing with us “the real deal” about search engines, and really exposing some of the questions we had about SEO.

Some of the things covered in this interview…

Keyword Checker tool: Keyword checker

Connect with Danny

Blog – http://www.seomoz.org/blog
Twitter – @DannyDover
Email: Danny@seomoz.org

I get asked all the time how I make money online, and exactly what I do. I simply reply with “I’m an affiliate marketer” but I’ve come to realize that is not a good enough answer. I’m going to breakdown exactly how I make money online, and what I do.

Before I start to explain, I want it to be perfectly clear that what I did to make money was not an overnight thing, I’ve worked very hard to reach the numbers I’m at.

How I make money online

Affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing is my main source of income, I’ve been an affiliate marketer for quite sometime now and I have developed a die hard love for it. To the people who do not know what affiliate marketing is:

Affiliate marketing

Affiliate Marketing is an Internet-based marketing  practice in which a business rewards one or more affiliates for each visitor or customer brought about by the affiliate’s marketing efforts. It is an application of crowd-sourcing. Examples include rewards sites, where users are rewarded with cash or gifts, for the completion of an offer, and the referral of others to the site. The industry has four core players: the merchant (also known as ‘retailer’ or ‘brand’), the network, the publisher (also known as ‘the affiliate’) and the customer. The market has grown in complexity to warrant a secondary tier of players, including affiliate management agencies, super-affiliates and specialized third parties vendors.

-Wikipedia

One of the things I do as an affiliate is I only promote products I firmly believe in, and that I have used. This has played a slight decrease in my earnings, but I focus on my credibility more than I do my earnings. I recommend anyone who is wanting to become an affiliate too only promote products you have used, and firmly believe in.

Private coaching

Private-coaching is another income source of mine. I consult with others ($50/75 hour) and help them improve their websites, businesses or whatever else help they need. Private coaching is not my #1 income source, but it does contribute a portion of my income online.

The breakdown on how I plan to earn six-figures this year

As many of you know, one of my goals this year is to become a six-figure blogger. As any smart entrepreneur would do, I brainstormed ways to achieve this goal. I was introduced to a guy named Adam Horwitz who was a 18 year-old who wanted to make money online. Within his first 8 months online he was able to earn over $100,000 from affiliate marketing. After I found Adam shared how he did it, I signed up for his course which taught me the steps he used to make six-figures. To my surprise… I learned a ton of new information that is helping me achieve my goal of  a six-figure income online. The reason why I’m telling you this is that you can follow the same steps I am from this course and make money on auto-pilot.

If you’re interested in joining me to the journey of making six-figures online, you can sign up for Tycooncashflow. It’s definitely worth it.

Making six-figures is not a walk in the park

It’s been a journey for me making 5 figures, so I know six-figures is going to be just a greater journey. So, I want to make it abundantly clear that making money online is not a walk in the park. Only 6 out of 1,000 people who try to an income online, actually do it. It doesn’t take a rocket-scientist to make money, it takes action. People make an income online by taking action. Reading hundreds of blogs are not going to give you a ticket to the Internet lifestyle. When I was chatting with my friend Joe Boyle we talked about how knowing something is half-the battle. It’s about taking action with the knowledge you know.

Group Discussion

I’ve shared with you how I make money online, so what about you? Do you make money online? If so, what do you do to make money online? On the subject matter of “taking action” do you agree or disagree that it is important to take action if you want to make money online?

Photo Credit: Manfredi90

Search engines are a big talk in the blogosphere. But does search engine traffic even matter? Should we really focus on where robots rank our site? I will be the first to tell you that I think it’s a waste of time to focus on search engines. Now, if you are a business or you run a product site, that’s a different story. For bloggers however, I believe it is a complete waste of time to focus on search engines.

Before I continue with this debate, keep this question in mind – who do we focus on? Search engines, or our readers?

Why I don’t care about search engines

Search engines are robots

Search engines are robots. Spiders that crawl your site to determine where you get ranked. I am better investing my time writing great quality content and having people link back to me because they enjoy my content. Organic back-links from popular sites that link to your site are better than getting ranked in search engines.

I do not gain credibility from search engines

Your site is number one on Google, big whoop. Just because I see a site ranked #1 on Google does not mean I will trust the content. Google from my experience has been notorious for sending me to sites that have no relevance, or seem trustworthy to me. Your readers will trust your site more and trust that you have good content if they see that you are being linked to and mentioned by other sites.

People destroy their community to worry about search engines

A lot of search engine positioning is based on keywords, and a lot of bloggers have killed their headlines and destroyed their content because they are so focused on using keywords to get ranked by search engines. What they don’t realize though, they are losing out. Sure, they will make the first page of Google, but after readers land on their page to see that your content is bad because you were to busy focusing on search engines. The end result, all your “hard” work has been done for nothing.

How I’ve benefited from ignoring search engines

Believe it or not, I only receive 13% search engine traffic, and that’s only from people searching in “Robswebtips” or my name. But how have I benefited from focusing only on my readers and not search engines?

Below are a monthly trend for Robswebtips traffic (Click to enlarge)

By focusing on your community and providing quality content, this is what you can achieve. As you find out in the image below, my readers do the promotion for me. Why? Because people enjoy my content.

As you can see, the majority of my traffic comes from referring sites, which has contributed to the growth of my blog.

Community Discussion – Should we care about search engines?

Let’s debate it up, what’s your thoughts? Should we care about search engines? If so why? Heck, maybe I’m losing out on a ton of traffic because I’m not focusing on search engines. I mean, all search engines are is silly robots indexing our sites, and ranking our pages according to keyword relevance.

Things to consider including in your debate…

• Should we care about search engines? Why?
• Does search engines do us more evil than good?
• Should we focus on building a genuine community whether than focusing on search engines?

Hey everyone, today I’m here with a good friend of mine Brian Greene, from Officesupplygeek. Brian reviews home office supplies on his blog, and today he will share with you some advice for reviewing products on your blog and connecting with other companies in a professional way so you can review products for free.

Interview Transcript

Rob: Hey Brian glad to be doing this interview with you today. To start off this interview can we get a little bio about what you do, and what motivated you to start blogging?

Brian:

Sure Rob, thanks for taking the time to interview me.  Besides having a regular full time job, I also am the owner of the webiste OfficeSupplyGeek.com that focuses on unique and cool home office supply reviews and news.

I started the blog back in November of 2008.  There were a few things that motivated me to start the site, the first was my fascination with a pen review website called PenAddict.com that I used to (and still do) read every day.  Also, being an avid reader of that site, along with a ton of other technology, product review, and sports related blogs for the past few years really got me curious about the different platforms and applications that were used to actually run those blogs.  The final motivating factor was that I was always intrigued by consumer behavior and how product reviews play a role the decision making process.  Being able to leverage all of that into a product group that I personally have a lot of enthusiasm for gives me an opportunity to help others find great products that can really improve their efficiency and make their work life a little more enjoyable.

Rob:Very interesting start up you had here. What piece of information would you offer to someone interested in starting there own review site?

Brian:

Even with only about one year of experience writing product reviews, I feel like I could probably write a book on things to know about the subject, but here is what I think is probably the single most important thing to keep in mind:

Just because you are doing a product review doesn’t necessarily mean you always have to draw a line in the sand and declare your personal opinion on the product.  Of all the people reading your site, there will be a many different sets of user preferences and opinions that make up how they will feel about a particular product.

Explaining that a product has characteristics A, B, and C and talking about how of each of those characteristics impacts the use of the product can be much more helpful to your reader than saying, “I love/hate this product because of characteristic A” and just leaving it there.  Usually by presenting the information in that fashion, it forces the reader to ask themselves how THEY would feel about the product features and specifications and can be more valuable than just simply rendering your judgment on the product.

Ultimately you want the reader to become comfortable with the fact that reading your review helped them to make an informed decision, as opposed to feeling that they bought a product based on YOUR opinion and preferences, which many times won’t be the same as their own.  Having a reader that feels like you helped them make a good decision will make them much more likely to return to your site again when they are in the market for a product that you might have reviewed.

Rob: Honesty is the key. Have you ever reviewed a product given to you by another company?

Brian:

Yes, all of the products I review are from other companies because I do not sell or manufacture any products myself.  The products I review are about 1/2 purchased by myself, and 1/2 given to me by the manufacturer, PR firm, or retailer.  Getting free products to review from companies has been hit or miss, but two big factors that help are the typical price point for items I review (usually under about $25) and the fact that the review/blog market is not saturated in this industry.  I’m sure I would not have the same success in obtaining review products had I decided to do laptop or cell phone reviews.

Many brands like Sharpie, Uniball, 3M/Post-it, Avery and others  have been very generous in providing review samples of their products, but when I first started the site, I had to purchase most of the products for myself. It took a little bit of work in the beginning, but it helps to reach out to these companies and just ask if they are interested in sponsoring a review and/or giveaway by sending product your way.  You can find many of them, or their PR agencies on sites like Twitter and FaceBook.  I’ve found that contacting them with a short email explaining who you are and some quick facts to show the reach that your site has can open the door to a positive working relationship.  Sometimes the PR firms are the best place to start because they are paid to find these opportunities for the companies that retain them.  An added bonus is that they might even represent more than one company in the industry, so you are essentially able to start building relationships with multiple brands with just one email.

Rob: With all the social platforms out there, Email, Twitter, Facebook, Myspace and so on, what would you say the most effective way to build a relationship with a company is?

Brian:

When it comes to relationship building and social media, I feel that Twitter is a great way to establish a relationship with someone in the industry that you blog about.  By using some of the search tools, you can find the folks that would be most helpful to you if you dont already know who they are.  Its also an easy way to open the door without that person needing to give up their email address, which people can be pretty hesitant to do.  Once you have that relationship established, its much easier to work with them via email.

Rob: I agree thanks to Twitter they have opened up a new effective way to communicate with others without releasing to much personal information. When approaching a company for a professional inquiry, what piece of advice would you offer to someone trying to “stand out” and get noticed through the thousands of emails the company probably receives. What would they have to do for the company say “this email is the one”

Brian:

It can be hard to get noticed, but I think the things that really increase your chances of being noticed and being selected as someone that they want to work with are to make sure that you keep the communication short and to the point.  You need to ensure that you include some brief info about your sites reach like unique visitors per month, RSS subscribers, even tiwtter followers or other social media metrics.  Additionally you want to make sure that all of the content on your site is of a professional quality.  Any company will want to see that if they put trust in you to represent their product that you will do so in a way that looks as good as possible.

Another approach if you dont have a good deal of existing content or an established blog with lots of followers is to write about or review products from the company that you might be targeting.  So if you want to establish a partnership with them, publish some content about them and use that when you reach out to them as a way to highlight how you understand their product(s) and can position them in a good light while also attracting consumers to it.  By publishing the content before you reach out to them,  you might also get yourself on their radar because any good PR firm or marketing team will use multiple tools to alert them as to when their products are mentioned online.  If you take this approach you will also want to make sure you have a good tracking program in place so you can see if your content has drawn the attention of the company you are writing about.  I use statcounter.com and you can see the ISP, which is often times the name of the company, so that is a huge help in knowing if you have the attention of someone at that company.

Rob: That’s some great information you offered there, I like how you suggested to write reviews about products for the company your trying to target. What was one of the biggest mistakes you’ve made when you started off reviewing products?

Brian:

Id say the biggest mistake I made in the beginning was not planning far enough in advance.  I would often find myself scrambling to find products to review, and it put me in a bad position in terms of having time to properly maintain the site, respond to comments and emails, and do the planning that I should have done before I started.

The best advice I could give in this area is to make sure you have somewhere in the neighborhood of 2-3 weeks worth of posts written and ready to go before you actually go live with the blog.  This is also very helpful to do even once the blog is live because you never know when you might get sick or have something come up that will prevent you from keeping up with your blog.

Rob: That’s some good advice. What would you say you like most about the internet lifestyle?

Brian:

I think that in my case it is a little different because I have a full time job.  This helps to reduce some of the worry of trying to make a living off my blog alone, however the drawback is also that I dont have as much time to work on things as I’d like.  Overall though I find it to be a good mix of being able to generate a little bit of extra income, while still having the security of my actual job.

An additional benefit though is that this has given me the opportunity to do some work in a field that I enjoy.  It gives me the confidence and security of knowing that if I ever lost my full time job, Ive got many contacts that I have made through the blog that could potentially help me should I need to begin a new career search, or decide to really ramp up the blogging activity.  Again, the flexibility of the whole situation is what I find most valuable.

Rob: Is there anyone you look up to as inspiration or for guidance? If so you can name more than one.

Brian:

I would say the biggest inspiration was Brad who writes a blog within my niche called The Pen Addict.  I have been a reader of his blog for a long time and you can really see the enthusiasm he has for pens, which translates into some really great reviews, and he always makes it a point to interact with all of his readers which I think is huge in keeping people engaged and returning to the site because it shows that you value their readership and input.  Since I have been reading his blog, and writing my own now, I have had the chance to communicate with him a few times and he has always been super nice and just good and helpful person to know.

Additionally I think that from a pure blogging perspective, Darren Rowse and Robb Sutton have helped me to learn a ton in a short amount of time.  I specifically remember reading a lot of great tips from Darren on how to improve results as an Amazon affiliate.  Although I’ve only recently started reading Robbs work, the information I  have learned from him really stands out from some of the other stuff that I’ve seen, especially when it comes to product reviews.

I try not to get bogged down by too many “experts” because if you read enough, eventually it will all contradict itself.  I find that keeping up with what those three are doing helps give me great insight from multiple perspectives, and by learning from them to make my own decisions (not just blindily following thier successes) I’ve been able to become more successful

Rob: Great people, I know Darren and Robb personally and they’re great people. Before we tie up this interview, are their any plans business or personal that you would like to share with us before we close off this interview?

Brian:

I do have some thoughts around expanding what I do online and possibly offline too, however I still have many things that I need to perfect and get right with my current project.  One thing I think that is important though is reinvesting the earnings from my site to further improve the content and experience for my readers.  Simple things such as purchasing a premium theme, better photography equipment, more products to review, and some helpful design and analysis tools really make a difference in the end product that I put out, which in turn increases readership, and makes my blog more appealing for advertisers, and those who want to partner with me.

Rob: Great Brian, I wish you the best. I would like to thank you for coming down to Robswebtips and taking the time to share with us this great information and cheers to your success!

Keep in touch with Brian

Enjoyed the interview? Be sure to keep in touch with Brian -

Website: Officesupplygeek
Twitter: @Officesupplygee

Photo Credit: Brian Greene

It’s tiring to hear people constantly crave over how many RSS readers, or twitter follows they have. Some people even praise their sites because of their Alexa rankings. But really, do those numbers really matter? No, they don’t. Just because you have 10,000 RSS readers, does not mean you have 10,000 people who read your blog. It’s time we stop worrying about these numbers, and start focusing on the numbers that really do matter.

What are the numbers that do matter

Lets say you have 3,000 RSS readers, but when you look into feedburner only 100 of those readers are opening your emails, and only 300 of them are taking the time to read your article. Those are the numbers that count. So you can pride yourself on having 3,000 RSS, but does it really matter if only 300 of those 3,000 read your articles?

Stop focusing on the whole, and start narrowing down your focus on the numbers. There is a reason that the tracking programs offer detailed analytics, and if you’re not taking advantage of them, start doing so.

How to focus on the numbers that do matter

Looking into user interaction

Now that we’ve learned that the mass number is not important, let’s focus on the lower numbers.  For example, we will focus on our readers. You have a total combined amount of 3,000 readers, but only 300 open your emails,and 100 of them click to your article. Now we need to identify why these other 2,900 readers are not reading your articles.

Investigating the problem

Let’s find out why these 2,900 readers are not reading your articles. First lets identify some of the minor issues, have you looked at which posts are getting the most click thru’s? Is it because you are writing bad headlines, that nobody is wanting to read your article? Take the time and email a couple of your readers. Email readers who do read your articles and email readers who don’t. Ask them what is the reason why they don’t read your article. Trying to assume the  problem works some of the time, but if you really want to find out the problem, talk to the people who are actually subscribe.

Group Discussion

Do mass amounts of numbers matter if your not seeing any results? Is it just pointless to brag over 3,000 readers if only 100 read your articles? After you’ve read this article, do you find it important to take the time to go deeper into the numbers? What’s your thoughts? Share with the community what you think about this. An article is never complete without others opinions.

Photo By: Konomiho