RosalindGardner.com

Learn Blogging & Affiliate Marketing with Rosalind Gardner

I Got a First Page Google Listing in Only 9 Seconds

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Despite continuing problems with getting my blog posts to show up or stay listed in Technorati and Google Blogs, it appears that at least one of Google's spiders still loves me.

Immediately after I posted “A 9K Walk Along Icey Roads in Rohdes” to my travel blog, I searched Google for the keyword phrase that I was targeting – Rohde boots – and was delighted to see that the post showed up in the 8th spot on the first page of returns (see the screen capture below).

Although I've seen posts get listed that quickly before, many also seem to disappear from Google's results almost as fast, so I searched for the keyphrase again this morning, and much to my amazement, it is still there.

Granted, Rohde boots isn't a particularly popular search term. According to Wordtracker, the phrase has a predicted count of only 12 for today. Furthermore, I haven't found an affiliate program that sells Rohdes.

So, why would I bother to target the phrase ‘Rohde boots' if so few people are looking for them and I don't make any money promoting them to people who find the post?

Well, my primary motivation for writing such a post is to share information about a truly great product that will benefit walkers like myself. In return, I hope to earn new feed subscribers with the invitation “If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!” that appears at the end of every post.

Furthermore, the site is monetized in many ways. Those who appreciate the information may browse around and find other products of interest to them that are sold through an affiliate program. Or, they may leave the site through a Google Adsense ad for which I get paid.

Assuming I get only 1 click per day from that listing over the period of a year, that would be 365 visitors to my site — for free — from a post that took me only 10 minutes to write. If only 10% of those visitors sign up for my feed / newsletter, that would be 36 new subscribers to whom I can promote products on a continuing basis. Now, if you write a post like that once a week, you can multiply those results by 52, and estimate nearly 19,000 visitors and 1900 new feed subscribers — for free.

But, those traffic estimates are probably low, especially considering the personal nature of the blog post title and content description that appears on Google, which is in striking contrast to the ‘salesy' nature of the other listings that appear on the first page of Google results.

For example, inthe last 23 hours, my most recent first page listing has generated 4 site visits, or 33% of the estimated traffic for the term ‘Rohde boots'.

So, imagine how much free traffic and revenue you can generate by targeting those ‘less popular' phrases if you post to your blog 3 or 4 days a week, or better yet, every day!

[tags]rohde boots,google,seo,marketing,free traffic[/tags]

Bloggers: Having Problems with Technorati Indexing and Display?

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Technorati has been acting very strange of late.

Last week, all my sites were indexed and the posts were displaying correctly. Then a post that I made on Roamsters (about Baggallini bags and tagged ‘baggallini') showed up almost immediately and now can't be found for love nor money (literally). 🙂

Weirder still, the Roamsters blog no longer seems to be indexed – while this one shows up sporadically.

I noticed on that a lot of folks are complaining of similar problems on the Technorati forum, but was wondering if any NPT folks had noticed the same strange happenings… and if so, were you able to correct it?

Now, let's see if this post shows up….

[tags]Rosalind Gardner,technorati,roamsters,indexing,tags,baggallini[/tags]

Carl Ocab: 14-Year Old Ranks #1 in Google for “Make Money Online”

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It's hard to believe that a 14-year-old kid who started his blog just this past summer, would rank #1 on Google for a highly competitive keyword phrase like “make money online”, isn't it?

Well, it's true.

After attempts to make money online with a tech blog and then a gossip blog failed, Carl Ocab says he was “Heavily Inspired by my Dad, I tried my best to find a broad topic that I can blog about for ages”, so he started blogging about how to “Make Money Online with a 13-year old”.

What a great hook!

And although you might be skeptical that the genius behind this effort is really only 14, reporters Annalyn Jusay and Abe Olandres from Manila who have interviewed Carl, both verify his age (with pictures) and also comment on his outward shyness.

Online, he doesn't seem so shy – with a big ad plastered in his top navigation that reads “I'm on the front page of the bloody competitive keyword “make money online” which goes on to an advertisement for placing your advertising on his site. Smart!

Here are a few posts to check out:

Carl's site is worth a look if you want inspiration or linking opportunities from his blog via reviews, advertising, guest blogging, and comments.

Did you find this post informative and useful? If so, please share it with others! If you have a comment, question or suggestion, please leave a comment below!

Cheers,
sig-ros

8 Phrases Guaranteed to Boost Site Traffic

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We all want more traffic to our sites…

Here are 10 phrases that will help you boost traffic and bring visitors back to your sites, time after time.

  1. “Subscribe / Sign Up”
    Tell your visitors to subscribe to your newsletter, and when they subscribe you'll capture their e-mail address. Each time they receive a copy of your newsletter containing snippets of articles recently posted, they will be prompted to visit your site. Watch your Analytics go nuts on those days!

  2. “Free”
    Freebies are always a good incentive to encourage folks to sign up for your newsletters. Too, you may allow visitors to use some of your articles on their own web site. Just ask them to include your resource box at the end of the article. This is a free way to advertise your site all over the internet.

  3. “Bookmark Now”
    Make it easy for your visitors to bookmark your web site, and give them a good reason to do so.  For example, promise fresh content daily or weekly.

  4. “Like us on Facebook”
    To expand your reach exponentially, your sidebar should incorporate links to all the major social media sites, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc.

  5. “Take our Survey”
    Ask your visitors and newsletter subscribers to fill out your online survey or questionnaire. This brings people back to your site. Use the feedback on ways to improve your web site to increase traffic and visitor retention.

  6. “Enter Our Contest”
    Give your visitors a chance to enter an online contest or sweepstakes. People love to win stuff, and they will come back to your site again and again to see if you have new contest offerings.

  7. “Join Our Forum”
    Ask your visitors to participate on your online discussion board. By participating they will meet other people, and they will  return to your web site on a regular basis to stay in contact with their new friends.

  8. “Join Our Affiliate Program”
    Allow your visitors to make money selling your products or services. This will increase your traffic (and revenues) when they link back to your web site.

An Unexpected Way to Get Traffic from Flickr

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Granville Island Farmers MarketOur Roamsters.com travel blog receives a little bit of traffic from the pictures that I upload to Flickr.

But I discovered another way that blogger photographers can get traffic when I received the following message about the picture shown here to the left.

Your photo(s) shown below have been short-listed for inclusion in the third edition of our Schmap Vancouver Guide, to be published mid-November 2007.

While we offer no payment for publication, many photographers are pleased to submit their photos, as Schmap Guides give their work recognition and wide exposure, and are free of charge to readers. Photos are published at a maximum width of 150 pixels, are clearly attributed, and link to high-resolution originals at Flickr.

If you would like your short-listed photo(s) to continue to our Vancouver Guide final selection phase, please read our ‘Terms of Submission' and press the ‘Submit' button, no later than our editorial submission deadline – Sunday, November 11.

I set the credit to go to Roamsters.com and accepted the invitation.

I've also granted another ‘permission to use photo' request for a photo to be used in Trail Blazer Magazine which will also be credited to roamsters.com.

Who knows? All it takes is one visitor from the Vancouver Schmap Guide or Trail Blazer magazine to visit the site, make a big buck purchase and my 1-minute picture upload and responses to their requests will have been very worthwhile. 🙂

[tags]Schmap Vancouver Guide,Flickr[/tags]

Is it Link Building or Spamming?

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I received the following question about link-building practices from Richard, an NPT reader:

“I am new at this and I have put much time and effort into research and learning. I have bought several books and programs including NetProfitsToday (the Super Affiliate Handbook). I've also signed up for your newsletter and am enrolled as an Affiliate.

I recently read a strategy put forth by a “guru” (ugh!), one that I had become to consider one of the more reputable, better respected “professionals” in the business (I think you have even referred to him several times).

One of his suggestions for getting traffic to your site was to join forums and blogs whose topics were related you your sites subject matter and to post even generic responses to a previous post.

He put forth that if you didn't have substantial knowledge to post a meaningful response, you would post something like “You have made a very good point” or “Thanks for the information, I didn't know that was the case” etc.

Obviously if you do have knowledge of the subject matter you would make a more meaningful response.) Of course you would do this with links(s) to your website(s) in your signature.

Is this considered “spam”?

Please check out today's article for my response to Richard on this topic.

#8 on Google for My Name

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Back on Monday April 2nd, I wrote a post titled “Are you missing out on this Traffic? I was…” about registering your own name as a domain name to get more traffic from the search engines — or at least to dominate the first page of results for searches on your name.

Well, I totally forgot to check to see whether RosalindGardner.com made it to the first page of results for a “Rosalind Gardner” search until just now… and I see that it's taken the 8th spot.

Not bad. Now I guess I'd better do that with the rest of my sites, eh? 🙂

Have you registered yours, yet?

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