Make the Million

Optimizing Your Keywords Part 1

Search Engine Optimization is an interesting subject and an important topic to know about. With the expected increase of internet sales making up 40% of all sales around the world by 2020, it’s no secret that getting to the top of the most popular search engine is important. As I continue to read everything I can get my hands on, I’ve come across a few free tools to help you optimize your blog.

Keywords and Key Phrases are an important part of being found by Google’s search engine. So the first step to optimizing the keywords you use is to figure out what kind of blog you are. Whether you offer financial advice, baby advice, dog training advice, whatever. Hopefully you can figure this out easily, but if you’re a blog that’s kind of all over the place (ahem, like us) then look at your posts and see what they’re usually about. Personal blogs are harder to pinpoint and you might have to rely more so on networking.

Open Excel and start a new worksheet. Type “Keywords” in A1.

Search your competitors in Google’s top 5 or 10 and copy their URL into this little tool, which will then tell you what keywords they used. Take note of what keywords are used in the multiple sites and record them in an Excel worksheet under “Keywords“.

Say your blog is about dog training. Go to Google, type in dog training and copy the url’s from the first page into Abakus.

Compile a list of keywords used and then head over here and find the different synonyms for the keywords you found. Also use the thesaurus found in Microsoft Word, it works very well. Enter “Ontology” in B1 and record your results.

After you have a healthy list of keywords, put together some key phrases like “puppy training, puppy training guide, puppy training foundation, puppy training basics, how to train a puppy, how to teach a puppy, etc” and head over here.

This site will tell you how often it was searched by people and give you a total, which you should then multiply by 2.5 to get a better estimate on your numbers. Copy the “Ontology” keywords or key phrases into the “Keywords” category one by one and do the search. If you want better, more accurate results you can use this site but it does cost money. There is a free 7 day trial though.

Record the results in in C1 under “Searches.”

Using these 3 tools should give you a better understanding of what keywords and phrases are to help Google find your site.

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John Chow E-Book Review Part 2

Chapter 5 places a large emphasis on RSS feeds and the importance of supplying one for your readers. There are paragraphs on how to increase your RSS subscription and why you should offer a full RSS feed, RSS button placement and monetizing your RSS. Out of all the chapters, this one is my least favorite. It’s not as if the information is bad, it is helpful, but it’s too basic. Asking people to subscribe to your RSS? Place the button where it’s visible? Don’t show your RSS feed count when it’s low? This could all be summed up in 1 paragraph in another section. This chapter should be a topic in another chapter, not a full chapter on its own.

Chapter 6, labeled Monetize You Blog, is where the EBook really starts to shine, which makes sense since the book is called Make Money Online with John Chow dot Com. Paragraphs on ad placement, affiliate marketing, how to hide affiliate links instructions, a big ReviewMe section offering advice and tips and more. It even has a break down on how to use Kontera and text link ads. There are numerous examples, supporting numbers and websites that help reinforce this chapter. From here on out, the book just gets better, which makes the previous chapters seem like an introduction to this point.

Chapter 7 is about Search Engine Optimization for the almighty Google. It’s a fairly detailed chapter covering topics like adding AdSense, explaining the Google bid gap and using competitive ad filters. It’s well written and easy to follow, explained in-depth and most of all, it’s helpful. The best part of this chapter is easily the section with directions on using Google section targeting. Browsing through hundreds of blogs I’ve seen tons of ads that had nothing to do with the content of the blog and following these instructions will solve that problem.

Chapter 8, the final chapter I’ll be reviewing since 9 is about how John got started, is about promotion. It starts off with a section John calls “evil blog promotion”, which is different ways of exploiting loopholes to increase traffic to your site. There are 4 listed here, each explained with a paragraph and then awarded an “evil” rating. Some people might complain, claiming it’s unethical to use these methods but in a saturated market like blogs, it might be best to use everything you can to get ahead. There’s a list on linking strategies, an explanation on link baiting, deep linking importance and commenting importance. Again, detailed paragraphs explaining the how-to’s and why you should do it for each topic discussed, making this chapter a good way to end the EBook. The focus here is strong networking with other blogs through different means and using blog services to help gain more and more traffic, thus gaining more and more money.

Final Thoughts:

John Chow wrote an informative, interesting and helpful EBook. The first 5 chapters seem like while John was writing them, his mind was focused and looking forward to chapter’s 6, 7 and 8 and he couldn’t wait to write about them. While they’re by no means bad chapters, quite the opposite, the book really start at 6. This book is a very good read and I recommend you download it and give it a shot, because even learning a few new things here will pay out in the long run.

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John Chow E-Book Review Part 1

John Chow’s E-Book is broken up into 9 chapters that cover a variety of topics on how to make money online using your blog.

“Here’s a clue for all you losers out there; someday never comes.”

Starting with an inspirational post about seizing the day and starting the process of achieving your goals, the book begins with a high note. The writing is blunt and straight to the point, using examples of how people who “hope” and “wish” to achieve their goals never will and are losers until they do something about it. A bit rough, but a solid kick in the ass if you remember yourself ever uttering the words “someday”.

From there we jump right into what services John recommends to monetize your blog with. He writes about 9 different services that have brought him the most financial gain and discusses how they each work in a short paragraph, accompanied by a link to their respective site. The explanations are general but enough for you to get a grasp on the service, allowing you to investigate further if it sounds like the right one for you.
Next up we have beginner blogging tips, which confused me as to why the service recommendation came before this, it seemed like the order should have been a little different, with the service recommendation in a later chapter. The tips here are truly beginners and will no doubt help anyone who’s been thinking about starting a blog. This section starts off with the importance of registering your own domain name for your blog, updating your blog, forming the ever important connection with your readers and a 10 blogging mistakes to avoid list.

The list is interesting because it focuses on how to fuel your blog with passion toward your subject and not to blog for money. Sound advice, but again the placement of the services section ruins it a bit, since most would think if passion is the basics, wouldn’t it be placed first on the list?
The rest of the chapter is an expansion of the 10 blogging mistakes to avoid list, with more detailed descriptions and some additional info about how to react to negative comments, branding yourself apart from the other bloggers, post length and frequency and the importance of consistency in regards to how your blog will be viewed by reader. It even discusses using MyBlogLog to help with writer’s block. The chapter has a very organic feeling, but the monetizing information thrown in every so often near the beginning can overshadow it at times. There’s no doubt though that you will learn important things in this chapter and use these basics as a foundation for your blog.

Chapter 4 begins with a list of 15 essential plug-ins your blog will need. The plug-ins cover a wide range of improvements to your blog. From improving the comments area, to using Digg and Feedburner to improve traffic. Each is described in a short, detailed paragraph with a link provided, making it extremely easy to navigate and download. However, there is no tutorial on how to install the plug-ins via FTP, so that was a little disappointing. After the plug-ins these is detailed information on turning on SEO friendly URL’s, setting the preferred domain address and setting up a 301 redirect. Small improvements that are important to gaining the traffic you want.

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Schedule, Schedule, Schedule

So you’ve picked a topic, started your blog and decided on a posting frequency. Let’s say you picked, oh I dunno, 5 times a week. You’re dead set on 5 times a week and it’s going swimmingly so far. Your posts are in depth, smart and informative. But week 4 rolls around and somethings come up, causing you to have an even busier week than normal. Chances are you aren’t a full time blogger, so you might have school, work or family getting in the way of your sweet, sweet blogging. You find yourself with a smaller window to post, the posts are shorter and more general, not as informative and much more rushed.

Well, that’s where schedule comes into play. There’s always going to be something that will come up that prevents you from fully focusing on your blog as much as you’d like, so when settling on a posting frequency it’s important to take into account the possibility of something distracting you.

So what can you do about this? Well, you write your blog in advance. Pretty simple, right?

The way I chose to revamp my blog and posting schedule is post twice a week, Wednesday and Friday, so that I can write on the weekend and I have Monday and Tuesday as an emergency buffer just in case something interferes with my weekend writing.

Not everyone will have the luxury of doing this, I know.

Depending on the type of blog, you might have to post everyday because there is a constant stream of information on the subject coming at you daily. It’s all about being prepared in advance, that’s why it’s necessary to flesh out your chosen topic before you start writing. If your topic has new information every day, are you able to write about it every day?

But what if some kind of discovery is made that relates to your topic or a special event is happening that only comes once a year? Then you’re going to have to post more, a lot more.

For example, you have a topic on “Designer Shoes” and you’re posting twice a week on the different pairs that comes out, your thoughts on how they look, how they feel, etc. Then fashion week rolls around, where there is an influx of new shoes coming out daily. You’re going to have to post daily to keep up, because the other blogs out there on shoes will be updating multiple times a day.

The bottom line is, you have to take your blog seriously to be taken seriously.

So if you chose a topic you really, really, really, really, really enjoy you shouldn’t have any problems.

But you probably still will.

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Focus, Focus, Fo… zzz…

One of the hardest things about blogging has to be writing about the same topic constantly. Scratch that, it is the hardest thing. If you’re looking at blogging being a long term hobby or even job, be prepared to write constantly on a set schedule. By set schedule, I mean one a day, twice a day, once a week, twice a week, etc. Whatever you feel comfortable with, you should stick to. As time goes by and you feel like you want to start posting less, or posting more, then by all means do it, but do it gradually. Go from 5 times a week to 4, 4 to 3 and so on. But too few posts and people will start forgetting to go back and see what’s new.

When you start a blog, you’ll have 100 different blog topics running through your head and you’ll most likely post multiple times a day. As the days go on, the well starts to dry up a bit and you’re searching deeper and deeper for those post ideas. Then before you know it, you’ve exhausted your 100 ideas and you don’t have anything left to say. Now you’re in trouble as you start missing days and posting half assed articles that somewhat relate to the topic, which results in readers leaving, dropped RSS feeds, less views and less unique’s. Before you know it, your blog is spinning out of control and you don’t know what happened.

Take a look at your posting frequency. If it’s multiple times a day, every day, chances are you burnt yourself out. Or maybe you’re just not as passionate about the topic as you thought you were. It might have been a flavor of the month concept that didn’t pan out like you had planned and it just fizzled out. It happens and your best bet is to start over.

Forget making money when you choose a topic, start off by choosing what you really love. People are incredibly focused on making money with their blog first and writing second. Choose something you could talk about constantly, day in and day out, to anybody that will listen. Because that’s who your readers are, they are the “anybody that will listen” and it’s your job to keep their attention. Remember that even though they will listen, they won’t listen for long if it’s bullshit.

The plan is to post at your desired schedule. People will eventually pick it up and will visit on the days you update, so then you’re the one in control. The pressure will be slightly off and you won’t star to view it as a “job” job.

If you’re thinking “the more I post, the more people visit and the more readers I get the better.” I guess, but remember the old saying “quality over quantity”? A couple of solid articles every week will be 100 times better than 5 so-so articles every week.

You also don’t want to bombard your readers with 3 or 4 posts a day, overwhelming them and turning them off. You want to take things slow and steady, gaining readers at a pace you’ll be able to keep up with as time goes on. Eventually if the articles are strong enough, the blog will start to pick up steam among the World Wide Web population and who knows where you can take it from there.

There is always a readership to be gained, no matter the topic, as long as you put the effort in on your end.

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Focus, Focus, Focus.

While reading beginner’s guides and articles to blogging, the first point made was always pick a topic you’re passionate about and one you can focus on month after month, until your blog is old and gray.

Depending on the topic, this might be easy to do or it might be a little difficult. Starting this blog, we thought that a blog on making money and talking about the different ways to make money was focused. Well, two weeks in we had to redo the blog because it’s wasn’t as focused as we thought.

Putting yourself in your reader’s shoes, or even just taking into account what you do when you read other blogs will help you better understand focus.

For instance, you’re looking for a blog on running shoes and when you Google it, the first blog to come up is “ShoeBlog.” Once you start browsing shoe blog, you notice that there’s equally as much information about running shoes as there is on dress shoes, hiking boots and everything in between. So you flip off ShoeBlog and go back to Google until you find a blog specifically on running shoes.

Well your readers will feel the same way if they’re looking for specific information on a subject and find too many sub-topics in your blog. It’s much better to focus on one topic for many reasons like:

• easier to find in Google & keyword strength
• easier to read and better structure

and more.

Easier to find in Google and Keyword Strength

If you were to type in “dogs” in Google, the matches would be 246,000,000, but if you were to type in “Siberian Husky dogs” the matches would be 437,000. So a blog focused on dogs in general would have millions of other competing websites against it, while a blog on Siberian Huskies would only have half a million. It makes your blog easier to find and give you a better chance at attracting a large readership. Your keyword strength would also be stronger for Siberian husky’s since your competition isn’t anywhere near as big as it is for dogs, again allowing people to find you easier.

Easier to Read and Better Structure

Having a blog on a specific topic will make the blog neater, more organized and easier for your reader to find the information they’re looking for. If the blog has scattered information on 100 different categories within your topic, it can make the blog look messy and unorganized, resulting in people leaving the blog for a different blog.

However, it’s not all black and white in regards to choosing a topic and writing about it. Sometimes your topic needs a lot of sub topics because they’re important in writing about your main topic. Well the dilemma that stems from that is a tricky one. You’ll have to do your best to keep it all in check and link them together into one cohesive blog. Even a blog on Siberian Huskies will have sub topics on different types of Siberian huskies so you could either narrow it down even more and blog about black Siberian Huskies or white Siberian Huskies, or include them all in your blog.

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The Template Search Continues

Finding a custom template isn’t as easy as I thought it would be. Sitepoint offers a marketplace for them, but at the moment the pickings are slim so we still haven’t found one. I’ve also been browsing Digitalpoint (what’s with all the -point sites?) and again, haven’t found anything that interesting.
So what I’ll be doing until we find a template is attempt to customize our current one or maybe make one from scratch, we’ll see how it goes. This might be a huge victory or a colossal failure, but either way it’ll be an experience worth venturing into.
If all goes as planned, I’ll be able to post up a big tutorial on how to do it yourself, which would be beneficial for everyone, I think. So, off to template design I go.

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Why Did We Redo The Blog?

The point of Makethemillion.com is to chronicle our journey on making a million dollars and providing information on how we’re doing it. We’re going to be talking about a bunch of different ways to make money such as day trading, online poker, real estate development and other types of investments.

So we decided to make Makethemillion.com a kind of information hub with different blogs on different topics branching out from it. I think it will make things a lot more focused and a lot more organized. Makethemillion.com will become a more personal blog, mainly about what we’re doing to make our money, but the other blogs branching off will be about how to make money with much more detail. A little confusing, I know but it will all make sense once we’re up and running. Both me and Jeff will be posting here and also posting on our other sites. Jeff is going to cover online poker and I will cover day trading to start off and as time goes on, we’ll be expanding into other topics.

I decided the first thing we need to do is get out own theme, so that’s what we’re on the lookout for over at Sitepoint. Though they aren’t cheap, I think distinguishing your look from the other billion blogs is an important step and since we can afford to do it now, we’re going to.

We’re going to be back up to regular posting frequency by Tuesday, but I don’t think we’ll have our own theme up yet. The online poker blog will definitely be up and the day trading blog will follow by next month, while this blog will be updated daily. At the moment, this blog will focus on how to make a blog based on what we’ve done so far, the information we’ve picked up and what we’ve applied ourselves. There will also be a healthy amount of SEO information, since I think it goes hand in hand with blogging.

Once we really get going, this blog is going to be great, guaranteed. So, you know, stay tuned.

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Make the Million Reborn

Two weeks in and we’ve already had to redo the blog. We decided 2 blogs doesn’t make sense since we’re posting about the same thing, so we’ve decided to focus on just 1 blog together. We have a few big changes coming up and it will take a couple days to implement them, so your patience is much appreciated.

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