A new year and many new courses and tutorials.

Once again it is that time of the year when there are quite a few new year resolutions to make an independent living and set up your own internet marketing business.

Once again there will be a huge number of internet marketing newbies ready with their pockets open, who will shell out money on anything and everything so that can achieve that dream of their – to be free of the 9-5 treadmill.

But are all these courses desirable? Is it advisable to spend money on anything and everything that is sold on the internet?

Of course, not.

Selective buying and selectively choosing on feedback and brand image is what is advisable.

One such course that bundles everything into one and ensures that you do not waste your money on too many unnecessary things has just started accepting new members. But their membership is limited to only about 300 and you should show an urgency if you are really keen on making money online.

This course is called “Online Profits” and is created and run by Daniel Scocco of “Daily Blog Tips”.

The reason why I said that you will not need another course is because “Online Profits” is that extensive. It has 24 modules that covers everything from picking domain names and hosting them to blogging and affiliate marketing. A few things that are covered in their modules are as follows:

• Business Principles
• Identifying and picking domain names
• Picking a hosting plan and setting up a website
• Researching niches
• Details about web designing
• Setting up and maintaining wordpress
• Blogging as a business
• Keyword research
• Online Forums
• SEO, link building and traffic generation
• Social Media, Affiliate marketing and Email marketing

That is just a jist of the modules. If you get into the details of the modules you will realize that it covers almost everything that you can think off when you think of “Internet Marketing”.

The best part about this course is the faculty that is involved. Take a look at it.

That faculty covers the who’s who of internet marketing. You can make out from it as to what kind of coverage the course has.

Daniel is offering a free report for his online profits subscribers. You do not need to join the course in order to get this report. It is absolutely free.

Get your free report on the 10 Deadly Business Mistakes You Should Avoid.

By reading this report you will get to evaluate the quality of information that Daniel shares and should be able to make a decision on joining the course.

Just ensure that you do it fast because I hear that as I complete this post, there are only about 150 spots remaining in his course.

Join the course today at online profits.

In order for any blog to rank in the search engines, you need to have a good pagerank and some quality backlinks. Pagerank is a factor of many things and backlinks form a major part of the ranking algorithm.

But where will you get these backlinks from?

Most of the blogs these days prefer to be “nofollow”, thanks to the Spammers. What this has done is that it is put a full-stop to the association in terms of backlinking and traffic referring that used to be there some time back between bloggers from the same niche. So now backlinks are being sold at the price of gold. Would you want to buy one? Is it preferable? These are questions that are not worthy a discussion as the answers are pretty much everywhere on the internet.

A backlink is not just important in term of SEO and getting your blog ranked in the search engines, instead it also brings in some traffic. This is because a link to your post or, your blog is in a way a reference to it and a reference will bring in readers, just because they expect something more to be read on your blog.

Now that blog commenting does not give you a backlink, how is it that you can get a backlink from the big boys in the blogging world. The big blogs are established ones and they wouldn’t mind exchanging links with your or, referencing to your post in case you have a credible standing in the blogosphere. But if you are one who is just staring out, it could look like and impossible task.

The answer to this is – “Guest Posting”.

What is Guest Posting?

Guest Posting is writing for a blog that is not yours. Guest contributions have always been a way of helping others or, making part time money, since long. Guest lecturers, Visiting practitioners etc. are all forms of guest contributions.

Guest posting is a voluntary approach from a blogger to write for another blog that he is not an owner of, in an attempt to put forth his viewpoint and thus gain links and readers from it.

Most of the blogs, these days have an option of guest posting. They clearly mention that in their front page. Bloggers who have been contributing content that is worthy of reading and that are interesting take take this option of writing for them. The details of how to write, what to write etc. are blog specific and will be available only on the individual blogs. Some blogs might ask you to register yourself on their blogs, and yet others may ask you to mail them.

Guest posting is a win-win situation for both the bloggers. If you are wondering how, then read on..

Advantages to the blog owner -

Blogs are craving for attention these days. The competition in any niche is so fierce that the one with the constantly updated content and the best content wins the race and this race starts every day all over again. In such a situation, it is important for every blogger to have the best content on their blogs and also to maintain the freshness of the content on their blog. Is is practically possible to write new posts almost everyday, let alone writing more that one post a day?

It is not!!

This is where guest posting comes in handy. This way, the blog owners keep getting fresh content and their blog is constantly updated. Most importantly the content is unique and valuable.

Advantages to guest blogger -

We already discussed the advantages that you as a guest blogger will get. Quality backlinks without having to pay for it or, bribe people and best of all, traffic overflow from that blog to your blog. If the blog that your are contributing to is a well established blog, the traffic flow can be huge. A guest post at established blogs like problogger and such other blogs have helped people gain as much as a 400% increase in traffic.

But there is just one hurdle in getting to do a guest blog on an established blog like that of Problogger – getting them to accept your guest post. Taking care of a few basic things can do that for you. Let us keep this topic for a discussion in another post.

My Guest Posts:

You can read my guest posts here -

• At CarlOcab – 3 Simple Tips To Make The Most Of Unproductive Days In Blogging
• At SiteSketch101 – Getting Rid of Procrastination…Today

Let me know your thoughts on guest posting by commenting. You can write a guest post for us. Read the guidelines.

Photograph courtesy Peter Huys

How will it feel if you had around 30,000 PLR articles at your disposal?

I wouldn’t feel anything.

If you have been into Internet Marketing for some time now and your are not making some decent money from it, in spite of the fact that there are a few thousand PLR articles stored in your Computer’s hard drive, then you would know the reason why I said, I wouldn’t feel anything.

That’s right.

PLR articles are something that is meant to just fill up the vacant hard drive space in your computer and do nothing. It is not normal with most of us starting out on the internet. We collect thousands and thousands of PLR articles and let them be there. Only if we spent some time on modifying and rewriting these articles, we could have made that money that we haven’t made for some time now.

Article marketing is one of the best and easiest modes of getting traffic. I have written only about a 100 articles in total and have submitted it to various article directories. These articles are what is getting me the traffic and the sales. I ensure that I write at least one article everyday, which should be the target of any newbie internet marketer, especially if you are short of funds to invest.

Creative ideas to write about 100 articles????

It is worth a thought and indeed worth some time. I am sure nobody wants to spend that much time writing articles. Then what is the easier way out?

PLR articles is the answer. PLR articles or, Private Label Rights articles are articles written by people for circulation, but which gives your complete access to modifying and rewriting it in any way you like. You can even use it in any form that you wish – ebooks, blog articles, ezines etc. Such articles can be easily obtained and then re-written to submit them to article directories and ezines. You don’t have to be too creative and will not have to spend time scratching your head for content.

Since most PLR articles come for cheap or, almost free, it is a tendency with all of us to let it cool our computer’s hard drive, like we normally do with most things that are free.

If you have been lazy to even re-write your articles or, for that matter, if you have had difficulty obtaining PLR articles, then “The Ultimate PLR Article Collection” is for you. A simple tool released by James Jones from Micro Niche Finder, this is an amazing piece of work, which can solve all your problems pertaining to Article Marketing.

“The Ultimate PLR Article Collection”, has a collection of about 29,378 PLR articles, which is completely at your disposal and you can do whatever you want. In addition to this, it has an easy article spinner which can help your rewrite your articles in minutes. these re-written articles can then be submitted to ezines and article directories. The fact that these PLR articles cover almost any topic that you can think off, is one of the few bonuses of this tool.

In addition of all of the above, there is a very simple e-book creator in the tool, which can help you create an ebook in minutes. What more could you ask for from a tool, especially if it only costs you $14.99. That is less than a few cents per article.

James is releasing this tool at this low cost only for a few days. He is also providing all future updated to this tool absolutely free of cost.

As a limited period offer I can provide you with a $15.00 cashback, paid to your PayPal account, if you buy “The Ultimate PLR Article Collection” and Micro Niche Finder together from the link below. Just send me the receipts for both the purchases.

Buy “The Ultimate PLR Article Collection” here.

Buy Micro Niche Finder here.

Photograph courtesy blaise chwola

When I launched this blog in December 2008, my objective was to only share everything that I went through in my journey to establishing myself in the internet marketing business.

I knew there were quite a few people out there who start off like I did – with very less money and little information about the internet. Consequently they fall prey to the scams and start buying everything that the so-called GURUS of the internet promote. Eventually they find that they have exhausted all their money and have nothing to invest in important things like an auto-responder or, a hosting plan.

Who am I? Where do I stand in who’s who of the internet? Does that really matter till the time the advice that I give is free of cost and does not involve investments. For the ones who think that this still matters, you can read my “about” page. For the others, let me tell you that I am not a celebrity blogger. Neither am I an internet  multi-millionaire, showing off huge mansions and beautiful cars. I am just an ordinary man like you. I earn well from the internet to live well. I do a bit of charity, have a nice house and a good car. But what really matters is the fact that I am not in debt and I am not afraid of the future. I know I have a sustainable income for life from my internet marketing business.

The objective of this blog was to give information – pure information to my readers, who I assume were newbie internet marketers. Hence I did not limit myself just to blogging. I know there is much more that I can share with you all. All of that will come in the days ahead.

Meanwhile, here are 33 posts on blogging, that I think is informative and that I personally think were my best in 2009.

1. The Start – Blogger or, WordPress
2. What do I blog on?
3. Using Google Insight
4. Staying on top for the same content!
5. The First Visitor to your blog
6. Is tagging your post important?
7. Titles for your blog post!
8. Content – Maintaining Continuity
9. Affiliate Theme for WordPress
10. Using Twitter to promote your blog
11. When will I start making money from my blog?
12. 6 Most required Plugins for your WordPress blog
13. Niche research for your blog posts
14. Learning to walk in the blogosphere – BlogMastermind
15. 6 under-rated useful WordPress Plugins
16. Your Blog Monetization strategy-part 1
17. The Secret of a successful WordPress Installation
18. Creating an identity for your blog – The Logo
19. Why should Twitter be amongst your blog promotion strategies?
20. The only All-in-One plugin required for WordPress Blogs
21. Should you write paid posts in your blogs?
22. Success with Niche Blogging
23. 4 ways to get new ideas to blog about
24. Blog promotion techniques – Getting a backlink
25. Building backlinks – Dofollow commenting at blogs
26. Tips on selecting a hosting service provider
27. 5 Plugins to secure your WordPress Installation
28. How to get quality content for your blog?
29. The Affiliate Theme for WordPress
30. 5 Steps to being more productive in blogging
31. Performancing Metrics – Knowing your stats
32. Are the big bloggers loosing focus of the topic?
33. Why blog commenting does not get you any traffic?

Do tell me your opinion on these posts by commenting here.

Photograph courtesy Zsuzsanna Kilian

Another year has passed and it is time to sit and review you achievements for the year. But what is even more important is planning for the next year. The big question at this point is – Do you have an agenda for the next year?

Every new year brings in time for newer resolutions. But the year that went never gives you the time to sit down and evaluate your performance on the last year’s resolutions. This is probably because of the what we have been taught all these years – “Focus on the future. Forget your past”. If you were not taught this, then you were really lucky. But I learnt it this way and hence have always been focusing on the future and ignoring the past.

Am I doing right? The answer is obvious. What is it that I was doing wrong?

In my attempt to focus on the future and forget the past, I did not take the time out to evaluate things that I did wrong. I did not evaluate the reasons why they went wrong just to ensure that I do not repeat the same mistake again.

As the New Year has dawned it is now time to sit down and analyze your past year and chalk out some fresh and practical plans for the new year.

Things that I did right in 2009:-

When I look back at 2009, I feel there were quite a few things that I did right and consequently worked well for my business.

I jumped into the Twitter Bandwagon on time – Twitter was the most happening thing in 2009. It exploded towards the beginning of the year 2009. People who did not know how to use this explosion to their advantage, sat pretty on the fence. Others who took advantage of the explosion reaped its benefits and made money out of it. I made the right decision at the right time and learnt how to monetize Twitter. Today as the New Year dawns I have newer strategies and plans for Twitter.

I attained partial freedom – The beginning of 2009, brought in the worst recession in the recent times. Stock prices tumbled and the bottomline of most companies showed negative results. People were afraid of losing jobs. A few thousands even lost their job. Internet Marketing was not serious for me until then. But then I found a reason to be independent, to be free of the fear of starving, to be free of the fear of losing jobs, to be free of the fear of being burdened with mortgages and loans. As the year ends, I know I have attained partial freedom. I have a self-sustaining income from my business and I am free.

My wife’s first blog – I got my wife to blog. At first she had very less interest but when she found that what she was to write was on topics of her interest, she just freaked out. Her blogs was ranking in the first page of Google, for quite a few prime keywords and she had increased her readership by almost 360%.

I registered my Company – I was able to register my company in 2009. My company will be into social media marketing and web designing.  I will be launching my company website and other details in the year 2010.

Things that I did wrong in 2009:-

These were some things that I did wrong in 2009 -

I made the mistake of jumping into too many things – blogging, minisites, affiliate marketing, web designing, social media marketing etc. etc. The consequence was pretty straight – Failures and losses. Some of the businesses that I was making profits in suddenly declined, because I had not taken them to a level where they would run on an auto-pilot. What I learnt from – concentrate on one business or, a couple of related business which does not require additional focus until your have built it to a self-sustaining level.

I chose the wrong hosting company -  The biggest mistake of 2009 was the choice of a wrong hosting company to host my blogs and mini-sites. Midway in August, my hosting company’s servers were attacked by hackers and my blogs and website were gone. They couldn’t even provide me with a backup. My blogs and websites were gone. I had to start everything from scratch, including my money generating mini-sites, for which I had not backups at all. What I learnt – Do not compromise on brand name and quality in order to save a few bucks especially in critical aspects like hosting.

I lost my entire list I built over the past year – The second biggest mistake was the choice of a wrong auto responder. My auto-responder company closed its business and ran away without even providing me with a backup of my lists. I chose the wrong auto responder service in order to save a few bucks. Consequently I lost my entire list that I built over the past year and a half. What I learnt – List building can be successful only if you choose the right auto responder service.

I did not launch my products – I did not launch any product in 2009, though I had plans of doing it in my agenda. Why I couldn’t do it? Reasons would only be excuses. Two such products are in the work-in-progress stage and should be ready for launch somewhere in March 2010. A product of my own would certainly have helped me build my online presence and my business.

I did not outsource – When outsourcing was the mantra of the year, I did not outsource. I wanted to do everything by myself and the result of this was that i had too many things to do and too little time. A few start-ups just remained as start-ups and yet others just did not start-up. I have about 21 good domains that I got for very cheap. These cheap domain names are still lying un-utilized. What I learnt – Outsource things that you necessarily need not do yourself.

What’s your agenda for 2010?

For those of you who are thinking of starting your online businesses, this is the best time to do it. As the New Year creeps in, the million dollar question is, whether you have an agenda or, not. People who have and agenda and a plan for the year 2010, will see success and the others won’t.

But before you even think of an agenda, you will have to find a few reasons why you want to do all that you think you will do this year. Your reason could be one of the following  -

Repayment of a mortgage – Recession in the year 2009, brought in the burden of a few mortgages an you might want to pay them off and be debt-free.

Get off the 9-5 treadmill – Unable to find time for your kid and your wife? The story is similar with everybody running just next to you in the 9-5 treadmill. The normal 9-5 job has become an 8-9 job and you hardly find time for your family, let alone a picnic or, a party. You might want to get off this treadmill.

Freedom from the insecurity of loosing a job – You just got to know that, your friend was asked to leave his company. You have nightmares and most of your time at home is spent on thinking about the consequences of loosing your job. Get freedom from this insecurity.

The best education for your kids – You missed getting your child admitted to that school of your choice, because you couldn’t afford to pay the admission fees there. You might want to get out of the embarrassment of answering your child’s question on why you couldn’t get him admitted to this school.

The reasons could be many, but what is important is identifying it. If you are passionate towards achieving what you have set out for, and your reason is strong enough to keep driving you, then you can move onto finalizing your agenda for 2010. You can be rest assured that you will be successful.

All the best for the New Year 2010.

Photograph courtesy Billy Alexander