As most of my readers know, I’ve talked about Dan Thies and Leslie Rhode before. I’ve known both of them from the beginning of the “StomperNet” days. They have helped me personally many times with very timely advise and proper techniques. Quite simply they do things the right way, and frankly their stuff just works.

If you’ve been around for awhile hear you’ve heard me rail against, “loopholes”, “magic buttons”, “silver bullets” .. etc. Folks there isn’t such a thing, but there are smart things you can be doing to drive traffic to your sites.

I live and breathe SEO .. because I suck at Paid search. Most of everything I learn – and teach, I’ve learn from both of these guys.

If you want more traffic, a bigger presence, or just want something to trust, this is it:

Links Are Not Hard

I know a lot of my readers are working on Adsense type sites right now, so I thought I’d provide some direction and a couple of quick tips. This is by no means the by all and end all .. but it’s not costing you anything either …

1) AdSense isn’t as easy as it used to be… There is a lot of competition these days and the content network is 2nd banana to Google & Search Partners PPC, so you won’t get the high Money per click like a few years ago — however the content network is back on an upswing, especially with a high number of banner ads making it there. So make sure to enable Text & Image Ad Types in Google Adsense setup.

2) Use WordPress. WordPress is great for 2 things: SEO (Use All in One SEO Plugin) and easy of use. And another bonus is that Google loves it. If you do a search for “adsense” in the Add Theme you are sure to find a good theme to use. I’d recommend something like BlueSense.

3) Placement is key .. Here is a color coded layout that gives you an idea on where is the best place to put your Ads:

4) Remember the goal of you adsense site .. It’s to get people off of your site as quickly as possible – ideally by clicking on the ads. So in this cause ugly works. You don’t want to engage your viewers you want them gone — in a good way!

5) Build lots of sites .. Don’t expect bug returns from only one site – unless you can point a lot of traffic at it. Make a small goal, like say $2 a day from a site, then rinse and repeat. If you get 10-20 sites up in a month then you will start to see some action.

6) Test & Switch .. Always keep an eye on your adsense stats and do what you can to try and raise the CTR on your ads .. the better the CTR the more money you will get paid per click by Google. If certain colors are working – switch em, try different placements. Try more ads, try less ads, try different sizes — try everything

Let me know what you think of my tips and of course if you have any quick ones, add them in the comments.

As many of you know I have a number of e-commerce properties as well as info products and many other content websites. Ecomm has a special place in my heart, mostly because it’s where I started. I started out coding html and then graduated to php when the company I worked for desperately needed a shopping cart app.

I know there are also a number of you that sell on the Amazon Marketplace. Well I have a warning for you. Watch Your Back.

Yesterday I was blocked and removed from the Amazon Marketplace for:

you may have listed products which are in violation of our policies against
intellectual property infringement. As stated in our policies, the sale
of unauthorized replicas, pirated, counterfeit, and knock-off
merchandise is not permitted on our site.

So I awoke on Monday morning to no orders in my Amazon inbox which is weird, then I found this email. And that was it. No real reason or examples, or most importantly no proof. I don’t sell anything that I’m not allowed to on Amazon and there are many other current merchants listing the very same products on their site right now – including the company that was drop shipping our orders. Also our feedback rating – the life blood of the amazon system – was 4.5 stars / 5 stars with no negatives in the last 3 months.

What’s dishearting is that as a merchant you have no recourse whatsoever. Sure maybe I could sue — but what would be the point of that, to lose more money? No Thanks.

Honestly I don’t have a problem with Amazon removing my account, what bothers me is that they are unwilling to actually provide me with the reason my account was terminated. No copy of the complaint, No example product, No phone call – nothing but the email. This folks is just bad business.

My only solace is that we haven’t been on Amazon for that long (only about 6 months) and we weren’t doing enormous numbers, and Amazon takes a very large percentage, which cuts into profits. But if you are selling – or are thinking of selling on Amazon head my advice and be wary and don’t count it lasting forever because they may just decide one day that they don’t want you.

Oh, and if you want to buy some perfume and fragrances that are 100% legitimate, I know a great store!

I just read at Commission Blueprint 2 Review that Tim has just announced that their new version will launch in September.. Cool

After having many issues with the advise domain and hosting — I gave up. Now the Internet Marketing Advice offer is available on this domain.

Check it our for some free stuff and unbiased advice on Internet Marketing products.

I’ve just launched a new site for my mail list for those that are interested in wading through the Internet Marketing mine field. (I moved this to this domain now) is now live and taking new Free members and heck I’ve even thrown in 4 Free Bonus eBooks just for joining my newsletter list.

Internet Marketing Advice