Ok folks, you CAN make some money in this shitty economy.

If you are willing to stretch a little beyond your comfort zone, you can cash in.

Last week I made $885 after expenses and it was a little out of my comfort zone.

I actually made more than that total, but this was the figure from a single client.

How did I do it? I took on a local client and built them [...]]]>

Ok folks, you CAN make some money in this shitty economy.

If you are willing to stretch a little beyond your comfort zone, you can cash in.

Last week I made $885 after expenses and it was a little out of my comfort zone.

I actually made more than that total, but this was the figure from a single client.

How did I do it? I took on a local client and built them a WordPress website.

I did not seek this client. This client called me.

The phone call went something like this…

Me: Hello?
Them: Hi Steve, My name is ____ and I understand you build websites. I need a website for my business.
Me: Yes, I do build websites but I only build sites for myself.
Them: We really need some help and ____ told us about you.
Me: Yes, he’s a good friend, what do you need?

I reluctantly agreed to help. Had a friend not been involved in the referral, the call would have probably ended soon.

Call me crazy, but I just prefer to build my own sites and content. The money is great with clients, but you have to earn it.

Don’t get me wrong, I love money and I need money very badly like everyone else. The difference in my life now is that I don’t chase the almighty dollar like I used to in my younger day.

If you are one of my 8 readers here, you understand that I have made a lot of effort into simplifying my life, not complicating it any more than it already is.

I am very selective about who I work with these days. I recommend that you use your gut feelings when selecting a client to work with.

In this case, my gut feelings were pretty good after I learned the scope of the project and I moved forward.

Let’s cut to the chase and explain what I did.

Knowing that I may only work with this client for a short time, I found a local web hosting company that offered good technical support as part of their hosting package.

I explained to my client that I can build them a site but I’m NOT their tech support. I will not take a call on Sunday afternoon that their website is down.

I also explained that I used pre-built WordPress templates. I am not a designer or a code guy. I am a simple dude. If they want fancy, they will have to look beyond me, I can’t go there.

The client agreed.

I LOVE the web hosting company I am dealing with. They bought the domain name and set me up a WordPress test site for the client.

I built the entire site “offline”.

The test site was accessible to the client and we were able to design it together.

Once the site was built, the hosting company took it “live”.

I can walk away from this project now knowing that I have left my client in good hands with a good web hosting company and technical support.

I can collect my paycheck and move on.

There is a high probability that I will remain for some time as a content creator and SEO guy for a monthly retainer.

How did I determine my fee?

Truth is, I didn’t. I let the client determine my fee as I always do. I’m working with more than one client right now and I let them determine the fees.

My process is simple. When a client asks how much do I charge, I ask what their monthly budget is?

I never give a price. When a client gives me a budget, I will then determine what I’m willing to do for them and I lay it out. If they agree, we move forward.

If a client insists that I give them a price, I simply tell them to call me when they have a budget. It’s that simple.

I advise you hold firm however you price your services. You will get the follow-up call.

I also advise that if it just doesn’t feel right, walk away. Trust your gut.

Ok Steve, now how can I get a client or how do I get more clients and earn more money. Simple my friend.

Whatever your talents or skills are chances are there is a demand for your services.

How can I get clients?

• Evaluate what you can do that people will pay you for.
• Stay local.
• Use Craigslist.
• You WILL get referrals.
• Rinse & repeat.

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I’m going to share with you an idea for a legitimate work from home jobs making money on Craigslist. How you, yes you, can actually make money with jobs you can do from home using Craigslist. The process is actually fairly simple. Stick with me and I will outline the steps for you to follow.

Just in case you are one of the 4 people who do not know what Craigslist is, you can get [...]]]>

I’m going to share with you an idea for a legitimate work from home jobs making money on Craigslist. How you, yes you, can actually make money with jobs you can do from home using Craigslist. The process is actually fairly simple. Stick with me and I will outline the steps for you to follow.

Just in case you are one of the 4 people who do not know what Craigslist is, you can get an overview and understanding at the Craigslist Wikipedia Page. Ok, now we are on the same track, let’s proceed.

Before you click away and increase my bounce rate for this site, you most likely found this article from a search for legitimate work from home jobs. I hope you will find a lot of great ideas within this article. This is one of the ways I make money working from my home and you can too. I will remind you that virtually anyone can do this internet based business idea that I will detail for you. There are almost no barriers to your entry. The economy is really bad and a lot of folks are looking for legitimate work from home jobs because they have lost their corporate day jobs.

You can start with almost zero knowledge and along the way, I promise you an unbelievable education as to how the internet works. It’s all self-paced. There are a lot of internet business ideas out there for work at home employment but I’m afraid that too many of them are scams. If you need to earn extra income, I hope that this idea will cause a light bulb to go off because the possibilities are endless.

During this process your own human potential will increase 1000% and you can use your new knowledge for the good of mankind or your own bank account.

This could be epic. Do like Griz says and put on a pot of coffee. I also recommend that you also put on your thinking cap.

We all know someone who is out of work. I’ve had a lot of people ask me if I knew about any jobs. I really couldn’t offer any help up to now. If I’m going to make a recommendation, it must be a legitimate home business with an opportunity for success. I recently tested for myself, what I’m going to share with you and it really does work. Because I enjoy internet marketing, I’m always on the lookout for for good online business ideas. I enjoy building niche websites but income from those can take a while. Making money on Craigslist is a faster way to put some money in the bank for yourself. The cool thing, is that you can work this as hard as you want and I do believe the only limitation as to how much money you can earn is whatever limits you may place on yourself.

This is really where your own potential will meet up with reality. I’ve been making extra income online for quite a while now and I’m always looking for new opportunities.

Earn extra income with legitimate work from home jobs

As with most business ventures, to start making money, you have to spend a little to make a little bit of money or a lot of money. Starting online internet marketing on Craigslist is very affordable, more affordable than most of the other ideas floating around out there. I will assume you have a computer and an internet connection. I can’t imagine that you are reading this post on a computer at the library. Ok, that part of your investment is done. Good. With this online business plan, you really can start earning money this month. Keep reading.

Legitimate work from home business

The dream of working from home is not for everyone. It’s hard work, no doubt. The cool part of this is that you can work this idea towards a full time income or easily stay part time. You will need to make an investment in a monthly subscription. The monthly subscription that will cost you a whopping $33 per month. Don’t panic, that’s chickenfeed. I will promise you right now that this very small sum of money that leaves your account every month is probably worth more than your Business Administration Degree from your favorite University.

I will keep all of this very simple and easy to understand. The 8 regular readers I have here on Bloggerlens all know that I am a simple man.

Craig Newmark, Founder of Craigslist

A job you can do from home. I placed an ad on Craigslist

A few months ago, I placed an ad on the Craigslist posting service. My offer was to help local small business gain better exposure and rankings on Google. I offered a very simple service with no promises or guarantees.

How about that? I offered a service in which I would be paid yet I gave no guarantees that my service would even work.

Here is what is wonderful about this method of earning money online. When you work from home online, you can offer your service to businesses all over the entire U.S.A. and never have to leave your house. You can work at your own pace without ever guaranteeing that your service will effectively work for a client or not. This is a legitimate online business that you can grow as big as you desire.

Stick with me here, I’m getting ready to start giving the nuts and bolts of this method to earn some cash on Craigslist but I wanted to make those points I have written first. I wanted to wet your appetite a little. This is a very exciting opportunity for you and I am hoping that you may use this to your advantage. If you have ever wanted to make money working from home, I will show you how I do it in this article.

This is not a scam or stupid or illegitimate. You can seriously affect the bottom line for your clients and their families with the service you can provide. You can make them a lot of money. At the end of the day you can be proud of what you are doing and I want to prepare you for the fact that these clients will send even more business your way. If you do this correctly, you will be turning down business.

Start a business making money on Craigslist

If you know how to post anything on the internet, you are 90% there in working this business. If you have a blog and you know how to post an article, you are home free. If you already know how to post an ad on Craigslist that means you are qualified right now. Isn’t that good news?

Seriously, if the extent of your knowledge is only your Facebook page, you CAN make money by using Craigslist. This would be a great home based business for Mom’s who stay at home with the kids. Most Mom’s seem to have a Facebook page. If you can make a Facebook posting, you can do this business.

The service you will offer is Link Building For SEO To Local Business.

I have spent the last couple of years working with and dealing with small businesses in my local community. The majority of local businesses are not very well educated when it comes down to how the internet actually works. They hire someone to build them a website and wait for the traffic to start rolling in. It never happens and they become desperate for help because their is no traffic or very little to their website.

This is not the case with all local business. Some are extremely knowledgeable. In my experience, most small businesses are not and those are your target clients. You are here to help and they need you badly.

This desperation for help is where you come in and offer your services. I promise you, there are some desperate business owners out there trying to survive this economy. A person like you comes along offering to help and they are grateful.

You have an opportunity to really help these small business. This can be very gratifying work where you can truly make a difference.

Is It Too Technical?

All you need is a computer & internet service.

No. Once again, I will remind you that I’m keeping it simple here. You will never touch the clients actual website. You will simply build anchor text links from other websites that will point toward your clients website.

If your local plumber in Greenfield, Alabama has a website and no traffic, you will simply assist in getting traffic to his website by building appropriate links and increasing his position in the search engines. Nothing more, nothing less. Business simplicity.

If your plumber is ranking at #25 for the term “plumber, Greenfield, Alabama” and you can move him to the first page of Google with a simple link-building campaign, he will gladly pay you for your efforts.

Local business are generally the easiest to move up in rank. You are mostly dealing with Mom & Pop type establishments who have very little or no knowledge at all at how to rank a website. Competition is generally very low for local terms. Usually, with a few links and a little time, you can push a client website to much better search engine rankings. With a little effort in link building on your part, you can usually see gains and moderately quick which result in happy clients. Happy clients usually mean referrals.

Can you start making money?

The short answer is YES!

• If you can write a 400 word article and place a link in your article that points to a client website, you can do this business and make money.
• If you can hire a writer that will do all of this work for you, you can make money with this business.
• If you can send an email to a writer explaining what you want them to do, you can do this business and earn money.

I can’t explain this in much simpler terms.

Let’s take a moment and summarize where we are at with this work from home business or maybe you prefer your local coffee shop.

You can make money on Craigslist offering a simple link-building service to local companies in your community who have existing websites.

• You place a simple ad in your local Craigslist
• You offer a link-building service to increase traffic and search engine rankings to websites.
• You never have to touch a clients website.
• You write 400 word quality articles with a variety of anchor text links that points to a client website.
• (Optional) You can hire writers to do all of the work for you.
• Your work is measurable to your client based on traffic stats & a simple check on rankings over time.

Here is the second part of the equation for your internet business. Where are you going to place your articles and links? You have many choices. Many of those are free such as writing articles and submitting them at sites like HubPages & EzineArticles. I do recommend that you make full use of these sites and establish a membership.

Where will you post your articles that link to your clients?
My first choice and the one we will concentrate on for this online business is The KeyWord Academy.

The Keyword Academy is the place that will teach you, step-by-step how to build a sustainable income by working online. The Keyword Academy is free to join and free for the first 30 days. In reality, you can test everything I am teaching you for free for 30 days with no risk at all to you. After that, it’s $33 a month. Remember, I said you have to spend a little to make money. This is part of your business expenses. It’s tax deductible folks, if you are running a business.

The Keyword Academy shows you step by step beginning on Day 1, how to properly create a legitimate work from home business by working online. If you are a seasoned veteran of internet marketing or a complete newbie, The Keyword Academy is the place to learn how you can create yourself a long term sustainable income online.

I make money with my Keyword Academy membership
I have been a member of The Keyword Academy for 2 years now. The forum alone is worth the price of admission. The forum is full of experts from across a wide spectrum of the internet marketing world. The forum gives you direct access to these individuals and you will receive an education that can’t be paid for just by reading the posts in the forum.

The PostRunner System
The true goldmine benefit of being a member of The Keyword Academy, and where you will make your money is in a system they have created called The PostRunner System. The PostRunner is a clever system consisting of a massive network of websites and blogs which allow you to submit quality articles to the site owner. All of these site owners are actual members of The Keyword Academy and in return for your content, the site owner allows you to place as many as 2 links per article that point to other websites (your client’s sites). Once a member of The Keyword Academy, you can also submit your own site to the system and receive free content from other members.

Once you are a member of The Keyword Academy, you can log into the PostRunner Dashboard and submit your article. You are given the option of selecting the website in which to submit. The PostRunner system will scan your article quickly to determine some quality checks such as duplicate content. Once the initial requirements are met, the PostRunner system will submit your article to the site you have chosen.

The owner of the site you have submitted to will receive an alert that an article has been submitted. The owner has 7 days to approve or decline your article. If approved, your article goes live and you are sent a notice. You now have an active link to your clients website. A very simple process that does not take much time.

I actively use the PostRunner system for my own sites and also when I do client work. This system works for me and it also earns money for me. That’s why I recommend you do the same.

As you consider this, keep in mind that my goal is to keep it simple as possible. You are not offering to change how the world spins. You are not representing yourself as an SEO Expert. You are not making any guarantees that your service will even work. You cannot control the search engines such as Google.

You offer a simple service. You can send each and every link you post to your client if you desire transparency. You can certainly determine if he has moved in rankings by going to Google.

Your results to your client is measurable and that will build confidence to your client about the service you offer. Allow them to cancel at anytime if they feel you are not providing results.

I do not share my exact methodology with the client. That would make no sense. I explain my system of link-building but I do not go into great detail. I certainly do not want my client to skip me and do the work directly for themselves. That would be dumb on my part. You will find that most of your clients have no time to work on their websites anyway, so this will not likely be an issue for you.

So now, we have an online business idea. We will advertise our link-building services for free on Craigslist. We will use The Keyword Academy to to build links to our client websites. How are we going to word our advertisement?

Place Your money making ad On Craigslist

Here is an outline for you to consider when posting your ad on Craigslist. You can modify for your own use. It’s very important to come across as a legitimate service. You do not want to sound spammy. The more comfortable your ad can make a client feel, the more likely they will respond to your ad.

I am a local guy who runs a few community websites among others. I understand how to help websites get ranked for the keyword terms you are interested in.

Steve Sherron

That’s pretty much how my ad looked. I got a lot of responses from my Craigslist ad. Presently, I’m only working with one client right now. At anytime that I want to earn more money and take on more responsibility, I would just place this ad again on Craigslist.

How much should you charge for your services?
Ok, this is highly subjective and could be a real problem to overcome when you are first starting out. You could do what I did. I made a personal decision that I would not take on any client for less than $300 per month. That was my baseline.

I decided that I would let a client set his own monthly budget. Once he sets his budget, I would determine exactly how much work I would do based on that amount. If we both agreed, I would begin work. If he has a $500 per month budget, you simply need to determine how many articles and how many links per month that you will build for that amount.

I work as a sole proprietor. I am not incorporated. The clients make their checks payable to me. You will have to make some business decisions as to how you want to be paid. Do you want to be paid before the work or after you perform?

My advice to you if you decide to try making money on Craigslist is to keep it as simple as possible. Never make a claim you can’t back up. Never make guarantees about search engines. Promise to do the work to the best of your ability and help your client to overtake their competitors. Once they see movement in their search engine rankings, your hardest work is complete. I would also mention to your clients that the only search engine that you work to increase their rankings in is Google.

Should you outsource your writing?
If you are not confident in your ability to write quality articles that will please the search engines, you may want to consider outsourcing your writing. I use The Content Authority when I outsource. I buy well written articles for .01 per word. A 400 word article will cost me $4.

I take that article and submit it to the Keyword Academy Postrunner System with appropriate links inserted to my client’s websites. This is an online business model on cruise control if you want to work from home. At the end of the month, you can check the rankings for the keywords you are targeting and submit a report along with an invoice to your client.

I make sure I explain to my clients that this is not a race. Slow and steady we will make progress. Progress may take 2 or 3 months to see visible results.

I will not work with anyone I am not comfortable with. I will not work with those claiming they have expertise already. If they were such experts, why did they respond to the ad?

I usually met face to face with prospective local clients over a cup of coffee. You may or may not want to do this yourself. I did it because I wanted to meet the person to see if I liked them and gave them a chance to see if they liked me. I was looking for good chemistry between us.

Do the math, if you go out and get 10 clients at $500 per month, you have just produced yourself a $60K a year income less expenses. Can you find 10 clients? Chances are you will not have to find 10 clients. Find just a few clients and show results to them and your other clients will come to you by referral. When I was meeting with potential clients, they were telling me they had friends that also needed help.

You can be as successful making money on Craigslist as you want to be depending upon how much effort you are willing to put into it.

Start your online business for free

This is a legitimate work from home business idea for you to ponder. You can give this online business a try for free for 30 days using The Keyword Academy. After that, it’s $33 a month.

Legitimate work from home jobs by making money on Craigslist could be a great opportunity to change your life and the lives of others.

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Stats usually don’t lie. I’m not always a pure stats guy. I usually let my gut feelings rule the day.

One of the things I like to do is build niche type websites that focus on a particular keyword or group of keywords. It’s one of my human potentials I am exploring to see if I’m any good at it or could become good.

You never really know if you are good at something until [...]]]>

Stats usually don’t lie. I’m not always a pure stats guy. I usually let my gut feelings rule the day.

One of the things I like to do is build niche type websites that focus on a particular keyword or group of keywords. It’s one of my human potentials I am exploring to see if I’m any good at it or could become good.

You never really know if you are good at something until you try.

2 years ago, I discovered I was very good at building community websites that specialized in local news and events. This discovery was accidental. Like everything else in life, you never know until you try.

I have a personal saying that nothing is dumb until you figure out it doesn’t work. To discover your human potential you have to try a lot of things.

Around April of this year, I decided to try my hand at niche websites. It may take a while, but I will learn if I’m any good at it.

Last week while looking at my stats from other sites and articles I publish, I noticed a definite trend when it comes to monetization.

The 2 forms of monetization I use is Adsense and Amazon.

I looked at a specific time period and my Amazon links had 6 times as many clicks as Adsense. That is pretty huge I thought.

Then I looked at earnings. I actually made 6 times as much money with Adsense than Amazon. That really opened my eyes.

I certainly feel like the Amazon links were a distraction for my readers and unfortunately, they are not converting.

Even with 6 times less clicks to my Adsense links, I was paid on each click.

It was a no brainer for me. Gone are my Amazon links on that site.

I want to reach my full potential with these sites and the only way to do it is to study my traffic stats and make adjustments.

If you are into the niche website thing, are you paying close attention to your stats? It only takes a minute and the information you receive could make the difference in a profit or not.

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Around May of this year, I made a decision to abandon my current efforts at hyperlocal blogging and move more into the niche website game.

My work on the internet for these type sites are more as a hobbyist than online entrepreneur. Over time (the rest of my life) hopefully I can report that the hobby provides a nice retirement income. When that starts to happen I will let you know.

From time [...]]]>

Around May of this year, I made a decision to abandon my current efforts at hyperlocal blogging and move more into the niche website game.

My work on the internet for these type sites are more as a hobbyist than online entrepreneur. Over time (the rest of my life) hopefully I can report that the hobby provides a nice retirement income. When that starts to happen I will let you know.

From time to time I will report my findings as I build out other websites.

The passion was not there
My heart just wasn’t into the local news and local events scene. I had been working on this network of sites for 2 years. My passion fizzled.

I think in this case, I worked hard enough to actually realize the full potential for my sites. The problem was that the full potential was not enough for me.

It’s fair to expect a decent return when you invest your time and energy. When you discover that the return is not there, it makes no sense (or cents) to continue.

The money just wasn’t there for me in hyperlocal blogging. I had tons of traffic, I had community recognition and I made a few bucks from local advertisers. However, it wasn’t worth my effort and I scaled back about 95%.

My biggest obstacle was that I was downright unhappy about what I was doing. I couldn’t get over my unhappiness.

Being a young 52, I figured I could build other websites and write articles for the rest of my life that may possible earn some income and it all be passive.

I like passive and that phrase is thrown all over the internet. Truth is, nothing is really passive.

Realizing your potential and changing course
The possibility of realizing your full potential by changing directions is not always easy for everyone. In my case, it was mental freedom.

I thought I would share with you what is possible if you work towards a goal.

I mostly monetize everything I do with Google Adsense and Amazon. I do receive an Adsense check every month. I’m working hard on Amazon.

When I do a product review or write an article that has potential, I will certainly monetize my efforts.

If you are a writer, I would also encourage you to monetize your articles at least to some extent. It’s OK to make a few bucks from your efforts.

As I look at my Amazon account I see improvement on a monthly basis. Most of my improvement comes in the form of clicks on my links. The money earned through Amazon is quite low when you look at the amount of clicks.

I believe that Amazon is more for tire kickers than purchasers. For me, Amazon does not convert a visitor that well.

I do make some money every month from Amazon but I also look at the clicks I get. I have always measured my ongoing success or failure with Amazon by the number of clicks. I’m not so sure that’s my best measurement however. Clicks do not always equal money.

Looking back a year ago at my Amazon stats for July of 2010, I had a total of 114 clicks on all of my amazon affiliate links.

This year, July 2011, I had a total of 568 clicks on my affiliate links.

I will tell you that it will take a few thousand monthly clicks to make decent money on Amazon.

If I can stay alive, time is on my side and yours if you are an Amazon Affiliate.

You can read the Guru’s all you want but to be successful, it comes down to building/publishing content on a daily basis. Try to publish something every day.

At the end of the week, you can look back and get a certain satisfaction that you posted a few articles that have the possibility of making you a few bucks for the rest of your life…possibly.

The upside potential is great.

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I have another Craigslist story for you today from a friend of mine.

His make money story from Craigslist is good enough that I wanted to share with you.

My friend recently bought an older Land Rover on Craigslist. I think it was a 1998 model Land Rover. It was not the luxury model but rather the simple basic model without all the bells and whistles.

He was looking for replacement parts on Craigslist [...]]]>

I have another Craigslist story for you today from a friend of mine.

His make money story from Craigslist is good enough that I wanted to share with you.

My friend recently bought an older Land Rover on Craigslist. I think it was a 1998 model Land Rover. It was not the luxury model but rather the simple basic model without all the bells and whistles.

He was looking for replacement parts on Craigslist when he came across an ad for a wrecked Land Rover of the same year but it was the luxury version. The seller of the wrecked car wanted $1500.

My friend is a master negotiator. I have watched him wheel and deal for 30 years. We were high school friends.

In the end, the seller delivered the wrecked Land Rover to his driveway on a flatbed for a total of $500.

My friend totally stripped the Land Rover of most if it’s parts. Things like seats, switches, lights, door panels etc.

He recovered thousands of dollars worth of parts.

Once that was completed, he placed the Land Rover back on Craigslist. He received immediate responses to his ad.

On the same day he placed the Craigslist ad, he sold the wrecked Land Rover again for $1000. All the buyer wanted was the motor and transmission.

As you can see, my friend ended up way ahead on this entire deal. There is definitely more than one way to make money on Craigslist.

Have you made money lately on Craigslist?

Update: I just finished a new article where I detail how a person can make a very good living by using Craigslist. If you are looking to earn some extra money, a little or a lot of money, check it out. Earn Money On Craigslist.

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I had a good weekend selling my stuff on Craigslist. I sold a 6-piece bedroom set and also sold a bentwood rocker.

For months now I have been working towards getting rid of “extra stuff” in my house. I have a large 3 bedroom house and we rarely have use for the third bedroom and it’s contents.

Furniture seems to do quite well on Craigslist. I posted several large images of the furniture in [...]]]>

I had a good weekend selling my stuff on Craigslist. I sold a 6-piece bedroom set and also sold a bentwood rocker.

For months now I have been working towards getting rid of “extra stuff” in my house. I have a large 3 bedroom house and we rarely have use for the third bedroom and it’s contents.

Furniture seems to do quite well on Craigslist. I posted several large images of the furniture in my ad. I received many e-mails inquiring about the bedroom set. I sold it to a guy who did not even attempt to negotiate the price.

When they arrived to pick up the furniture, my wife actually did an “up-sell” and sold them our bentwood rocker.

I’m convinced that a person could make a substantial part time income selling stuff on Craigslist. If you have large furniture items, I would recommend that you post these items on a Thursday. On Friday, you will receive a lot of e-mail inquiries about your items. Saturday is when they will come pick it up.

I’m sure that my large images helped me to sell my furniture. You can read an earlier blog post of mine where I show you how to post large images on Craigslist.

Now is the time to get that furniture out of your house. Parents will be looking for dorm room furniture and apartment furniture for their kids heading to college later this summer.

All comments are moderated. Spammers go somewhere else, you are wasting your time.

Lately I have been using Craigslist a lot. I have been using the site to look for a few things but mostly, I’ve been using Craigslist to post items. I have learned a few things on the way. I’m no expert, not by a longshot, but silly me just discovered how to put as many images as you want on Craigslist and to post large images on Craigslist, not those little dinky photos they allow.

How many of us go back into our blog articles and do a little tweaking to try and capture more visits and more revenue? This is a practice I’m doing more and more. There is virtually no way you can get the most out of your blog posts by simply publishing and walking away.

Articles are like plants, water and fertilize them and they will sprout visitors and revenue.

If you simply publish a vanity [...]]]>

How many of us go back into our blog articles and do a little tweaking to try and capture more visits and more revenue? This is a practice I’m doing more and more. There is virtually no way you can get the most out of your blog posts by simply publishing and walking away.

Articles are like plants, water and fertilize them and they will sprout visitors and revenue.

If you simply publish a vanity blog it doesn’t matter perhaps. Many, many of the articles I publish here on Bloggerlens are just straight from my thoughts. No keyword research, no nothing. Then at other times, I may write some articles that are appropriate to monetize.

How can you tell which articles to monetize? One of the things I do is to go into Google Analytics dashboard and look at “content”. Click content and then click “top content”.

Analytics will list the top content pages of your site in order of pageviews over a given timeframe. You can adjust the dates accordingly to see what are the top performing pages in your site.

Here is an example from bloggerlens.

Over this particular time frame I selected, my green screen article is performing the best.

Next, click the article link. Now click the entrance keywords to that article. Analytics will list the main keywords being used to find your article. Pretty cool huh? Sorry I blanked out my keywords because I am still working on this article. It makes me a few bucks every now and then.

As you can see, there are 105 different keywords. At this point, we can get crazy and overanalyze or we can keep it simple. I like to keep it simple.

I grab 20 or so of the top keywords and quickly do a google search on each term. I look for any of the terms to show adsense ads on the right hand side of Google. If it does not show ads, I discard the keyword. If it shows adsense, I have an opportunity at some revenue.

Even if a term shows no adsense, you can still look at other affiliate opportunities. Let’s just talk about adsense today.

I look for a way to implement the keyword/keywords into the article with a new sentence or paragraph or even an image. I may also place a tag.

For long term benefit, I prefer to do this with “evergreen keywords”. For example instead of using Kodak Zi8 flip camera, I would use Kodak HD Flip Cameras. The Zi8 will eventually be replaced and no one will search for it again.

This is a dead simple way to fertilize your articles. Wait 30 days and do it again.

There are many more things that are possible also with links and keyword research but if you just want to keep it simple, this is a good practice. After your article ages, it will be easier to start ranking for some of the more difficult terms.

It has been said that a person can earn a full time living based on one article on one site. I do believe this is actually possible. A person would have to be lucky or his name would need to be Grizzly.

If you took the time to write the article in the first time, why not tend to it every once in a while?

Imagine where this article may be in 5 years and the possible revenue if I keep upgrading it over time? Could be some good vacation money.

Everything I have mentioned are free methods to improve your site and traffic. It will only cost you a few moments of your time.

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Who would have thought I would get 2 blog post articles out of my day today when I sold 3 bookshelves on Craigslist. I wanted to share this story also about how one man can and does make money online with Craigslist.

I love selling on Craigslist. I sold the bookshelves to a guy who did not have a way to haul them. He hired a guy from a listing on Craigslist to come [...]]]>

Who would have thought I would get 2 blog post articles out of my day today when I sold 3 bookshelves on Craigslist. I wanted to share this story also about how one man can and does make money online with Craigslist.

I love selling on Craigslist. I sold the bookshelves to a guy who did not have a way to haul them. He hired a guy from a listing on Craigslist to come to my house and haul away his bookshelves.

Joe arrived in a red pickup truck with a camper top. In his truck were some blankets and 2 hand trucks. Joe was a little dumpy looking because he was wearing old sweatpants with a little bit of a beer belly. Who wears sweatpants anymore I thought? Joe had a bluetooth earpiece. Joe offers his services as plain labor and hauling with a pickup truck.

I asked Joe how he was doing on Craigslist? He told me he was doing quite good actually. Yesterday morning he woke up without any jobs. By the time the day was over, he had worked 4 jobs from calls on Craigslist. Today he had 2 jobs. Joe lost his job back in September. His red truck was inherited from his Father. He told me he felt like his truck could make him some money.

Joe was a talker. As he was telling me about his Craigslist adventures, his phone rang and he answered using his earpiece bluetooth. It was someone looking to hire him. Joe charges a gas surcharge of $20 and then charges by the hour. How many of us have pickup trucks? How many of us make money with our trucks?

Joe is the embodiment of the American Entrepreneurial Spirit.

Make money online with Craigslist

Here are a few of Joes’s Secrets for Craigslist.
Joe has multiple accounts
Joe wakes every morning and deletes the ads he posted the previous day.
Joe then posts 4 new ads for the day so they are always appearing near the top.

Below, I have re-posted Joe’s ad on Craigslist. I admire Joe. Joe doesn’t whine and ask for a handout. Joe works for his money. We need more Joe’s in our country.

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Need help moving? Hauling? Getting something you bought back to your home?

I move couches, loveseats, washers, dryers, beds (all sizes), exercise equipment, etc………………all the time. I have even successfully moved floor model big screen televisions and upright pianos. If your load is more than I can handle, then I will NOT accept your job. No problems and no games.

I can handle items up to 12 to 13 feet long.

Strong man and a truck for hire. I can obtain EXTRA helpers if needed. I have three helpers on call. My pick up truck has a topper, thus your cargo will be protected from weather, birds, etc.

My charges are $23.50 for the first hour and then my rate goes DOWN to $20.75 for each additional hour. I only have a one hour minimum. This rate includes labor, the usage of the truck, equipment, and fuel used while moving. The time begins when I arrive at the job.

There could be an additional fuel charge depending on how far I have to travel to begin your work. This is simply to allow me to break even on fuel traveling to and from jobs. We will discuss and finalize before I come to do your work.

I do not have any geographical restrictions.

It doesn’t matter if you are on the first floor, second floor, or the third floor. It doesn’t matter if I am moving a washer, dryer, or a box of feathers. It doesn’t matter if I have to walk a long distance from my truck to your home. All of these details are covered in my hourly rate mentioned above.

NO CHECKS PLEASE.

In addition, I can email you a scanned copy of my driver’s license BEFORE I come to do your work. This allows you to know more about me than I know about you. I want to promote safety, security, and productivity before, during, and after your job is completed.

Call 704-xxx-xxxx and my name is Joe. For fast response, please call me as opposed to using email.

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Can you make money online using Craigslist? Absolutely. I made $85 today and I made $60 last week on Craigslist. Ask Joe if he’s making money?

I’ve had some other good experiences with Craigslist. Read my post about selling a car fast on Craigslist.

I you want to start your own legitimate business at home check out my very detailed post, Legitimate Work From Home Jobs.

Would you care to share your thoughts or things that you are doing to make money online with Craigslist?

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If you follow the blogosphere of the internet marketing world and those evil people who are well versed in SEO tactics, you already know that Google has recently slapped a lot of very well known, popular websites down in the rankings.

Well known “content farms” have been penalized. What’s a content farm? Generally, it’s considered sites such as eHow, Hubpages, Wisegeek and the list goes on.

Let’s talk about the content farm known [...]]]>

If you follow the blogosphere of the internet marketing world and those evil people who are well versed in SEO tactics, you already know that Google has recently slapped a lot of very well known, popular websites down in the rankings.

Well known “content farms” have been penalized. What’s a content farm? Generally, it’s considered sites such as eHow, Hubpages, Wisegeek and the list goes on.

Let’s talk about the content farm known as Hubpages
I have a couple of alias accounts on Hubpages and I have a few articles that have done quite well in the search engines and make a few bucks every month. There was a time, that I believed a person could do quite well financially by publishing articles on Hubpages.

I actively started using Hubpages to any degree in June 2010, 8 months ago. I spent very little time on them but the time I did spend was trying to produce quality. I used Hubpages to test some outsourcing also. I dropped a couple hundred bucks and used an outsourcing service to publish about 40 Hubs. The writing was quite good and I tweeked all of the articles. Most of these were published in December 2010.

I have over 100 articles on one of my Hubpage accounts. I have sold quite a few items on Amazon and I have earned $125 in adsense from Hubpages over the last 90 days.

This is chicken scratch by any measure and hardly worth mentioning. However it is passive income and the total grows every month. I spend 15 minutes writing a 400 word article, plug in an Amazon capsule, hit publish and go to the fridge and get a beer.

I usually write a random Hub when I run across a nice juicy long-tail green keyword that does not fit well with one of my other websites. I’m not totally stupid. I can drop $4 on a 400 word article about how to slice, dice and drain a sore on your ass that no one else wants to write about. I’ll make $2 a month with a Hub like that. After 2 months, it’s pure profit baby.

Seriously, think about the nastiest things a human body can do and write a Hub on it. You will get some traffic and some clicks. Make it really disgusting and people will click an ad just to get off your page before they spit up.

Now, with the recent Google changes, I do not think Hubpages is a place where I will waste much more of my time and energy. Another words, I no longer think I can reach my human potential as a writer on Hubpages.

I have several of my own sites and it just makes sense to build my own properties and own my own content.

Hubpages became too popular and too many people started abusing it by submitting crappy content for the purpose of backlinks and other devious SEO objectives.

I should have been smarter from the get-go. It’s never a good idea to build something on someone else’s land. Call it a brain fart or whatever you want. I have learned my lesson.

Too many Hubs rank for crap
When I do a search and I see a top ranking Hub, lately all I find is crap. Too many Hubs offer no value to the reader. The content is mostly thin. Too many internet marketers have invaded what was once a decent platform that offered value and answered questions of the searcher.

(Hypothetical Example), All I want is a homemade recipe to cure indigestion. I find a Hub that reads like a snake charmer just wrote it after his first module of Rosetta Stone. I check further and find this Hub has 78 backlinks from a Bangladesh community forum.

How did my Hubs fare after the recent Google Algorithm Panda change? I’m glad you asked. Let me go check, hold on one moment while I open up my Ranktracker Software.

Let me just take a spot check at a few promising Hubs that I’ve been monitoring. I don’t give away my exact Hubs. Just take my word for this.

Virtually all of my Hub Farm articles plunged

• Hub #1. -8 spots. Sitting at #13
• Hub #2. -3 spots. Sitting at #13
• Hub #3. -6 spots. Sitting at #22
• Hub #4. -19 spots. Sitting at #28
• Hub #5. -13 spots. Sitting at #23
• Hub #6. -33 spots. Sitting at #48
• Hub #7. -15 spots. Sitting at #25

The Hubs above represent thousands of visitors and most likely hundreds of dollars per month once I got them each into the top 3 spots of Google. HubPages is a revenue sharing site, so we both lose money.

Not knowing what the future holds for these Hubs, I will let them sit in the corner like fat ugly chicks who go to the Prom without dates. Neither has much of a chance.

Some of my Hubs had real promise. These weren’t random Hubs. These were researched and planned with a little bit of forethought and keyword research. I had active backlinking campaigns on the Hubs that were showing the most promise.

Have I wasted my time writing for Hubpages? To a degree, probably yes.

Will I spend more time on Hubpages? Hell no! Not for the time being anyway. I try not to make the same mistake twice.

Would I recommend Hubpages to anyone? Absolutely not. You will never realize your full human potential on Hubpages. I would rather see you start your own sites and learn from your mistakes on a web property that you own.

I will watch my Hub farm articles and their rankings over the next 45 days or so to see if they regain rankings or if this is a permanent downgrade placement from Google.

In the meantime, Hubpages has lost a good writer who wrote solid helpful content. It’s the fault of Hubpages for not helping their good writers reach their full potential.

My opinion on Hubpages
The following is my opinion with no solid evidence to back it up. Hubpages should share a lot of the blame for their Google slapdown. I hope it’s not permanent. Hubpages allows anyone to publish. They have filters for certain words and duplicate content, but as long as you get past their filters, just hit the publish button and backlink the shit out of it.

I guarantee that HubPages is scrambling right now. I hope they figure it out and I’m sure they will.

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