I hate blog contests, I really do. I was happy to find out that I am not alone but in spite of the disdain for these seemingly endless piles of steaming dung, they continue to populate the blogosphere.

White Trash Showdown Continues

A few weeks ago, some of the MMO bloggers decided to do a Jerry Springer show and make sure that they publicized to the entire world that indeed MMO blogs are in fact, a complete and total waste of time. As if anyone still needs convincing then they removed all doubt.

I thought the shotguns had been put away and that peace had again taken over the land, that is until today. Imagine this if you can, Garry Conn popped off at another blogger again. Shocking, cause that NEVER happens. The target again seems to be John Cow, or I guess the new owner of John Cow.

In a nutshell, Garry went off on another one of his rants about how every other MMO blogger is a scammer and that he is the only one with integrity, he’s there for his readers, all that stuff. It’s the same rant that he always does. No surprise.

Well New Cow decides to respond with class and dignity and really complimented Garry on his blog and tried to avoid the drama, at least that’s how it appeared to me. As you can see, that isn’t how it ended up.

Stupidest Contest Ever

By the time the replay of 7th grade recess was over, New Cow decided to throw out a $500 dollar challenge that basically was a contest to see which one could make more money in a 30 day period. Full documentation, all in public view, the whole nine yards.

The way it shakes out now, they have decided to show EVERYBODY that neither one of them has any sense by holding the stupidest contest ever.

Here’s the way I read how it is going to work, you can check the comments section of the thread out for yourself, maybe I am missing something and just wrote the stupidest post ever, about the contest that turned out to NOT be the stupidest contest.

• They are both going to start a niche blog - they choose the topic.
• They are going to build, monetize, customize, promote etc for 30 days.
• They are going to sell the sites on Sitepoint at the end of 30 days.
• The highest sale price is the winner.
• The loser has to forfeit the money from the sale of his blog to the winner.

Wow…..high stakes gambling here huh. This contest qualifies for the stupidest contest ever for many reasons, but the two flaws that I see are this:

• Anyone can bid any amount on either blog - the other has no way to verify it.
• If either blog sells for say 5 bucks……Wow….what a high stakes contest.

There is absolutely no drama involved here. None. Either blogger could create a Sitepoint ID and bid whatever amount they want to on their own blog. Instant Winner.

Conclusion

If you want a flashback to 7th grade recess then check out the stupidest contest ever. You might lose about 20 IQ points for reading the thread but it is entertaining to watch two allegedly grown adult males crow about how great they are, only to see them put together a contest that a 12 year old could game.

I have a feeling that this is nothing more than linkbait designed to scam the entire blogosphere. Why? Because I don’t think anyone could be stupid enough to think up such a dumb contest on their own. I have a feeling that Garry and New Cow know each other and planned this.

For the sake of all that is sacred, I would hope so. If they didn’t do this for linkbait then they both simply advertised to the world that common sense isn’t present on either of their blogs.

I like Garry and I hope I like New Cow but I have to say……A wise man once said…it is better to be silent and thought of a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.

Good advice.

PS…saw the Iron Man Movie tonight….it was awesome.

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I recently published a quick post that I had purchased Bookmarking Demon and would be writing a review of it after I had a chance to test it out.

I really thought nothing more of it until I had the following pretty nasty comment show up in my inbox.

I like to try and look beyond incidents like this and find the motivation or the reason behind thought patterns like this. If you can figure out what makes people tick then you will be far more successful than most people on this earth.

I think this resentment towards affiliate links signifies something deeper than what may appear on the surface. People are always looking for the “answer,” always looking for the magic bullet to making money online and they often buy products on recommendations from people that appear to be making money.

Sometimes these products don’t provide the “instant millions” that they thought it would and therefore a certain amount of resentment builds. Repeat this process a few times and you have an angry commenter who thinks everyone is out to trick him out of his money.

Understandable? Maybe.

Did it still tick me off? Absolutely.

Dose of Reality

Here’s a little dose of reality for anyone who thinks that buying an affiliate product is the answer to their prayers.

• Making Money Online is not easy.
• Making Money Online is Hard.
• Making Money Online takes work.
• Affiliate products are tools…..NOT THE SOLUTION.

If your average Joe goes out and buys a really nice set of tools, will that make him a good mechanic? Of course not, yet so many people fall for the gimmicks of unscrupulous affiliate marketers. They think the tools are what will make them successful.

This is Insanity!

The tools only make the job easier, they don’t give you the skills you need to complete the job. The work still needs to be done. You don’t become a carpenter because you buy a really nice saw.

So the message I want anyone reading this to get is that Making Money Online is HARD! Affiliate tools are NOT the answer to your problems but they CAN greatly increase your efficiency and your ability to capitalize on the knowledge that you already have.

Affiliate marketers are NOT responsible for your success, you are responsible for that. Just because they link you to a product does NOT mean it will work for you, or that it will even work as they describe. You need to investigate any product you buy to see if it fits in your toolbox.

Conclusion

I am not going to bother trying to defend my integrity anymore on the subject, if someone thinks I am a scammer then so be it. I am going to continue to post affiliate links in my posts, you can buy or not buy, I will still be successful because unlike some….I am USING THOSE tools.

I am DONE with looking for the answer……I am CREATING the answer. I am building sites and blogs that will take me where I want to go, not looking for some $97 dollar product that is supposed to make me millions.

The difference between successful people and those who aren’t successful is that successful people do things that unsuccessful people aren’t willing to do. Unsuccessful people often don’t quite see it that way and seem to think it’s luck or some secret tool that they are using to get ahead.

It isn’t luck….it’s hard work. I work a 12-13 hour day at my day job and then come home and often work on my niche sites or this blog until 1:00 in the morning. It’s hard work but it’s paying off. I am working hard now so that I won’t have to work at all later.

Enough lecturing from me, I have work to do. Let me close with this….YOU are responsible for your own success, not some marketer and certainly not some affiliate product.

Affiliate Products are TOOLS…..NOT the solution.

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I watch bloggers everywhere struggle to make money online. It’s admirable, entertaining and yet sad all wrapped up into one. I say this because they are almost all following the exact same play book. You can’t blame them, if you listen to the “experts” then they will tell you how easy it is to make money blogging.

The Truth

The truth is that it isn’t that easy to make money blogging and the chances of you striking it rich are about the same as getting hit by lightning. That isn’t good, but if you want to make money online then have an open mind, there are LOTS of ways to make money online.

I enjoy blogging but the reality for me is that it takes far too much time. That’s the decision that I have made for me and my situation. I would much rather build a niche site, get it SEO’d and indexed, bring some traffic and collect the money.

It takes a lot of work on the front end to build niche sites but once they are built and indexed and drawing traffic, they are a passive income source. I can be playing golf or riding my Harley while they make money, which is far more appealing to me than having to write and promote content incessantly.

I want to blog because I enjoy it, not because I depend on it for income.

The Stats

Let’s do some basic math to see what is possible here with a few niche sites. If you build a niche site that conservatively brings in a dollar a day. Not a difficult feat to accomplish at all using the various monetization sources available.

$1 dollar a day is obviously $365 dollars a year. This is certainly not that impressive, but let’s say we have 10 sites…..$3650 dollars a year is pretty impressive…..now let’s jack that number up to 100 sites……now you are talking $36,500 dollars a year.

This is getting into the area where it will catch your attention. If you figure hosting fees and domain fees in there then you have approximately $1000 dollars in expenses. Still very good. Let’s really get crazy and let’s say your sites bring in $5 dollars per day on average.

Does that match have your attention? It should because it’s $182k dollars a year! How is your blog doing?

The Reality

I hear the skeptics right now, making every excuse in the world. The basic question would be is $5 dollars a day feasible? Absolutely yes it is. If you research and identify the right niches then you could find some that will produce $50 dollars per day, while others might produce $0.

The trick is to shoot for an average return of $1 at first and then build from there. A basic Adsense site with some sort of traffic should be able to easily turn out $1 dollar a day with very little trouble.

Don’t let me mislead you regarding the amount of effort involved because this isn’t easy. You can’t just throw up some junky site and hope for the best. It’s a LOT of work on the front end, but every time you have another completed site, it’s there for good.

It becomes an automated money machine if you did your homework.

The Tools

There are a number of tools out there than can make your niche site building considerably easy. One affiliate program that I have been doing pretty well with lately is the Ebay Affiliate Network. You can earn a percentage of any Ebay sale you send to their site as well as $25 dollars when a new user signs up and buys something via your referral.

At $25 dollars a pop, you can see new Ebay users are a very attractive proposition.

If you aren’t clear how to set up a niche site then the easiest way to build one is using Bans or Build a Niche Store software. This program makes it so easy to get started and get a basic site up and built. You can see a number of customer sites at the link to show you what is possible using BANS.

There are a number of other site building programs available but this is easily one of the best, especially for those who don’t really know how to program or are getting started.

I will be writing more on this software and other tools I am using to build my empire. I am up to 11 BANS sites total with a number of domains purchased to continue. My goal is to build 100 of these within a years time and to do that I have started automating some of my niche site building.

Conclusion

I’ll write more on some of these other tools later though. For this article, if you aren’t familiar with BANS then check them out and see what you think.

If you are considering becoming a niche site guru then BANS would make a great addition to your arsenal. Any BANS users in the house?

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