It’s so great to have a platform to share psychology and inspiration with you multiple times each week. I get more ideas in a day than I can catch and the blog helps me record and share them with you. In the past two years I have learned a lot about what works for me and what doesn’t in this marvelous medium. Some of the things I’ve learned have proven quite valuable saving me time and, in some cases, earning me money.
When I started blogging in December of 2006, I had no idea how massive the effect would be on my life. My first blog, The feeble, weak-kneed rileycentral.net I started back them has now evolved into four separate domains and I have acquired friends and resources like you wouldn’t believe in just this short time. Part of the success I feel is due to reflection. We can spin and spin and spin in our lives and never stop to analyze the movement. Blogging is really like that. You must stop in blogging and consider where you’ve been and where you want to be. Then, you make a plan in that place hoping to meet your own goals. Thanks for being my readers here at the Funny Farm.
If you blog: I recently published a list of 50 Blog Tips that Deliver. I encourage you to head over and learn from some of my hard knocks!
A close friend who will remain unnamed is to be thanked for the idea here. Folks, thanks for tuning in today to PFTFF (AKA Postcards from the Funny Farm). In celebration of Damien Riley’s 1,000th post on Postcards he has agreed to sit with me and talk about his blog(s) and what he thinks after 1,000 posts have been submitted to the interweb. Let’s jump right in:
How are you today?
Damien: Doing well. Just watching Letterman here naked. I’m a little worried about the laptop though, it feels a bit hot on top the lap. Ha! Just kidding, I’m never naked when I blog.
Ha ha. That is very funny. Hey, thanks for talking to us today. So how the hell did you write 1,000 posts in 21 months. Is your melon warped?
Damien: Quite. Recently I have started bic-ing my head. The gray and receding hairline was really starting to bug me. I found out my melon is a bit malshaped, but nothing that bothers my wife. No, seriously though … I enjoy making posts. They are therapeutic to me. Many of those months my wife was not happy with all the time I spent blogging. In the past few months though as you guys know, I have started making crazy money with this stuff. I added two other blogs and now I am blogging for money all the time. I take my wife out for cocktails and a movie once or twice a week on blogging money now. Thank you to my advertisers and for Google for recognizing me at a solid 4/10 rating. To summarize: My melon is warped, my psyche is not :) I am well aware I work on my laptop and am happy with the pay (in all forms).
LOL. Once again the joker. So dude, I have to ask: why so many typos?
Damien: I am a search and plunk typist. That means I look at the keys not the screen when I type. I learned it wrong in high school and have never fixed it. I am very embarassed I have so many typos. I don’t know what to do. Hopefully you guys will forgive me and try to fill in the blanks.
What are you going to focus on the next 1,000 posts?
Damien: Before I am 90, because I hope to live to 90, I hope to wear out 5 or 6 laptops. Blogging makes my thoughts clearer. I hope to learn more about writing and strengthen my mond while wearing out laptops. I just got a fresh Acer. My wife rocks. She bought it for me because I had broken my last one. I want to know what the people out of the web are saying and doing and of course, put me where the easy money is. That is always nice (though now that I think of it, it’s not all that easy is it kids? Do I get an amen?)
I see. Well, this is a special day and we appreciate you answering these questions. What word do you have for people reading this:
Damien: Don’t take yourself seriously, take yourself very seriously. Care about other people and their brains and try to find something to love in everyone in your circle. Mostly though, try to laugh and have fun, we’ll all be dead before you know it. Seriously, the 1,000 posts thing is no big deal.
1,000 posts for this guy and counting! I encourage you to give him some comments in this post. It’s a landmark moment that will vanish like the wind in a day or so. Thanks for reading! Follow your vision.
I post these monthly in case readers find them entertaining, interesting, or useful. I’ve compared it to a diet pill, something that keeps the unwanted out and the good stuff in. For a detailed explanation on the CAN Blog Self Rating System click here. Otherwise, it is fairly self-explanatory.
Goals for July 2008 were:
Circulation: 3
Analytics: 2700 visitors for the month
Net: 200 bucks
Analytics: 4504 visitors for the month (blew my goal out of the water!)
Net: $217.50
Overall Rating: 5/5
Goals for August are:
Circulation: 4 incoming links from guest blog posts. (at time of writing this, 2 are already submitted and not yet published)
Analytics: 5000 uniques
Net: $250 (Ideally I should get more jobs now because my Google PR4 is restored … we’ll see).
I have had 3 days of the best Fathers’ Day celebration on known record for my brain.
This afternoon at 2pm after enjoying myself with my two lovely daughters and genius son I find myself brimming over with inspiration in need of sharing with the anywhere from 40-200 people that visit me on any given day. I was sitting out by my pool listening to some truly amazing music by Maroon 5 and I decided it was time to give back. I learned to do this from my good internet friend, Derek Semmler. With the “Amazing Visions” contest coming to a close I thought the only post I could publish would be one that gives back. So, I thought, what do they really want? A coupon? Money? Opportunity? Then I came to my embarrassingly simple conclusion:
Consider it done: Even though I publish the results and sources of my income every month here at the Funny Farm, I might as well just summarize it again so you can benefit. Here’s the mainstay of my online income folks, sign up and get on board. The first one does contain a referral fee for me of $15 paid to me (by PPP and it costs you nothing) when and if you publish your first paid post. The second one has no referral fee. I just wanted to be up front about the first and ask that you use the graphic link provided when you sign up.
1. PayPerPost, The application process takes a few days. After that you are given writing job choices. The better your PR is, the more opps you get. Please know this may reduce your PR, but it pays cash whereas Google doesn’t pay you anything. I currently have made 85 dollars in June already on PPP.
2. PayU2blog, these guys are great. I am so pleased with their payout and the way they run their business. It involves putting links in your posts. You have to do all assignments and you get $5 per link. Like PPP, there is an approval process so good luck with that!
Ok! I hope that helps you guys out. Why not have extra cash every month for your blogging?
I’d like to challenge you to make tomorrow the big day, or, the day you got serious about making money with your blog! best of luck. I am always here for support.
If you are browsing for the articles on psychology and inspiration and baffled by this throw off course, I apologize for this momentary indulgence in helping my blogging friends. I will return tho the brain and cognitive therapy tomorrow so please stop by. Remember the tagline here is: ” … posts on psychology, inspiration, and BLOGGING.” Maybe you should start one! Message me if your need some help doing that.
To close, let me just say to all the dads out there: HAPPY FATHER’S DAY, your role is so important to your kids and to society. Keep on keepin’ on, dudes.
postscript: Here’s a link to some amazing songs that inpsired me to give you this post today:
I need your input. I write sponsored posts on this blog primarily for PayPerPost and PayU2Blog (a few times each month). Do they bother you? I would like to know your honest opinion when you have a moment:
I’ve been paid for a couple I submitted last month. My latest has been a tip on how to fold construction paper (who knew?) Share your knowledge and make a little Coke machine money at:
I’ve had the honor and pleasure of meeting Kimberly Clay, internet marketing expert, online entrepeneur, and founder/blogger at GetMyWealthNow. You may have seen her 125×125 ad on my blog that reads: “Make Money, Build Wealth.” I whole-heartedly endorse her services. They are largely free and extremely helpful in generating online wealth. She’s an expert. When I read through her posts I always find something new of great value. And you may recall last month she asked me to write a guestblog in her niche, and I wrote about how to master making money through blogging one st.... That was a lot of fun, since I don’t usually write about mmol stuff. I am getting more and more into it … you should too if you’re not already! Kimberly’s blog and website is an excellent way to do just that.
Readers that have been here since the early days know that my progression into money has been a gradual one. I’ve taken and continue to take “baby steps” into the marvelous world of being paid. Some ask me “How are you making money with your blog?” I will tell you that reading Kimberly’s blog is part of how. So far with the money I have made through blogging has taken my wife and I out on dates, bought my son some reard treats at the store, and allowed me to do advertising of my own of Postcards from the Funny Farm.
Kimberly is not just a stellar coach who will work with you and help you create wealth through blogging, she is also a very nice person who I am happy to know. Her emails are always upbeat and positive and she always takes the extra time to answer my questions about making blog money. You should click on her link and see if you agree with me about Kimberly. What have you got to lose? A couple seconds? I can tell you what you have to gain by knowing Kimberly and/or reading her blog: bucks in your pocket and traffic for your blog!
You may have noticed in your visits here the quite attractive 125×125 button AD that reads “Make Money - Build Wealth: Get My Wealth Now.” Kimberly Clay is the gifted entrepreneur who owns and authors that site. It is full of daily tips and examples on how to create wealth. I highly recommend you visit her blog.
When she asked me to write a guest blog, I knew right away what my topic would be. As my seasoned readers know I have stepped this blog up in the past year little by little to be monetized. Sarah and I were talking yesterday about how cool it would be if we could pay our student loans through Postcards from the Funny Farm. I’m about half way there and it is exciting. But once that goal is achieved, I plan to follow Kimberly’s strategies to make my online wealth go even further.
Inch by inch, life’s a cinch.
Kimberly Clay is a generous sponsor of this site so I am energetic to guest blog for her, send traffic her way, and do whatever I can to show off her excellent blog/money/inspiration resource. I’ve learned several indispensable things after subscribing to her RSS.
If you are interested in reading my guest blog article on her site, the url below. Leave her some comment love over there her, I think you will find it a very down-to-earth and practical. fun blog:
If you are interested in having me guestblog for your blog for free, read the page explaining the process and contact me. Thanks! I hope to hear from you. Guest blogging is a fun and great way to assist bloggers in practicing writing, networking, and affiliate marketing. To advertise on my blog, read this 411 page
The expression: “Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water” seems especially appropriate for Google here at the beginning of 2008. I am no seo or blogging mmol genius but I do know a few things about logic and ethics and setting PayPerPost writers’ pagerank to zero is a choice lacking in both.
Under the guise of weeding out vacuous content from searches, they claim all blogs that have PayPerPost articles on them are less helpful than those who don’t and thus set their PageRank to zero. This is an example of a company thinking they will reinvent natural law to suit them because they can, not because they should. It’s going to bite them, the internet did not evolve to this point to be defined by one company.
I recall when I first got into using Google, it seemed like such a cool enterprise. The page was white with no ads and it had applications that were all utility, no fluff (ie; analytics, gmail …). Now, they have decided they know based on one criteria if a blog is helpful to the internet, this is ignorance at its height and I hope Google stops this practice. My how Google’s “feel” has changed for me.
As for me? I will continue to be a postie because it’s something I am good at and it’s something I profit from. That’s why Walt Disney, Rod Serling, Ray Kroc, Richard Carlso... did what they did. Last week I lost my PageRank of 4/10 when it was set to zero. I had a feeling this might happen when I read the news about what Google was doing to posties. But has my readership changed? It has gone up. Has my content changed? It has gotten better. The way I see it is this: Google figured the blogosphere would appreciate it if they targeted posties, and for the most part, they are probably right (check out Duncan Riley’s tone on Tech Crunch). But that doesn’t mean that weeding out all blogs with PayPerPosts on them will increase the value of a search. In fact, in many cases, it will keep good information out of a search. Is the only information we want on the internet that which is written without compensation? You might as well stop watching TV as far back as I Love Lucy.
To quote Michael Stipe: “It’s the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine.” Emphasize: I feel fine.
I predict Izea (PayPerPost’s rebranding) and SocialSpark will revolutionize rankings in 3-6 months. You can come and tell me I was wrong if they don’t, but as for now I am making sure I focus 100% on my idea of what a good ranking is:
Monthly Traffic Goals
Inbound links
Comment counts, and
Quality content (paid or unpaid)
If I can succeed in these areas (which I can and do already) then I’ll take my PR0 with pride and look to other ranking systems like Izea’s RealRank to determine how I’m doing. To my fans/readers: fear not, I am neither down nor out. I will get better through moving away from Google’s PageRank system, not worse. Whether you like PayPerPost or not, I hope you see how throwing every blog out that uses it is harmful to the blogosphere.
Now, to close, I have a question and I promise not to pigeonhole you or throw YOU out if I don’t like your answer:
What do you think about Google setting blogs to zero for participating in PayPerPost?
1. 1500 total hits.
2. Post one or more relevant, seo friendly posts per day.
3. Daily average of 80 hits
Money
1. Continue to learn and use Adsense and PayPerPost.
2. Write a post for Smorty.
3. Break $100 in earnings for January 2008.
This is the first post in a monthly series I am calling: “Blog Traffic, Rank, and Money.” I invite you to watch the progress of my blog. I also hope you can take something from the data to help boost your traffic, ranking, and money. As far as December goes, all I want to say is this: The only way to go is up ;) As things rise, I vow to share what worked and, as Derek Semmler has pointed out to me, sometimes what didn’t!
I invite you to subscribe and keep up with the updates!
A close friend who will remain unnamed is to be thanked for the idea here. Folks, thanks for tuning in today to PFTFF (AKA Postcards from the Funny Farm). In celebration of Damien Riley’s 1,000th post on Postcards he has agreed to sit with me and talk about his blog(s) and what he thinks after 1,000 posts have been submitted to the interweb. Let’s jump right in:
I’ve had the honor and pleasure of meeting Kimberly Clay, internet marketing expert, online entrepeneur, and founder/blogger at 
