Despite the fact that all my websites are in the sandbox (except one) and do not get much search engine traffic I have just now found some time to explore and test social networking and popular news websites.
Yes, the saying ‘first things first’ sometimes does not work in my case. But as I know many website owners target this channel of traffic.

Well, I am quite happy with the results. It took me 10-15 minutes to register with the below listed websites and 5-10 minutes to submit one of my articles to all websites. No, I did not make Digg.com home page or anything of that type (though I wish I did), but I have got my first experience, discovered that it is a fast, easy and efficient technique. And I have got over 100 visitors to that page within 16-18 hours.

Websites I experimented with (in addition to del.icio.us that I use for a few months now):

www.netscape.com
www.boredatwork.com
www.digg.com
www.shoutwire.com
www.stumbleupon.com
www.shadows.com
www.i-am-bored.com
www.fark.com
www.boingboing.net

It is evident that one either needs good contacts with the regular users and members of the websites or you should submit something terrific to really succeed and get tons of traffic. I conclude this from the amount of posts that I could see submitted to the websites – virtually every second there were made new additions.

I do not expect much financial benefits from the traffic that these websites will generate for me. It is obvious that the greatest part of the users is web savvy people. They are not likely to click on my contextual ads or explore my CPA offers. The only way to make money with this traffic is CPM (get paid for adv impressions and using some ingenious ad blending techniques).

But it is also a good way to go for branding and getting some recognition in your niche – I think it is guaranteed if you submit something useful on a regular basis.

Summary: if you are unfamiliar with these services – just spend 30-40 minutes for fast acquaintance with them – they function more or less in the same way: it is a community of registered users that review submitted news and articles and decide to vote for it or not, if it is worthy information or just crap. If they decide it is valuable you are guaranteed a great amount of visitors to your website – be prepared to handle it.

I do not doubt that these websites are also a great place for learning what types of content and news gain most popularity on the Internet, what is the recent buzz, what consumers want.

[tags]netscape.com, boredatwork.com, digg.com, shoutwire.com, stumbleupon.com, shadows.com, i-am-bored.com, fark.com, boingboing.net, social networks, social bookmarking, myspace, seo, internet marketing, affiliate marketing, blogs, content generation, news aggregator, ebay, google, make money online, work from home, home based job, wikipedia, del.icio.us, technorati, bloglines, duplicate content, links, earn your living online[/tags]

Being quite unhappy with my results of using CPA (cost-per-action: you get paid once the visitor from your website did some action on the website you are affiliated with) programs (I am signed with Commission Junction, Shareasale – do not use them much – and LinkShare) I have decided to explore what works with other online entrepreneurs.

Here is a list of my observations:

- There is a new generation of CPA networks that most webmasters discuss and use: AzoogleAds, HydraMedia, etc. At this time Azoogleads.com seems to be the buzzword for a CPA network. I have applied to become a member – they promise to contact the applicants within two business days. Now it is a week – no reply: approved/ rejected – no idea.

But as I have discovered it is their standard practice – they have too much applications at the moment and strict screening guidelines. It is recommended to call them. They have a big amount of applicants due to all positive feedback on the Internet and fail to process every application in time.

- What programs to apply for? I mostly run offers to buy some products – promotions with banners and text links. But at the moment it is the history.

What works now according to those webmasters who are doing fine with CPA networks:

Freebies. Free trial memberships (ringtones, diet, etc).
Surveys and contest.

- Promoting techniques are more or less traditional:

website,
PPC (unfortunately for affiliate marketers, you can’t send the traffic directly – you need a landing page on your website. From that page, you cane send your visitors to the merchant website),
forum signature,
MySpace spamming (send your hot offers with your bulletin and embed the affiliate links. Remember to properly express the benefits and call to action within 1-2 sentences),
E-mail marketing

Summary: CPA as an income for online marketers is obviously not dead. One just has to keep up with the changes that occur so fast on the Internet. Yesterday’s leaders are no more key industry players, promotional techniques change even faster with social networking topping the list for this moment. Just apply for the new networks, browse their offers and test, test, test.

[tags]cj, commission junction, shareasale, linkshare, azoogleads, hydramedia, cpa, reviews, freebies, incentives,  myspace,  seo,  internet marketing,  affiliate marketing,  blogs,  content generation,  news aggregator,  ebay,  google,  make money online,  work from home,  home based job,  wikipedia,  del.icio.us,  technorati,  bloglines,  duplicate content,  links,  earn your living online, surveys, contests[/tags]

AdWords provides a feature enabling advertisers to have a much more detailed picture of invalid click activity in their account. The metrics of “invalid clicks” and “invalid clicks rate” are created to show virtually all the invalid clicks affecting an account.

Invalid clicks are filtered in real-time by the systems before advertisers are charged for them. The resulting data will of course differ from one advertiser to the next. Moreover, a much smaller number of invalid clicks may also be credited to the accounts after-the-fact, as the result of a publisher being terminated from the AdSense program for invalid click activity. These is going to appear as account-level credits.

One of the most problematic issues about the topic of click fraud has been estimating how big the problem is. Estimates from third-parties have been both inconsistent and greatly exaggerated due to their methodologies. Advertisers can compare their log data with their AdWords charges to see the real the number of invalid clicks in their own account. And this new tool was created to make estimating invalid click activity much simpler.

When clicks are invalid, you aren’t charged for them, and they don’t affect your other campaign statistics. You may include the invalid clicks and invalid click rate columns in reports. More info on the topic can be found HERE

To read the full article CLICK HERE

[tag] AdWords, Google, invalid clicks, invalid clicks rate [/tag]