Have you heard of SocialSpark?

Posted on May 8, 2008
Filed Under Online Income | 1 Comment

I’ve made it no secret that I’m a member of PayPerPost. With a pagerank of 0, I made nearly $300 in my first month. I’m definitely going to keep this one. If I can make that much with no pagerank, just think of what I can make now that Google upgraded my rank to PR3.

Recently, the owners of PayPerPost (IZEA) started a new service called SocialSpark. izea It basically takes the original PayPerPost business model, throws in a Myspace twist. You can communicate with other posties and advertisers. There is also a blog and forum for you to better communicate with everyone.

For now, I’m able to continue using PayPerPost on a daily basis. I am also using Social Spark on a daily basis which is nearly doubling my monthly profit. Both PayPerPost and Social Spark give opportunities based on your RealRank, PageRank, and Alexa ranking for your blog.

As you work on improving these 3 ranks, the quantity of your opportunities and price of your posts increase.

A unique feature of Social Spark is the “BlogUBack” offers. Basically, you review their site and in return they review your site. I think this is truly a remarkable feature and I’m glad IZEA threw it in there. Instead of paying hundreds of dollars for reviews, you simply look for opportunities with the BlogUBack offer and reserve the opportunity.

There is also quite a difference in the way you are paid in Social Spark VS. PayPerPost. With PPP, you are paid 30 days after your post is approved. I basically receive payments nearly everyday from PPP for each post I’ve had approved.

With social spark there is still the same 30 day waiting period, but instead of sending the small payment to Paypal, it is stored in your account until you ‘cash out’. This way you can keep building your payments and cash out when you are ready. There is a small downfall however - There is a $20 minimum cashout in Social Spark whereas PPP had none.

I believe IZEA is on to something good with Social Spark, but there is always room for improvement. Some believe that the payment policy needs changed, some like it. The one thing I wish they would implement is some sort of referral bonus when you refer new members. PayPerPost pays $15 per referral, Social Spark…Nothing. I also love the fact that they stand behind their code of ethics which are:

-100% Audit-able In-Post Disclosure
-100% Transparency
-100% Real Opinions
-100% Search Engine Friendly

All in All, I have to say I’m very happy with Social Spark and I can’t wait to see how this service pans out in the future.

April Stats for unTECHy

Posted on May 1, 2008
Filed Under Stats | Leave a Comment

Wow, what a month April was. Traffic and visitor participation was great, I’ve found steady streams of revenue for unTECHy, and I’ve met my goals for the month.

Well, not ALL the goals were met. I still haven’t held a contest here at unTECHy, but I’m still jotting down all the ideas in my notebook.

OK, so here are my stats: (Up/Down from previous month)

Traffic:
Unique Visitors: 2817
Average Daily Visitors: 94
Pageviews: 6101
Average Pages/visit: 2.17
RSS Subscribers: 15

Revenue:
Adsense: $5.94
Bidvertiser: $0.00
Hits4Pay: $22.95
Commission Junction: $8.50
Other Affiliation Programs: $40
PayPerPost: $220.50
TOTAL REVENUE: $297.89

Website Costs:
Hosting: $16.99
Advertising: $0.00

In March, I mentioned that I was looking into a BANS (Build a Niche Store) website. I said that if I made more than $150 in blogging revenue for the month of April I would purchase BANS and review it. Once I receive my checks for the April earnings, I’ll purchase BANS ($97) and will do my best to keep up how it is working for me.

I plan on sharing everything from purchase and installation, to SEO/traffic and earnings. BANS has been showing alot of promise around the internet and I’m sure I can make my $97 back + more before the end of May.

So as far as my May goals, it will pretty much be to inform my readers about as much as I can about my BANS experience. Not to mention I’ll be growing my blogging revenue as well.

Stay tuned!

San Diego Was Great

Posted on April 29, 2008
Filed Under General | Leave a Comment

Well, I made it back in one piece. I don’t really have alot of time to post about my trip, but let me just say WOW! San Diego is quite a beautiful place to visit. I’m going to work on a post with a few of my pictures of San Diego. Hopefully I can share it later in the week.

On an even better note, I’ve noticed Google finally decided to share some PR with me. My first pagerank is PR3. Lets see where it goes from here.

Offline for 3 days

Posted on April 24, 2008
Filed Under General | Leave a Comment

It’s lame for me to do this, but I thought I’d let all of you know that I’ll be offline for the next 3 days.

My birthday is coming up on 4/28 and my girlfriend bought me a weekend getaway. We’ll be flying out to San Diego in the morning and won’t be back until Monday night. Since it’s a getaway, I’ll be leaving my laptop at home.

Maybe I’ll share some stories and pictures with you on Tuesday.

See you then!

Down with McDonalds!

Posted on April 22, 2008
Filed Under General | Leave a Comment

McDonalds Advertising While stumbling the web tonight, I happened to run across a website called mcspotlight.org. It’s a website that spotlights the world famous McDonalds empire.

While checking out this website, I found a section called “A year of great Quotes from the whitness box.” It conatains direct quotes from key personnel within the McDonalds corporation.

For anyone who takes particular interest in the downfall of McDonalds, this is a must-read. Here are some of my favorite quotes:

Den Fujita, McDonald’s Japanese President:
“the reason Japanese people are so short and have yellow skins is because they have eaten nothing but fish and rice for two thousand years… if we eat McDonald’s hamburgers and potatoes for a thousand years we will become taller, our skin become white and our hair blonde.” - from Behind the Arches, the authorised biography of McDonald’s.

Ian Whittle, McDonald’s crew member, Sutton (UK), 1983 - 1986
“The Manager openly agreed that women - the prettier the better - should operate the tills, especially on a Saturday. This would encourage male custom. Despite the presence of Asian, Black and Oriental managers, the store was blatantly racist. ” - from his McLibel witness statement

Andrew Cranna, McDonald’s management, West Ealing, London (UK), 1984 - 1986
“Most of the crew in store were generally made to feel as if they were fully expendable.” - from his McLibel witness statement

Siamak Alimi, McDonald’s Training Squad, Colchester (UK), 1985 - 1987
“If anyone joined a Union or even seriously considered joining a union, they would be sacked.” from his McLibel witness statement
“I knew of cases where employees in my store worked as much as 26 hours in a row.” - from his from his McLibel witness statement
“Every time you were seen not smiling you were called to the corner and told to smile.” - from his McLibel witness statement

Sid Nicholson, McDonald’s UK Vice President
(For crew aged 21 or over the company) “couldn’t actually pay any lower wages without falling foul of the law.” - giving evidence in the McLibel Trial
“I do not accept that McDonald’s crew are low paid.” - giving evidence in the McLibel Trial

For more of these great quotes, I suggest heading over to McSpotlight.org’s Great year of quotes.

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