I love blogging, the idea of it, the passion of it and the thought of creating something that is unique to you, your interest and your social presence. You are indeed your own publisher and your own social web.

A well thought out business blog can be a very satisfying experience as long as you are very aware of the pros and cons. Anyone who expects to make a million bucks in a short time is just not realistic, but with time, effort and strategies many people can make a nice living doing something they truly love to do.

What I have found is that when you talk about such things as gardening and you find ( and they find you) people with that common interest join forces and you get to share and talk about a subject that will keep you motivated for years to come, you are indeed a success.

Many people will talk about one subject ( gardening) but then muddy the waters and lose readers by trying to throw in subjects that have nothing to do with the main topic. When you find those subjects that compliment your niche, then you can indeed affiliate with those products that will add value to a reader and not have them going...wtf? ( excuse the language).

I am sure that @Mattias has great viewpoints regarding the subject of blogging, the opinions I have put here are just mine from what I have learned, experienced and observed.

did I mention that I love blogging? lol

Best to everyone

Hi Barry (and Glen!),

I just also posted this in the "Feature Of The Week" forum in reply...I also have concerns and suggestions about the new Top Biz feature.

How will nominations be made? Who will be chosen to be featured in the biz ballot area if there are numerous nominations of the same businesses by different members? The first person who makes the nomination, or the person who puts in the most details? I have a lot of questions.

Do you think it would be better to have a criteria of...

"Which businesses would the community like to see in a group discussion?"

...and just feature the businesses without links, and WITHOUT one person featured with each biz, in the voting post, and then anyone who's a member can put their link in their signature file and let people know about it during comments. That could provide a more equal spread of traffic and a lot more details of peoples experiences, and less hassles than having featured people/person needing to reply and explain to every post/question, the replies could come from all members of those businesses, whoever is available and knows and understands the biz they are in.

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I was just reading other posts here about blogging...if we post a lot here at ALP community, we can find our posts on certain topics and create a compilation of old posts and easily paste those into a blog series, I'm really thinking about it now!

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The reality is that having a successful business without marketing or selling is an oxymoron and far too many people have been sold this bill of goods to such a degree, the path of failure has been littered with dashed hopes and dreams so your pet peeve as you term it is my outrage at how people have been used and hurt by false claims by those who have few ethics.

Thank you for bringing out of the closet those things that NEED to be said. I for one appreciate it.

The sharks or so-called experts will continue to get rich by taking advantage of people with false claims of instant, EASY wealth. The best advice I can give anyone is do your home work, learn as much as you can first. Don't listen to the hurry up and get in before it's too late pitches. Some of the best companies have been in business for years.

It is great to have a dream. Just create a plan on how to achieve that dream. Success is a process.

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I believe that you are right Glen, keeping any link generic, it will keep the business in question, more objective for everyone, they won't be thinking of the "me" equation and that is truly the best way to do things.

There is so much information regarding "work online" home businesses" and so forth, but understanding the criteria on HOW to choose a business that would be right for you is not so easily forthcoming or can be very distorted.

Coming from the school of hard knocks as well as doing a lot of research on understanding what people should look for, I hope that these tips will be helpful.

These are generic tips and not pointed to any particular program or business that one might see. This is a long ( winded lol) post so thanks for your patience ahead of time.

Questions to ask:

1. How long has the business been around? Many businesses will fail within the first two years for a variety of reasons. There are those who will say to stay away from the pre-launch or ground floor hype and while I agree with that, to me the keyword is hype, which leads me to number 2.

2. Check out any business, new or long standing for third party credibility. I am sure you have seen sites that have testimonials, but if they don't offer a way to verify the sources, stay away from it. The expression of its easy to talk the talk, but can they walk the walk is very appropriate to this tip. There are those businesses that have been around for a long time and one business comes to my mind... here are some thoughts to credibility - is the business in question in good standing with the Better Business bureau? Is it financially secure? Has it received any awards or recognition form other reputable organizations? What if any complaints have lodged against the business in mind? What do you know about the owner and staff of the business in question, you are most definitely allowed to check them out.


3. In my mind, when one is thinking of products or services, the word integrity comes to mind. Lets face it, its hard to sell something you do not know or like. With that in mind - Is the product or service useful and does it have a "stand alone" value which would be appreciated and having benefit to buyers? Can you test out the product or service in question to see if it really is as good as the advertisements say it is? What type of cash-back guarantee does it have? These are powerful motivators not only for you the affiliate, but will be even more powerful for your buyers.

4. Training and support is very important to anyone, seasoned or novice who is running their own online business. Will you be personally mentored? is there information on the business site to help you learn and even more important, if you have questions will they be answered? What tools are you given to help you get the word out about the product and service?

5. What is the compensation plan? Do you even understand what it is and is it easy to understand? here are some issues that you should be considering:

1) In a matrix type business, are you penalized for helping someone start the same business who then grows faster than you (breakaways, you don’t want that)
2). Conversely, can you do better than those who came in before you?
3). Are you paid based on products/services (to be legal) and what is that payment (% or flat rate)? Most importantly, is the plan fair and reasonable? Many business opportunities have lots of hype such as "we’ll do the work for you", "find 3 and its free"

6. Always read the legal stuff, it may be dry reading, but in the end it will be worth every agonizing moment to help you understand what you are getting into and is it going to be worth your while.

Best Regards,

@blogneta

Hi Diane,

These are all very good suggestions and exactly the kind of elegibilty detail I was looking for.

I believe the details cannot be vague and there should be some validity to the points being made, no one wants to have to look up all the details to confirm what's being said, so the credibility of it will lie with the person making the submission and with no affiliate links allowed and no association to the member who submitted it.

This will put the program on its own merit and members will make it known which one they like.

Regards,

Barry

The longer you wait for things to be just right the longer the path to success. Blogging great but is also losing its attractiveness, because of the sudden influx of auto-blogs, he1l you don't even have to write your content anymore. Thus a huge number of blogs on any topic or niche are being exploited as we speak. As with anything useful automation will be the downfall. Best thing to do is start blogging and get your ideas out there. Stop waiting. Get busy. There is lots of help here if you seek it out from those that know. Many are right here in this thread.

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I made more money in MLM and networking offline than I ever did online. Why. I actually spoke to real people about real products.

I have huge gaps in my online business knowledge. I struggle with a lot of things like optimisation etc.

What I do know is that I have a pretty unique idea that needs marketing and I am looking to do it via blogs, however, despite all my online presence I don't know where to start. So, what chance total newbies.

It takes a certain type of brain to undedrstand many online procedures. Despite being around these things for years I still don't understand matix processes.

Things actually get MORE difficult because all the simple things have been tried.

No doubt about it though, Good products at the right price properly sold is still the way to go.