The Article Writer

Give Me Some Google Luvin’

Just Don’t Rely Upon Your Toolbar…Yet

I’ve been waiting patiently as the latest Google PageRank update spreads across the search engine’s datacenters before discussing these changes with my clients. As with every update, signs of an update in progress are usually evident a few weeks prior to the change showing up on your Google PageRank toolbar. So, if you have been relying upon the toolbar to tell you when your pages have changed, then don’t. At least for about one more week.

Digital Point Goes Wild — No Surprise There

I first learned about the current update being in progress on Friday, April 20th on a popular forum. Digital Point, the SEO/webmaster forum, has been combining threads covering this issue to a solitary thread that began back in January 2007. 80,000 plus page views later and that discussion has shifted to the most recent update.

Visit Dig Pagerank/Use A Back Link Checker

A helpful site to learn how your pages are doing is Dig Pagerank. There, you will find that they track all of Google’s datacenters — so by plugging in your URL, you will see how things are unfolding. Try checking different datacenters to see how your numbers are coming out; some will have your old PR, some your new one, while most of the rest will show both at least until everything settles down. In addition, if you use a backlink checker that features PageRank, you will probably see those linked pages changed too.

Okay, I See Two Numbers…Huh?!

One note: If you see two numbers and are wondering what your page rank will likely be, the new number featured is what you should end up with when all is said and done. Again, you’ll have to wait several more days before everything takes effect, so there could be a few surprises left. This has already happened to me as my new JetEmployment site was originally showing zeros and twos but the datacenters are now showing zeros and fours. If the new numbers stick, then I will be happy — at least about one site.

No, I am not laughing at you, but I am laughing about something you wrote.

So, who makes me laugh? Lots of people! Take Dave Wallace who posted (and dug) his article titled, 10 Signs That You May Be a Blog Addict. I like point #2 the most — missing deadlines because of blogging– although I haven’t used that one yet. Close, but no cigar.

Sometimes I marvel at the questions people present online about life’s mysteries. Then again, I get a chuckle from reading something such as Reading into my cat’s nose bumps where no less than fifteen people offer their suggestions as to why their cat will touch them with its nose. Okay, I own two cats (or they own me) and they do peculiar things. Remember, they are cats and there isn’t an animal prone to stranger behavior than a cat except for a dog.

Not everyone believes in aliens (the space kind, not the illegal ones) but some of today’s hottest celebrities certainly do. I got a hoot out of Mick Jagger’s two accounts of seeing a UFO, not because he said he saw them but probably for the real reason he thought he saw them: his heavy drug use. Patrick Nottingham made this point when he discussed Jagger’s candidness about spaceship sightings on his High Strangeness Altoona blog. Yeah, it’s only rock ‘n roll (but I like it).

I didn’t know whether to laugh or to get sick to my stomach, but the recipe for Scrapple on the WildRecipes.Com site really caught my attention. Do they really use a hog’s head as one of the key ingredients? If that isn’t enough of a gut turner for you, then you will understand why this site lives up to its trademark of, “Utterly Outrageous Recipes,” when you learn how to make Cricket Cookies, Spam Shake, and Fried Hornworms. Mmm… tasty!

All right, enough giggles… I have some projects that need finishing up on this Friday. Have a great weekend!

Welcome to Y!PN

I was one of the fortunate folks who was accepted into the Yahoo! Publishers Network beta invitation that was extended in late 2005. By January 2006, my submitted site was approved and I began to run YPN ads on that site and on one other site. Gleefully, I felt that YPN was going to be a nice alternative to Google AdSense and the first two months seemed to prove that out. Just like AdSense, I could display an assortment of ads on my site and generate good income by means of paid clicks.

Good Money Followed By A Trickle

The good money flow soon dried up as the number of irrelevant ads increased. Even though Yahoo gives its publishers the opportunity to tweak what type of ads show up on a site, invariably unrelated ads would slip through. If I run an automotive site, I certainly do not want ads hawking mortgages to be included. Worse, throw in some ads for ladies perfume and the click through rate will sink even further.

Yahoo Gives Me A Ring

In the early days, Yahoo phoned me twice to get my feedback about their network (unlike Google whose only contact with me has been via several email broadcasts). The Yahoo representative was very helpful and he seemed genuinely interested in helping me to succeed with their program. He shared some tips on how to get the most out of YPN, so I changed my sites accordingly. The changes helped for a short time, but the ads soon missed the mark again.

Big Bucks With AdSense

I have been using AdSense since October 2003 and the results, especially in the first eighteen months of usage, have been quite good. In fact, I eclipsed the $1000 per month mark for several months during 2004, even topping $2100 by February 2005. Thanks to my two aviation sites, the term “private jet” was a big payer — unfortunately, spam sites also sprung up and the competition killed off my big profits. Later, I found out through an aviation client, that click fraud for the “private jet” keyword phrase was totally out of hand. Eventually, someone wised up and figured out that paying 25 cents per click was much more likely to bring good results than clicks of $2, $5, and $10 or more.

Back To YPN, For One Week Only

After three months of using YPN and AdSense fairly evenly — I switched everything back to AdSense except for a pair of my low trafficked blogs. Income with AdSense hasn’t been all that good, but it is much better than YPN. When I launched JetEmployment in February 2007, the AdSense ads went up and my overall income doubled. However, ten days ago I noticed AdSense income dropping for JetEmployment, so I swapped those ads out for YPN. Big mistake: one week later and YPN has once again proven to be a miserable failure, ad tweaking or not.

AdSense For Now

I plan on keeping my YPN account, but I will only use it as a back up. AdSense is the industry leader as their ads are always relevant and their pay out is much higher. I have my application in with a new ad provider who promises higher income than AdSense, so if I am accepted into their BETA program (more about that at another time) I may take one site and give them a whirl. Then again, maybe I’ll be content with what I have.