This is a sponsored review of the PublisherSpot network. However, I was not influenced by the payment and was already aware of this project from the site’s owner, Tyler Cruz.

Confusing.

This is how you more than likely view the affiliate marketing industry. Join this, or join that. All of the marketing companies claim to be the best, with the most offers and highest payouts… but who really takes the cake? The subtleties are slight, and really your experience is the only thing that is a reliable measure of a network’s success. So how can you possibly come in blind and determine which ad or affiliate network is the best?

In comes PublisherSpot.com, the latest web-project from one of my closer online buddies… Tyler Cruz. PublisherSpot is the place to go if you want to learn objectively about the advantages/disadvantages of various ad and affiliate networks. I know first hand that Tyler has actually dealt with most of these… and there are now 45 networks that you can browse, compare and choose. Really, this is something everyone should consider because even a 1% difference in kick-backs could make or break a campaign. Tyler has put a lot of investment into this one (thousands to be more exact), and I can already tell it’s top-notch work. Let’s have a look at some of the brand new features of this powerful ad network search engine!

A Compelling Ranking System

Clearly, PublisherSpot has put an extensive amount of work and research into their ranking system to determine the best of the best ad networks. One of the first things that you will notice when you visit PublisherSpot is the nice and organized “top networks” panels running along the right side of the screen.

Let’s be honest, nobody wants to read through every review… signing up for multiple networks along the way… just to get to the best network after months and months of effort. If you can use the best network from the start, why wouldn’t you?! It’s common sense, and I love how they break things down into “ad networks,” “affiliate marketing networks” and the best overall network from both categories. Right now, Clickbooth is winning the overall & affiliate network, while BannerConnect is the best ad network.

This ranking system is absolutely great, and is totally driven based off of user input. As far as I can tell, the thing is nearly flawless at this point. There is a big amount of security involved, and every registered member has the ability to vote up or down a company and determine where they rank. What’s even cooler is that the updated commenting system displays your personal ranking on each network where you leave a comment, so you can debate in a leveled environment.

Organized, Integrated, But Simple

If you know me, I’m a sucker for websites with great looking designs. PublisherSpot makes my mouth water because all of the design is perfectly organized and it looks fantastic. I know that Tyler tried very hard to get everything looking it’s best, and it has really added to the functionality of the site. There really isn’t any other option if you are looking for a website that sorts and reviews publisher networks for guys looking to make money online, so I was naturally excited when PublisherSpot came on the scene.

The new features make this an absolute gem. I especially like the new fully-integrated member system that exists across the website. When you sign up for an account with PublisherSpot (totally free), you are getting a one-login access to the review website, commenting system, blog website and integrated forum. That’s one heck of an advantage, as the forum & blog are small right now and we wouldn’t want to waste time subscribing to every little feature of the site. Publisher Spot really puts it all together.

Paid Services: Good or Bad?

Tyler has talked extensively about the “network spotlight” section of PublisherSpot. Essentially, different advertising networks can come by and pay to be listed in the front of the website and on the top of search results. I’m not quite sure why he keeps mentioning this, as I don’t really think it applies to anyone except those working for the actual companies. Still, the featured network makes for a nice distraction and really compliments the rest of the site. Tyler claims that this ability gives a chance for the smaller networks to bump to the front of the list, which is definitely a plus. I would have to agree that it does “even the playing field,” but do we really want to see the bad networks on top? I guess it has its pluses and minuses, so this one was a bit of a toss-up for me personally.

A Fool’s Endorsement?

So now the question is, does PublisherSpot get my endorsement? Well they paid me… so YES! Kidding, of course. But in all seriousness:  I endorse PublisherSpot. I have been a member myself for a while now, and have never received a spam message or anything. It’s a simple system that works wonders, and I have found out about some great networks to make money on that I wouldn’t have seen.

With over 45 networks reviewed to this date, the collection of advertisers on this website is extensive. They typically update you when a particular network has some big news out, so you can use this as your “central hub” of sorts to manage your networks. One thing I would like to see added is a sort of tracking system where you can manage all of the networks you are signed up to and find out what all your earnings look like. Even still, I think you would all be better off after signing up and having a look around… it’s really quite a job well done by Tyler Cruz.

Side Note: Check out Tyler’s Affiliate Marketing Challenge 3 for over $10,000 in prizes!

-Jimvesting

There are certain misunderstandings about the internet marketing world that I feel you should all be aware of. Setting itself up as kind of an “elitist” group of people, internet marketers are the ones making thousands off of websites, products and other online trades… sometimes even at your expense! But things really aren’t as bad as they appear, and hopefully after reading this you will realize that the barriers to entry are all made of glass.

A lot of marketers are going to make arguments that the following points aren’t true; in fact, they couldn’t be truer. People who tell you that it requires a lot of work, money, effort etc. just to get your bearings are trying to persuade you to stay away from their market. Don’t believe it. The bottom line is that being an internet marketer is a lot easier than you think. You all know that I don’t work as or consider myself an internet marketer, but this is really just a choice I made a while back to limit my exposure to the internet. If I wanted to sit down and make some money, it wouldn’t be very difficult at all to get in the game. Let’s get to the top five incorrect thoughts.

1. You Need a Lot of Money In Order to Make Money
Say what?! Too many people are trapped in the notion that they need to spend to earn. While you certainly can accelerate your earnings with a bit of an investment from the start, I came into the online money making business with literally an empty PayPal account and gradually built it up.

The internet is probably the only place where you can get an entire online business built for under $25 and be successful. I got my start by generating so-called “seed” money, which you can earn through any Get Paid To (GPT) website in a few minutes, and investing that in a domain name. Eventually, I had enough built up to afford nice web hosting, advertising money and the whole lot. This all started from an empty PayPal account!

2. Traffic = Sales
Too many people think that traffic is traffic is traffic… that couldn’t be further from the truth. Unless you are spinning off a website that isn’t even yours and couldn’t care less about where the traffic comes from, you are going to want the visitors that make it to your website to be legitimately interested. Furthermore, having more traffic doesn’t mean you are going to increase your sales. I have seen tons of Pay-Pay-Click and similar marketing plans fail because of poor traffic. In fact, these cases actually involved marketers that shifted away from profitable campaigns in favor of faster traffic… which eventually drained their margins.

Want an example? Say I am starting up a website about planting trees to save the environment (aw, how nice). I’m not going to put money down to target the word “tree” because that could bring me people who want anything from birdhouses to gardening tips… not the environmentalist spin I was going for and not the people who will make me rich. Relevancy in marketing campaigns is more important than you’d think!

3. The Internet Marketing Business is Over-Saturated
Ever feel like someone is trying to close the door on you? Lot’s of successful bloggers or internet marketers tell you that there is no room for you to get in the business. In fact, there is plenty of wiggle room in every niche (yes, even the “make money online” niche). Online business is accelerating at a rate in excess of 20% annually. I feel like the current levels of participation on the internet are only a fraction of what they will be, so get in now… we still aren’t even close to fruition.

Now that more and more marketing companies are coming to the table, it appears that somebody thinks there is potential there. The trend is your friend! If you see more and more internet businesses popping up, namely internet marketing companies, then it is obvious that people see huge gaps to be filled and want a piece of the pie. Why not you too?

4. You Need This Product To Succeed
In all my time online, I have never bought anything over $100 in value that I didn’t say to myself: “hey, this shouldn’t be worth more than $50.” There are literally hundreds of so-called “miracle” programs and products out there that are essentially exploiting our gullible sides into thinking that they will help. You can do anything and everything yourself. Once you get a bit more established, sure, go for it. But if you are a beginner you really don’t need any of the stuff marketers through at you to make money… bottom line.

I’m planning on launching a post soon where I analyze the appropriate value of products that I have tried and paid for personally on the internet. It’s true that if you have the money to spare, certain programs may accelerate your ability to work. However, nobody actually needs the things they recommend… and the help provided is only marginally better than what you can do yourself. For a slight increase in productivity, you probably will be better off without it.

5. You Can Make Hundreds/Thousands in One Day by _____________
One common misconception in ANY online business is that you can make hundreds of dollars, or even a few thousand, in just one day. If anyone tells you that this is possible, you should be a skeptic. Option one is that they have used days in advance to prepare in order to launch their campaign successfully with all the right keywords and niche exposure. Option two is that they are professionals doing this already, and have gradually built up positions that now make them $X dollars every day.

Lesson learned, if you are new to any business… it’s not going to be possible, at least at first, to make that kind of outlandish profit in a day. Sorry to burst your bubble, but the odds of being successful without a professional background in one day’s work are close to none. Taking your time and gradually making your presence known is the best way to fly every time.

Bottom Line: There are many internet marketing misunderstandings, but I have chosen to highlight those that deal with the whole “elitist” point of view. Never say never, but also don’t fall for things that seem too good to be true. Anyone can be an internet marketer by building up gradual positions… put in the work and you’ll succeed!

-Jimvesting

This is a sponsored post of the popular webmaster resource Triple.com. My opinions were not influenced, as this is an honest review of the program.

Triple.com is a top-notch domain name, web hosting and webmaster resource website that has long been one of my favorite companies on the net. They have some great deals on domain names, cheap $4/month web hosting and great extras that can get your website online in hours. An official ICANN domain registrar, I’ve used these guys before and absolutely love the customer service. When they came to me asking for a review of the new affiliate program, I jumped at the chance to let you guys know about this great company in a constructive way.

With the brand new Triple.com affiliate program, marketers and blog owners like you and me can make some extra commission off of our readers and visitors. The referral system works in two different ways. The first branch is referring customers that buy the actual domains, hosting, security certificates, etc. You get a whopping 30% off of every person who makes a buy. The better leg (in my opinion) is the webmaster referral system, which nets you 15% of everything any other webmaster brings in. This means that you get 15% of all the business another webmaster refers… which can make for a nice payout each month.

Ethical Profits Made Simple
Let’s be honest, a lot of the affiliate networks out there have you pushing products on people that they shouldn’t be ordering in the first place. Those of you who own blogs already know the importance of reliable hosting and domain names. Those of you who are just into making an extra buck online can appreciate the need for reliable service that any website owner will inevitably face.

Forget these shady gambling, dieting or marketing packages that you feel unethical in promoting. Triple.com is a fantastic website with a great track record and a product that people need. Now with the Triple.com affiliate program, you can get paid off of customers buying real products and from webmasters referring interested business.

Efficient and Orderly Design and Payment Management
As a former web designer myself, I absolutely hate websites that are run on unprofessional scripts and unappealing designs. I really can’t say much against the Triple.com system. The primary website (the business end) has an awesome “Web 2.0” look to it that makes things easy to navigate and clean. In addition, the affiliate managing back end has just a few basic pages to manage your income. Sure, it would be nice to see some added analytical features, but all the options you would want are there and the payment tracking system is one of the best I’ve seen.

On top of the design itself, there are some great looking banners that will fit with almost any blog theme or website layout… so your customers will catch all your links and get you the maximum potential revenue. You get two referral links, one for your customers and one for your webmasters. Clean. Professional. Nothing else to say, Triple.com is a great looking website.

Payments and Restrictions
Now that you’ve had a chance to hear about the affiliate program and webmaster company, let’s talk about the restrictions and payment scales that are set up for you as an affiliate. First things first (and correct me if I’m wrong), Triple.com seems to be open to everyone with a PayPal account. So all of you international readers looking to make some affiliate money may have better luck with the Triple.com program than with a full-fledged marketing broker like Market Leverage or NeverBlueAds.

Payments are all processed by PayPal every month. The best part about this is that there is a super low minimum balance to reach withdrawal at $20. That’s just a few domain sales or one web hosting account. I would like to see them expand their reach out into giving checks and accepting other mediums of payment… but PayPal is definitely a solid start as a lot of people like the anonymity.

Bottom Line: Triple.com is a fantastic webmaster website with a great reputation in the industry. Their new affiliate program is an awesome way to make extra income on the side… with the potential 30% per sale and 15% per referred webmaster. A low payout threshold, quick and efficient pay processing and an awesome product you will actually enjoy promoting… Triple.com is a great new program that has my recommendation.

-Jimvesting

This is a sponsored post of the t3Leads.com network. The views expressed are my own, and have not been influenced by the promotional nature of the bid.

You all know what affiliate marketing is by now. Big advertisers pay big money for leads, and using programs like Market Leverage, NeverBlueAds and ClickBooth you can score big commissions. I know a lot of people that are affiliate marketers making $50,000+ every month just using their computers! It’s truly a lucrative business that pays well once you have your feet wet in the business.

I agreed to do this promotional review of the T3Leads network primarily because they are the running specialists for the finance niche of the market. They claim, as everyone else does, the highest pay per lead rates in the business… but being a niche focused marketing company they do have their advantages over more popular solutions such as those listed above. Truly a business dedicated to forming lasting business relationships, let’s have a look at the t3leads pay per lead program!

The T3Leads Website Design and Functionality
First things first, you know that I am a sucker for good looks… so let’s see how t3leads matches up with the best. On first glance, things look pretty decent. A nice flash banner, a few top products on the sidebar and a good description of what the website is. The only problem here is that the website really falls apart when you navigate away from the homepage.

Signing up is easy enough, and while they send you an email confirmation… I had a strange suspicion that me confirming the reception did absolutely nothing. The one good thing about the main portion of the website is that they have only a few places to go so as not to confuse anyone. There is a great contact page that can put you in touch with a representative from the get-go (before even registering), and a clear-cut FAQ. The primary website (non-members) gets a passing grade for good functionality, though it didn’t blow me away.

T3Leads clearly didn’t put a lot of effort into the members area. This thing is really all over the place, and everything is written twice… once in English and once in Russian, a trend that continues over to the forum board as well. Perhaps they are fixing this, as we company is new, but it’s a bit awkward right now. The member’s section as a whole takes some getting used to, and the functionality isn’t up to par. However, I think that the payment area is really nice… and you can organize it all pretty easily.

The T3Leads Offer Selection and Schematics
What I think is cool about t3leads that really sets them apart is that they give you a virtual army of websites to use in marketing. Here are a few examples: example 1, example 2, example 3. Point taken, the websites that they give you to market are very professional looking (save the ugly numbers on the end), and used correctly you could make a lot of money. Not only that, but all of the websites come with a list of keywords already included… so you know exactly what needs to be done with no research. These sites range from debt consolidation to home loans and everything in between. A nice addition is that they also offer the option for you to custom-make your own websites to pull in some revenue with an API of sorts to work the system a bit more effectively.

The system is a bit odd at first, but t3leads actually doesn’t operate like a standard affiliate marketing company. Instead of giving you the ads and everything where you just need to use a link to give business, t3leads gives you the entire website and let’s you market it as if it were your own with banners and creatives. This is a cool concept, but I think that it burns out a bit by the fact that you really have no clue what you are making, as the reporting system as a whole is pretty darn weak at this point in time. There is a nice way to track all your clicks each day, but it’s impossible to discern what is coming from where.

The T3Leads Support Line and Help
As I said in the opening remarks, they go ahead and give you all the contact information from the get-go. This is definitely not the place you want to go for good support, as you don’t get a personalized representative like you do with a mid or large size marketing firm. However, if you need support they seem readily available in a relatively bare (but new) forum and ticketing system.

My personal experience in talking with them has been pretty average, and that’s exactly what I would expect from a company the size of t3. However, it’s nothing to scoff at, as they will help you in the long run (maybe just not as fast as their competitors).

Jimvesting’s Final Call
Alright, after exploring the system at t3leads, my recommendation is to approach with caution as I give the network a 5/10 ranking. They have a pretty good system in place with giving you your own websites to market, but it is all pretty loosely assorted with an awkward members area and not a very good revenue reporting area. In addition, I’m a bit concerned about payment frequency. While they claim bi-weekly payments… which would be amazing… I have personally seen delays in my little time here.

This may be a solid option for those of you who are international and can’t seem to find a network to work with. There are 6 methods of payment, including popular methods like PayPal, Check and Bank wire, but the threshold is a high $100. My final call is that this might be a fun network to experiment with, but they are just too young to put any serious money into at this point in development. A nice start for a new company.

-Jimvesting

One of the most clear cut methods in marketing a website or blog is the so-called “bum marketing” that often centers on creating unique articles for better search results.

The theory behind this goes that by submitting a ton of individual articles to several websites, you will over time increase all of your search engine term rankings. As we all know, higher search engine ranking positions (SERPs) lead to increased traffic to your website… which is always a good thing.

Thinking about “bum marketing” for promotion got me thinking whether or not it would be possible to do the same thing for revenue. Granted, writing up articles can be a good amount of overhead work; however, marketing your content can be one of the best free no-risk methods to driving insane traffic to your website. Making money by writing articles is really as simple as cashing in on high-traffic niche through Google, and collecting on the clicks that come in organically. Let’s get to work in turning ordinary “bum marketing” into a profit machine!

The Method to Make Hundreds Marketing
Before I get into the specifics, allow me to first talk about the method we are going to use to turn article writing into a steady cash flow in a simplified version. Essentially, we are going to be doing exactly what would commonly be used in bum marketing with either a referral link or monetized website on the other end of things. Since article submission services like eZineArticles allow you to attach a link in the “resource box” section that appears at the end of your posts, we can slip in a resource that is going to make us money. I’ve devised a five-step process that covers everything from researching a niche area where we can place high in Google, to finding a great product to market, to actually getting your affiliate information visited!

The Five Steps to Success: Discover/Research a Niche Area Come Up with Killer Keywords for SERPs Finding A Hot Product that You Can Market Create a Path to Profit in the Resource Box Write Unique Articles & Get Published!

The most important step in any process is usually the first one. With no exception, coming up with a niche area that offers high volume with competition that you can beat out is essential. If you are trying to penetrate a giant industry with your hastily written articles… you have another thing coming! What we need is to find an industry where you can be a big fish in a small pond to steal all of the traffic in Google search results.

Start researching a target market now.

There’s really no two bits about it, whether or not you feel you can write articles for the area you research is highly irrelevant. You simply need a market of people that are willing to spend on a product here or there… something that you can exploit for capital gains. The process is as easy as identifying a market, finding a product for the market, researching the profitability of that product and finding more markets! You will want to do this until you have about five separate targeted markets that compose one collective niche.

Example: Let’s get you through the niche process in a sample. Say I started with “sports” as a general idea. Too popular would be an understatement here… so let’s narrow the field a bit and go to “sports betting.” Still, this is a bit too heavily invested for my blood… there’s no way we’ll be hitting page 1 with this. So let’s narrow it further to “football betting.” Now that’s the kind of niche that we can penetrate with some clever keywords!

2. Come Up with Killer Keywords for High-Ranking Results
Now that we have our niche in place, we need to find a collection of keywords that are going to give us a high amount of traffic with a low amount of advertiser competition. This sounds simple, but it’s a bit trickier than it sounds… so you may want to spend a good amount of time getting acquainted. There are a lot of tools to lighten the load, so let’s talk about a few of the best while we hunt for 15-20 keyword phrases to exploit.

My two favorite tools to come up with creative keywords that you can use to get those all-important top rankings are the SEO Book Keyword Suggestion and the Google Adwords Keyword Tool. I would say that Google is now your best option, as they have all of the rankings built in for your display. Best of all, you can export all of your results to a spreadsheet for your convenience!

The most efficient way to research keywords is to simply open up a blank document in notepad, excel or your favorite data entry program so you can jot down your best ideas. Remember, we want to shoot for 15-20 terms total… so you should write down more than 30 great ones before you narrow down the field to the top tier results. It’s much easier for me to give you an example, so let’s go through our term “football betting” in a keyword adventure.

Example: Okay, so we have our text editor open and we are ready to explore some opportunities. I like to start with Google and work through a few other tools to really get the best results from my efforts. Google more than likely has the best numbers (for obvious reasons), so I’ll use them first. After entering “football betting,” I am getting 68 immediate results. I like terms that have low competition with over 2,000 in daily hits… so keywords like “football betting system,” “bet college football” and “betting predictions” would be good options. Remember, we can discover more words by searching the terms we come across in the results page. This might take awhile, but it’s worth it for getting those front page clicks.

3. Finding a Hot Product that You Can Market
There’s going to be a product for every market out there… and you really only need one to make a lot of money. We are basically going to be finding a product that offers an affiliate referral program where we can refer leads and make money. This can either be a lead-based or sales-based program, but I prefer making actual sales because of the higher commission on each success.

Once again, we turn to our favorite affiliate networks to find offers that convert well (high ratio of sales-to-views) and pay well (high ratio of cash-to-pocket). Let’s open up Market Leverage, ClickBank, NeverBlueAds and/or any other network you might be using. I would try something generic like “sports” as a search term for our “football betting” niche. Most networks have some great statistics pages so that you can see just how well these programs are paying affiliates. You’ll want to structure your landing pages differently based on which offers you choose, but right off the bat I see “Vegas Baby” and “Pure Play” betting services that offer around $2/lead a piece. We’re going to be aiming for the fast cash if we use a lead based system… so plan accordingly!

4. Create a Path to Profit in the Resource Box
The “resource box” is the area underneath every article that you publish that is going to bring in the bacon. In it, you need a way to get loads of traffic coming toward your website or affiliate link so that people who read your top-ranked article are getting you paid off. There are a few ways to sneak in your link under cover, so let’s talk about how we do this most effectively.

Unfortunately, websites like eZineArticles (the most popular) won’t let you put in an affiliate link or even a cloaked redirect link into your resource box area. So what can you do? Register your own domain name! I’d recommend the cheapest possible (as it doesn’t really matter) such as a .info name… and you have your problem solved.

Once you have your domain, you have two options:

1. Create a forward: In this method, all you need to do is have your domain name operate as a forward to your affiliate link. As long as you write your domain name in the resource box, the article service will be none the wiser.

2. Create a landing page: In this method, we are going to create an attractive landing page that hooks readers into giving us a referral commission. This is what I use especially for lead-based referring, as you can’t just dump a reader into a survey… you need to give them a set-up opinion poll or something catchy to get them interested in doing the work for you.

Link your newly created domain name with a short description around it that entices readers to click on your link to find out more, and you have yourself a high-paying stream of income!

5. Write Up Unique Articles & Get Them Published
The stage is set, so all we need to do now is put it all together in a bunch of articles and get them published on a few article resource websites. You should aim to pump out as many unique articles as possible, as they only need to be just over 400 words apiece to be effective. Remember, do not use duplicate content as Google will never let you survive. You can use old blog posts of yours if you wish, but you should be piecing together articles from no more than 2 paragraphs a post, and you need to change around some words with synonyms. Doing either this, or just jotting down some generalized information with keywords inside, will get you traffic if done correctly.

Submit Your Articles to These Websites: eZineArticles.com (REQUIRED!) GoArticles.com USFreeAds.com ISnare.com SearchWarp.com

You could try additional services, but it’s a waste of your time if it doesn’t get a top spot. eZineArticles is the one you need to be in, but the others could potentially get you some great rankings as well.

The most important part of submitting articles is having the keywords you researched in the title of the article! Remember, your list of 15-20 killer keywords are going to be in the titles, and this is how we get our serach traffic because the article title carries the most weight. Below are a few examples of titles that are keyword-effective:

• Five [KEYWORD HERE] to being a successful…
• Three keys to [KEYWORD HERE] like…
• [KEYWORD HERE]… in one week or less!

The best part of article writing is that it doesn’t even have to be good… it just needs to get ranked. A lot of the stuff you are writing is going to sound outright “street” if you are doing it quickly. That’s perfectly alright. Remember, this isn’t 5th grade English…. we just need to get hits and get out, so being effective in your writing is essential.

Bottom Line: By writing articles rich in high-grossing keywords for a niche you can be competitive in, it is very possible to start earning $100s every single day. The power of researching a product that will sell in a niche that has a high amount of volume is astonishing. After the initial struggle to put up articles on the five service I have outlined, you’ll start seeing money flowing in from your affiliate link hits day after day!

-Jimvesting