Vera's Works In Progress Blog

Been So Long Blogging

2010-01-13T05:59:00.001-08:00

It's been so long since I've been blogging here, that I thought I ought to do a quick short post because that's what bloggers should do - shouldn't they - update their blogs?!

It's not that I have been blogging or working on my SEO skills or doing my online marketing. I have been busy, very busy with all three things. In addition, I've be travelling, celebrating Christmas, hating winter, celebrating the new year and my household chores. Just like everyone else.

I could promise to keep this blog updated regularly, but the truth be told, I'm too busy with my other sites. I've lost count of them, but it could be close to 100 sites now - authority sites, blogger blogs, wordpress blogs, and a whole lot more. It's always a learning process.

My goals for 2010 are to make 15 authority sites. I know this doesn't sound like many new sites, but along with these, I will probably, no doubt, be making many, many support sites. So my work is cut out for me this year. You could say that I'm building real estate, increasing and diversifying my "portfolio".

Anyways, just a short post for now to close up the postings from last year and show the world, I'm still not dead. Happy New Year, 2010!

New SEO Guy on the Block?

2009-08-23T08:30:00.000-07:00

Well, I found this guy or should I say, I met a new guy who I've been reading at work, reading for what seems like hours on end. We've been slow at work and I thought I should make use of my time and educate myself in the world of blogging or more accurately named: affiliate marketing. Since I consider my real job as something that gets in the way of my personal life and my dreams of making money online, I thought I might as well keep learning because I'm sure I'd get fired if they caught me actually "blogging" at work. But trust me, that doesn't stop everybody. I am not so particular at calling myself an affiliate marketer. When people ask me what I did on the weekend, I usually answer "blogging" because it sounds just plain weird to say "I was affilate marketing on the weekend, what did you do?" So, I read the stuff on the internet at work. I just hate wasting time. If you, like me, are stuck in some very boring job that you actually hate, you should educate yourself by reading valuable articles on the internet. If you're not allowed to surf the internet at work, poor you. I think you should find a new job.

Talking about "blogging" at work. Or should I say "internet marketing" at work. Something that's really hilarious or else very rebellious is that I taught two guys at work who can see clearly through the corporate structure and all that bull, I actually taught them to set up some blogger blogs for themselves. For a couple of months - naughty boys - they were blogging at work. I was highly amused and would burst out in laughter whenever I passed their desks and I saw the blogger dashboard open on their monitors. They never got caught and one of them actually made $150 in the first two weeks. He has a financial site (because he knows all about stocks and bonds and all that money stuff), and he spent his time on the financial forums. He kept putting his links in the forums - yahoo and google and he got tons of traffic and those oh-so-important clicks on his Adsense. I was sooooooo jealous that my "student" had done it so quick. I should be charging for mentoring. Update to his story, well, he hasn't done much blogging lately, but he still makes a bit of cash because he ended up on page One of the Big G. He and his partner bought a house and they are so busy fixing it up right now with all the house repairs and everything that comes with buying a house. I still fondly refer to him as "Smarty Pants".

Okay, so back to the subject at hand. I might have found a new guy to follow and I've been reading his site very carefully. Now, although his posts have lots of spelling errors, and, Lord! he does cuss at times, his posts have some very brilliant information on making money online. I kind of get some sort of deja vu when I read his posts, but that's okay, my imagination is very highly developed and I have come to accept this as a "normal" part of my brain functioning.

Now this guy I've just met or found or whatever, his name is Ben. He seems to be an SEO expert because he really knows what he is doing as far as making money online. I first heard/read about him on my making money online guru's site, Grizz, of whom I've spoken alot about in my postings because he has been my "teacher" after I had wasted a year of my life on John Chow. (Is this starting to sound like a soap opera?). Guys I've known?

It's really good that it's been slow at work lately because this guy Ben writes ridiculously long articles and trust me, as far as some men are concerned, my attention span is rather short), (would you believe it, one of his articles I read, I actually copied and pasted into MicroSoft Word and the entire article was over 2000 words long! Wow! ( I actually am reading his articles from start to finish because they are not only filled with spelling mistakes and swear words (I also miss Vic Franqui because he was hilarious and vulgar too, but don't tell anyone I love guys who are somewhat hilarious and vulgar because they make me laugh my own ass off) (vulgar here is meant in the good sense). However, Ben's articles as I was saying are full of valuable information for those trying to make money online. And his articles are LONG! And believe me, if you read his articles you will find out why your own articles should also be LOOOOONG.

Ben's site is about how to make money online with SEO and we all know how important SEO is when you are trying to make money online. Want to get to page one on Google? You'd better know your SEO. What's that you ask? Oh my god, if I have to tell you now. It means Search Engine Optimization, silly...

Even though I've been doing it for about 2.5 years now, minus the year I wasted on John C, I had still lessons to learn from this Ben guy. Perhaps, if you aren't making some cash online now, you ought to check out this guy's site at www.makemoneyonlinewithseo.com and you might, like me, still learn a new thing or two.

Back to the soap opera if you want, I'm still faithful to Grizz...

Griz Comes Alive

2009-07-31T05:13:00.000-07:00

I haven't heard/read any new posts from my favorite blog master affiliate marketer guru, Mr. Griz of Make Money Online fame for so long. I started to wonder if he was dead and maybe I should be writing his obituary. But then, I knew he was probably busy as hell, making money online elsewhere.

However, I have to be more honest, I haven't posted on this blog either for ages because, I, too, have been so damn busy looking after my own blogs, writing and backlinking and trying to make money online myself. I have been checking his blog now and then since his last posting in May, but nothing new was there. I kinda missed my 'teacher'. I really missed him.

His blog has been an excellent source of knowledge for my partner and I. We missed his postings but we realized, he's really told us all we need to know. Why should he post further? And, after all, it is "Summer Time". Still, everyone missed you Griz. Everyone who asks me 'how to blog', I just refer them to his site.

My other favorites, Vic of make money blogging and Court of internet marketing from Courtney Tuttle.com have also stopped regularly posting on their blogs and moved onto other things. After all, when you've said all there is to be said, what more must you say? That's reality.

Anyways, he posted a new post on his Make Money Online for Beginners about a new product called Niche Devil that is supposed to be a fantastic auto-blogging system. This marketing system creates thousands of blogs in a record amount of time. Vic Franqui has made this new software. Am I going to buy it? Let me tell you, I'm deeply thinking about it.

If you are just a little bit curious about this product, just hop over to Griz's site and check it out. In case you didn't know, his site is right here at make money online. Click on it.

And, finally, I've written another blog posting myself.

Wordcamp Blogging Conference

2009-05-20T09:21:00.000-07:00

A couple of weekends ago, I attended a Wordcamp blogging conference - Wordcamp Toronto 2009. I actually took some time out away from the computer and met up with other bloggers. I have to tell you, it was informative, fun and very refreshing, meeting other bloggers in the flesh.

There is a whole world out there, if one just gets outside. Usually, you never meet bloggers in real life, you have these cyber relationships, using pseudonyms, emails, chats, comments and it never seems quite 'real'.

The Wordcamp conference took place, as I said in Toronto in a chi-chi warehouse like building. The conference lasted for three days. Guest speakers were famous people from the blogging world such as THE Lorelle (website at lorelle.wordpress.com) among others. I'm only mentioning her because I've been to her website a few times and have often heard of her. She gave a speech on tips for using WordPress, accessibility and other WordCamp conferences. Interesting thing is, WordCamps take place all over the world.

Other speakers gave presentations and workshops on social media marketing, Flashpress - upcoming - watch out you Flash lovers and podcasting.

About meeting people at the WordCamp. Bloggers come in all shapes and sizes, ages, etc. Some have been blogging since the mid- 90s. Another thing I discovered is that most of them are experts in social media. Me, I'm not. I just started with Twitter and I barely know what to do. I sign in, it asks me what I'm doing and I usually enter something like, just looking around or updating my blogs. I'm a Twitter virgin.

I also discovered that most of the people have only one or two blogs and they are not using blogging to make money online. I was getting tons of questions about my many blogs and how to make money online. It was funny to feel like an expert for a day.

I use WordPress alot for my other sites and I have used wordpress.com to host some of my sites. Just because I'm blogging about it here on Blogger, please don't consider me unfaithful.

Anyways, it was a great experience to attend the WordCamp Toronto 2009 and if it ever comes to a city near you, I would highly recommend you attend.

Not writing here much these days because I'M BUSY....

Til later...

The Blogging Continues

2009-04-12T07:31:00.000-07:00

As mentioned in my previous posting entitled Lazy Blogger?, I have actually been busy writing for my other blogs, providing some editing for a friend who's first language is not English and slowly getting back links. Spring must be around the corner somewhere, I just wish it was a bit closer. It's still cold out here but yesterday I saw some brave guys wearing shorts and some girls out there, crazy enough to wear some skimpy tops. Brrrrr!

I really hate getting back links. I love writing, I love working on my sites, but the task of getting back links, yeah, I hate it. However, I do know the necessity of it, so ya have to do it. Probably a lot of you hate this task to, but we contact people with other sites, submit our sites to blog directories, perhaps use some bookmarking software which gets you more links, comment on other people's blogs, submit to article directories and maybe you use your own network or use some other network. It's an arduous task, but it eventually leads to high search engine placement and the result of that is more traffic from the search engines and a better potential to make some money online. It's that simple or that difficult.

I truly believe in "Visualization" where you visualize something which helps you to achieve the goal in your vision. Usually, I joke that I will someday make enough money to quit my day job and move south and manage my blog empire somewhere in the sunny south, wearing shorts and a t-shirt and flip flops sitting under a palm tree on the beach.

Well, I have to update my "Vision". I recently went south and took the faithful laptop. Reality peaks it's little head in the door. I found it virtually impossible to see my laptop screen in the bright sunlight. LOL! I ended up "managing my blog empire" inside the hotel room. At least in the room, I could actually see my laptop screen. I went for lots of long walks on beach, soaked up the sun, did some offshore gambling with my companion, at great food, drank lots of red wine, dinners.... etc., etc...

So update to the Vision: Managing the blog empire will occur inside. Beach fun will happen outside. Working 9 - 5 will long be gone. Hold onto the blogging vision.

What's your "Vision"?

Lazy Blogger?

2009-03-22T05:34:00.000-07:00

You might come here once in a while to read my posts and for that I thank you. You might come to the conclusion that I'm a lazy blogger because I hardly ever update this site. I mean, really, it looks like I have only three posts for the whole year of 2009. With this article, it now adds up to four whole posts for 2009.

Yes, you are correct, you can count: this article will make it a four whole posts. But if you are doing the same as I and building up your network of sites to create what might be called a "passive income", then you will know I am as busy as a bee settting up sites, writing content, seeking backlinks and all of the tasks you need to do to actually achieve a "passive income".

However, I've been thinking, if I ever make an income from my sites to write home about, I would not yet be able to call it a passive income. You really have to work at this blogging thing, becoming a serious internet marketer with the goal of taking yourself to the next level.

The thing I hate the most of all is trying to get back links. I can't stand it. I love the keyword research, the setting up of a site, writing content, the reading and learning from the sites of my three or four gurus, but I can't stand the task of having to get back links. Really hate it, but 'ya have to. Bite the dust.

I think that one day my endeavours will become what they call a passive income while I sit around a pool with palm trees in the distance somewhere south of here with my laptop, managing my blogs, but really, until that time, even though I hate getting backlinks, I would not call it a passive income.

You need persistance and you have to work hard to finally achieve what they call a passive income.

Blogging into the New Year

2009-02-06T05:40:00.000-08:00

Yes, I have had blogging paralysis as per my last post, but I am slowly moving into the new year and hope to break out of the paralysis.

I was reading about SEO, back links to one's site/blog and how important keyword anchor text back links actually are. The experts say that Google rates a website, gives it Page Rank based on how many back links are pointing to your site. I also understand they will rate a site based on the age of a site, the quality of your site and whether or not you have posted original content.

So I've been doing a little bit of writing and working more on my backlinks and they are slowly increasing for the sites I'm working on. I have quite a few sites now but I am intensely working on two of them and this takes a lot of time. I am waiting for one of these two sites to achieve the goals I have set for it and then I am going to move on to working intensely with a third site to "get it going". You, like me, are probably investing a ton of time into your blogs and with the same goals as I, most probably, know how much time is involved. It's perseverance, time and lots of hard work.

Along the way, I have to make time for my learning about SEO and blogging/affiliate marketing. I'm still following the same SEO/blogging/affiliate marketing experts (I have named them "my gurus") as before and that includes Griz with his make money online site and now his Adsense for Beginners site, Justin with his SEO expertise, and Court - his Internet Marketing site and Keyword Academy. Working fulltime and trying to blog fulltime, I only have time for these experts and I don't even read them as much as I should, but they are the experts and they tell the TRUTH.

I just wanted to let you know that next week I am starting a course offered by a university on SEO. I'm doing this because I want a little piece of paper that "officially qualifies" me as an expert in SEO. It'll look good on my CV/resume. I might need it some day. I might pick up some more knowledge, but I don't know really whether I'll learn anything new. Am just taking the course for the official little piece of paper.

You might think that this blog is not very search engine optimized, and I link out all over the place with a total disregard for "link juice" etc., etc., and yeah, you are quite correct . This is just my little space to record my blogging journey and go blah-blah-blah about certain subjects related to blogging. You should have one too!

Happy blogging into the New Year....

Veraz

P.S. Yes, I know, I know, I haven't done many articles here this year. I've been busssssy.

Blogging Paralysis

2009-01-14T05:50:00.000-08:00

Blogging paralysis. What the heck? you are probably asking. Well, it's the state I find myself in. It's something like "writer's block", except as a writer, I'm not blocked. I can still write and that's a good thing because I've got so many blogs right now, I'm feeling dizzy. I might not feel the dizziness with all these blogs, but I still have to work fulltime like many, many people and at the same time, building up one's blogging empire, you have to almost work full time on your blogging and affiliate marketing sites.

I spent a couple of months before Christmas building up about seven new sites. I wrote and I wrote and I wrote content. I might have used a little help from a tool which is something like Blog Content Wizard (a new update is available now with all kinds of added functionality) and I might have occasionally used a tool called Linky Love from Frank Carr at his site OpTempo.com. Still, most of the writing I did myself and then I might have hired some freelance writers in foreign parts of the world to help with the load of writing when Christmas was fast approaching and I hadn't even made up a Christmas shopping list, decorated, baked or dusted. The stories I could tell you about dust bunnies.

So, let's get to my main point. I think I've reached a blogging paralysis. My symptoms? Well, like I said, I can still write, so it's not writer's block that I am suffering from. I've got all these sites set up with lots of content. The keyword research was done in some cases for the sites that mattered.

Next task: getting back links. Argh! here's where the paralysis comes in. My partner is merrily getting back links to his sites and I'm stuck. I just don't know where to begin and I'm PARALYZED! I'm too chicken to ask other site owners because I wouldn't know what to say. I've managed to submit to some directories, but when it comes to actually asking a human being, oh-mi-god! I've been in this state for a week now and am wondering if the cold weather has actually frozen my brain. It's been minus 19 Celsius here with a windchill of minus 29 C. I'm not sure why I am living in this north pole-like place. I even bought a book on SEO and they have two chapters devoted to the exercise of obtaining back links to one's site. I've been reading and reading but maybe that's just because I'm trying to put off the "inevitable". Procrastination - it's the only game in town right now for me. Diagnosis: I'm suffering Blogging Paralysis.

Blogging into the New Year

2009-01-06T18:40:00.000-08:00

You may have noticed that I haven't been blogging and posting all that often and the reason is quite simple and explainable to my readers. The holidays were upon us, and I moved to a new apartment on New Years Day. The holidays were busy because I went away to visit family and friends and I was packing up our apartment like crazy. And working at a real job inbetween. I stopped blogging about a week before my move. Real life intervened in my blogging journey.

The Christmas season was upon us and that means baking, meeting up with friends, family, travelling, shopping and wrapping gifts. There is no room left for the quiet world of blogging.

My partner and I have moved to a larger apartment with one bedroom designated as our office and the spare bedroom should anybody decide to visit us.

Needless to say, I have missed the blogging. I haven't even been checking my stats. And, to note, the Google people did a page rank update on New Years Eve and I didn't even notice. However, I checked today and, yes, indeed, there's been a page rank update. One of my blogs went from a page rank of 2 to a page rank of "no page rank information available". Another of my blogs where I post even less and have about two back links to, went from a "no page rank information available" to a page rank of One. Go figure. I don't know what the experts would say about this but it is confusing and somewhat annoying.

One could always forget about the Page Rank thing and just keep writing, posting and getting back links and a little anxiety would be eased.

Anyways, I am back into the blogging and looking forward to what this year will bring. As I've always said, it's a journey and a journey in which there are always new things to learn. Hope this year brings me and you lots of traffic and a little wealth building wouldn't hurt. Happy New Year to all and may this year bring peace to all.

Blogging and Real Life

2008-12-12T11:53:00.000-08:00

I thought I'd write an article about blogging and real life. Where does blogging fit into "real life". How much time does one set aside for blogging? How do you fit blogging into your real life? These are questions I have asked myself because I notice that I may be addicted to blogging. I notice also, that my partner seems to be majorly addicted to blogging as well. Even more than I am myself.

I’ve watched him. He comes home from work, takes off his coat and boots, heads to the bathroom and then directly heads to the computer. He’s lucky, I cook dinner. He blogs till dinner and then he’s got to wash the dishes. If there’s any time before our favourite TV show, he is back on the computer again.

Me, I wake up early in the morning and I head directly for the coffee machine to make my latte, drink my latte and then check my emails. I can’t do much in the morning except check my email accounts and then it’s a mad dash for work. I take my laptop to work and then during my lunch, I attend to some blogging matters, whether it`s checking my stats, re-writing an article for submission to the article directories or doing some research for a new article or actually writing an article for one of my blogs.

During the week, I don't get much time for blogging, but come the weekend, both my partner and I are heavy duty blogging, writing, reading, researching, checking emails, finding back links or whatever. We fit into our weekends of blogging somewhere: groceries, housework, eating, sleeping, maybe running a few errands, but blogging basically takes precedent over everything.

Sometimes, I think this is ridiculous. Thank god, I don't have any babies to take care of – it would probably mean that my children would be confiscated by the authorities for a lack of neglect. People at work ask me on Mondays what I did on the weekend and mostly I answer that I was blogging and writing. Literally. They must be bored with my answers and my weekends, but, alas, I am not.

I don't have much else to take care of and we don't go out much and we don't have much of a social life. It doesn't seem to bother us much, seeing as that we are both highly addicted to blogging and both content with our addiction and unwilling to change anything much. Still, I sometimes nag my partner about things he has to do which he whines about as well but continues to procrastinate on.

So where does blogging fit into real life? Well, it fits in anywhere it can and we are still hoping to make money online and still hoping that our blogging journey will take us somewhere meaningful. Sometimes though, I get kind of discouraged because I am, at this point in my blogging empire, where the content is there and I've even hired a writer in India to help with that content. I'm working on the back links to this empire, in fact, I just started today and I'm hoping that this blogging that is taking over my life will get me somewhere indeed. It's a long path, a long journey, but I'm in it for the long run, so I keep working and keep on treading down the path of the blogger. It's a lonely path sometimes, but we must remember not to give up, like so many would-be bloggers do.

Article Submission Sites

2008-11-30T10:29:00.000-08:00

Lately I’ve been submitting some of my articles to EzineArticles, in other words, sharing blog content I’ve written with the world of blog writers. The benefits of doing this for any blogger are that, this is a legitimate method to get a few backlinks for your sites. The good news is that I was just awarded “Expert Author” status after I had submitted the first ten articles to Ezine. So I thought I’d post my Expert Author banner on this site. One small step forward in my blogging journey with the result being I can now post an unlimited number of articles at Ezine.

If you sign up for Ezine Articles, you can do the same thing. You are allowed a couple of links back to your site in the author’s box. Be sure to use your keyword anchor text to link back to your site. However, don’t submit an exact copy of your article otherwise, there is going to be a lot of duplicate content in the Google search engines. Once you have written an article for your own site, go and re-write your article and submit that article that is slightly different from your own article for your own blog.

Why would you do this? Article submission is one way to get legitimate back links to your site. Google seems to like Ezine. This makes it worth the extra effort. I also use a couple of other article submission sites, one of them being Go Articles and the other being ArticlesBase and ArticlesDashboard. GoArticles allows you to give yourself a backlink in the first paragraph which is great because if a site uses your article, they may only use the first paragraph with a “read the rest of the article by clicking here” just linking back to the article submission site which kind of cheats you out of a back link.

If you haven’t already, look into the article submission sites for your own articles for your own blog and watch your links grow. It’s a time consuming process to do it by hand and there is software available for automated article submission to the sites, but I haven’t yet got to that stage, but something tells me that my blogging journey is eventually going to have to include this on my path to making money online.

Addendum to Articles, Postings etc.

2008-11-24T15:57:00.000-08:00

Well, I quickly got a response from the owner of the website who had used my article.

It was a nice response. They told me they always credit authors.

I've had it done before when people steal your articles. Or they take your article from Ezine, scramble the words with some program and then leave your name showing at the bottom of the gobble-dy-goop. It kind of makes you look ridiculous and you can't even contact the owner of the site to ask them to delete the article.

I asked them to give me an anchor text link back to my site with my keywords. They were more than kind to do so and so quickly. How nice!

Sometimes people can surprise you in ways which leave you a pleasantly astonished to say the least. It kind of renews your faith in humanity and the blog/web world.

Ciao! for now.

Articles, Blog Postings and Thieves

2008-11-23T10:26:00.000-08:00

So, if you’ve been reading my blog and keeping up with my postings, you would probably know I’ve been blogging for about 2 years, but only in the last few months have a finally learned what the hell I’m supposed to be doing thanks to my five or six odd Gurus in making money online. Blogging is a long path, but rougher and longer for some and smoother and shorter for others. First you have to learn how to use the various blogging platforms such as Wordpress or Blogger and then you have to learn about Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and then you have to learn all about keywords.

As I’d already mentioned, I have had to learn about the value of backlinks to my sites and how to get valuable backlinks and what they mean. A back link is kind of like a vote for the value of your site in Google. It helps Google evaluate your site when they rate your site with the Google Page Ranking system. My previous article mentioned how one of my new sites – at only two and a half months old had gained a page rank of two. Hey, I was over the moon about it and felt like I finally knew what I was doing. An update to this is that I have found two other subpages in my new site that have obtained a Page Rank of One and I was equally ecstatic about this too. I guess I must have learned something from my Gurus of Blogging. I’ve done all I’ve done by writing by myself all my articles, submitting articles to a few directories manually (how time consuming this is!) deep linking within my site for the convenience of my readers and also to validate my site for Google.

Yes, I’ve been submitting re-written articles to three directories by hand. I once tried a free automated program and hated it. It got me registered at all these unknown directories and then I received thousands of emails from the admin of these sites for confirmation. All of these sites began with the letter “A” and a lot of them looking like Adsense sites. I never used this program again. So, I’ve been re-writing my articles by hand and submitting them to Ezine, GoArticles and a new site I found called ArticlesBase. I like Ezine because Google loves it. I’m waiting for Google to show me some GoArticle love. However, I love most of all ArticlesBase because they allow up to three text anchor links in your actual article and I thought that was rather generous of them. So I’m waiting to see the results of this.

Okay, so I’ve submitted my re-written articles to the directories manually, but there’s something that makes me awfully angry. I found this site that had copied one of my articles word for word from my site without my permission. Now it’s fine and dandy if someone uses my articles that I have submitted to the article directories but when someone just steals an article from my site - that kinda pisses me off. I’m going to be writing to them soon, and letting them know they can have my articles from Ezine, etc., but if they are going to just copy my article, they are going to have to give me an anchor text link back to my site on my chosen keywords.

How did I find this article thief? Well, I discovered this site called CopyScape.com. All you have to do is put in the page with the http address and then it searches for copies of your pages on the World Wide Web. I’ve placed the CopyScape “DO NOT COPY” banner on the top right hand side of my other site now because I’m miffed. I know it probably won’t stop other thieves, but at least with this program you have placed a warning on your site and you can check who’s stealing your stuff. We all know how long it takes to write articles for our blog postings. I'm going to write that email now and I'll let you all know what happens.

That’s all she wrote, I’ve got so much more to write…. Veraz

P.S. Just a footnote, I've added the CopyScape DO NOT COPY banner to this blog so you can all see what I mean. Maybe you'd like to add that to your blog or site.

Google Page Rank Update

2008-11-15T08:23:00.001-08:00

Well, the news is that Google has just completed another page rank update. I wasn't actually awaiting this with bated breath because most of my blogging sites are relatively new and I wasn't expecting anything anyways.

Last night I checked a site that I started officially on August 30th. Now if you've been reading my blog, you will know that everything I have ever known about blogging correctly has come from my list of Gurus. This list of Gurus includes Griz, Court, Justin and Vic. They are the smarty pants of the blog/internet marketing world. That's my opinion anyway.

Now, can you just imagine my surprise when I went to my blog about cheap hotels in panama and other travel information I created on August 30th - to be exact, because I went and checked the date of my first posting to my blog - I got a page rank of TWO!!!!!!! Holy smokes was I happy. I've done all the correct things, I prettied it up a little with a little favicon, I regularly post long articles I write and research myself, put up a few pics here and there and then I have gone and manually searched for back links in a natural legal way, like posting a few articles in the article submission services, a few comments here and there etc., etc., just about everything that Mr. make money online himself, Griz, teaches us to do in his blog lessons for beginners. Newbies like you and me.

Needless to say, I was really happy with this Google Page Rank update. However, most of my other blogs are too young right now - less than the 2.5 months of age of my travel blog and they don't qualify yet for a page rank from Google. Oh, I forgot, I do have another one on travel to another part of the world, but I haven't worked on back links because I've been concentrating on the Panama blog. It's a lot of work getting links if you are doing this naturally.

You can purchase back links from a variety of sites, but I am rather paranoid about buying them. A friend of mine recently purchased a back link from a site which had a page rank of 7 and a few days later, that site lost that page rank of 7, so it ending up being a waste of money and a waste of a link.

For the time being, I am doing very little automatically. I'm just doing it all by hand manually which is time consuming when you have so little time on your hands. It would be great to automate some of the blogging process especially when you have more than one blog to manage. I even write my own articles, but I know that you could hire some writers for great prices to help you build content on your blogs from sites where you can hire freelancers who bid for your projects . Does anybody have any ideas?

On the Prowl For Back Links

2008-11-07T09:57:00.000-08:00

As I had mentioned in my last posting Blogging And Following as of Late, I had mentioned that I had added another Guru to my Guru list. His name is Justin, an SEO expert. Well, he’s on my daily reading list and the guy is quite brilliant which helps me because I am not exactly a genius when it comes to writing for the search engines, keywords and long tail keywords etc., etc. However, I am learning, thanks to guys like Griz, Court and Vic who are smart enough and kind enough to share their knowledge with the general population. Had it not been for them, I would probably still be reading JC and thinking about giving up on this blog/affiliate marketing journey because nothing was happening. It’s a slooooow process.

If you’ve been reading any of these guys about how to make money online and the very important SEO stuff, you are going to know already that it’s all about the back links. To quote Justin in his video, back links are the legs upon which your site stands. That’s how important it is. If you don’t have legs, god forbid! You can’t stand up! Yikes! I never knew! I’ve designed my share of sites in my past history and I’m wondering why they still have a page rank of Zero from Google and I now know why. They don’t have any legs to stand on because they don’t have any BACK LINKS. I’ve moved on and designed some newer sites and they now have some legs or back links to stand up on. I’m posting articles about once or twice a week and hopefully, they will get better page ranking in the Google system. I write quality content with keywords and long tailed keywords in mind, I do the research and then I spend time hunting for backlinks. Yes, I am on the hunt! The sites are indexed already and that is a good thing, but they are not where I want them to be yet.

I don’t do any social media per se for my other sites, but I do a little for this site because this site is more of a social media site and I want to communicate with my fellow bloggers in the blogging universe. I learn from them, sometimes make some friends and all is well.

So, like I said, I am on the prowl for some good back links to build up my sites “legs”. I’ll find some, no doubt in my own blogging empire – whenever that gets started which might be at about 2:00 p.m. today. Who knows?!?!!! But I’m still looking for backlinks, low or high quality backlinks like a huntress in the jungle and it’s a slow process for sure, riddled with danger. I always wish someone would publish a step by step guide listing where you get backlinks but that might not be a very safe option because the journey for everyone and every blog must be an individual, varied and natural process. I’ve heard there’s software that can help but I haven’t tried anything like that yet.

One of the ways I’ve learned to get back links is to submit articles to various directories and I have used a couple of them – GoArticles and EzineArticles. Both of them I like. I tried the free download of article submitter, but I didn’t really like some of the directories they hook you up to – most of them seemed kind of unknown and unimportant. I guess I’m just picky. Perhaps that’s just the case with the free version of Article Submitter. I also tried ArticleMarketer, the free version, but now they want me to buy it and I don’t have the spare cash right now. Right now, I’ll just stay with GoArticles and Ezine and submit my re-writes to those sites.

Anyways, that’s it for today’s report on my blogging journey. I’m off to build an empire…

Blogging and Following As of Late

2008-11-01T06:32:00.000-07:00

It would appear that I have been a bit lazy as of late, not updating my blog on my latest works in progress, but that isn't actually the case. If the truth be told, I have been down with the flu, reading alot and working on my other sites. Researching, writing and flu time has arrived again. Busy, busy, busy.

Of course, my previous posting was merely a privacy policy, but I've heard from the experts that Google needs to see a privacy policy. So, I made up a privacy policy to put up on this Blogger site and my other sites as well. Another thing they like to see is a site map, which I've worked out in Blogger but not in Wordpress yet. Not exactly sure how to use the plugin or which plugin is best, so when I really feel driven to find out how to make a site map in Wordpress, I'll get to it.

About the reading. Well, I've discovered some other Gurus whom I might have mentioned before. One of these guys is named Justin, an SEO Master at SEOZombie. I'm learning alot from him about key words and writing for the search engines. He's got some excellent and very informative articles on SEO. I realize after blogging for maybe two years, I've had a lot to learn on writing for the search engines and long and short keywords. Optimize, optimize, optimize.

The other expert I've discovered is Frank Carr at Optempo.com. I've liked his site for awhile now and he's got some great software to sell at very reasonable prices. Go have a look at his Link Luv Post Builder and his Blog Content Wizard if you are a blogger short on time and in need of ideas to generate some new material for your blogs, but not your main blogs, you might try out these tools. Hey! but who's short on time.?!?

So, I'm going to add Justin and Frank to my list of gurus to follow now. I think I have enough Gurus for learning the ins and outs of blogging, niche blogging and affiliate marketing. I surely don't have any time available to learn from anyone else. I'm feeling kinda grateful to these guys. So, in total, with Griz, Vic, Court and now Justin and Frank, I think I have enough guys to follow and learn from.

I started a business blog almost two years ago, but it only earns a little bit of money every now and then. If I had found these guys two years ago, I would have saved myself a lot of time and energy and made some comforting cash. The problem with my first blog is it covers too many subjects - categories and the articles are soooo not optimized for the search engines. I suppose I could always sell it (after reading this article by Court on "Would Anyone Like to Sell Their Site" I thought about it for one minute). My site is aged, is already in the search engines with tons of research and articles. I have had many compliments on the actual content of the site from my readers. The problem with the articles though is that they are NOT OPTIMIZED FOR THE SEARCH ENGINES. The other problem is that I didn't know enough about link building back in the early days of my blogging. If I had the time, I would go back and delete some articles, some categories and focus my content and keywords on my target audience. I would start building up some backlinks to the site. I would hate to sell the site knowing that some good cash could be made from it in the future. I know myself well enough, that, if Court took over this site and it started making some good money, I would be sooooooo jealous for weeks on end! So right now, I'm just letting it sit there. I have written one article in the last month for the site, and it's probably the only good SEO article that I have written for the whole site.

Also of note, I've been reading and learning about back links. I'm finding they're awfully difficult to find and acquire. Google also values the number of backlinks to a site and this is a very time-consuming process when one has one blog or a network of blogs. However, I did check out one of my new dotcom Wordpress blogs and I have two backlinks and I have NO IDEA WHERE THEY COME FROM! I checked out the sites that are linking to me - and I still have no idea. The person that linked to me added a wink emoticon... And I am so grateful to whomever this is and I'm thinking this person is my angel and the happy feeling lasted for about three long hours. Wow! thank you someone!

And lastly, I created my first Squidoo Lens yesterday. It was actually fun to do. I used a tutorial which said the lens could be created in 10 minutes, but it took longer than that. I'll probably make a few more shortly and then after that, go and learn about HubPages.

Free time, where have you gone? Oh yeah, I know this article is not optimized for anything. It's just my obscure ramblings on my blog journey about what I've learned and where I'm going to.

'til later, Vera Z.

Privacy Policy

2008-10-21T04:04:00.000-07:00

Privacy Policy for vera-works-in-progress.blogspot.com

The privacy of my visitors to Vera-Works-in-Progress is important.
At Vera-Works-in-Progress I recognize that privacy of your personal information is very important. Here is a listing of what types of personal information I receive and collect when you use visit Vera-Works-in-Progress and how I protect your information. I never sell your personal information to third parties.
Log Files

Like most other websites, I collect and use the data contained in log files. The information in the log files include your IP (internet protocol) address, your ISP (internet service provider, the browser you used to visit my site (such as Internet Explorer or Firefox), the time you visited the site and which pages you visited throughout the site.
Cookies

I do use cookies to store information, such as your personal preferences when you visit my site.
You can choose to disable or turn off “my cookies” or third-party cookies in your browser settings, or in your anti-virus program. However, this can affect how you are able to interact with my site as well as with other websites. This could mean that you would be unable to login to services or programs such as forums or accounts.

Thanks for visiting.

Organic Traffic vs. Social Traffic

2008-10-14T18:47:00.000-07:00

I’ve been rather busy of late, not writing much here because I’ve been busy with my other sites, setting up my blogging empire, or should I call them my marketing sites?

I call this site a “work in progress” because it’s exactly that. It is a work in progress, tracking my learning, my experimenting, my successes, my failures in blogging and affiliate marketing. I’ve got a lot to learn and I’m learning everyday. That must be the true essence of what living a life is all about. You learn as you go, you have successes and failures, and you just keep learning and gaining experience. Sometimes the path you take is smooth and sometimes it’s as rough as a mountain edge above the tree line.

This morning I did some “social media” stuff for this blog and only this blog. It’s a necessary thing, to participate in the blogging community, to meet other bloggers, exchange ideas, learn from the community and share the knowledge. It’s also a great way to increase your readership if you are a social blogger. This is a social blog and there’s no shame at all in having a social blog. However, on the other hand, if you have marketing sites, it’s best to avoid social media for a couple of reasons. One of those reasons is that fellow bloggers aren’t actually visiting your site to purchase stuff. The second reason for avoiding social media when you are an affiliate marketer is that with affiliate marketing, you only want organic traffic sent to you by the search engines, Google and Yahoo, etc. It’s all about organic traffic, is it not?

How do you get organic traffic? Your goal is to get onto the first page in Google for whatever subject your site is about. This way, you are getting pure organic traffic to your site and people are more likely to come to your website in search of information about a product they are considering buying. People who are looking for product information will most likely click on the ads you run on your site and purchase something. This is what it’s all about. And I’m not going to be teaching you about how you do these things here because there are already the experts or the “gurus” if one could call them that with great sites which teach you these things. I have already mentioned their names on my site – the great ones I have learned from and I would/could not ever compete with them. I am not yet an expert on how to make money online and I will not be a pretender. I’m not into faking it.

Yes, I am talking about Griz, Court and Vic and I might be adding one other guy I’ve been reading as of late at SEOZombie. Go check out these guys and learn from the greatest. I’ve already mentioned in past articles how I wasted a year of my life on JC and like a scorned woman, I keep questioning myself, what did I ever see in him? How could I have wasted so much time on him?

I’m still trying to get onto the first page with my new sites, but it’s probably going to take awhile. What am I doing as I am waiting for the miracle to come? I’m learning about search engine optimization, learning more about writing content that is rich in the keywords I am writing about. I’m learning about how to get back links that matter. I’m learning how to market my blog. Whoever said this was easy might be crazy, but some things do get easier as time goes by. And to top this whole learning process off, I am constantly writing quality content for the sites that I hope will make me some money eventually.

What else am I doing? Well, since I’ve been in the long term habit of writing, I have set up another site where I am offering my skills as a freelance writer for hire. When the site is ready to reveal to the public, I’ll probably link to that site from here, but my new baby is not ready yet. All this commerce is keeping me quite busy lately. I haven’t got time for anything and there are dust bunnies rolling about my apartment like you wouldn’t believe. I’m okay about that. I would hate to be dying of boredom and it’s okay with me to work hard at something I love. After all, a labour of love is not really labour at all.

Happy blogging and affiliate marketing! Veraz.

Blogging to Travel

2008-10-05T05:48:00.000-07:00

I guess I'm one of the lucky ones. Since I was a child, I have had the opportunity to travel. Once bitten by the travel bug, you will never be able to cure yourself of the disease. Travelitus I think it's called.

It was always my goal to travel the world and I could say that I've almost achieved it but not quite. That is one of the reasons that blogging fits so well into my life plans and goals. You can blog from anywhere in the world. All you need is a laptop or an internet cafe. Now as I get older, I've visualized the future for myself. I'm sitting under a palm tree somewhere on some white sand beach, close to a straw thatched roof bar and internet access and I'm managing my blogs. My usual costume in these fantasies is a loose white t shirt and a pair of shorts and some flip flops (my favorite footwear). I might be wearing a sunhat to protect myself from the harmful rays of the sun. Then again, I might not be.

When I was young, my parents took my siblings and I on fabulous trips to distant destinations on other continents, we experienced different cultures, saw amazing architecture, stayed in some good, some bad hotels, walked around towns built centuries ago, explored museums, castles, mountains. We were constantly surrounded by foreign languages which gave most of us in the family the gift to learn different languages. This opportunity was one of the greatest things in our childhood. However, the negative thing about all this travel was that most of my siblings and I were bitten by the travel bug.

Since then, my adult life has continued to be a life of travel to far off destinations. The funny thing is, I've found myself wondering why I didn't move to one of these far off destinations. I've been pondering that as of late.

So this is where blogging and my future goals fit in. As a blogger and freelance writer, I have written many travel articles for other people's blogs and I have several travel blogs myself. I can write from experience about the different countries I have been to, about their cultures, their hotels, their restaurants and good and bad experiences while travelling to different places. I love to write about other countries and different cultures.

I have other interests which I also write about, so I will never be bored. This blogging thing requires lots of research, lots of blogging knowledge and writing skills. Add to this, there are long hours involved in the whole process. I'm certainly not one that, once I retire I'll drop dead. (You always hear stories of people who retire and then drop dead because working was their whole life and they suddenly have nothing to do - get some hobbies now! I say). I've got so much to do, so many more places to travel to and SO LITTLE TIME LEFT!

A Business Plan

2008-10-01T04:12:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I was thinking about my online business and to what level I want to take it. Yes, like everyone else, I want to make money online and quit the corporate world of nine to five working to make someone else richer. Hey, I want to make ME richer. I want to work at what I love doing and I want to work the hours I want. Perhaps you are thinking the same thoughts as I am. You and I, we, want to have our own online business. So, how exactly are we to achieve this?

I was searching many blogs yesterday trying to find out exactly what steps one has to take to do this and I couldn't find anything that was short and sweet. We need Steps. We need a Plan. What's the plan? How does one create a successful online business and become a successful internet marketer?

During my search, I did read some articles from some professional bloggers which vaguely mentioned how they did it. It was almost like detective work, but nowhere did I find a "Plan", a step by step guide. I was looking for this. One thing I did notice was that most of these people did not mention how they went from a fulltime job to a fulltime internet marketer. That would be an interesting article. I would be reading it.

Within their stories, they seemed to have one thing in common. They don't seem to have been working fulltime and blogging fulltime. That seems to be the common thread. Not working fulltime seems to be how they made the transition to fulltime internet marketers/affiliate marketers. First, you need TIME, that precise commodity.

If you have done the reading of the most helpful and honest sites (I've mentioned their names in previous articles) about this type of career, you will notice that there is SO MUCH TO DO to launch a career working for yourself and having a "career" as an internet marketer. Just exactly how do you do all the tasks you need to do to launch many blogs and sites in order for you to make money online?

All corporations have something called a "Project Manager". What a Project Manager does is create a project and list the major tasks needed to be completed by a "Team" working on the project in order for the Project to be successfully implemented. The Project Manager needs to know the end goal and how his team is going to get there - to achieve the goal successfully. Working below this Project Manager is a team, the people with the skills necessary to take the project to the "end goal". In this way, the corporation/ the business will achieve its goals for the year and continue to profit.

So I figure that if you and I are going to be a success in this online business thing, we have to set ourselves up as a Project Managerand a team and we have to know the end goal is the success of each project. Each blog we set up, therefore, is a "Project". We are the Project Manager, we are the team that will enable the project to become a success. Therefore, let's take as an example, Project No. 1 which is blog No. 1.

First of all you have to decide the subject of your project. This will require some keyword research. Once you have decided what your new project/blog/affiliate marketing site is going to be about, you have to start building it and then writing quality content. I am assuming you are at this point and you know how to optimize your content for the search engines. Now what are the list of tasks you must follow through to make this project work before you even think of monetizing your new blog?

What I did was to create an Excel sheet with the list of tasks necessary because I didn't want to miss any steps and since I have started an online business, I felt the need to stay organized. I created an actual hardcopy file of each site. These files I keep in an actual office filing drawer, stored alphabetically.

Each file contains the name of the site/blog, a list of passwords, my Excel task tracking sheet (which guides me through the project and ensures me that I have done all the necessary steps for each of my "projects".

My project task sheet contains the following information, the step by step guide to building each site. I thought I would provide my readers with this information so you will not be missing any crucial steps for your own business projects. You don't have to make a hardcopy of it, but I do because maybe I like to have a file, a piece of paper in hand. So here it is for my readers. Make your own task sheet for your own individual projects. I am not going to explain here why you should do any of the following tasks. If you are on your way to being a professional blogger, affiliate marketer, then you should know already the reasons why you must complete these tasks. For some of the tasks, you can buy software to maximize your time, but if you are new, you may have to do this all manually until you start making money. If you think I've missed any crucial steps, please drop me an email or make a comment. I always welcome suggestions.

Name: the first column will contain the name of your site/blog/project
Articles: you should write at least 6 quality articles. I usually write about 10 and then I update anywhere from 1 - 4 times per month
Submit your site to the search engines. I submit to Google, Yahoo and MSN
Get a StatCounter on your site. Head over to StatCounter.com. You do this so you can track your visitors and other stats.
Submit an article to GoArticles.com. I start with one and then do more article submission later
Submit an article to ArticleMarketer.com. Same as above.
Submit an article to Ezine.com. Same as above.
Register your site at Technorati.
Register your site at Digg.
Register at Feedburner.
Register at Del.icio.us.
Tag on Del.icio.us.
Link to your other RELATED blogs only.
Submit your site to BloggingZoom.com

After you have completed all these basic steps, I would advise that you find a way to get more backlinks - one way back links to your site. This is very very important, but that's another article of course. And if you are at this point in your online business, you should already know the importance of backlinks.

Check where you are in the search engines. Once you have a good ranking in Google and lots of backlinks, it's time to monetize your blog.

Hope this article helps... till later...Vera.

Boring Sunday

2008-09-28T10:30:00.000-07:00

Well, it's another Sunday, the day before the week of work begins, Mundane Mondays, Tiring Tuesdays, Weary Wednesdays, Thirsty Thursdays and Fabulous Fridays.

I've spent the morning working on' my other blogs both of them being travel information blogs. I was writing some articles and posting them. I downloaded an updated template for my wordpress blog and fixed it up to appear the way it did before. I discovered that one of the plugins I was using was causing an error to display and my tag cloud not to work. If you clicked on a link in the tag cloud, it was going to an error 404, page not found.

The older of my two blogs, one about Panama, has enough articles now on it to look somewhat respectable and I won't have to update it so often now. I have to get some more natural backlinks to it and I've been using some Article Submission Directories. I haven't actually commented on anyone else's blogs yet. I might do that in the future. I certainly haven't decided about that yet.

Soon I am going to start searching for another topic to blog about, but that will require some keyword research. My second blog only has a few articles on it and I am going to have to write much more quality content for it to actually make it something worth going to for the audiences. So far, I have no back links to that one.

I've been thinking, later, I am going to set myself up as a freelance writer so I will probably have to set up another blog site for that. I write alot and might as well just make my services available for others to use. It's an idea any way. I occasionally write for others and just maybe, I could set myself up in a business.

Anyways, Sundays are relatively boring and I've got housework to do, looming its ugly head and then I should get some groceries if I expect to eat during the week. Just another boring Sunday.

'til later, Vera....

Lessons from the Gurus

2008-09-27T07:04:00.000-07:00

In learning the nuances to becoming a successful blogger or affiliate marketer, the resources online are sometimes overwhelming. Where does one begin when there is so much information available? Who do you trust to give your accurate information?

When I first started blogging about two years ago - okay, I have to tell you, I am a late bloomer. I've worked in the computer industry since about 1995 and moved to internet technologies after that. I finally found the area I loved and that is graphic and web design. Two years ago, I discovered blogging (I know, that's late) but I still didn't actually start a real blog on my own until six months after that. What took me so long to start? Well, I had one look at Wordpress and the learning curve involved and I thought it would be quicker to set up an html website and try and do the same thing that blogs do. Another mistake on the path to "blogging"/ affiliate marketing success. A further mistake was that I was following the wrong people, for example, John Chow, thinking I could do the same things as he did and make the thousands of dollars that he did.

One day, I discovered Court's website and eureka, I started cluing in. From Courtney, I landed on Griz and from Griz, I discovered Blogger Unleashed. These guys tell you how to make money online. They're dishing the cold hard facts. I love them!

Anyways, I've been writing like crazy for my two other blogs, doing the research, writing and giving up on housework, my social life, cooking great food, lunch hours and just about everything else. I've been getting back links, writing here, seo and all that stuff. I want more from life than this and this little voice in my head keeps saying when I return home from work and am turning the key in the lock of my door: "there must be more than this to life..." I think that's a line from a song, is it not?

So today, I discovered this other great little site called Optempo. Another gem of a site discovered! Full of information to help bloggers and affiliate marketers. Anyways, there's a lot of information on this site and as always, it's a question of "where do I begin?" (Is that not also another line to some old song?) I think this site might solve even more of the roadblocks on the path to blogging/affiliate marketing success. Eureka! I have discovered another Guru in the blogging/internet marketer world.

Social Media

2008-09-26T09:20:00.000-07:00

In the world of Web 2.0 which brought us blogging and website content created by readers, writers and just about everyone... how important is social media? Well, my answer is, if you are a blogger and want traffic, then the world wide community that is social media is very important.

With social media, it is one of the best ways to promote your blog. It is one of the best ways to get in touch with other bloggers, share ideas, contribute to the world of blogging, exchange links, meet new friends, learn about new technology and increase your traffic.

This blog here, Vera's Works in Progress is my newest blog. You can see that I just have a few articles on my site because it's a new blog. I work full time and only have time to blog mostly on weekends and today which is Friday because I took the day off of work. Don't worry, I didn't call in sick or anything, I actually got the time off because I've been working so much overtime lately. I don't get alot of time to post articles because I do have other blogs which are sort of blogs but they might also be known as sites which I develop which hopefully one day will make money online. Oh yeah, about making money online. This is NOT a make money online blog because if I'm really honest with you, I don't have a lot of clues about making money online and couldn't pretend to know about making money online and make a fake blog about making money online. I leave that to the experts on making money online which I shall name only as Griz, Vic and Court. I would call myself a student of these three people, let's say. I would never compete with them - because you might become known as an idiot if you tried. However, I've learned lots from these guys. I'm giving these guys free links because I'm really grateful to them after being so conned by J. Chow from whom I learned zippo.

Anyways, so if you are a blogger and like to write about certain subjects, your personal life, your favorite hobbies, whatever, social media is important for friendship building, communicating with others in the blogosphere and getting traffic to your personal blogs. I'm not teaching you here how to use social media, you can go to the sites for social media or search them out in Google if you like.

Some of the social media I like are Digg, MyBloglog, Blogcatalog, Technorati to name a few. As you can see in my right hand sidebar, since starting this site, I have signed up for MyBlogLog and Blogcatalog. I'm not in a rush for traffic just yet because it's very important for a blog to get some quality content for one's readers to read and as you can see by the small amount of articles on my site, hey, I'm just new. So if you are a new visitor here and you're not exactly seeing much right now, just stay tuned as I develop quality content for my brand new blog which is about a couple of subjects so far. Hope you enjoy and thanks for visiting.

New Technology

2008-09-26T08:19:00.000-07:00

I bought a new laptop recently with Windows Vista on it. Let me express my pure disgust with Windows Vista. And let me clarify further. I never wanted Windows Vista in the first place. I just wanted plain old reliable Windows XP.

I didn’t really want Windows Vista on my laptop because I have not ceased hearing bad news about the new operating system. I’ve had my new laptop for about a month. First of all, it’s loaded with crap I don’t want on my laptop and I have not the slightest interest in. I want basic programs that do what I want them to do, I want an anti-virus program and I want a word processing program and I want email. I just want the few things that I want on my laptop. Not too much to ask for. Okay, well I do want a large hard drive, good memory and speed. The basics – just what everybody wants. Well, let me tell you about my goddamn new laptop.

Well, for one, it constantly feels the need to update my Windows. This happens once or twice a day. Every day. This takes about an hour. There is no choice for me to cancel the update. The next step in this process is to restart my machine, run the Startup Repair program and finally I get onto my laptop. Not bad – hah! Start up time for my laptop with the great big hard drive is about an hour. I am honestly thinking of purchasing a 2nd or 3rd hand computer – I could probably get more done.

Then for the free 30 day version of Norton Anti-virus which is installed on my laptop. Everyday during the 30 day trial period, it has needed to be 1) fixed 2) updated. Yeah, I know anti-virus programs have to be updated frequently, but sometimes having to both fix and update at least twice a day is a bit much. I actually have work to do. Christ! All I can say is – how pathetic. I’ve tried to download another anti-virus. Took me ages to find out where the hell it downloaded to and then I haven’t a clue how to run the thing. I'm still stuck with the trial version of Norton Anti-Virus.

After this all happened – my access to hook up to Wifi seems to have “disappeared". So, I restarted my laptop again and lo and behold! I’ve got another Windows update to go through! That’s finished a half hour later and now it’s running the Startup Repair as I write this post. Don’t shut down your machine while this is going on.

So, I am going to call the computer store where I bought the laptop first. Then I’m going to have to find a computer expert to take off this goddamn Windows Vista, put Windows XP on my machine and only the programs that I want on MY Laptop.

Sometimes, I get sick of these software companies. They keep coming out with new versions of that and that software and they try to convince us how much we need it when the current version of software we are running does all the tasks we need it to already. So I am reverting back to what works, what fits my demanding requirements and to hell with all these goddamn updates. I am NOT VERY pleased.

Backlinks

2008-09-24T02:06:00.000-07:00

Serious bloggers will know about the value of having quality backlinks to their blog sites. Well, yesterday was a great day for me just discovering that one of my blogs I created on August 31st was showing up in Google on page three for one of my keywords. Then I searched some more and discovered I had another link in Google on page two.

It's taken me just over three weeks to get into the Google index in such a good place. You're probably wondering how I did it. Well, first of all, I had been doing alot of reading about the value of Search Engine Optimization and the value of backlinks. After I had learned my lessons, I had to put this into action.

First of all, it is important to write quality content and to write using your keywords. I have about 13 articles and a few pages on my new blog. These keywords I have included in many of my articles. The blog I am talking about is about a certain subject and only one subject. (I'm not talking about this blog, Vera's Works in Progress which is my own various ramblings about the subject of my blog journey and my blog projects. When I create a new blog, I concentrate on one subject only.

The second thing I do, after writing an article is to re-write that article using synonyms and different phrases and then I submit it to different article submission directories. There are a few free programs out there that can do this for you and save you alot of time. I only used that briefly but wasn't too impressed with my first attempt at using it, so I just submitted to a few good article submission directories. Remember, the blog I'm having success with is only several weeks old.

What directories did I submit to? Well, the few I'm working with right now are GoArticles.com, and Ezine.com and ArticleSubmit.com. So, do they help you to get backlinks? Yes, I'm finding they are quick. Another thing is that they are free to use.

Other ways to get back links are more expensive. It appears that companies are now charging high prices for bloggers or affiliate marketers to get back links on high page ranking sites. So, a new market is developing in the blog world because everyone has just learned of the value of quality back links.

There are other ways to get back links as well. If you have friends in the blogging world, you can ask them to give you a back link using anchor text for your back link. You can exchange links but one way back links are of more value. Also, the higher the page rank you get this link from, the better it is for you and your site.

Anyways, I just wanted to share my good news of discovering my very young blog is now ranking high in the Google search engine for a couple of my key word searches. It just made my otherwise boring day a little bit exciting when you can see your hard work kind of paying off.

That's all for now, signing off.

Writing Articles and Blogging

2008-09-21T15:49:00.000-07:00

I've been busy this weekend writing articles for my two blogs. Both of them are travel blogs. I like to travel and nothing is more pleasant than writing about the places one has visited and longs to go back to.

One of them is about Panama and the other is about Venice, Italy. I recently started them. The blog about Panama got started around August 31st. I was researching and writing articles like crazy and currently I have about 12 articles on the site. The other blog is about that lovely city in Italy called Venice that I visited and would love to go back to.... Just one more time.

But I'm not ready to announce them just yet. The Venice blog needs quite a few more articles.

It takes lots of time though to do the research, set up your sites, write, find photos. I feel like I haven't had a weekend off for the last month. Needless to say, the housework gets put to the side and I don't have much of a social life to speak of.

Then there is all the Search Engine Optimization stuff you have to do for a blog and that's a time consuming process. I actually have quite a few sites and blogs and keeping them organized is a lot of work too. I came up with a system. I created a generic chart in Excel to keep track of what I have done for each blog. There are columns with labelled with all the tasks of creating a blog. Submit to Google, Yahoo, MSN. Submit to Technorati, Post Articles to this and that article submission site. I'm still trying to work out this system and I will give more completed notes when I am finished. It's all about keeping organized once you have more than just a few sites going.

I've been wondering what this blog, Vera's Works in Progress is all about and really, it's just about my blog journey to quitting the rat race and going to live in some beautiful sunny place. I have this fantasy that I'll be sitting somewhere in a warm climate on a beach, under a palm tree, laptop on my lap and just blogging away, managing my empire. But that's a long way off. Right now, I'm just blogging on the weekends and my lunch hours working within someone else's corporate structure.

Vera's Work in Progress Blog

2008-09-14T10:46:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my Work in Progress Blog!

I'd like to introduce myself. My name is Vera and this is one of my blogs. I'll be sharing the rest of their names later on in my blog.

I'm not an internet millionnaire yet. I'm still working fulltime as a web designer/graphic artist, but over the last two years, I ventured into blogs and I am doing this on my personal time.

However, I decided to try and earn my living from blogging and after a year and a half to two years of blogging, making mistakes, learning, learning and learning and finally being able to sort out the liars from the learned, I think I might stand a chance.

About two years ago, not ready to learn blogging, I set up a web site to make money online. But I soon learned that a web site has a lot of drawbacks for making money online. At the time, I was reading John Chow's blog site, but I think he was giving us all false information - because I followed all his rules and didn't really make much money to speak of. He surely had some blackhat tricks he wasn't sharing. I wasn't learning. That's the truth.

Somehow, I discovered Courtney Tuttle's site and I finally felt like I had stumbled upon something. I was learning things I had never learned before. From Courtney Tuttle's site, I clicked over to Griz's Make Money Online site and from his site - I started visiting BloggerUnleashed and watching Vic's video logs. He's vulgar, honest and terribly funny! I love him! Apart from the love, though, I've learned a lot of stuff on blogging and making money online. These three guys should be known as the Gurus on Blogging. My white hat off to you guys!

My Vera's Work in Progress blog is not actually about making money online because I don't pretend to be an expert on making money online by any stretch of the truth. I've got a bunch of other blogs I work on about such subjects as beauty, travel and other luxury items. I'm hoping I will be able to set up a large portfolio on blogs, BANS sites and other websites to create a portfolio which will take me down the golden path of retirement. Hey, I've still got time.

So, what's it all about, this blog. It's about my journey into internet marketing, travel, food, beauty, aging, and other weird things I see and learn and just about anything I would feel like posting to the world.

Signing off for now, talk to you later, Vera.