People frequently underestimate the power of blogs and blogging in building a business online, whether it be a network marketing business, a typical Internet marketing business or a traditional brick-and-mortar business needing an online presence.  The main reason I feel people overlook the power of blogs is their lack of understanding of how blogs work, combined with the fact that the blogging world is far larger than they could ever estimate and has giant followings in almost every market niche. 

I’ve used blogs for the past year to successfully build a growing downline in my network marketing organization.  I don’t blog daily, because I lack the time, but I do blog several times per week on multiple blogs and with great success, earning far more through my network marketing company than I could ever hope to make from running Google Adsense ads.

Most people are not aware of the fact that when they blog using a content management system for blogs like Wordpress, a notification of each article you write is pinged (i.e., sent) to at least 20 different major blog directories through a pingining network (in the case of Wordpress) called Pingomatic.  Search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN and Ask are combing theee blog directories 24 hours per day to learn when new websites appear and when new pages are published.  Each time they discover headline links to previously unspidered websites and webpages on these blog directories, the search engine’s algorithms make note of a need to spider the blog website it found at the blog directory.  All of this is going on the background without your knowledge.

The main point to be made here is that if you do nothing but blog, the Internet world will find and discover you and search engines will bring you traffic.  And the great thing about this type of traffic when you’re promoting your network marketing company, is that these are totally free leads that cost you nothing but the time it takes to write and post articles to you blog.  Search engines love blogs because they know they’re a great source for fresh and original content, and what they want to pass on to their search engine users is good content sites.

With each of the blogs I write to promote my network marketing company, I always provide links to my network marketing company eStore to gain new product sales, and  I always link to a recruiting website provided by my upline to help in recruiting new associates for me.  Thus, by hardwiring my blogs to my e-commerce site and my sponsoring site, I end up putting most of my network marketing business on autopilot.

To see an example of how I accomplish this, click on this link to visit my sponsoring site, or click on this link to go to my product sales store.

I’ve been purchasing web hosting now for over ten years.  Along the way I’ve had great web hosts, good web hosts and several I wouldn’t want to wish on my worst enemy.  The ones I call bad are the ones that range from web hosting firms that let me down on service to the ones that never had any intentions of providing any level of service, regardless their claims or sales promises. 

Many people feel that if you pay more you should get better service.  That’s simply not true.  I’ve been using HostGator.com’s web hosting services for many years and have never been let down by them on quality and speed of service.  They have always been “Johnny on the spot” when it comes to servicing my needs and fixing any issues that have come up from time to time.  And if you want someone that offers fast service over the phone, via a chat line or via email, these guys are great. 

When I first signed up with Host Gator several years ago their packages were very competitive in terms of costs versus features.  Others now offer more features for lower rates, but Host Gator is still considered competitive and reliable.  Trust me when I say that reliability is an issue and one you need to consider.  I once had 400 sites on one server earning me over $1,000 a day.  The server went down, the hosting company dragged their feet on fixing the problem for almost a month, I lost everything!  It took me several months to rebuild all the sites and by then I could never get the income back up to anything near my previous letters.  During the month I was down Google and the other major search engines simply concluded the websites were closed and I lost my valuable search engine indexing.  Needless to say, I learned a valuable lesson as to why one should never put all your eggs in one basket. 

Whether you’re just starting out with hosting your first domain name or wish to significantly cut your costs of hosting on one or a hundred domain names, it’s hard to beat the bang for the buck you can get with Web Hosting Pad.  These guys are tops in my book when you consider what you get for the money.  You can host unlimited domain names, have 1,700 gigabytes of hard drive space (Yes! That’s 1,700 gigabytes — no typo), and 17,000 gigabytes of monthly bandwidth for an average monthly price of as little as $4.95 per month.  I know it sounds too good to be true, but it’s not — this is the real deal.  I’m talking cPanel hosting with Fantastico — the works, with much, much more!  I always prided myself on my ability to find great deals online, but Web Hosting Pad, without question, represents the best deal I’ve ever found online.  Give them a try, you’ll be glad you did.  I also use the boys at Bluehost.com and have been quite happy with their services, but Web Hosting Pad offers far more disk space and bandwidth for far less money. 

As many of you know I’ve been doing business online for 10+ years.  I’ve written and sold e-books, built hundreds of content sites running Google Adsense ads (pulling in six-figure income) and once proved I could go from a nobody to eBay Powerseller in 90 days. 

None of these business models had what I called long-term “teeth.”  eBooks, for example, quickly become out-of-date and no longer popular.  One must keep writing and producing new books to hold income levels up.  Sure, there are ways to do this, but research and writing can become a huge “time drains” that don’t bring in income. 

One can make money selling on eBay, but you’ll work day and night no matter how much you automate your eBay business.  The amount of email communication between seller and buyer is unbelievable, popular products have tremendous competition on eBay that drives down margins, unique products are hard to find, yada, yada, yada.

Building content sites to produce ad revenue take even more time because the days of creating machine-driven content and having it rank high are gone.  Google’s programmers have done an excellent job of weeding out bad content and duplicate content.  I’ve personally witnessed my Adsense revenue drop from six-figures per year to 6 cents per day (at times).  No joke!

So, for the past year I’ve dedicated a great deal of my time to finding an online business model that would produce ever-growing profits successfully for a lifetime.   My criteria for finding and determining the ultimate work from home business was to find a business that could be done from home, parttime or fulltime, online or offline, proven products from a competent trusting supplier, products that are “consumable” and have to be replaced as they are consumed, products that are backed by a moneyback guarantee, products I am proud to sell and would use myself, a supplier that provides excellent customer service and has a proven track record for solid research and production of great products that remain popular for multiple generations (i.e., they don’t die out). products that offer healthy commissions of at least 25% or more, and lastly, a business that would not die when I die — one that could be passed on to my spouse or family member.

Was I successful in this hunt?  Yes, indeed I was, and the answer has existed for 140 years!  In fact, its been staring me smack dab in the face since I was 4 years old.  That’s right - 4 years old!  For when I was 4 years old my parents moved the family from Kansas City, Missouri to my grandfather’s farm in rural Louisiana.  My grandfather was a poor truck farmer, that rarely went into town shopping.  What little shopping I did see and remember him doing was buying detergent, liniment, Petro-Carbo salve, vanilla, kitchen spices, extracts and various other household and personal products from the man we all came to know as “The Watkins Man.”  Yes, the company I speak of is non other than Watkins Incorporated, manufacturer of personal home products for 140 years.

Starting in 1868 in Plainview, Minnesota with one home run product, the now famous Watkins Red Liniment, the company has grown to manufacturing 350 in-demand products that every consumer can use.  They sell through a network of 50,000 associates, and most recruiting and selling these days is done online.  In fact, when you sign up at Watkins you get a website just like this one.

The total capital required to start a Watkins business is less than it costs to take a family of 4 to the movies in my hometown of Houston, Texas.  Watkins offers anyone the opportunity to own a piece of Americana.  You’ll be selling products your great grandparents, your grandparents and more than likely your parents used.  And the beauty of it all is that these products are more popular today than they were 50 years ago.  Watkins has 50,000 associates marketing there products in North America.  We offer anyone interested in learning more about the Watkins experience a free ebook that answers most of the questions you might have.  Keep reading this blog and I’ll take you along my personal trip to success as a Watkins Associate.  I’ll demonstrate how easy it is to recruit and sell these products online.

Over the past 9 years of doing business on the web I’ve purchased several thousand dollars worth of e-books and online courses, all guaranteeing me the opportunity to earn millions online.  I didn’t purchase any of these so-called blueprints to online entrepreneurship success because I’m a sucker.  In fact, I was skeptical about most of what I purchased, but purchased them anyway as a matter of on-going research and not because I was so much interested in the author’s moneymaking system, but more so because I felt I could pick up a few good useful tips along the way — tips I wasn’t already aware of at the time.

That said, when I look back on these purchases and realize I’ve outlived most all of the web entrepreneurs I’ve bought from, it becomes quickly evident that most work at home guru websites fall far short of their promises.  Some are even nothing more than another internet scam to make money. 

How can you spot a work at home scam when you come across one?  There’s no guaranteed way of spotting a work at home or work from home scam, but a few pointers I can offer are as follows:

• Read the testimonials on the entrepreneur’s sales page and try to visit the sites of every person providing a testimonial.  Many times you’ll find they are no longer operating.  So ask yourself this question, “If this plan is as good as the author or website owner claims it is, why has former purchasers of his moneymaking system gone out of business?
• Read the moneyback guarantee closely, seeing how it is worded.  Every web entrepreneur selling an e-book will have a moneyback guarantee.  If you find one that doesn’t offer a 30-day or more moneyback guarantee, then move on to another site.  On the otherhand, if they offer a guarantee, read it closely for trickly language or loopholes that would give the seller an easy way out, living you holding the bag.
• Make sure all links on the sale page works.  Only today I found a website that was offering a terriffic moneymaking tool for webmasters.  I wanted to find out more about the product, but couldn’t because most of the links to online videos and audios covering the product were broken links.  Thus, ask yourself this simple question — “If the system the webmaster is peddling is so great and he’s selling so many copies, why does he have so many links that are not working?”  This is typically the sign of a guy who has given up and moved on to something else, but will still take your hard-earned money if you’re willing to part with it.
• Lastly, do some online research to see how popular the guy’s website really is.  After all, you can’t make money online without traffic. I recommend typing the search phrase site:thedomainnameinquestion.com in a Google search box to see how many pages of his website does the guy have indexed in Google.  I also recommend going to Alexa.com and determining how popular the website is.

Although these pointers don’t represent all the ways you can determine if someone is running a work at home business plan scam or not, they will end up saving you a lot of money in the wrong run and will prove to be pretty true indicators for a very long time.

I don’t own hundreds of domain names.  I own thousands.  In fact, in the last month I’ve purchased so many domain names that the list exceeds 3,500.  Unlike most people I bought very few domain names with the idea of ever selling them.  Instead, I quickly fell in love with every domain name and had a business plan in mind for each one I’ve ever purchased.  This is no longer the case.  My business plan has evolved and I’ve decided to build another web enterprise.  My new business will be a domain name sales portal. 

Like most people with ADHD I’ve always been very creative, successful in many ventures, but lacked focus and discipline at times . . . often for long periods.  Back in 1997 and 1998 I knew that I would one day own more domains than the average Joe, but I really never thought it would be more than a 100.  Buying domain names is more than just a passion with me, it has clearly become an addiction.  Fortunately, I only purchase premium domain names and my total inventory is now worth in the millions.  Just as fortunately, my career affords me the income level one would need to comfortably own so many domain names. 

 As you’ve read in my previous post, I tried selling some online.  In fact, almost 300.  It made me an Ebay Powerseller, but it didn’t make me rich because Ebay is not the right forum or place for selling domains and getting anything approaching their real value.  You can find some bargains on Ebay from time to time, but you have to sort through a lot of clutter to luck up and get the right domain for your niche.

That said, my new enterprise will be focused on selling premium, investment grade domain names at bargain prices.  Why? Because my business model will be based on volume.  I’ve commissioned programmers to perform the web development and create the necessary database driven applications I will need to manage and sell domains.  Look for me to go live with the new site in 8 weeks (or less hopefully).  I’ll let you know the new domain name and url address of my new domain name sales site just prior to launch time.  Giving visitors to this website the head’s up will certainly lead to you making an unbelievable domain name investment.  So stay tuned.