I have been a big mp3 player fan since they first came out. I was the first of all my friends back in the days to have one. I love them , they really transformed how music can be enjoyed in a tiny convenient package.  Apple’s Ipod is THE mp3 player to own and almost has become synonym name for an mp3 player.  I too have been a big fan of the ipod I have gone through several generations other than the newer ones. I love them great interface etc , etc .

The Microsoft Zune though has been pretty much a bust for Microsoft. It was at first big and chunky and loaded with typical Microsoft software problems.  Its been a few years and now finally Microsoft has come out with a Zune that is worthy of peoples attention.

The Zune HD is smaller and a lot slicker than its previous incarnations. It’s Vivid OLED Screen is a real pro for this player. Its easy user interface that is very fluid to use.  The sound quality I found to be better than my Ipod. The standard ear buds are low quality though that come with the Zune.

What I really like about the new Zune is of course its HD capabilities. The Zune comes witha  built in HD radio tuner something that the Ipod truly needs.  If you have ever worked out in a gym you know how annoying it is to  be on the cardio machines and not be able to tune in to the tv broadcast volume.  Then their is the being sick of your own music factor and you just want to listen to the radio instead. I have no idea why the Ipod have radio it has always been my big hang up for it.

With the Zune HD you also get the ability to watch hd movies and television shows right on your pmp player. The Zune also has an additional A/V dock and remote (MSRP $89.99) that you can stream hd video right on to your television.  This is a great addition. It sets up really quickly and a fun way of sharing movies.  This will definitely be putting a huge dent in the dvd business in the near future much like the mp3 did to the cd. Video quality is excellent of course.

The most exciting feature though is that it is app enabled .  Although the apps are in the infancy stage right now for the Zune we all know that will not be the case for long. People love their apps and the trend is for everything to be app driven in the future. Microsoft positively got this step right .  It will be curious to see what Microsoft does with it .

There a few cons. The inability for the Zune to work with Apple’s Mac is probably the biggest one.

I love the Zune HD  . Will it catch on to be as popular as the Ipod ? I am not sure about that .  Apple has a huge head start that would take years to catch up or a product so innovative that it would blow it out of the water. Zune does take a step to toward that though.  One thing for certain no one will be laughing at this Microsoft Zune.

Ok , So today I decided to try to get 1 million twitter followers on Twitter.  Everyone says its impossible and that I will not even get 30k followers.  I hope to prove them wrong.

To be honest I do not think I actually have a chance on doing it. I am though going to try my hardest and not give up. I have not given myself a timeline to do it . But I expect it to take me at least 1 year to 2 years if I am ever to achieve it.

I am hoping that you all will help me too. By adding me to your follows and spreading the word.  I hope I entertain you along the way and show that anything is possible if you try hard.
Follow Me on Twitter

“Go that extra mile that failures refuse to travel. It is far better to be exhausted from success than to be rested from failure.” Mary Kay Ash

I am going to give it my all, though the goal may never be reached the journey sure will be fun.

Wish me luck

hey give me advice , encouragement , tell me I suck or whatever , I would love to hear some feedback.

What I learned today is sometimes you just need the right story to become popular or maybe at least follow it on its wings .  Your blog can grow really quickly with the right story, coverage, or humour. Get the right contet and have people pass it on. Soon you will be watching your traffic grow.

Yesterday a little 6 year old boy Falcon flew off into the air in a giant home made weather balloon. It was all over the news , the nation watched wondering if he could be saved as rescue and National Guard blackhawks followed close behind the balloon.  The the drama the balloon fell slowly to the ground a brave rescue rescue worker rushing to catch the rope so it would not fly again. Then open the balloon and no Falcon .

This became a very big hit on Twitter and many other social websites. Soon it was on Twitters top 10 most active tweets, consuming at least 5 of the spots at once.   Balloon boy became a hit online and across the nation.  Tweet after tweet people laughed and giggled and complained all about balloon boy. There were questions such as: was it a hoax ? Where is Falcon or aka balloon boy if he is not in the hot air balloon?

A simple story like the example of Falcon or video, article or picture can quickly capture the mind and audience of the web. If you are lucky to find yourself catching a ride on  one of these viralwaves, then your success can happen over night.  With viral episodes like balloon boy people pass the info from one person to the other , and like a virus it soon spread every where.

With this story for instance someone threw this website up online http://www.whereisballoonboy.com/.  This site was not marketed anywhere but as a joke on twitter and it quickly got 25000 hits.   If done right this website could have been very profitable by capturing new followers of your website or sales .

These sort of viral news and entertainment happen quite often.  The most popular method in recent years have been usually with youtube where a video or a photo captures the audience. Musicians, directors , actors, models , and many other businesses have launched successful careers by singing or performing their talent on youtube, facebook and myspace.

The lesson is have good context that entertains your readers and you can quickly grow. You do not have to go extreme virals like Falcon , instead focus on growing your audience with valuable or entertaining information that they will share. Offer something unique and useful. The best and most valuable growth and sales are always those by word of mouth.   What to do once you have people coming to your website and how to turn those hits into a plan on how to make real money , that is upto you. Never let them slip by without at least giving them another reason to come back or to purchase a product or click a link.  So go show your talents to the world and get that video camera rolling.

Once in awhile there will be ads showing forex, I just want to say that I believe is a very volatile market place where you can loose your money really quickly.  I do not endorse any Forex trading at all and personally believe you should stay far away from such volatile trading .

Forex retail from all knowledge I have gained from friends who are professional traders are just about all scams , do not let anyone tell you otherwise.

Forex scam

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A forex (or foreign exchange) scam is any trading scheme used to defraud traders by convincing them that they can expect to gain a high profit by trading in the foreign exchange market. Currency trading “has become the fraud du jour” as of early 2008, according to Michael Dunn of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission.^[1] But “the market has long been plagued by swindlers preying on the gullible,” according to the New York Times.^[2] “The average individual foreign-exchange-trading victim loses about $15,000, according to CFTC records” according to The Wall Street Journal.^[3] The North American Securities Administrators Association says that “off-exchange forex trading by retail investors is at best extremely risky, and at worst, outright fraud.”^[4]

“In a typical case, investors may be promised tens of thousands of dollars in profits in just a few weeks or months, with an initial investment of only $5,000. Often, the investor’s money is never actually placed in the market through a legitimate dealer, but simply diverted – stolen – for the personal benefit of the con artists.”^[5]

In August, 2008 the CFTC set up a special task force to deal with growing foreign exchange fraud.”^[6]

The forex market is a zero-sum game,^[7] meaning that whatever one trader gains, another loses, except that brokerage commissions and other transaction costs are subtracted from the results of all traders, technically making forex a “negative-sum” game.

These scams might include churning of customer accounts for the purpose of generating commissions, selling software that is supposed to guide the customer to large profits,^[8] improperly managed “managed accounts”,^[9] false advertising,^[10] Ponzi schemes and outright fraud.^[4][11] It also refers to any retail forex broker who indicates that trading foreign exchange is a low risk, high profit investment.^[12]

The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), which loosely regulates the foreign exchange market in the United States, has noted an increase in the amount of unscrupulous activity in the non-bank foreign exchange industry.^[13]

An official of the National Futures Association was quoted as saying, “Retail forex trading has increased dramatically over the past few years. Unfortunately, the amount of forex fraud has also increased dramatically.”^[14] Between 2001 and 2006 the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission has prosecuted more than 80 cases involving the defrauding of more than 23,000 customers who lost $350 million. From 2001 to 2007, about 26,000 people lost $460 million in forex frauds.^[1] CNN quoted Godfried De Vidts, President of the Financial Markets Association, a European body, as saying, “Banks have a duty to protect their customers and they should make sure customers understand what they are doing. Now if people go online, on non-bank portals, how is this control being done?”

Not beating the market

The foreign exchange market is a zero sum game^[7] in which there are many experienced well-capitalized professional traders (e.g. working for banks) who can devote their attention full time to trading. An inexperienced retail trader will have a significant information disadvantage compared to these traders.

Although it is possible for a few experts to successfully arbitrage the market for an unusually large return, this does not mean that a larger number could earn the same returns even given the same tools, techniques and data sources. This is because the arbitrages are essentially drawn from a pool of finite size; although information about how to capture arbitrages is a nonrival good, the arbritrages themselves are a rival good. (To draw an analogy, the total amount of buried treasure on an island is the same, regardless of how many treasure hunters have bought copies of the treasure map.)

Retail traders are – almost by definition – undercapitalized. Thus they are subject to the problem of gambler’s ruin. In a fair game (one with no information advantages) between two players that continues until one trader goes bankrupt, the player with the lower amount of capital has a higher probability of going bankrupt first. Since the retail speculator is effectively playing against the market as a whole – which has nearly infinite capital – he will almost certainly go bankrupt.

The retail trader always pays the bid/ask spread which makes his odds of winning less than those of a fair game. Additional costs may include margin interest, or if a spot position is kept open for more than one day the trade may be “resettled” each day, each time costing the full bid/ask spread.

According to the Wall Street Journal (Currency Markets Draw Speculation, Fraud July 26, 2005) “Even people running the trading shops warn clients against trying to time the market. ‘If 15% of day traders are profitable,’ says Drew Niv, chief executive of FXCM, ‘I’d be surprised.’ “^[15]

Paul Belogour, the Managing Director of a Boston based retail forex trader, was quoted by the Financial Times as saying, “Trading foreign exchange is an excellent way for investors to find out how tough the markets really are. But I say to customers: if this is money you have worked hard for – that you cannot afford to lose – never, never invest in foreign exchange.” ^[16]

[edit] The use of high leverage

By offering high leverage, the market maker encourages traders to trade extremely large positions. This increases the trading volume cleared by the market maker and increases his profits, but increases the risk that the trader will receive a margin call. While professional currency dealers (banks, hedge funds) never use more than 10:1 leverage, retail clients are generally offered leverage between 50:1 and 200:1^[2].

A self-regulating body for the foreign exchange market, the National Futures Association, warns traders in a forex training presentation of the risk in trading currency. “As stated at the beginning of this program, off-exchange foreign currency trading carries a high level of risk and may not be suitable for all customers. The only funds that should ever be used to speculate in foreign currency trading, or any type of highly speculative investment, are funds that represent risk capital; in other words, funds you can afford to lose without affecting your financial situation.“ ^[17]

Ok the next beginer step you have to take as I have was to join some kind of marketing or affiliate program that pays you for directing traffic to another website.

I have learned that the best program to easily start making money is with Google Adsense.  Google Adsense is a program where you get paid per click(ppc).  That means anytime someone comes to your website and clicks on a link to your website you will get paid a small amount of money .  I am not sure what the payout rate to percentage of Google pay . I do know that every different niche has its own pay rate. For one niche or ad you might get paid only .05 cents per click while others you can be paid up to 5 dollars or more per click.

It would be great to always be targeting high paying clicks but it is also much harder.  The more content you have the better chances you have to receive more clicks.  Also , as discussed earlier your content needs to be original and well written, it also has to be continuously updated to achieve the best search engine placement and traffic.

What pays well for Adsense? The theory to find out how much you can get paid for a niche for Google Adsense is to check what Google Adwords  is charging. You are getting paid a percentage of what Google Adwords cost for an advertiser.  The best way though is to keep away from niches that produces low returns such as warez, free ,celebrities, games, etc etc and concentrate on high return niches such as insurance, health, some apparel, acne, etc, etc.  Use the Google Adwords Keyword tool to find out what traffic search terms are popular and use secondary search terms to create keywords to blog about.

Do not try to cheat Google Adsense. If you are thinking about trying to cheat Google Adsense with fake clicks or click groups then do not even bother signing up , you will be banned and be banned fast.  You should follow all their terms.
Ad placement. Another important factor on how much you can make with Google Adsense is where you place your ads and what is the best converting ad.   What I was told is to place a top banner below the banner and then place 300×250 banner ads on the sidebars, like I have on this blog.  But you should experiment and try to blend your ads as much as you can.  The better placement and the better it is blended into your site the more organic it will look and therefore make you more money.

Well thats all for now more to come and please share your thoughts if you stop by

thank you !

Jim

There are few fundamental rules about sales online that I have learned.  The biggest one I have learned is that people do not read they scan.  Most web surfers just scan articles search for keywords or words that will lead them to an answer of the question they are looking for .  Like where can I buy an Ugg shoe , they will scan your site looking for the word Ugg or a place to search.

The importance of this is very clear. You must make your page easy to scan and read and very easy to navigate through. Allow the reader to quickly find what they want and dash to your affiliate or google adsense link.

The second thing that I have learned that is very important is that in order to get indexed by google and placed high on search engine pages. You need to have high quality content.  That means your articles must be unique , original, well written and it also should be simple. If you are just copy articles over and over again Google will just dismiss you as a secondary source of the information you are trying to sell. Update your page with unique content as often as you . Hopefully doing this will help you rank higher and have a better search engine optimized page.

more to come…….

share what you have learned , comment below and help this community grow!

I want to learn all there is about making money online with legit products and service and so can you . There is a tons of ways of making money and I decided to try it. I am getting ahead of myself though lets start from the beginning.

My name is Jim and I have been selling on Ebay for the last 5 years. I have really enjoyed doing it and decided to branch out to places where I do not have to pay so many fees and possibly make a lot more money .  Well that’s the goal at least. Will I do it ? Maybe or maybe not .  Through this blog I am going to share all my ups and downs and hope that you follow me along the way and learn from my mistakes , learn something ,or perhaps teach me something .  I am always happy to learn and even more happy to share.

So here is the deal , I took my old website http://heelsandsteals.com/ and transformed in into a blog using Word Pess as the back end.  That is my experimental website , from there I am going to try everything I learn.   On fullarmourdesigns.com website I am going to share everything I learned or am trying to learn.

Why blog ? I am not sure why . I have been told there is not much money to actually make blogging .  I think differently though, I have seen many people make good money doing so . I figure if I can use google adsense ( that is all the google ads you see on the page)  and affiliates to drive traffic to the blog and build a community then perhaps I can make a solid revenue from it. Maybe not large but at least a blue print on making money online.  Then rinse and repeat with other websites. To the point I have a network of websites earning me cash.