The Knitting Fiend

Regulars have noticed the "adver-blog" or "advermercial" influence this past week. In my blog history, I've always periodically posted a few "blogs about blogging", and as I told you, I was going to experiment with some ad-services. I had found one to try; naturally, being the curious sort, I had looked for a bunch of others.

Well, I found a bunch of new services. I figure those who are interested in the current state of "how blogs may or may not hawk product and make money" will be interested; so I'll write about it. Others won't be interested. I promise another real knitting post showing more entrelac tomorrow!

For those still here, here are the various services, ranked in order of how much money I made in the past week, and how much total.

Now, for some narrative discussing each service:

Payperpost: This blog-ver-tizing services seems to be the most profitable. You sign up, get approved, pick an opportunity and start posting for pay. Once you've done that, you have become "a postie".

At any given time, there are quite a few opportunities for posties to make money writing a post. This morning, there are a total of 58 opportunities with different levels of payment. I seem to be eligible for about half of them-- the others either require a blog with more traffic, a better google rank or fitting a particular blogging niche. (I'd love to take the $135 "Top 10 Reasons to become a US Citizen" opportunity, but I don't qualify. My google rank is too low. :< Instead, I'm shilling by taking the "How Much Have you Made from PPP" opportunity, which pays qualifying bloggers $10.)

A hitch for some bloggers: I notice quite often blogs on the free blogging services are excluded: myspace.com, typepad.com, xanga.com, blogspot.com, livejournal.com, wordpress.com, and vox.com.

So, how much can you make? Well, for me the limit is about $70 a day -- on a lucky day. You can take two paying posts a day. However, you need to put one non-PayPerPost between those two. So, if two $35 opportunities come up, the blogger needs to take one, post the paid post, then post something else, right away, then post a filler post, then take the next $35 post. (And since the $35 ones that will accept me get snapped up, it's pure luck when I see a $35 one!)

Still, the need for the filler posts is sort of an "issue" for knitting bloggers because our posting culture really does tend to be at most one post a day. Still, I'm willing to post 4 haikus if necessary. Or wedge the entrelac post between two haiku-adverts. (We'll see if my readers can stand it though:) }

Still, there is a hitch: Notice the (maybe?) next to the earned dollar amounts in the table above? With PayPerPost, each post needs to be approved by a human being. The advertiser evidently takes a look, and payperpost people check to see if you met the requirements. So far, only two of my posts has a little thumbs up icon indicating they are provisionally approved. But those are both $35 posts. So, I've made at least $70 but maybe I've made $202. I can't be sure.

That said: I've actually had fun trying to see if I can match a haiku to a product. Sometimes the match is tenuous, but I'm going to keep trying until I've been disapproved!

Now, on to the next "make millions blogging" service!

LoudLaunch: I've definitely make $22.50 with this service; no question marks. I get paid $7.50 per post. It's a decent service, but obviously, it pays me less than PayPerPost. Your payment depends on your blog's rank and traffic. There aren't as many opportunities; all pay the same amount. Because their policies are different from PayPerPost, it may turn out you can make more using this service -- but for me, LoudLaunch doesn't pay enough.

TextLinks.com: I've made zero. Nothing. Zilch. However, this service is painless. You sign up. If your page rank and traffic are high enough, they approve of you. You put some code somewhere on your page, and then pretty much do nothing. Supposedly, Textlink looks for advertisers who will pay a price they set to run links wherever you slapped the code. So far, no one has bitten. (And I bet no one will. I'm guessing the system is a bit troublesome for advertisers too.)

ReviewMe.com: Ha, ha, ha! I made nothing with this service; I predict I will never make anything with this service. Unless, that is, you, a Knitting Fiend reader, happen to operate a company who specifically wants me, The Knitting Fiend, to review your product. Then, you can go over to ReviewMe.com, sign up, pick me to review. Then, fork over $100 to Reviewme.com. They'll offer me $50 to review you. But, at least, like Textlinks.com, after the blogger signs up, the system is painless.

Helium.com: Total waste of time! I found this service, about 3 weeks ago. I cannot even begin to describe everything that is bad, frustrating and unrewarding about their system. So I won't. Unless you want to experiment, seriously, don't waste your time.

Summary: PayPerPost.com makes me the most money (if my articles are eventually approved.) LoudLaunch.com ranks second. The TextLinks.com and ReviewMe.com don't work for me here, and I suspect they never will. (But they likely work at diet blogs, mortgage blogs etc.) Helium.com? HA!

If you've been inspired to join PayPerPost, you might as well make some money right away. If you review my post, they'll pay you $7.50 (unless that's changed.) Only join you want to continue in the program, because they won't send you a check unless you make at least $25. (Though you can make that either by getting other to join or writing posts.) To see the application form and decide if you want to make $7.50 reviewing me, click the icon: