Suze Says.. Internet Money Guide

What's Hot on Google Plus

2011-10-30T23:10:00.001-07:00

 

It seems that every week Google unleashes more and more really nifty features for Google Plus, and they did not disappoint this week. They actually introduced 3 cool new toys this week..What's Hot, Google Ripples, and a photo enhancement suite called Creative Kit for Photos.

What's Hot

 

Google Plus now has it's own version of Twitter's trending topics. What's Hot shows the hottest posts across the entire Google Plus network, not just in your circles. Whatever is being shared and talked about the most can be found under the What's Hot link on the left side of your screen, under Sparks, as well as underneath new posts inside the main stream.

Google Plus Ripples

It's always fun to check and see how posts travel and how things get shared.  With Google + Ripples you can check a post to see just who shared it and visually follow the conversation.  To see the post's ripples, just click the dropdown options in the upper right hand corner of any post (where you would usually mute or block a post, etc) and click on "View Ripples".  From there you can see how much it has been shared and by mousing over the individual circles in the diagram can see who it was who shared it. Each circle represents another share, and the arrows show a share's direction. A larger circle with circles inside indicates more resharing. It shows when someone shares a post and multiple people reshare that post from that person. There is also a draggable timeline slide bar at the bottom of the ripples diagram page to let you see the spread of the share by day.  The "View Ripples" choice only shows up once a post has been shared for the 1st time.  It even includes some metrics.  This could be a really useful tool for tracking what your followers are interested in and what gets the most engagement on G+.  There is also a scrollable list of shares on the right that updates as you zoom in and out of the Ripples, which makes it easy to find influential people....

Note: Cross posted from The World According to Suze.

Permalink

Wanna Be a Giant Squid..

2011-06-28T07:09:00.001-07:00

Image by BigGirlBlue via Flickr

This week Squidoo announced some big changes in their Giant Squid program. Up til now, a lensmaster had to have created 50 “quality lenses” to be eligible to apply to be a Giant Squid.

What’s a Giant Squid?

A Giant Squid is a sort of club for lensmasters who have created at least (now) 25 quality lenses.

The Giant Squid title comes with some pretty desirable perks, including no daily lens limit, greenlighting of your lenses so you don’t get stopped by the spam filters, the ability to create lens templates and save them, and elimination of the “no more than 9 links per domain” limit. That last one will be HUGE for me. I like pictures on my lenses. If you’re not a Giant Squid and you have more than 9 pictures hosted at the same domain you can’t publish your lens. You have to split them up somehow and host them at different places. What a HUGE pain in the butt that is! It’s there for good reason, I suppose, but they should have some exceptions, like Photobucket and Flickr. Oh well, now all you need is 25 lenses to apply and that’s no longer an issue! Awesome! Each level of Gianthood above 25 gets a few extra little perks, like getting to be able to hand out Purple Stars at 250....

Note: Cross posted from The World According to Suze.

Permalink

Should You Buy Squidoo Lenses?

2011-05-07T15:38:00.001-07:00

Image via CrunchBase

When I first decided to get off the fence and actually start making lenses on Squidoo, I went there and looked around, and sat, and thought, and made lists of the million things I could make lenses about, and then.. I did nothing. I just didn’t know where to start. I knew making a lens wouldn’t be difficult, I am pretty good with the HTML and have been blogging and doing various other types of writing online for quite a few years now, but I just didn’t know what I wanted to do first. Then I found someone who was offering a whole bunch of lenses for sale. She had a bunch of lenses, all in niches that I was interested in, an...

Note: Cross posted from The World According to Suze.

Permalink

Do Url Shorteners hurt SEO?

2011-04-23T15:44:00.001-07:00

Note: Cross posted from The World According to Suze.

Permalink

picture courtesy of dev/random

Anyone who regularly posts links to places like Twitter or Facebook, or anywhere really that has a character limit, is well aware of how vital a good url shortener program is. If you’re just regularly posting pictures of your lunch, well maybe you’re not too concerned about the effect of using these services on your backlinks and SEO. For bloggers and marketers, on the other hand, it could be hugely significant. I’ve been wondering for a while now about the effects of url shorteners on the links I post, and while poking around the internet today, I came across a couple of different blog posts about it and this video by Matt Cutts, explaining that url shorteners do not hurt your SEO if the service uses a 301 redirect. The page rank and anchor text do flow through from the shortened link. ...

My First Squidoo Payout Earnings

2011-04-19T09:05:00.001-07:00

Technorati Tags: squidoo,payout,earnings,money,SEO,google,backlinks,lensmaster,squidoo lens,how much can you earn on Squidoo,making money with Squidoo,affiliate

Image via Wikipedia

I joined Squidoo back in 2009 with the intention of jumping in, making lots of lenses, and making lots of money. I wish I had actually done that, because by now I’d have lots of lenses making me money already, but, unfortunately, I didn’t. A couple months ago, February I think it was, I decided to get on the ball and actually do something there. I have, so far, a total of 18 lenses and this past payday I got my first Squidoo payment from my lenses. I made a grand total of $7.74. Okay, so I’m not getting rich here, but I don’t think that’s half bad for not really doing much of anything. I haven’t done much but create them and then update them here and there. Some of them do need a little makeover, but overall I think they are looking okay. I have plans to do a little article marketing and work on some backlinking in the near future, but as of yet I really haven’t done much in the way of promoting them and I have made a couple sales. Yesterday, I woke up to find I had made 6 sales on one of them! That was a sweet surprise! That was the first “big” sale I’ve made so I was pretty excited about it. I will get paid for next payday, and hopefully I will have made some more sales by then. ...

Note: Cross posted from The World According to Suze.

Permalink

How To Use Windows Live Writer to post to Tumblr

2011-04-13T11:05:00.001-07:00

I don’t have the time at the moment to do a fully detailed write-up about Windows Live Writer specifically, but I just wanted to post something quick about my newest discovery. Since I’ve just recently started blogging again, I haven’t kept up on a lot of blogging-related things, so I’m pretty late to the Windows Live Writer party, but I just discovered it 2 days ago. It’s pretty freaking awesome! The only thing I was disappointed about was there was no support for Tumblr in Windows Live Writer, so that’s what I wanted to write about here. ...

Well, whatta ya know!

2011-03-05T10:02:00.001-08:00

It seems while I was busy doing other things, Blogger finally got its head out ohttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giff its ..well, you know..and gave me back my blog! Shortly after my last post on this site, I got a notice from Blogger saying http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifg this blog had been shut down due to suspicion that it was a splog..aka spam blog..set up just to post crap for the purpose of collecting Adsense cash. I immediately wrote to them telling them that, no, it wasn't, it was my blog, but I got no response. I was shut down, couldn't post here, couldn't edit anything, couldn't moderate comments, which left the spammers free reign to post their crap to my comments..grrrrr. I periodically checked back and finally gave up, figuring it was a goner for good. Then today I happened to check again, expecting it to still be locked and found it was BACK! Thanks, Blogger! I don't know what about this blog would make anyone think it's a spam blog, since I made regular posts, written by me, not trying to sell anything to anyone. The only thing I can think is that maybe someone I posted something about didn't like it and reported me for spam? Oh well..now that I have it back, I might actually start posting here again. In the meantime, I've got another blog now, a Wordpress blog hosted on one of my own domains, at , and I've been making lenses over on Squidoo.com and you can follow me on Twitter or on my Tumblr blog.

Data Entry Job Scams

2008-02-18T13:52:00.000-08:00

Grrrr.. I'll never understand why people don't do research and check things out, Google for information, read forums, do some form of due diligence before they plunk down their hardearned cash for ridiculous scams. I did an article on Gather.com a while back that I'm still getting comments on, about rebate processor job scams, from people who did decide to check into it before joining anything and are really glad they did. Rebate processor, data entry jobs and survey database sites that charge you money ARE SCAMS!!!! I'm writing this because in the last two days I've run across three posts from different people saying that they did pay for one of these BS things, and they're a ripoff..which they would have known without losing their money had they done some serious research.

For those who don't know what rebate processor and data entry scams are all about, the jist is this. You pay these scumbags anywhere from 39.00 to 197.00 for access to their "database" or job bank or list of companies that are supposedly willing to pay you for placing ads or proceesing rebates, etc. Once you pay, you get access to their site that tells you how to join Clickbank, pick a product/products you want to advertise ..which they term as the "companies you want to work for"..and you then go to classified ad sites or launch PPC campaigns with Google or Yahoo,etc. and when someone clicks your ad ..aka buys the product you advertised..you get paid. Well, you can join Clickbank, launch a PPC campaign or place ads to sell the products all on your own without paying these sleezebags your money. They do, to be fair, explain a lot about Adwords and how to do a PPC campaign, which can be helpful, but the same info is free all over the internet as well.

How do I know this? No, I DIDN'T pay for any of these scams..I just have talked to people who have been scammed..and did research on my own. This is a list of free classified ad sites you can post ads to, if you do want to join Clickbank, pick some products, and post some ads on your own.

http://www.interking.com/ Kingdom Classifieds
http://www.homeworkads.com/Homework Ads
http://www.bizclassifieds.com Business Classifieds
http://www.classifiedsforfree.com Classifieds for Free
http://www.bestmall.com/class/submit.html Best Mall Classified Ads
http://www.1second.com/freead.htm 1AmericaMall
http://www.theadnet.com/ The Ad Net
http://www.5starads.com/ Five Star Classified

As far as the survey sites are concerned, they are a scam as well. They don't give you any information you can't find on your own on multiple sites for free. One person who signed up for one of them told me that half the sites were BS, a lot of them paid in sweeps or points, and some of them weren't even active anymore..so the site was outdated.. and I think he said he paid 99.00 for this information. I've seen these ads claiming you can make 75.00 and up an hour doing surveys. It's NEVER GONNA HAPPEN!! I have a survey directory right on my website http://www.starrbrite.com/surveys.html, that lists which ones I know actually pay cash, which ones are BS sites pretending to be survey sites, etc. ..you can send your 99.00 to ME at... lol

I know it's marketing, and they do provide information, which they have a right to be compensated for and charge whatever people are willing to pay for the info, but it just irks me to no end because the ads are so deceptive, and they target people who are searching for something to do at home, usually because they're disabled or can't work outside the home and need to support their families..they can't afford to be scammed..and they also encourage them to choose THEIR program as the program they should choose to advertise..which gives them that much more of an opportunity to scam even more people.. !!

If you're looking for LEGITIMATE work at home jobs, try www.westathome.com
or http://www.alpineaccess.com/external/careers/become_an_agent.html.. these two companies hire people to work at home answering phones for things like infomercial calls and taking orders for various companies. I know for a fact these are legitimate, actual jobs and they don't ask you to pay anything.

Stephen Ducharme, ContactThem scam

2008-02-14T10:57:00.000-08:00

While surfing the other day, I saw an ad someone had posted about a program called "ContactThem" which claimed that they would pay you $4800 to add their links to your website for one month. That sounded like a great deal to me! I have a website..and I like money.. especially free money! Anytime someone wants to pay me lots of money for doing something as simple as cutting and pasting a link onto my page, I'm there! Of course, being the skeptical soul that I am, I decided to do a little investigating before rushing in to claim my $4800. I clicked the link and it took me to a website for a product called "Contact Them" that asks you to sign up and download their software. After my big Zangdo virus fiasco, I'm pretty darn careful now about what I download, plus they asked you a few questions before you download it, so they can "personalize" the software to you. Meaning, make sure they send you the right hype and scam page, targeted towards telling you what you want to hear based on what you're looking for. The questions are 'what describes you the best:", and lists choices, like "I'm an internet marketer interested in promoting affiliate programs" or some such thing, and "Main reason why you want the Contact Them software" again with some choices. They also ask for your phone number along with your other contact information, and it is marked as 'required". It says "your account will match your phone number". Hmmm.. this made a few bells go off.

I Googled Stephen Ducharme, "Contact Them scam" and "Virtual Contact, Inc", and what I found out is that Stephen Ducharme is the self-proclaimed "Free Ad Guru" and claims he never pays for advertising. I also found out that, while his website claims this is brand new software they spent four years developing, there were several complaints on a few message boards from around 2005 for a product by this name, and also something called "My Affiliate Finder", which by the name sounds like it may be the same type of software he's now calling "ContactThem". In or around 2003, there were complaints about other products from Stephen Ducharme , in particular one called "How to get 1million visitors on your website without paying a dime in
advertisement" The complaints said that his promised customer support is pretty much nonexistent, and they do not answer emails or phone calls. In addition to that, after you purchase something from this guy's company, they call you and try to talk you into bigger things, like "coaching"., with high-pressure sales tactics. They ask you questions about your credit cards and available balances, and what you end up paying is the amount of your available balance! YIKES! Read what happened to this poor guy http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/072/ripoff0072066.htm.

These complaints are all a few years old, and I didn't find any complaints recently specifically geared towards the ContactThem software, so maybe he's cleaned up his act.. or maybe it's just too new, since he says it just launched.

The ContactThem offer has two parts.. the software program itself, and the affiliate program...which is the part where he claims you can make "up to" 4800.00 your first month for simply placing their ads on your site. Of course, you have to read the disclaimer at the bottom of the page

"These figures of earnings are examples to help you understand the earning potential - You can make more or less. There are no guarantees of income. *You are NOT paid per click, per impressions or for the period of time our banner is exposed on your website; you are paid per sale generated. You receive a sales commission when members join our paid membership upon your referral or your sub-affiliates'. Recurring monthly commissions are subject to members' renewals. By default, 2 levels of commissions are paid; to access levels 3 to 10, you need to meet each level qualifications. Please take time to consult the qualifications for each level inside the affiliate area that explains everything in details."

This means that you can join as an affiliate for free, and promote the program on your own and try to get people to sign up by marketing it through whatever channels you can find..and possibly make some sales or get people to sign up and upgrade...get them to UPGRADE is the keyword here. You don't get paid for them signing up, they have to upgrade and pay the 49.00 a month before you make any money. Of course, you won't make any real money unless they not only sign up and upgrade, but they then get people under them who sign up and upgrade, etc. Or...you can UPGRADE and pay 49.00 a month to be able to use the ContactThem software to find people to send your ads for the affiliate program to ...and/or promoting the actual software. using their program.. Either way, it's not a simple matter of put the banner on your website and sit back and make tons of cash, like the ads would have you believe.

I will say this for him, he's REALLY, REALLY good at the smarmy sales copy. He knows exactly what to say to make people want to sign up...but he neglects to tell you that it ain't half as easy as he makes it sound. If you do sign up to be an affiliate and you can manage on the free option to find some people who do sign up and actually upgrade, that would be fine. However, we all know it's not that easy. Anyone who has done or is doing internet marketing or affiliate marketing, knows that you have to promote something. You'll have to actively market it. Unless you have a huge mailing list or tons of traffic to your site, you'll need to place ads. Chances are, even if you choose to upgrade and pay the 49.00 a month for the chance to market to the leads they provide you with using their software, a small percentage of those who actually sign up will do anything with the program. Some may upgrade and pay for a couple of months, but most will give up after a few months when the profits they were promised in the ads don't materialize magically. There's nothing wrong in this, it's marketing, and A LOT of programs do it the same way, but it's deceptive, and if people do sign up and attempt to market this affiliate program, they need to be aware that their earnings will most likely, for probably 99.9% of them, never be more than a couple hundred dollars.. if they can manage even that.

This is an FAQ page about the affiliate program...http://www.contactthem.com/affiliateprogram3.php?

Up to this point, one would think there's really nothing wrong with this program, aside from the smarmy and deceptive advertising tactics.. but..

Here's where the scam part comes in:

As a free affiliate you are qualified to earn commisions on your first 2 levels with no qualification, no strings at all.. but from level 3 on you have to qualify to earn commissions by being an active (read: paying) member who has reached $1000 commission earned. A legitimate "affiliate program" does not require you to "qualify" or pay anything in order to collect your commissions. This is not an "affiliate program", it's just a glorified ...and deceptive.. MLM scheme.

What's your compensation plan?

Level 1 = 20%

100% Free - No qualification required
Level 2 = 10%

100% Free - No qualification required

Level 3 = 5%

(To qualify for this 3rd level of commission, you must be an active member of ContactThem software (minimum is $49.95/month)
+ You must have reached $1,000 in commissions earned.)
Level 4 = 2%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 10 members)
Level 5 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 20 members)
Level 6 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 30 members)
Level 7 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 40 members)
Level 8 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 50 members)
Level 9 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 60 members)
Level 10 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 70 members)

This brings us to the ACTUAL program.. the software.....

What is ContactThem?

It's software that claims it can find the names of, and allow you to contact with a personalized email, virtually every affiliate marketer of every affiliate program on the planet. It sends emails to these people telling them how much you like their site and would they be interested in becoming an affiliate for your product or service and placing your links on their page. Of course, you don't have to actually go to any of these affiliates's sites, so how do you know if they are even active affiliates? or if they even have a website? Most do, but some do not and market through email or other venues. It does make mention somewhere on the site about "Internet marketers/list owners/affiliates/website owners/promoters/resellers", and it says it will tell you the marketer's stats and activities, so I suppose the program knows which type of marketer they're contacting and everything about them, and tailors the emails to each individual? It claims you won't get SPAM complaints, because it's a personalized email. So what? I get lots of SPAM that's personalized, and unsolicited email trying to sell you something, last time I checked, was still SPAM, and the complaints may very well come.

His sales page claims that you will find lots of "tire kickers" talking bad about him on the internet because they "don't understand him", he's ahead of his time. LOL Well, that's a CYA statement if I ever heard one. Though it is true that a lot of people will cry "scam" if they buy something and don't immediately make a million dollars with no effort, becasue they don't know how to work the program, the majority of scam complaints tend to be true, and I'm betting Mr. Ducharme deserves his reputation.

In theory, this software could actually be really useful in helping you make lots of money, if you can find a bunch of affiliate marketers who are stuck on stupid or complete newbies. If I understand it correctly, the way the program supposedly works is that you find a 2-tier affliate program and sign up, and then you send emails to all of these other affiliate marketers from these other programs that the software finds for you, promoting your affiliate program, and they become your subaffiliates in the program. I don't know about you, but if someone who is not the owner of a product or a company contacts me, asking me to promote their products, I'm gonna know they're an affiliate of that product/program. If it's something I'm interested in, I'll go sign up as an affiliate on my own and get full commissions DUH! I could be wrong. The reason they have subaffiliates is because people to sign up to be one, but I just don't see it happening a lot when you're marketing to current affiliate marketers.. On the other hand, suppose you sign up for the service, you do manage to sign up a bunch of sub affiliates under you, and they put the links to your products on their sites..and nothing happens..or only a few sales happen. This wouldn't be a big deal in normal circumstances, but it is a big deal if you're paying $12,000 a year for the ContactThem service! YEP, you read that right.. $12,000 a year.. payable in convenient monthly installments of just $997.00!! DOUBLE YIKES!! Of course, if you can't afford that, they have the limited version that will allow you to contact 200 marketers every day instead of 1000. There are some marketers who wouldn't think twice about paying that much money per month for leads.. but for most people, that's just not an option.

BOTTOM LINE: I don't think you can really classify this program as a scam per se. It is, however, deceptive marketing, and it is not an affiliate program, it's just a MLM scheme. The whole thing definitely falls under the hype and air category. I am willing to bet also, that once you sign up as a free affiliate, the high-pressure, very persuasive emails will be forthcoming quickly..and A LOT of them. Whatever you do, if you do sign up for this program, whether for free or as an upgraded member.. when they call you, and they almost definitely WILL CALL YOU.. don't TALK TO THEM.. do not let them talk you into ANYTHING, and under NO circumstances tell these people, or anyone associated in any way with this company your personal information, including the balance on your credit card. If they call HANG UP!

UVME Is a Bust.

2008-02-11T09:52:00.000-08:00

You may notice that I have the little UVME widget thingie in my sidebar. I joined up with them during the prelaunch phase, because it seemed at first glance like a great opportunity. They have a decent pay plan and the concept is a proven money maker. Even though tons of games are free online, people still do shell out money every month to play games online. People LOVE games! It seemed like it would be something doable to recruit some people who wanted to make some real cash and have fun doing it, and recruit people who would want to sign up to play games, even if they just mostly wanted to play for free. The games actually look to be pretty decent games, simple, easy to learn with no huge learning curve, yet fun and addicting. Added to the fun of being able to chat on IM with your friends while you played and challenge people to games and possibly win cash, it would seem like a no-brainer that the UVME opportunity, unlike so many others, would be a winner.
Alas, all is not as it seems. The problem is this..it's pretty ocmplicated for people to be able to actually sign up and qualify for commissions. It's also actually pretty difficult for people to sign up and just play the games. Even though I joined long ago, I haven't really had the time to promote or recruit anyone. I didn't participate in the beta testing either, because I just haven't had a bunch of leisure time lately. I haven't really done much at all in regards to the program, actually. I was waiting for the actual launch, to see how everything worked out before I devoted a bunch of time to recruiting, and now I'm glad I did. I got this email from Jane Mark yesterday. If you don't know her, she's the co-owner of quite a few very popular advertising programs, like FavAds and Croc-Ads and she seems to be a pretty straight forward and levelheaded lady, so I am willing to take advice on some things from her. I am especially willing to believe that UVME may not be a great opportunity if she says it sucks, because, unlike me, she paid her money, went to actual seminars for the opportunity, and tried to jump through the hoops to make it work, and still couldn't pull it off. I also have to give her opinion on this one some consideration because of her love for Lawn Chair Millionaire. Her and her partner are big-time in favor of LCM and promote that to the hilt, so I figure if she's willing to promote that crock of crap and considers that a good opportunity, then if she says UVME isn't worth it, it must really suck. LOL Here's an excerpt from the email she sent regarding UVME.

"As many of you know I try very hard
to recommend programs to you that
I believe will make money for you

I have four criteria I set when I look at
a program

1) It needs to have a good product one
that is in demand by the public

2) It needs to have owners that are
responsible and have the interest of
their members at heart as well as their
own profit motive.

3) It needs to have a pay plan that has a
broad reach either because it has significant
upfront commissions or realistic monthly
commissions meaning people will likely
stick with it or other ways to earn profits
in the interior of the site.

4) It needs to be doable meaning that most
people, even if they are newbies, will be
able to promote it effectively if they work
at it.

Sometimes I think a site has met my criteria
but until I actually put it to the test, I cannot
always be sure and...

Sometimes I am wrong...

In June of last year, I recommended a site
to you called uVme . At that time
many of you signed up free and I thank you
for that.

On January 28th, the site did a soft launch
and I upgraded in order to test the site
for you.

I found that one of my essential ingredients
for giving my recommendation was wanting
and that has to do with the structure of the
pay plan

I attended a live presentation in NYC on the site
several months ago and thought I understood
the procedures for upgrading. I asked the right
questions, I thought.

I have read every email they have released
to the public but ,when I actually went to
upgrade in late January, I found that I had
to go through hoops I never anticipated.

Let me make it clear, this is only my
experience and it may not be the experience
of many other members who may have
successfully upgraded at uVme.

Here's what happened to me

I paid my 197 plus 64.95.

The 65.00 is a monthly fee.

In order to become active, I had to
verify two numbers that appeared on
my credit card after I upgraded.

I verified them

I then had to go to a completely different
site and play games on the site with 10.00
that had been deposited to my site. I played
one game and then when I went to play the
second game using an ie browser, the system
froze up and I lost that game and the 6.00.

I switched to fire fox as my browser, ordered
another 6.00 to replace the money I had lost
and continued playing until I had spent the
10.00 , I thought.

However ,I later learned that I had only played
9.00 worth of games and that until I played the
last 1.00 I would not be qualified to collect
commissions and even if I played the 10.00 if
no one accepted my game challenge, I may not
qualify for commissions from my upgraded members.
Hmmm...

A second hurdle to overcome was to have
one of my downline fund their account with
20.00 and play 20.00 worth of games. I had
my partner, Phil, play those games in order
to see if I could qualify for commissions
He played. I am still not sure if that would
have qualified me for commissions because
it is unclear to me if his games need to
be accepted for challenge or not or simply
played. Hmmm...

Even if I has met that criteria which it
seems I did not, I need three people to
activate their accounts under me by paying
197 and the monthly fee of 65.00.

By activate their accounts I mean they need
to follow a series of steps that I attempted to
do and if they do not, I will not qualify for
commissions because they will not actually
be active members. If they are not really
active members, I lose the dough, I think...

Confused? So am I

I have been told by one of my downline
who I know well and trust that there are
nine steps to follow before I qualify for
commissions

I have been told by my upline that if I come to training more sessions, all will
be clear.

But I thought I went to a personal training
session in NYC and I thought I asked all the
right questions but I was wrong.

So here's the problem for me.

The upgrade process was confusing to
follow for me and not only did I have to
sort it out but I had to make sure at least
three people under me sorted it out the right
way or I would come out on the losing end

I don't know about you but I have enough
trouble keeping track of my own life and
making sure that three people under me
are going through a complicated set of
procedures to secure their own commissions
is not my cup of tea.

But lets even suppose that over time, I
got better at this and I could effectively
teach my three upgrades to become
qualified the right way, then I would
collect my commissions but...

What happens to my downline if they
are not able or do not have the time it
takes to teach their three members exactly
how to follow this procedure.

I would have collected my commissions
but my downline may get stuck holding
the bag.

I don't want to leave anyone holding the bag here.
Well, unless, or course, it is a Lipton tea bag:)

Frankly, I just think uVme is too complicated
for me and while there are training sessions to
tell you how to do this, in my opinion some people
may get stuck. I did.

So I am withdrawing my original recommendation
for this site.

This is not something I do often but, I do
want my recommendations to mean something
and sometimes I am wrong.

Let me make this clear .

This site may take off
It has some wonderful features and,
if you like to play games, this may
be your perfect vehicle for fun
and profits.

You may simply want to join just to
play the games and no one can argue
with that. Go to it.

If you focus and attend the training sessions
you may come out a winner at both of
the sites associated with this site.

And I hope you do.

But since many of our list members are new
to the net and I know how difficult it can be
to earn bucks, I will look for something that
is easier for you and has the deck stacked
in your favor.

Nothing in business comes easy.
Any program you join will require
your time and your attention. You will
need to train at the site and focus but
I have a cardinal rule.

If it seems too hard for me to do, there
may be others in the same boat and
I want you to be able to keep your head above
water when you embark on a new venture.

So use your own judgment here.
My word is not the final word
It is an opinion only and you know
what they say. "Everyone has an opinion"

Now, I don't know about you, but that all sounds like a whole big lotta hassle to go through just to be able to collect commissions from something. I totally agree with Jane that it seems too complicated, people will get frustrated and confused, and not be able to qualify for the commissions they worked hard to earn and give up. It's hard enough to find people who are willing to sign up for simple to do, free stuff that will make them money, if they have to pay over 200.00, then licensing fees every month on top of that, and then find people willing to sign up and pay, whether as an associate, promoter, or player, and then have to go through this big, complicated process, and make sure their downlines are all able to go through it too, it just isn't going to happen.

They have three levels you can join .. Associate, where you pay 197.00 + 65.00 as Jane did, (payable every 28 days), and you get your very own games platform and a .biz site..in essence, you own a game site and make commissions from promotors and players you recruit under you.. if you can manage to jump through the hoops.

For promotor level, you pay a one time fee of 199.97, which gets you your own game site, and you can earn commissions from players who join your site and play under you. You are not eligible to recruit (and earn from) Associates or other promotors, and you don't get a .biz site, only your own .com.

Then for players, you can play for free for 14 days, and then have to upload cash to your account so you can play games against other players and be eligible to win (or lose) money from playing. I was under the mistaken impression that people would be able to play free if they wanted to, not just for 14 days, but would just not win money or be eligible for challenges. That may have been misinterpretation on my part, but I could have sworn that's what I was originally told.

Bottom line is, this one just is not going to be the right opportunity for me, and I predict it is a wrong fit for most other people as well. As Jane says, this is just my opinion and I could very well be wrong. UVME isn't a scam, it's an opportunity like anything else, and people have to find the things that will work for them and fit their lifestyle, personality, and skill set. I should add that I never did get to even play the games, because I tried to log in to at least try out the games somehow, and see if they were worth paying money to play, but when I signed into my back office, there is no option to play games unless you first sign up as either an associate or promotor and agree to pay them money. I saw a few other sites advertising free games and to sign up and test out the games, and I was even tempted to sign up using a different email just to see what happens, and see if I would be able to play games that way, but I just decided it wasn't worth the effort. I suspect a lot of others will feel the same way.

Proofreading is Your Friend

2008-02-10T09:55:00.000-08:00

PROOFREAD, PROOFREAD, PROOFREAD

I know this is the internet, and grammar and punctuation, and basic communication skills, like proper spelling, are sometimes woefully lacking in the things people choose to post. It’s just for entertainment, and who cares about proper spelling and grammar. This is true in most cases, but when you’re publishing something to your blog, or an article, or an ad page, would it be too much to ask to proofread what you're writing, use proper grammar and run the spellcheck? If you're chatting with your buddies in IMs or chattng casually in a group or forum, it's not such an issue, but in any kind of writing where you're attempting to sell something or teach someone something, taking the time to proof read and spell-check will go a long way in making the difference between people thinking of you as a real writer, a wannabe, or worse, a complete idiot. I know it's nitpicky, but it's a pet peeve of mine, and I know I'm not the only one. I'm not perfect, by any means, and even I am bad about not proofreading sometimes. When I go back and read some of the things I’ve posted, I see glaring typos, and I cringe! Let's review! It's "Let's go there", not "Let's go their". Their is possessive, there is a destination. It's "we were going", not "we was going". Read over what you write before you hit the send button. I read an article the other day by a woman who said she was a technical writer and made so many thousands of dollars in her job, and there were several typos and instances where she used the wrong word. She had obviously gone back and changed something in the article, but didn’t proof read after the change to be sure it made sense. I thought to myself that I hope she has an editor for her professional work. Even though she is probably great at her job, the errors in her article lowered my perception of the value of what she was saying. I know I'm not the only one who thinks this way. It's about image. Do you want people to think you know what you're talking about and are well-educated, or some hack spitting out garbage? To be fair, I know English is not the native language of many who publish online, and a lot of errors are inevitable and forgiveable in those cases, but for the American and English-speaking world, not so much.

I'm not suggesting that you should always use completely proper English and be absolutely perfect in your punctuation, etc. You have to write in your own style, in your own voice, and be real and connect with your readers. In some instances, your blog for example, it's perfectly fine to say "gonna" and start your sentences with but or and (even though it's wrong), and end your sentences with a preposition on occasion. Just be sure you spell the preposition right (not write) and that your sentences make sense. Spell checkers are your friend, and you should learn to use them! This will ensure you won’t end up with a post like this one I found on freelancing.

I was going to put the link to the blog so you could see the whole article, but it's a splog, so I won't. Maybe it doesn’t much matter what the article says, since it’s obviously only there for content purposes to pull in traffic for their Design Quote affiliate program links, but even splogs should be readable. The beginning of the article starts out great, with helpful, pertinent information on how to increase your freelancing income and manage being a freelancer.. but the end is where it goes horribly wrong..

This is what it says
Freelance Writers: Double Your Income

“Double your income by effort earnest most your business. Yes, if you impact as a worker writer, you are streaming a business. And as a business, you requirement to verify things seriously. Can you rattling threefold your income? Of instruction you can. Just ingest your instance more expeditiously and intend more and better-paying clients. We every undergo we hit likewise some life when we don’t intend as such impact finished as we should. That’s dustlike if you poverty to analyse yourself as a unaccompanied ‘artiste’ struggling with writer’s block. But it won’t revilement the condiment if you analyse what you do as a earnest business. Use your instance efficiently. Get the impact done. And encourage your services. If you are genuinely likewise unsure to garner up the sound or intercommunicate in face of a crowd, at small ingest your composition skills and create a promotional income collection you crapper beam discover to likely clients. And here’s the easiest artefact to threefold your income: intend meliorate clients and discuss higher fees. In fact, the meliorate the calibre of client, the more unstoppered they module be to negotiation, and the more they module knowledge your work...

and it goes on from there..

What’s up with that?? It looks like they may have used one of those article spinner programs that they claim will re-word your articles for you to make them different enough that you can submit them to several different places without duplicate content. Maybe it was one of those that you plug in your keywords and basic ideas and it writes the article for you. Whichever it was, the software, apparently, has a few bugs that need to be worked out.. and the poster needs to learn to proofread before he/she publishes. LOL

The point is, if you’re going to write things and publish them for the world to read, take 2 minutes of your time and proofread and spell check, so you don’t end up publishing things that look like the article above. You may think that noone cares, and maybe a lot of people don't, and are only interested in the information and ideas, and not so much how well you can write, but a lot of people do care. They will judge you on not only what you say, but how well you say it, and judge your business in the same way.

Thank Gawd for Spyware Doctor!!!!!

2008-02-05T07:44:00.000-08:00

You wouldn't believe what I've gone through in the past week. I have spent the last week going crazy with the most aggravating and annoying virus ever known !! That sucker just would not go away! I stupidly downloaded an application from some list or traffic exchange or other. actually, I think it was from a solo ad from some safelist.. for something called Zangdo. The page said it was a "get paid to" type program..something along the lines of Treasure Trooper or Cash Crate, etc.. and it sounded like a pretty good program, and I'm always signing up for crap just to kick the tires and see what it is, so I went ahead and signed up I should have known something was up when the page said it was 100% spyware and adware free..like, come on..it's safe..you can download me.. YEAH, RIGHT! Well, I downloaded it and waited for the usual welcome email so that I could verify my account, etc, and it never came. Next thing I knew, this program had taken over my browser..the stupid thing was a particularly virulent browser hijacker that would redirect my page to ads and give me these annoying popups every time I tried to go anywhere online. It only affected certain pages, which was kinda weird...like Ebay and Netwinner and Gather.

I have Avast and AVG on my system and neither of them caught it..so I went searching for something that would remove it. I only found one website ANYWHERE that had any information about this Zangdo virus and it had many, many people posting to request help in removing it. They recommended downloading about 15 different programs and running them all..AVG, Avast, Kapersky's, Panda Virus, Superspyware something or other, Ad-Aware..a whole long list of them.. and detailed multiple other steps for people to try. I was desparate, so I downloaded them all and ran them and NOTHING found this dang program.. they all found a ton of cookies and adtrackers though..dangerous stuff! Needless to say, they were all a complete waste of time.

My roomie suggested I try something called SpyNoMore, because he said he had the same type of thing on his system and that had worked for him, but it was 30.00..I don't have 30.00 at the moment, payday ain't til Friday and I just paid my rent..and I'm not about to pay 30.00 for something that MIGHT work, after everything else I tried. Then I found a copy of Spyware Doctor ..let's just say not through your regular retail type channels..it was more of an acquisition than a purchase..but I installed it and ran it and wooohooo IT WORKED!! All I can say is Thank GAWD for Spyware Doctor, because I was getting ready to say screw it and reformat my computer. That wouldn't have been a major tragedy, because I have a 300 gig external drive, so I could back everything up and not lose anything, but I really, really hate having to go through reinstalling all my crap. Now I don't have to worry and I can get back to my normal surfing habits. YAAAAY.

If you ever see anything called Zangdo..or anyone sends you an invite to join..DON'T DOWNLOAD IT.. and tell all your friends too!

Something new at BigCrumbs...Crumbboosters

2008-01-19T12:29:00.000-08:00

Something new and really great has been added to BigCrumbs!! It's called Crumbboosters and it's another chance to up your earnings at BigCrumbs.

What Are CrumbBoosters?

CrumbBoosters allow you to earn cash even when people you refer to BigCrumbs.com decide not to join! In fact, you'll earn the cash back they would have received for any purchase they make!

Now, if someone follows a referral link you post that takes them to BigCrumbs.com, they look around and see something they like on the Special Offers page ..or they click a link to a store from the store list.. they decide not to join for now, but want to take advantage of the coupon or end up browsing and making a purchase from one of the BigCrumbs retailers...and YOU EARN CASH BACK at the CrumbEarner rate. That's it! Even though they're not in your downline and not a member, you can still profit from showing them the way to the BigCrumbs site and having them make a purchase.

You don't even have to do anything to start taking advantage of CrumbBoosters..it's automatic and based on your referral links. So, as long as someone follows one of your referral links to BigCrumbs, you'll earn when they click through to a retailer and make a purchase!

You might want to consider creating a referral link that uses the Special Offers Page, or points to the merchants list as the destination page. That page incentivizes people who are not ready to join to shop through BigCrumbs and may be most likely to earn you some CrumbBoosters.

BigCrumbs also offers a Special Offers Widget, which allows you to automatically display current BigCrumbs Special Offers with your referral link embedded. Put that on your blog or your website so your visitors can see the current specials.

On top of that, you'll also earn the standard referral commission whenever one of your qualified referrals earns a CrumbBooster. In other words, CrumbBoosters are treated like purchases. If you'd normally earn a commission on a particular member's purchases, you'll also earn that commission when they earn a ">CrumbBooster.

You'll continue to earn residual income for referrals who join, each time they shop
You'll now also earn cash back at the CrumbEarner rate for each purchase made by a referral who doesn't join.

MLM ...Hype And Air

2007-12-25T18:38:00.000-08:00

I just wanted to do a quick post to wish everyone a Merry Christmas.. or whatever holiday you happen to be celebrating this season!

I have been working on a few things, including a post for later, or maybe tomorrow..whenever I can get it done, let's leave it at that LOL ..about downline builders and also traffic exchanges and several other things, so those will be coming in the very near future. I also wanted to take this chance to say a little something about
me and the purpose of this blog. This blog is pretty new, but I have a lot of things in the pipeline to write about as time permits, and there will be lots more stuff soon. When I write about something, whether it's a new program or a marketing tool or whatever it may be, my purpose is never specifically to bash the program and be negative. If a program gets a bad review and I say it's a waste of time and/or a ripoff, it's because from the information I've gathered about it, it IS a waste of time and a ripoff, and there's no way to sugar coat that for the satisfaction of the poor souls who get suckered into it. Sorry! I try never to be negative when I can help it, because I do think there's some truth to all that positive manifestation and you attract what you put out stuff. If there's something positive to be said, I'm very happy about it, really! On the other hand, if I see the Emperor marching along with his butt flappin' in the breeze, I'm gonna tell him.. "Hey, dude..you ain't got no clothes!". I don't hype, I don't lie, and I don't take advantage of people. I hate programs that are nothing but "hype and air", and I hate that people will join them on the recommendation of someone they trust, because they're some big-time marketing "guru" and then get shafted. How much money have you invested in "the best, most explosive business EVER!!!!" that's going to make you rich in your sleep, for doing nothing...? and how's your bank account looking now? The only one rich is the marketing guru and whichever one of his/her buddies started the program!

For example, when Lawn Chair Millionaire launched, one of the biggest selling points that people kept talking about was the fact that the "leader board" of people really pushing it had some big-time marketers on it. They reasoned that it MUST be a legitimate money-maker and they were safe in joining, because "those people" wouldn't be involved if it weren't legit. All it really meant was that they got the heads-up that it was going to be a great opportunity to make some cash for themselves, since they have huge lists and powerful marketing tools at their disposal to push people to join under them, and with their huge number of referrals, they knew they'd get a big ol' hunk of cash for themselves. Those who trusted them and believed it must be a great opportunity, most of them anyway, haven't been quite as lucky. I'm sure some have made some money, sure...but the majority probably haven't fared quite as well. Unfortunately, that's what happens in pyramid schemes.

If the program doesn't have a legitimate, useful, marketable service or product that people can..and would WANT TO..actually use, that is worth the monthly charge to be in the program to use the service/product.. it's just hype and air.. it's crap!

If the admin of the program spends lots of time telling you about the compensation plan for referring new paid members, and how much you'll make from recruiting and "fast track bonuses" and building your matrix that only needs 50,000 people to join to fill your matrix and get RICH..and very little time telling you how to actually market the product/service itself and grow an actual business ..you got it.. hype and air!

If they say you can earn as a free member, or that you don't have to recruit to earn, but then the only way to actually do anything, "unlock" the most desireable features, or make any kind of actual money with the program is if you do pay and upgrade and promote.,,.it's worse than crap..it's lies and dishonesty and deceit.

Whether you're an affiliate of an actual company with a real product, or you're promoting the latest flavor-of-the-month hot new 'business" in the hopes of making those promised millions at the end of some matrix, there's nothing wrong with that, but be smart, and be honest..with yourself and with those you partner with. That's what building a downline or getting referrals for things is. At least it's what it should be, and you shouldn't be dishonest with people who are nice enough to join your team.

Merry Christmas!

Suze Says

Marketing Pond shuts down My Power Mall

2007-12-20T09:11:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, Valerie Underhill, owner of Marketing Pond announced that, since My Power Mall is no longer a free program, she has removed it from the Marketing Pond list of programs. Marketing Pond is a downline builder for free online programs, and since Ginny Dye announced their new policy that members signing up for a mall after December 17, 2007 will now be required to make a purchase every month to keep their mall, it no longer qualifies as free. Although I think it may make it a little tougher to get and keep referrals for MPM now, the referrals you do get will be guaranteed to be active. I guess, something had to be done. What good is it to join a program like MPM and then not shop in your mall. Nobody shops, nobody earns. The MPM program has some potential, but only if people utilize it and support it. There are those who bash MPM, saying it's just a bunch of affiliate banners grouped together and "duping" people into joining up and shopping under Ginny's affiliate banners to make her rich. My opinion?.. so what? It's not a new idea. Ginny didn't invent the affiliate "mall" concept, and if she can build it up and make it successful, and if people join and use it, and people make money, what's bad in that? I'm not really enthused about the mall part, personally, but if the Debit Card program works the way I think and hope it will, that could be the key that revs My Power Mall up and gets it running. If you can manage to get a decent number of referrals, they all get referrals and they all purchase their cards, that's one income stream right there. Then, if we are allowed to fund our card and use it purchase things that are not in the actual mall, like from local merchants, and earn on those purchases, that will make it easier to earn and those purchases will qualify members for their monthly purchase requirement as well. Are you likely to earn big money with MPM? Not really..I could be wrong, but in playing with the income calculator on the site, from what I can see it takes 5-10 referrals each getting 5-10 referrals and spending a minimum of 30.00 to 40.00 a month each up to Level 4 before you really see any significant cash. Unless you get lucky and your referrals really start shopping and referring, and then you might get something out of it before level 4. It's still kinda a wait and see thing, since MPM is pretty new.

Another "mall" program that is still listed in Marketing Pond that I think has a lot of potential is Big Crumbs. It works the same way as MPM, refer, shop and earn rebates, etc., but it has some things that MPM doesn't have. First, you can shop on EBAY and earn money back! I love Ebay..so, that really works for me. Ebay power sellers can also add their pages to Big Crumbs for people to shop from. They have been around for 2 years, and they are more of a social networking type community, with forums and ability to link with other members, etc. They have a much easier to navigate and more attractive site, and I think the rebates and percentages you earn are larger than most places as well. Their mall works better for me, because I tend to shop a lot on Ebay. They have less stores than MPM, but they have all the good ones, so just another option to think about.

Lawn Chair Millionaire! ..Scam .Update

2007-12-14T14:45:00.000-08:00

Lawn Chair Millionaire! ..Scam or True Opportunity? by Suze P. — lcm, get paid, hype | Gather

So, it's been just about a week on this Lawnchair Millionaire thing..and I've had some time to check around and get some more information. My opinion.. save your $80.00.. the Lawn Chair is a lemon. There are SOME who have reported making some money with it. Those who were able to get lots of referrals are making out okay. Those of us who don't have the ability to recruit a bunch of people..who can also recruit a bunch of people.. will be sadly disappointed, not to mention poorer than when they started. One member reported making almost 5000.00 so far, and 2000.00+ of that is residual income. That's awesome.. YAY FOR THEM! Except, I suspect they will be sadly disappointed when that residual income dwindles down to nothing, as those who weren't able to recruit a gaggle of referrals and realize that they've been violated without benefit of Vaseline, stop forking over their 30.00 a month and quit.. and most of them request their money back as well. I've seen over and over, disappointed people, all saying they requested or are going to request their money back. If you are one of the lucky ones who was able to get in and get a bunch of referrals within the first few days or so and were able to make a few bucks, good for you! For the other ..thousands.. of people who weren't so lucky and feel like they got the shaft.. sorry, but the good thing is, there's still time to request your refund.

Just a few things to note..in case you haven't joined and were wondering.. The Vault is nothing more than some forex trading and gambling "opportunities" that cost you lots more money to get in on, and aren't guaranteed to make you money either. . So, basically, there's nothing in the vault that you can't get anywhere else online without the 30.00 per month fee.

Also, they don't tell you before you join that the way they pay you is with a debit card that you must PAY for. This is the only way to get paid from this program. You need to purchase the card and the number of referrals you have determines your cost. I believe they were charging everyone the maximum amount of 64.00 at first, but changed it due to complaints. That part I'm not positive about though. The breakdown is as follows and includes a shipping cost: It costs $64 if you sponsor no one, $54.99 if you sponsor 3, $44.99 for 5 referrals, $25 for 10, and it's free if you sponsor 15. A LOT of people were highly po'd to find out this little tidbit of information, which isn't mentioned until after you fork over your cash. Plus, debit cards usually have additional fees that you will also be charged if you want to actually do anything with them..load them, withdraw your money, etc.

I have noticed a dramatic dropoff in people hyping it after the first two or three days..I've hardly seen an ad for it anywhere the past day or two. That, in itself, is very telling. I posted the original post about this program to Gather.com, and I got some comments on that article there with people's reactions, if you want to go read them, the link is below.

Lawnchair Millionaire on Gather

Zion5 Profit Club..launching Today

2007-12-09T11:32:00.000-08:00

I joined a new site yesterday that I found out about through one of my contacts on Yuwie, Warren, called Zion5. At first glance it's a little confusing and it's hard to know what to do with it, but when you read about the site and how it works, you can quickly see that it could be a great place to make contacts, earn referrals, build your downlines..or just make some like-minded friends. It's very simple, really. You just join, go to the "websites" link and add your referral urls and a description for any and all programs or products or websites you are wanting to promote. If you are the first to add that site, your link will be the one shown to any unreferred members, or members who have nobody in their referrals who is a member. If you're the 2nd ..or the 150th member, your link and name won't show when someone clicks on the link, but if someone in your downline joins, it's your link they will join under.

The site owners say they've got big plans for things in the future to be set in place to help everyone make lots of money. Get in now and start telling your contacts about it, to lock in your place as the site grows and more opportunities are revealed. Join Zion5 Now!.

Lawn Chair Millionaire! ..Scam?

2007-12-08T17:26:00.000-08:00

Lawn Chair Millionaire launched on 12/06/2007, and it's everywhere already! Lots of people are really excited about this one. Why wouldn't they be, if what they claim is true? That's a big IF. No sponsoring.. earn the day you join.. earn if you do nothing other than sign up and pay your monthly fee of 30.00. I signed up at the website to try to get some more information about what the site truly is about. I didn't join..yet.. because it costs $80.00 to join and 30.00 per month to remain a member. I don't know if I want to part with 80 of my hard-earned dollars just to test drive something, when I can't be sure it's not complete BS. According to the rather vague info at the site, they have one single moneyline. Everyone who joins after you is under you, and you get paid your share of the "Moneyline Pool" every day from the day you join. According to the site, my share on sign up would be about 73.00, which would almost cover my $80.00 investment, but then it has the amount broken up under the 73.00 into three months. So I don't know if I'd get the 73.00 today or broken up over the three months. They're not very forthcoming with a lot of details. I believe that it is broken up, based on what the ads say. It also says they guarantee you'll get paid for at least 60 days. So, what happens after the 60 days? if you don't have referrals of your own.. from this no referrals required system.. you won't be guaranteed payment every day any longer? This one smacks of a pyramid scheme to me. If you get in early, you'll make some money, but will it be able to sustain payments and will you continue to be able to grow and make money indefinitely..? My guess.. probably not. Unfortunately, it's so new that it's hard to get any kind of concrete information about what the "real deal" is with this program.

I did a little looking around online, to see if I could ferret out any more information about if anyone has been paid as promised or not, and I found one post on Yahoo Answers from a guy who said he got 19.00 his first day and expects to get that every day and more. Another guy who claims he signed up on day one, said he has tripled his initial investment already. Not too bad, if it's true, and if that is what everyone can expect who joins. I imagine he made that by recruiting a few people under him. I doubt that's how much he got just from the moneyline. They do offer a one month money back guarantee.. or so they claim. No idea, of course, how many hoops they make you jump through to get that refund, or if you'll ever see it, but you can always drop out if the money isn't rolling in as expected.

Here's what the ads say:

"The Moneyline Pool has YOU earning money the day you join, and for months after, whether you refer anyone to Lawn Chair Millionaire or not! No sales = No problem!!

The entire Group is working together in ONE single Moneyline. EVERYONE who joins after you is placed below you in your business! YES, If you join NOW and upgrade immediate, everyone who join after you from the globe will be placed under you!

The moment you LOCK IN your position in the Moneyline you LOCK IN your Moneyline Pool shares! Your first share is paid to you at midnight the day you join.

This golden opportunity costs you a one-time $49.99 set-up fee and $29.99 monthly fee.

Every time you sponsor a new member you earn a $20.00 Fast Start Bonus that gets allocated immediately when the sale is made.

You earn a $15.00 Referral Bonus each and every month that your personally-referred members stay active by maintaining their subscription to The Vault.

Earn by simply joining the Lawn Chair Millionaire Group!

This income is allocated to your commissions in the Administration Money Manager in three segments during the first 60 days of your active membership.

A selection of unique and proven ways that you can turn your Moneyline Pool commissions into small fortunes.

TAKE THIS SERIOUS.

This will be a great experience, if you take this serious and BEST is that you share it with others after you upgraded to maximize your earnings"

The other facet of this system is their "product". Yes, they do actually claim to have an actual product. It's called "The Vault" and, apparently, is filled with tons of amazing information you can use to make more money. Even if you can't recruit referrals to the Lawn Chair Millionaire program (LCM), you can use the products in the vault to earn money. I can't find any exact information about what sort of mind blowing information is in this vault, but one member said it's pretty much a bunch of crap. The stuff in there isn't free, most of it you have to pay more money for. I can't find any real details as to what exactly is in there or if there's anything at all worth paying 30.00 a month for access to. Your membership to "The Vault' is what they claim the membership fee is for. Odds are that "The Vault" is just a bunch of crap they had to throw in to keep the system "legit", but may or may not have any real value.

I will say one thing, they do go for the hard sell. Immediately after signing up, I got no less than 5 emails from LMC urging me to upgrade now!! to avoid losing my position and lowering my share of all the millions. It must be effective though, because one site claims they are having people signing up and upgrading at a rate of 400 people an hour! Maybe one more email and they woulda had me!

I'm going to keep my eye on this one for a few more days, and see what I can find out. If you're feeling adventurous and want to try it and see what happens, you can sign up at http://www.lawnchairmillionaire.com.

Suze Says.. Internet Money Guide

Vanity Googling.. or The Importance of Signature lines

2007-12-05T10:04:00.000-08:00

Trying to get traffic to your website or blog is a very time-consuming process. Especially if you have a low, or even no, budget to work with and can't afford to buy hits or place paid ads. It's important to research and find the things that work, and in researching traffic generation you will, most likely, hear the same things repeated over and over. This is because, they work! It's not necessary to reinvent the wheel. Although finding new and different ways to promote is a good thing, especially when you find something that really works, you can learn from those who are successful at bringing traffic to their sites.

One of these tips you, undoubtedly, have heard repeatedly is the importance of a good signature line. Put your referral urls, your blog address, anything you need to promote in a signature file and attach it to everything you post, anywhere on tbe internet. I spend a lot of time on Gather , commenting and posting and pretty much wasting valuable time I could be spending earning money or, generally, trying to have an actual life. The other day, I published an article on rebate processor job scamsm and one of the commenters on it told me she found my article through Googling for information about rebate processor jobs, and that I was 3rd on the page under the search. Up to that point, I never even thought about stuff I write on Gather being indexed and searchable on Google, but, apparently, it is. Who knew!
I never put signature lines on my articles there, but from now on I will.

I then, out of curiousity, decided to vanity Google myself and see what came up. Well, 1050 pages of me came up under one nic, and 3200 under another. Not all of it was me, there are a couple of other people with the same nickname, but it was probably more than 90% me. That's 4250 chances of someone coming upon something I posted somewhere and seeing what I wrote, and thus seeing my signature file and whatever I'm trying to promote, clicking on it and joining up or buying something. The only problem with signature files is, if you change programs, move your site, or for some reason the information you post becomes outdated, then the signature files stop being effective. That's why you should use a good ad tracker if you can. Trafficwave.net has a great program and tons of features that will help you promote and grow your business or blog, and one of those features is an ad tracker that will let you change your ads from within Trafficwave, and anywhere you posted that signature line you're tracking it will change and be updated. How's that for a nifty little trick! So, if you don't already have one, get yourself a good signature line and use it whenever and wherever possible. Just be sure that wherever you're posting to allows them, because some forums and groups don't allow you to use them.

Some general rules of signature lines:
1. They should be no longer than 4 lines, 5 tops.
2. They should contain fewer than 80 characters per line.
3. They should also be plain text only — no HTML, no images. (well, that's a matter of choice, but the "rules" say that generally a good business or promotional signature should be just text).

So, that's the tip for today. Hope it helps :O)

Suze
Create a Traffic wave today!

FreebieForce:: free stuff.. for 39.35 a month

2007-12-03T10:48:00.000-08:00

FreebieForce::Product

I got an email the other day to check out this new Freebies site, called FreebieForce. This is one I don't think I'll be joining. I went and signed up as a "pre-enrollee" and watched the video, listened to the opportunity, and it sounds like a great deal..if I had a spare 39.95 a month, every month, to spend on free stuff that I may or may not need or use. Paying 39.95 a month to get free stuff, doesn't seem like the stuff is free to me. They claim the freebies they offer are really great, but with not being able to see the whole site and see the whole list before paying and joining, I just don't know that it's something I'm willing to do. Of course, they have an earning plan in place, so that you can recruit a downline and potentially make crazy money every month. People love freebies, right!! Everyone should line up and throw their money at the site, happy to pay for this. I'm just not sure I buy it. I could be wrong, and I may kick myself for passing it up and not getting in on it in the early stages later on, and I may even change my mind once I've thought about it and get more information. But at the moment, I just don't see it. They claim the money will be HUGE! (shocker, I know). They claim you can get free laptops, free hotel rooms, free meals, Ipods, pretty much anything for free. Not your average freebie site, for sure. There also is the earning plan where you get your recruits and then you make money every month from their membership. You only need to sponsor 3 to get yours free plus 10.00 per person profit. That's great, and totally wotth it IF you can get those 3..and IF they remain paying members and just keep paying without fail every month. Now, hopefully, you'll have more than 3 and be making big money, so if one or two drop out here and there, it's not a big deal. I don't know about you, but I don't know 3 people who will pay 39.95 a month, every month, for a freebie site. I could be wrong, and for some it should be very successful. The ones who can recruit a downline and motivate them easily, they'll be alright. Me, I'm not quite at that level just yet. You, on the other hand, may be. You may be willing to try it and see if you can recruit enough people to make yours free, or maybe you're curious enough to see what they're offering to try it. That's why I'm posting this, just in case some may be interested in trying out and potentially making lots of money and getting the awesome freebies they're offering.

This is what they have to say about their program:

"In addition to receiving fantastic free offers, you can also make money with FreebieForce using the 3x8 forced matrix.

With our "3 for Free" 3x8 Matrix, all you have to do is tell 3 people about FreebieForce.com and get them signed up - and you'll be getting free stuff for the rest of your life, while having your monthly subscription fees paid. AND on top of that, you'll have an extra $10 bucks per person - so you'll have made $30 helping your friends get free stuff, all the while getting your subscription fees paid for the rest of your life !!

But the compensation plan really is so much more than that. You've got the potential with FreebieForce to make $1000s a month!

When your friends decide to start telling others, you.ll be making $10 off every person that they tell directly - that's right, we give you a $10 MATCHING BONUS TOO!! So if you take the opportunity right now to tell 3 friends and make $30 immediately (plus $39.95 a month for as long as they remain members), you've got the potential of having those friends tell their friends. We'll give you $10 per person they tell, no matter how many they tell... FOREVER!!

So while your matrix fills up with all the great people who want free flights, hotels, cars, cash, trips, food, gas, and so much more, you'll be getting immediate results - and immediate cash."

One other thing that turns me off is, I've gotten several emails since I signed up from my upline telling me to hurry up and sign before I lose my place and lose my opportunity. People are joining in droves and they could all be under me if I just upgrade now! Hurry..do it now before it's too late! I hate that! I know, it's marketing, and for some things it works, but in this case it's just annoying me. If anyone does join and has some success with it..and it turns out to be as good as they say, please let me know.

Way To Go.. You RAWK!!

2007-12-03T02:13:00.001-08:00

Jusr wanted to share a little something here. Lots of people will tell you, and it's actually very true, that one way to get visitors to your blog or website and build up that ever important traffic is to visit other blogs and websites and comment, comment, comment. After a while, it gets kind of redundant and boring, and you start to sound kind of insincere and generic if you say the same thing over and over. Great job! Thanks for the info! Loved this post.. whatever.. so, I found a site that gives you "101 Ways to Say Good Job" Maybe you can find a few things on the list to help shake up your comments and breathe some life into them.

Some of the suggestions are "That's a great point", "That's an interesting way to think about it", "Outta sight", "Super duper" and "That's a real work of art".. LOL Go ahead and check them out, see if you can find some you can use

Swypefile Launched..and Crashed and Burned

2007-12-03T02:12:00.000-08:00

Swypefile closed! Well, it seems that Swypefile wasn't long for this world. It opened and closed quickly. Don't know what the problem is, exactly, they just said it wasn't working as they had envisioned and they were closing. They will hopefully reopen after they rethink things. Oh well, easy come, easy go.. although, all those people who spent their time collecting content and builing profiles and recruiting people are probably pretty unhappy. That's just the way it goes, I guess!

Swypefile Launched- Internet Marketing's Digg

2007-11-24T20:40:00.000-08:00

Swypefile - Internet Marketing News, Discussion, Strategies

I wrote this post last week for my Days Go By blog, and decided since I now have this one to repost it here, since it is more relevent here. Swypefile has launced, on November 19th, and things seem to be going well. There's a ton of great info already available, and you can join up and add your content, as well as the great stuff you find you think others should read. What is Swypefile, you ask? It's a site for internet marketing news, discussion and strategy that works kind of like Digg and other social reporting sites, only it's strictly for marketing. Users submit links to pages they want to share spanning several categories, including:

Affiliate Marketing

Blogging

Content & Copywriting

Contextual Ads

Ecommerce

Email Marketing

General Advertising

General Business

General Marketing

Lead Generation

Link Development

Miscellaneous

Niche Marketing

PPC Advertising

Product Development

Search Optimization

Social Networks

Technical Issues

Tracking & Analytics

Viral Marketing

Web Design & Usability

You can join and submit content, even your own content from your blog or website, as long as it's within the guidelines, and you add friends, and refer people like most sites. They provide link buttons and "swype this" buttons for you to add to your pages, so people can add your content to their swype files if they want.

You can earn $$$$ from your submissions too. According to the sites FAQ -

"Automatically monetize the content you submit with Google AdSense
Aside from the obvious exposure and traffic potential of submitting content to swypefile, you'll also earn money directly from submitting content - swypefile automatically monetizes the content you submit with Google AdSense.

It doesn't even have to be your own content - if you spend some time each day scouring popular online marketing sites and submitting quality content you find, you can earn money from that just the same.

Just add your AdSense ID to your swypefile profile, and any time a swypefile page with content you've submitted is viewed your AdSense ID will be used at least 50% of the time.

... and that means when people click on the ads, YOU get paid directly by Google.
... by showing Google ads with YOUR AdSense publisher ID at least 50% of the time on all pages containing content submitted by ALL of your referrals!"

I signed up. why not! It can't hurt, and if it turns out to be as big as Digg and Del.icio.us and that sort of site, I might even earn some cash. Might as well get in from the beginning and give it a shot!

And to give you even more of an incentive to sign up and be active in swyping and commenting and rating, they're offering a little bribe to members until the end of the year. Between now and the end of the year you can earn "free referrals" based on your usage and participation. Everything you do at swypefile, including submitting content, voting, commenting, etc., will add to your "karma" You can view your karma level in your profile, and they will automatically assign a percentage of new users who sign up after you that don't have a referer to you. Now THAT's a good deal!

Join Swypefile Now!

And so it begins...

2007-11-24T15:33:00.000-08:00

I've been thinking about starting this blog for quite some time, and I've finally gotten around to it. I've had a personal blog for a few years now Days Go By, as well as a very neglected Yahoo 360 blog, MySpace blog, Multiply.com blog.. you get the picture, but this is the one I've really wanted to create. I know there are probably, oh..a zillion, blogs about money and making money online already, so you may ask yourself, what can I offer that will be useful? The answer is..nothing, really, except my opinions and experiences and whatever information I can manage to gather to share with the world at large. Next to the heavy-hitters, financial geniuses and internet marketing gurus with their own wildly successful blogs, pulling down 100,000.00 plus in revenue from sharing their words of wisdom with the world, my babbling probably won't make a difference. But if I can find some interesting and profitable ways to earn some cash, or save some cash..or, yes, spend some cash, and it helps a couple people along the way, then I feel my time will not be wasted here.