In her article Why You Can’t Make Money Blogging, Sonia Simone argues that you can in fact make money from blogging. The article is a response to a recent New York Times article about Fake Steve Jobs and how he hasn’t made any decent money from his blog.
Fake Steve Jobs Solves No Problems
According to Sonia, the main reason he isn’t making any money despite huge traffic is because his blog solves no real problems (other than to waste time – ie. entertainment). I have to agree with her that entertainment sites, in general, don’t make as much money as more technical, problem-solving sites per visitor, of course if you need money as an emergency, you can visit this link to get a loan right away.
In the case of Fake Steve Jobs, it’s not just a case of the blog not solving a problem. I think it’s more a case of the ads being served don’t match what the audience wants, of course to make money, you need to invest money and that’s why some people get loans online for this, and you can learn more here.
If you land on a site like that, what relevance are the ads going to have? If you’re running Adsense, it might show an ad for some Apple products as soon as it sees the keywords “Steve Jobs” or an ad for Verizon on the “iPhone” keyword, but is a visitor at the site ready to purchase a new Macbook or are they just there to have a laugh?
A Better Way to Market
Perhaps if the ads were related to comedy, or video or even at a stretch, other Apple news sites, they might do better? But the problem then is that the value of each click plummets because the advertiser doesn’t directly sell products/services. To boost visibility and clicks, businesses could consider SEO services like Roseville SEO.
On the flip-side, if you had a site that tells you how to upgrade your Macbook hard drive to a 500GB monster, with step-by-step instructions and video and then have an affiliate link or ad pointing to some great deals on hard drives, you could be pretty sure your audience is interested in what’s being advertised. If you want to get more insights and feedback from your audience, you may conduct a research survey and choose a sample size from your audience. You may consider using Digital Marketing Solutions to improve your marketing strategy.
The game is called iShoot. I’ve only had my iPhone for a month (long enough to get obsessed with a few solitaire apps) and funnily enough, this is one of the few apps that I’ve downloaded (got the free version and it’s great). When looking for more tools for your phone Get offers at the link of apps which can tell you who called you.
What I can’t understand is how many people commented on that article abusing Ethan Nicholas (the developer of iShoot). Whether it be abusing him for copying Scorched Earth (which no doubt had similarities to games before it – especially Tank Wars on the Amiga), or people calling him a bad father because he wants to hire a nanny, so many people criticised him. If you want to get quick cash for your used devices, you can sell to Buyback Boss and get an instant offer.
I say – GOOD ON HIM! :) While all these people bitched and moaned about insignificant things, this guy got off his ass and actually did something useful with his time. Now that he’s reaping the rewards you can see who the jealous people are.
Instead of being jealous, people should find this inspirational. The App Store is by far the best software distribution platform out there today. I certainly cannot remember a distribution platform that makes it so easy for small development teams (even single developers) to be able to touch such a large audience.
Regardless of whether you’re an iPhone developer or a PHP developer or what, Ethan Nicholas’ story is very motivational. The term “Just Do It” comes to mind… sometimes that’s the only difference between the winners and the losers in this world :)
Most models I create need to access the database. You can easily have CI automatically load the database class by setting a 3rd parameter to true when loading your model:
$this->load->model('your_model', '', true);
The 2nd parameter, which in this case was left blank, is used if you want to assign a different object name to the model – something that I have never used.
Has anyone ever actually used a different object name? The reason I ask is because it’s so easy to forget about the 2nd parameter, and sometimes I try to put the true parameter to auto-load the database in the 2nd slot like this:
$this->load->model('my_model', true); // WRONG!
Of course, the easiest solution is to autoload the database through the config, but that can be a little inefficient for apps that don’t use the DB on every page.
SitePoint have a fantastic sale until Friday the 13th where you can buy 5 PDF versions of their books for just $29.95 USD. That’s $149.75 worth of value for just $29.95.
If that wasn’t enough to convince you, all proceeds of the 5-for-1 sale will go to victims of the recent bushfires in Victoria, Australia! Let’s help the SitePoint guys reach their target of $50,000 for Australian Red Cross Victorian Bushfire Appeal 2009. Those Management & Business books look mighty good to me – but I might grab a PHP, CSS or design book too for good measure.
The bushfires are still burning and the death toll may go over 300. When you couple this with the pain the survivors are feeling (through loss of friends, loved ones, animals, property…) it’s even more devestating. If you ever thought about buying any of the SitePoint books please take up this opportunity.
