It’s Back….But Not in Black
It looks like a light shade of Orange to me.
I was going to make this post yesterday but I was busy losing tups, no losing them as in “crap, where have they gone”, but losing them as in “go forth and spread your seed you fine chaps”.
I’ll admit that it didn’t take me all day, but by the time you’ve been tossing throwing them around all day my arms couldn’t really take any typing, so I retired to the TV.
But here I am this morning, arms slightly less sore, and able to type relatively coherent sentences.
So what’s back?
The A-Team?
Meatloaf?
Shell Suits?
Baked Bean Rounders?
Blankety Blank?
Gordon Brown?
No silly, it’s something with fewer explosions but more corned beef, something less of a fire hazard but more tasty, something where you just need to fill in the blanks but less useless.
^^I promise you that the above sentence does make sense….if you live inside my head
FREE MONTHLY WEBSITES IS BACK!!
To be honest I wasn’t aware it had gone anywhere, but I’ve now been informed that Free Monthly Websites 1.0 has been taken away by Tiny – only 3 other people will get that joke, and none of them read this blog, what a waste.
So 1.0 has now been replaced, not surprisingly, by 2.0 (I have it on good authority that 3.0 will be the next one)
It’s sad to see 1.0 being turned into dog food but we do have to learn from the past, and we have to admit that 1.0 did have it’s faults.
It was like a cat we once had, it was very friendly, but it kept falling over.
Free Monthly Websites (FMW) 1.0 was friendly enough to snuggle up to, but you did need a bit of HTML knowledge to edit and personalize the websites. Whilst my own personal view is that you really should have some basic HTML knowledge if you are doing anything online, I’m not here to judge you, and if you don’t have any HTML skills then FMW 1.0 would have been a bit of a challenge for you.
It was also limited in what you could do with it, the creators of FMW (John Thornhill and Dave Nicholson) hadn’t really been marketing for all that long, so didn’t have much of an idea about what worked and what didn’t when it came to the websites.
But 4 years on, they are a lot wiser – John has come to realize that it’s not possible for Sunderland to be anything other than a mid-table team, and Dave now understands that Alan Shearer isn’t a bloke that comes to my house to clip sheep.
They are also a lot wiser when it comes to Internet Marketing.
After the feedback they received from FMW 1.0 customers, they’ve put their minds together and come up with 2.0.
The main aim is to keep everything as simple as possible, so FMW 2.0 has been built on an engine that I know a lot of you are already familiar with, it runs the PlanetSMS/Planet Divinity eBook and software websites. So everything is controlled via an online admin area, this means:
- No HTML!
- No MySQL Databases
I suppose it’s kind of like WordPress, but tailored towards an all in one solution for creating content rich affiliate websites.
I’m getting hungry, and when I get hungry, I tend to fill out the posts with a screen shot. So allow me to introduce you to what the admin area of a Free Monthly Website will look like:
I was going to take another screen shot of the front end of a site, but I’ve had some Monster Munch and the hunger has subsided.
Plus there are tons of screen shots on the FMW website that you can take a look at, saves me cluttering up cyber space with duplicate images!
I’m sure there was something else I was going to say, but can’t for the life of me remember what it was.
So for now I’ll have to leave you with my closing statement about Free Monthly Websites.
Free Monthly Websites 2.0 is a great update to the original. It takes all of the good points of 1.0 and builds upon them to turn FMW 2.0 into a much better all round system.
If you were a FMW 1.0 customer, then you’ll probably have already signed up, but if you are a newbie and are wondering what all the fuss is about, please go ahead and check it out. It does exactly what it says on the tin – you get a free affiliate website every month, no strings attached!
Thanks for reading,
Dan
P.S. D9 Hosting now has a Facebook page….and we may actually use it, so please feel free to “Like” us!
If It Looks and Smells Like a Turd…
I should be sat eating a nice ham and egg sandwich now, but instead I’m on here thinking how best I can communicate what I’ve just seen.
I’m not an irrational angry kind of guy, but I’ve just seen a video that made me think to myself “What a couple of *****”
It’s a recorded phone call between two Internet Marketing syndicate members and was recorded in the build up to the launch of a product called “Video Boss”.
The recording includes more heavy breathing than 2 asthmatics making a porno, but the content goes a long way to exposing what these guys really think of their customers (you and I) so stick with it. There’s also a hilarious comment in there about some magic mushrooms (coz drugz iz well cool lolzpmslrofl!!), so at least they are putting all those immoral earnings to good use.
If you want to see what sort of snakes that are behind these massive launches, there you go, might make you think twice about buying anything from them next time?
And I know I may get a few angry unsubscribes for “ratting out” these guys, but come on, how can anyone with any kind of moral compass not feel just a little bit pissed off with the way these people conduct themselves. If you have a blog or a mailing list with any kind of following, would your readers appreciate it if you let them into the kind of crap that’s been going on lately?
I can’t go without quoting the original source, if you’ve never come across the SaltyDroid site before, have a read through, it’ll take you a while but it’s a real eye opener, which side of the fence are you on?
Original Video Source: Strong language warning
http://saltydroid.info/syndicate-shit-storm/
Update: The Salty Droid website is getting hammered by traffic (as you can imagine!) since this video was posted, so getting a connection to it may be a bit hit and miss, but if you keep trying you should eventually get on
I have Nothing To Say
I’ve got nothing to say, so what should I do?
I feel guilty for not writing anything on the blog for the past few weeks, but without anything of value to write about, I’m stuck.
I’ve had a few JV offers that I may or may not talk about in the future (have any loyal readers or mailing list subscribers noticed how long it’s been since I promoted anything to you?), but nothing that really warrants me spending an hour putting together a blog post containing silly pictures with even sillier captions.
So what I’m going to do is use this blog as the WordPress gods originally intended, I’m going to just randomly jot down a few things as they come into my head about life as a full time marketer and a 25 year old (it was my birthday last week, where were my presents?) company director.
As you will probably already know, I run D9 Hosting with my business partner Paula Brett, and back at the start of the year we had a big meeting to discuss some changes that we’d been mulling over for a while.
One was to look at getting some technical support help in, as I was getting somewhat over run with support tickets, and the 2nd was to look at our entire network infrastructure. Don’t get me wrong, there was nothing wrong with the existing network, as I’m sure customers reading this can confirm, but there were a couple of nagging issues that could have caused problems in the future had we left things as they were.
So we decided to go ahead and hire some technical support staff, and also started to research options to improve our network.
To cut a long (boring) story short, we ended up moving to a new datacenter in Florida that should (fingers crossed!) allow us to offer more services and provide us with a more stable network – if you are a D9 VPS or Hybrid customer, keep an eye on your mailbox in the next 10 days or so for a cool new feature we are bringing to you at no extra cost!
We first hired our new staff in June, and spent the next couple of months training them, and we also completed the DC migration at the end of July/start of August, but during that time both me and Paula were incredibly busy, and worked stupid hours. I think for a few weeks my shift hours were 9am – midnight!
But I didn’t mind, and I think this is quite an important point.
I actually enjoyed working those hours, because I was working at something I enjoyed doing.
Since the staff training and migration has been completed, the work load has gone down again. The staff are answering support tickets, and the servers are now running smoothly in the new DC, and payments from the 6,000 websites we host are coming in daily, so basically you can say that I’m “living the marketing dream”.
I have a profitable business running on just about auto-pilot.
It’s the thing people dream about, well, I’ve lived the dream and I’m now going to shatter it for you.
No Matter How Much Money You Make On Auto-Pilot, Doing Nothing Is Soul Destroying!
Of course, just my opinion, but for the past couple of weeks my workload hasn’t been enough. The money has been coming in from both D9 and my other marketing stuff, but I’ve been well and truly bored out of my skull – it hasn’t helped that I’ve torn my groin so can’t play football for 2 – 3 months, but that aside, I need to work!!
I was actually so bored yesterday that I went on an 8 hour wagon trip down to Sheffield and back….and noticed that a lot of new wagon (lorry) trailers now have curved rooves to streamline them in an attempt to save fuel, which I thought was a somewhat ingenious idea.
Whilst writing this I’ve remembered a saying my Grandad always used to say, I used to think he was crazy, but he’s right:
Busy Days Are Happy Days
No matter how much money you have, you still need to do something to occupy your time. Look at all the millionaires in the world, if they wanted to they could sit back and do nothing all day whilst they continue to make money on auto-pilot, but they don’t, they prefer working.
I appreciate I may be coming across as a bit of a jerk, I know there will be a lot of you reading this who’d love to be in my shoes but as I’ve said before, it’s just my opinion and I’m standing by it, having everything run on auto-pilot whilst you sit back and relax is a really soul destroying way to live your life, the brain needs some sort of stimulation every now and again!
Luckily I’ve snapped out of “bored” mode now, and am working on setting up a VM master and then converting some existing nodes into slaves as part of our new VPS/Hybrid ideas, so that should keep me busy for the next couple of days. After that I’ve got an eCommerce website to do for a regular web design client of mine, then I may even pull my finger out and create a couple of new sites of my own.
So thankfully the quiet time hasn’t lasted too long, THANKFULLY!
What do you reckon, is the “make money on auto-pilot” dream as good as it sounds when it becomes a reality?
….Or have I just won an A* for writing a load of old bollocks 🙂
The Part I Played In Destroying The Global Economy
After a lot of soul searching I’ve come to the conclusion that I played a part in destroying the global economy.
Yep, Freddy Mac Daddy and Fanny Mae (Quoted from @TurnerDigital) have got nothing on me.
So what have I done to be associated with such good company, have I been short selling company stocks, lending money that didn’t exist in the 1st place to people who couldn’t afford to pay it back even if they lived for another 150 years, or something far more Dick Dastardly?
Well, here it is, my public admission, in true AA style:
My Name Is Dan Thompson, and I’ve Stopped Buying Things
Not things completely, I still eat and wear clothes, I also still buy random gadgets and crap T-Shirts, but over the past 2 years the amount on Internet Marketing products I have purchased in almost 0.
I say almost 0 because I’m sure I purchased something last year, but as you can tell, it didn’t leave a lasting impression on me.
So with my new “anti buy stuff” attitude, I’m slowly destroying the economy, the money I’d be giving to Marketer x for their brilliant new “How to rank 1st on Google whilst eating pizza with Cameron Diaz whilst she does Donuts on a remote air field in Southern England” is no longer going into their pocket, and in turn that money isn’t going to their local crack dealer, and that money isn’t then going into their local McDonalds….or wherever crack dealers eat nowadays, it’s a vicious circle.
If everyone was like me, imagine how much worse the economy would be.
But why have I stopped spending money in the IM niche, I used to spend money when I 1st started, so why stop now?
Well, I’ve come to this conclusion – since I’ve stopped buying all of these big launch eBooks that contain “an unmissable new secret that’s so secret I may have just made it up to sell this overpriced PDF” you’d have thought my earnings would have evaporated to nothing, I mean if I don’t use this amazing new technique then I’m clearly going to fail.
But that’s not the case, I still make as much, if not more now than I ever did when I was buying every IM product that I was offered.
Those initial products I purchased to help get me on my way were great, but there comes a time when you have to stop following instructions and think for yourself. I’ve realized that there’s only so much information you need to get started as an online marketer, so once you have that basic understanding the only thing that’s stopping you is yourself, if you have a basic understanding of how things work then get out there and put your plans into action, free yourself from the shackles of overpriced crap!
It’s like driving a car, when you first start you read up on the theory behind it all, and you then go for lessons, and eventually you take your test and are allowed out into the big bad world…..full of horse riders, cyclists and caravans……
Once you’ve done the theory and passed the test, you start to drive on your own, and if you make a mistake you learn from it and know not to do it again.
So basically what I’m getting it, is that once you’ve got the basic understanding of everything grasped, and your hosting and auto-responder in place, is it really worth buying anything else?
I can understand purchasing products and services that make your life easier – graphics, PLR articles, “make your life easier” software, and so on, but if you are a competent marketer already, do you really need any more theory guides, wouldn’t you be better going off and researching something on your own – and then you could be the one selling your “secrets” 😉
For example, last week whilst foraging through the internet, I noticed that a highly popular script in a particular niche that I’m active in has no rampant affiliates promoting it, so I can get in there and make affiliate sales on the script, and also some hosting sales on top of that – hosting is a fundamental part of the script.
And to promote this, I’m not going to use a top secret technique from an eBook, I’m going to do something that I’ve tried and tested over the years and that I know works:
1. Create website where I share my experiences of the script with the readers, and post a few “how to use it” guides
2. Drive traffic to the site via organic Google results, as I’ve shown you how to do umpteen times on this blog
3. I’ll get affiliate sales from the product, and sales from the hosting
4. Bingo, job done!
5. Total cost of project – $8 for the domain name
I haven’t actually created the site yet, so I may be setting myself up for a humiliating fall, but I’d like to bet that if we come back in 6 months time, the website will have made me at least a few thousands dollars, none of which would have been possible if I’d have still been reading my way through a badly written PDF telling me “what I must do to succeed”.
End of minor controversial blog post, I think there’s a point in there somewhere, if not, just have fun looking at my illustration of a car driving into a wall, notice how I remained un-sexist by not implying the sex of the driver.
Bye for now,
Dan
1 Nugget That Not Even The Colonel Knows About
Following on from my last mega-post, I’ll bring you one final nugget of information that I’ve picked up on my travels. It’s one of those things that people love to speculate on, but nobody really has a definitive answer to it.
So what is the mysterious question?
Here you go:
Q: Does The Geographical Location of a Server Effect Search Engine Rankings?
A: Yes
**The End**
What’s that I hear you cry, you want proof?
The video below provides you with all of the proof you need, it’s a video made by Google for their Youtube Google webmaster channel.
*Any eager beavers reading this as soon as it’s been posted via the RSS feed may need to wait for the video to show. I suck at embedding Youtube videos on WordPress posts for some mad reason!
**Turns out the video works, but it covers up some of the links in the nav bar, but I don’t think any of you really use them anyway
So to summarize, if you run a site that is specifically targeted at a certain market, you stand a better chance of ranking well in the search engines if the server your site resides on is located in that country.
But lets not take the videos word for it, Google may be pulling a devious little trick on all us nerds, lets put it to the test.
Go to Google.co.uk (The UK Google site) and search for something along the lines of:
wellies free delivery
If you then check out the domain names that come up on the first page of the Google results using the Network Tools Express search, you’ll be able to see the geographical location of all of the top sites is the UK.
You can search again for something like:
plumbers in sheffield
And you’ll see that this time we have a lot of local business results from Google that appear, if you do the Network Tools search on a few of the domains, you should find that the sites hosted in the UK achieve a higher listing than those hosted in the US and elsewhere.
So if you currently host a site that targets the UK market on a US server, you may well find that a simple server move would increase your, or your clients search engine rankings.
You don’t have to just test it on Google.co.uk, feel free to try your own local version of Google and have a look at the geographical location of the server.
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D9 Hosting Provides Shared & Reseller Hosting Services
For Clients Across The Globe With Servers Located In
Both The USA And The UK!
Select Your Preferred Server Location During Checkout:
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I’ve turned into the devil, I’ve turned an informative blog post into a plug for D9 Hosting, but come on, if you are going to take my advice you may as well get the hosting from me as well 😉
As I’ve been writing this post, another SEO myth that needs dispelling also came into my head, but I think I’ll leave that one for the next post – unless you all leave a comment telling me that these “nugget” posts are crap, in which case I wont bother.
So next week: Why spending loads of money on “different class c IP” hosting is a waste of time, and again, this is backed up by Google.
Just before signing off, here’s a chance to take part in a D9 Hosting/Internet Marketing fantasy football World Cup league. It’s free to play, and as well as the prizes provided by Fifa, we (D9) are offering existing customers 50% off their next hosting bill, and 50% off your 1st hosting bill if you fancy joining – all you need to do is win the league.
If you are new to Fantasy Football, here’s a quick overview of how it works:
- You have a “transfer kit” which you use to buy players
- Each player will earn you points every time they play, by scoring goals, keeping clean sheets, getting an assist, etc. (They’ll also lose points for getting sent off!)
- The points are then added up, and added to your team’s score.
- You’ll play in a league against myself, Paula, and other D9 customers
- There are also prizes provided by Fifa, including a brand new car, football shirts, and more
- It’s totally free to play!
So even if you have no football (soccer) knowledge, pick a random team of players and who knows, you may just get lucky!
It’s all a bit of fun and we’d love to see you in the league 🙂
Instructions on how to enter are below.
1. Sign up for free account at:
http://www.fifa.com/theclub/index.html
2. When you’ve signed up, log into your account and click on “Games” and then the “Activate” button under “McDonalds Fifa World Cup Fantasy”
3. You can then log in at the Fantasy Football site: (Bookmark this URL!)
http://en.mcdonalds.fantasy.fifa.com/
4. You can then go ahead and select your team
5. When you’ve selected your team, you can join the D9 league by clicking on “My Leagues” > “Create/Join”
And then enter the following league code to join our league:
187968-44949
The closing date for the 1st round of games is the 11th June, so try and get your team registered before then, and good luck!
Fantasy Football Tips
1. You’ll most likely find yourself running out of money, so my tip is to pick a solid foundation of 12 or 13 quality players, and then make the rest up with really cheap players from the teams that don’t have much of a chance – you only pick 11 players to start the game so start with your quality players and leave the cheap ones as substitutes.
2. Your captain earns double points, so select your star player as the captain
And that’s all for this blog post, but before I go, here’s a recycled post from 4 years ago, call me un-patriotic but the gist of it remains the same 🙂
https://elpassoblog.com/why-england-have-no-chance-of-winning-the-wold-cup/
Over and out,
Dan
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