Conflicker Worm Virus Removal Tools

Conficker Worm Removal Tools, do we really need them? The new virus threat known as the Conficker C computer worm is still being highly discussed. The big news story that 60 Minutes ran on this past Sunday about the computer virus seems to be causing a lot of panic amongst computer users everywhere. The news is of course that this could become some sort of April 1st Computer virus because the Symantec corporation is tracking it and warns it's "awaiting further instructions". Since it's still a few hours ahead of the big day, April 1st, 2009, people have been feverishly trying to protect themselves, either searching for conficker removal tools, running windows security updates and trying to get free McAfee Antivirus downloads on their personal computers. It's amazing how one little bit of exaggerated reporting can cause mass hysteria amongst households everywhere. The Monetizer is here to help and these simple things should put your mind at ease about this virus which may not even do anything on April 1st.

First off, if you're running Vista or using a Macintosh computer, then you're safe. If you don't use Internet Explorer for your web browsing then you're also safe, as the worm only attaches to that internet browser. You don't need to worry about rushing out to get Norton or Symantec Antivirus or contacting the conficker working group to make sure you're safe. The Conficker worm won't be on your system.

If you're running an older operating system on your computer (before Vista) and use Internet Explorer for browsing the web, I highly recommend you check for Microsoft Windows updates. According to the reports, if you haven't done an update of Windows for October of 2008, you won't have the proper security patch in place to prevent Conficker C virus.

If you want to be super safe, you're going to want to make sure your antivirus software is up to date. If you don't have any, I recommend you get antivirus software to protect your computer. My preferred software names are Kaspersky Internet Security or Trend Micro Antivirus, as both have served me well on multiple computers preventing viruses and firewall breaches with minimal intrusion into daily computing activities.

April 1st is closing in (or here), but there's no need for freaking out. Don't panic if you're using a computer with the Microsoft Vista operating system, if you're using Mozilla Firefox (and never touch I.E.), or if you use a Macintosh/Apple computer. You're safe and there's no need to panic over the "impending doom" that 60 Minutes has seemed to imply from its recent story on the Conficker computer worm.

60 Minutes Conficker Virus - Threat or Not?

While The Monetizer is mostly about making money online, I'm also interested in presenting info on technology, tips, tricks and ways to increase productivity, or in this case protect your important data/identity on your personal computer. On the Sunday March 29th, 2009 episode of the news documentary show "60 Minutes" they had an in depth report and look at the Conficker virus. Conficker is described as a fast-moving computer worm, which is apparently latching onto over 3 million computer systems worldwide but is not really inflicting any damage, yet. The only thing the virus is doing is "awaiting further instructions" which in and of itself is terrifying. According to the computer security experts, this worm is set to change course on April Fools Day, which is a day or so away. This could result in all sorts of havoc including sending spam, spreading other harmful computer viruses or bringing down websites.

The story went on to show interviews with higher-ups from Symantec (makers of Norton Antivirus) and Google. At Symantec they demonstrated the importance of having updated antivirus and antispyware software, which most people know of these days. They had an interesting simulation showing 60 Minutes reporter Lesley Stahl using a computer, going to Facebook, and clicking on a link that she thought a friend had emailed her of a cool video clip. The link which was fake immediately gave her computer a virus. They had another computer monitor set up right next to hers which then displayed every bit of data she entered into her computer being captured on the other computer. This is the danger that is computer viruses in our modern age. The rep from Google discussed the notion that Google takes every precaution to warn internet "searchers" of potentially harmful sites that show up in search listings. Google has the warning "this site may be harmful to your computer" which shows up under some listings and then a second warning once you click to the site. After that, the Google rep said, the internet surfer is on their own.

Back to Conficker, let's make sure we have the facts straight so a mass panic doesn't start. Security experts say the people behind the virus most likely aren't looking to crash websites and damage computers because doing so would prevent them from "making money". The latest computer hackers tend to be cyber gangs looking to score by grabbing people's data such as Credit card numbers and bank account information. It's basically like their very own (highly illegal) shortcuts to internet millions. So in that regard don't worry about your computer being destroyed by Conficker, but do take your personal data and identity protection seriously.

Many of our PC's are already protected from the Conficker virus because we have the latest, greatest Antivirus Software. To be sure, it's very easy to make sure you're protected from the potentially harmful consequences. There's really 2 choices you have in fighting off the potentially harmful effects of downloading the Conficker virus:

1) Make sure you have run the most recent Windows updates for your computer. There's a security patch that Microsoft released in October 2008 which prevents Conficker. Many people don't have that important update or perhaps are running illegal copies of Windows which don't have the update. Also, it's not a bad idea to update and security software such as Antivirus Software and antispyware while you're at it to prevent other viruses.

2) Buy yourself a Macintosh. They don't get hit by viruses nearly as often as the PC's.

You can read all about the Conficker virus story at CBSNews.com.

30 Most Memorable Fictional Entrepreneurs

You may never have thought you'd see the name Homer Simpson mentioned with the word "entrepreneur", but believe it or not the lovable yellow and quite often absent-minded cartoon dad made a top 10 list, of fictional entrepreneurs. Homer checks in at #8 on the list provided by Inc. magazine, which talks of the various money making endeavors Homer has been part of such as Internet consultant, tabloid publisher and sugar tycoon. Coming in at the 1 spot on the list is Hank Rearden a steel magnate from the novel "Atlas Shrugged". Other memorable names you may recognize in the top 10 include a sports agent who "shows the money", a magic candy factory owner, and a weapons-dealing man who's alter ego is tough as Iron.

30 Most Memorable Fictional Entrepreneurs

1) Hank Rearden (Atlas Shrugged, steel magnate)
2) Milo Minderbinder (Catch-22, uses war for opportunity)
3) Daniel Plainview (There Will be Blood, oil tycoon)
4) Jerry Maguire (Jerry Maguire, sports agent)
5) Mildred Pierce (Mildred Pierce, book/movie - working class mother of 2)
6) Willy Wonka (Chocolate Factory, owner and tour guide)
7) Homer Simpson (The Simpsons, multifaceted dad)
8) Charles Foster Kane (Citizen Kane, wealthy media magnate)
9) Tony Stark (Iron Man, weapons dealer & superhero)
10) Harold Hooper (Sesame Street store owner)
11) Maxine Lund (Being John Malkovich, co-founder of the experience Malkovich biz)
12) Stringer Bell (The Wire, real estate developer/dealer)
13) Fred and George Weasley (Harry Potter, owners of Diagon Alley shop & owl-order business)
14) Bree Van De Kamp (Desperate Housewives, self-sufficient housewife, Caterer &
Author of Mrs. Van de Kamp Recipes)
15) Rick Blaine (Casablanca, cafe owner)
16) Lorelai Gilmore & Sookie St. James (Gilmore Girls, managers of Dragonfly Inn)
17) The Once-ler (Dr. Seuss' The Lorax, entrepreneur)
18) Seymour Levov (American Pastoral, business owner)
19) Bill Henrickson (Big Love, owner of 3 wives & 2 stores)
20) Sweeney Todd and Mrs. Lovett (barber and baker)
21) George Jefferson (The Jeffersons, owner of Jefferson Cleaners chain)
22) Calvin Palmer (Barbershop, owner)
23) Benjamin Horne (Twin Peaks, owner of Great Northern Hotel)
24) Yermolay Lopakhin (The Cherry Orchard, change agent)
25) Frenchy (Small Time Crooks, founder of Cookie business/bank robber)
26) Peter Venkman, Raymond Stantz &
Egon Spengler (Ghostbusters, founders)
27) Paul Dombey (Dombey & Son, wealthy shipping magnate)
28) Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, founder of Bubba Gump Shrimp)
29) Julia Sugarbaker (Designing Women, interior design firm)
30) Tony Soprano (The Sopranos, mob boss extraordinaire)

(Source: Inc. Magazine)

Surprisingly Zach Morris from Saved by the Bell failed to make the list. After all he started several different product lines, published modeling calendars, spaghetti sauce, magic rings, formed a rock band, and even tried to pawn off Screech as an alien to make some extra dough from the FBI as reward money. Zach was the epitome of a hustler trying to make money while working but also while coming up with various money making schemes. I might also argue for Ari Gold from the hit HBO series, Entourage. Ari was fired from his job and ended up forming the Miller-Gold agency with Barbara "Babs" Miller, still managing his talented young client, Vincent Chase. He even gave up a lucrative position as major studio head to continue running his own biz.

So what do we take away from this list? Possibly the notion that you don't have to be a rocket scientist, truly famous, or a business person to become a successful entrepreneur. Seeing this list has given me some food for thought in terms of movies I'd like to see such as There Will Be Blood, and books to read including Atlas Shrugged. Perhaps these characters, although fictional, can serve as inspiration for us all. One day you even may see this character, the lovable Monetizer who makes money online ranking up on the list too!

Latest Linkbuilding & Exchange Strategies

In the past month I purchased three new domains and set up Wordpress blogs on them, in the hopes of generating even more online income. Recently, I began to focus on just one of the sites in particular, as well as The Monetizer blog, in a linkbuilding frenzy. Day by day I've used the 3 methods below and suggest if you're serious about your linkbuilding campaign you look into them as well (if you're not using them already).

1) Grizz Niche Support Page - This is one great resource created by Grizzly, author of Make Money Online with Grizzly and Make Money Online for Beginners. On this page you'll find a list of bloggers from new to veteran, looking for link exchanges. Each blogger lists out their various sites and you can add yourself to the list in the comments field. You can also go about emailing as many of those people as you want, letting them know you're interested in setting up a link exchange, whether it be inside a blog post or on your blogroll. Grizz recommends the in post variety, while the sitewide blogroll link doesn't necessarily hit you at all in your attempts to increase page rank and search traffic.

2) Entrecard bloggers - A lot of people tend to bash Entrecard as a traffic source, and they may be justified in this, however the site does offer another advantage: finding blogs in your niche(s) to network with and exchange links with. I've made several great link exchanges here with all sorts of blogs. As you know the Make Money Online category there is heavily saturated, so you can likely find someone there willing to give you some link love. Simply go to the "Campaign" tab, then search on your desired category, message the person on Entrecard (or their site), and you've got another potential link exchange. I think it's good practice to drop your card on them also, just as a way to intro yourself and blog, but don't get caught up in the dropping! :)

3) Article submissions - This is the tried and true linkbuilding method, recommended by Courtney Tuttle, and I have to say it's worked quite well for me. I currently use a free program called Article Directory Submitter which requires some manual work on your part, but definitely makes things easier than going to each site on your own. Of course you'll need to register yourself on many of these sites before you can proceed. From there I develop articles around 500 words total, and insert 2 links into the main body as well as the author resource box. Some sites allow the links in the article, others prefer them only in your resource box area.

Now depending on the search term you're trying to rank for you may need to write 10 plus articles to see some success. Outsourcing may be your friend for that, more on that below. I usually find that 2-3 articles, combined with submitting your site or specific page links to Socialmarker.com's sites can usually help you rank pretty well for a medium competitive term (maybe 600,000 results or less). Terms in the low millions for search volume will require quite a bit more work on your part. Something I've yet to try but will soon be looking into is outsourcing the article writing. As much as I enjoy blogging and writing, it can become tedious and paying someone else a few bucks for a 500 word article isn't such a bad idea! Consider Craigslist.org as your source to set up ads to find writers. A tip I learned from an interview on Yaro Starak's Internet Business blog - Entrepreneurs Journey is to use the Phillipines as your source, because you can hire writers cheaper there. According to the gentleman in the interview, they see the lesser (several dollars for an article) money you pay them as quite good based on their own currency rates. Of course use that advice at your own discretion based on your own feelings towards paying someone less in another country. Give it a try if you want and experiment with how much money you offer for an article there. I've noticed people in the Entrecard marketplace who offer to write blog posts as well, so consider asking them to write you an article and pay up the EC's.

The above 3 methods are my latest means of linkbuilding for some new blog websites I've created. I'm focusing on one site in particular and doing a little bit of each of the above each day. The key to success for any blog project you're working on is consistent action day after day, so that one day it all pays off in the form of passive earnings from online income. Give the above a try yourself, stay focused and consistent and you'll be doing yourself a great moneymaking favor!

Here's to your success,
The Monetizer

Make Money Online with Entrecard!

Finally, for all those who have bemoaned and complained that Entrecard is a big waste of time and traffic, the blogging advertisement system has some great news. The Entrecard powers that be made a major decision to help all its users make money with Entrecard while improving the value of EC's.

The following comes from an email I just received from Entrecard:

A real ad network
We will be opening as much as 50% of our ad impressions network-wide to third party advertisers. We will be accepting cash payments to run 125x125 advertisements through our widget network. Ads will be sold as run of network, or targeted by category, for a low CPM rate to be announced. Please plan your daily entrecard ad purchasing accordingly. Whereas before, when you purchased an ad, you were buying a minimum of 100% of the impressions, you are now buying a minimum of 50%. However, the maximum is still 100% of the impressions, because if we have no ads booked for that category, or for the network, for any given day, you will still get all of the impressions.

Exchange your credits for CASH
With the money we make selling as much as 50% of our network impressions, we will purchase your credits from you, and delete them from the system. This means we're going to let you sell credits for cash, right from your dashboard! This has been the single most requested feature since we launched Entrecard. Members have clamored for a way to sell Entrecard credits for cash, but the same problem always arose: where does the money come from to let people sell their credits? How do we use our greatest resource (millions of daily impressions across ~60 niches) to benefit everyone? After much deliberation, the answer became clear. We must open up our ad network, and funnel the proceeds of the entire operation back to you, the members!

Their email goes on to discuss them making your Entrecard credits more valuable then they used to be. Basically Entrecard credits have been created rapidly but not used as fast, leading to what they consider inflation. To combat this they want to buy out and eliminate all those spare credits. Of course there's a few catches, such as the fact all Entrecard bloggers must now display their widgets "above the fold", and also the fact that 3rd party advertisers will be able to utilize your ad space now.

Entrecard's email offers a nice concise recap of this major announcement....

You can boil this down to the following 4 bullet points:

1. In a week, we're launching an ad network where anyone can advertise through Entrecard widgets for CPM rates. This can be run of network advertising, or targeted by category. We are making available 50% of our inventory, or approximately 40 million monthly impressions.
2. With the money we make, we are going to buy credits back from you. You will be allowed to sell credits via your dashboard, and we will devote 75% of daily sales to buying credits back.
3. The economy will no longer be in a state of inflation, but rather in deflation which means your credits will gradually start becoming more valuable.
4. For all this to work, we must institute an above-the-fold rule, which goes into effect in a week.

So let your creative gears start turning...You can see now that if you're offering services through the Entrecard marketplace, you can earn actual cash for that work rather than advertising credits. Plus if you have credits just sitting in your account, now you can cash em in for money! So add Entrecard to the list of ways to make money online!

Download Jean Chatzky's The Difference FREE!

There's a great free download available over at Oprah.com. Today until 10:59 PM EST, the website is offering a free PDF download of Jean Chatzky's 2009 book, The Difference: How Anyone Can Prosper in Even The Toughest Times. The book is a great look at the traits and habits that wealthy people have that we can all acquire as well as how to find the right career for you, how to take risks, working hard and working smart and making money work for you.

Here's Amazon.com's product description of The Difference:

Can you really start from nothing and become truly secure financially?

What’s the difference between you and Warren Buffett? Between you and your boss? Or between you and your successful neighbor? What do the financially comfortable have that you don’t?

It’s not that those people were born into money, caught a lucky break, or have an Ivy League education. It’s not even that they are smarter than you or make more money than you do each year. So what do they have that you don’t . . . at least not yet? What’s The Difference?

Trusted financial coach Jean Chatzky shares the secrets her groundbreaking research of the self-made wealthy has uncovered so that anyone can break through the barriers that stand between them and true financial freedom. Find out why it’s important to:

• Get happy, but not too happy
• Do what you love, but don’t quit your day job
• Read every day
• Remember that failure is not an option–it’s a necessity
• Harness your intuition to take risks that make sense
• Practice the Kevin Bacon Principle–make connections
• Say thank you–and mean it
• Make your money work as hard as you do

Through candid interviews and a study of more than five thousand people, Jean reveals the traits and habits of those who have moved from the lowest economic strata to the highest. The Difference helps you take a look at where you are now and offers simple strategies for going where you want to go. The Difference, you’ll see, is within you: You have the power to determine your financial future and achieve the next level of wealth.

From what I've read so far, The Difference is an interesting and entertaining book. One habit mentioned early on is the habit that many wealthy people have of constantly reading and learning. Definitely worth a free download, but it's a limited time offer. Download yours by heading to Oprah.com and registering for a user account.

Jeff Paul's Shortcuts to Internet Millions - for Real or Scam?

(Jeff Paul - moneymaking plan or scam?)

So are there really shortcuts to make fast money online? Well in the current information age many internet marketers would love for you to believe so including a man named Jeff Paul. I just caught the second half of one of his infomercials they run about how people make quick money online. The commercial was for Jeff Paul's "Shortcuts to Millions" which includes information and websites guaranteed to make you money. The promotional ad featured "examples of success stories" from older men around an estate's luxurious swimming pool, with babes in bikinis hanging out poolside. The main hostesses were also hot babes in tight outfits, speaking in front of new sports cars about everyone's other favorite subject, money. It's unknown if the hostesses themselves were millionaires, but that's another story...

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(Jeff Paul girls - Palumbo and Hayes)

Extra info: For anyone wondering, the Jeff Paul girls seen in the new commercial are brunette babe Carmen Palumbo and blond bombshell Stacey Hayes (seen above). The previous infomercial featured two busty Jeff Paul babes, Kelly Britz and Tina Milano, discussing how easily they created moneymaking websites and even taught their "girlfriends" to do the same with Jeff's easy system.

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Most likely the advertisement wanted viewers to see how great life is for these guys now that they earn automatic income by making money online. As we all know sex sells and even Napoleon Hill mentioned how most men are concerned with earning money to impress women. The Jeff Paul Internet Millions ad featured various people talking about the success they had with Jeff's internet millions system. One guy mentioned how he is living his dream life, debt free after two bankruptcies and having a long walk near the edge of a cliff. You can check out Jeff's about me page here to see his rags to riches story about making money online. According to the story, he was once in debt over $140,000 but turned it all around to become an internet millionaire. Jeff showed examples of daily checks he has now generated ranging from $5,700 to $14,000. Of course the fine print at the bottom of the infomercial read "results vary".

As for shortcuts to making money online, if there were some we'd all be using them. The shortcuts usually involve a lot of time and effort or a lot of your money coming out of pocket. This particular product included guides and DVD's on "Automated Income", "Quick Start" and "10 Free Instant Website Businesses Guaranteed to Make you Money". Funny thing is that the guy selling this is showing us for free the best shortcut to generating wealth: create and sell your own product to others. If it talks about how to make money and people jump on it, you've found a shortcut, no matter if the product works or not. You can judge that by the number of Make Money Online blogs in existence, just on Entrecard alone. Jeff Paul's product is just $40, with your money guaranteed back if you don't make money. I'm not pitching his product because I've never used it and have seen some reviews & scam alerts for it online, plus as many of us know learning is free these days and many of the ideas people are selling are just collections of various information we can all find on our own, for free.

As for my own make money online recommendations, here's your quick start to make money online: Set up a blog, whether it be free with Blogger or self-hosted on Wordpress. The latter is the better option as it can provide more ways to make money. Find a profitable topic you can blog about to build your blog site around, and find products or advertising to go with it. Using those sites with Google Adsense, Affiliate programs or to market and sell your own e-book, online course or product is a definite way to make automated passive income. But be forewarned, you will need to put in some work, or some money to get it done. You'll also face competition and other obstacles, but the payoff can be quite nice if you learn how to do things for free, online.

Check out The Monetizer's Recommended Ways to Make Money Online!

Free Software Downloads to Save Money!

Don't let the blog post title fool you, because I'm not condoning pirated software downloads at all. Using various money saving deal websites, in the past week The Monetizer was able to find several FREE and legitimate software programs you can download and install onto your PC. These will help clean up, optimize and back up your valuable personal computer data, and also save you money in the process!

Consider Paragon's Drive Backup 9 Special Edition. It retails for $39.99 but was featured on the deal site yesterday for FREE! That's right, free. Now the download itself seemed to be tough to get to work, mainly because so many people were flooding the site. Luckily, someone uploaded the legitimate download file on their own server for others who wanted the deal. I've installed the program yesterday and so far it looks good. A very helpful program to have so you can back up your entire laptop, PC or specific folders/files to another safe spot in case of a crash.

Paragon seems to be offering yet another free software program, Total Defrag 2009. This helps in optimizing your computer by defragging the hard drives, freeing up cluttered drive cluster space. To see more info on how to download it, use this link for DealsPlus.

PS: Find some "helpful discussions" about this deal at Slickdeals.net forums.

Also extremely helpful is this Free WinUtilities 6.2. It's a very inclusive program which has features such as registry cleaner, uninstaller, dish cleaner and much more. Use the program to clean up and make sure your computer is optimized to the fullest!

Another deal for those of us running our own business(es) is MyCorporations SmallBiz Pack, also for FREE. MyCorporations is an Intuit company, so again this appears legitimate. The Deal websites these program downloads come from are reliable sources, but please download at your own risk and follow all instructions/indications along with them.

MyCorporation's SmallBiz Pack for free

Hopefully the above programs can help some readers to establish reliable data backups, optimized PC's and help in getting their businesses on track!

ShoppingAds Account Shutdown!

Well friends, I'm sorry to report that popular make money online program, ShoppingAds has closed several accounts, including The Monetizer's. Earlier this morning I received the following email, which some readers here may also have received:

Hello,

In the final hour of evaluation, it has been determined by eBay and ShoppingAds that your account must be deactivated. We know that many of you have been working back and forth with us to try and improve the situation, and we thank you kindly for your efforts. Unfortunately, as warned (that there were no guarantees), we had to take this course of action.

We thank you for your partnership up through this point and wish you the best of luck.

We are in the process of making an aggressive case on your behalf to eBay of having you paid for February’s earnings, and will let you know as soon as we hear back. If you will be paid it will occur on April 1st, 2009.

As for our ads- we strongly suggest that you take down our ad code IMMEDIATELY as you will no longer be paid for hosting them.

Thank you,

ShoppingAds.

Well this is unfortunate, because I do have some money sitting in the account, so hopefully things are resolved and I'll receive that payment on April Fool's day (ha ha). But as always, this is why having a backup earning/ad plan helps. Luckily The Monetizer joined eBay Partner network several months ago, and their terms are much more favorable. Payments come quicker and with less of a minimum earning amount required.



I strongly urge people who got the ShoppingAds account shutdown notice above to switch their ShoppingAds ads to eBay Partner Network ads. Just make sure to match the same style, color and size from your old ShoppingAds to your new eBay Partner style ads so that things don't look too off. You can do this by logging into your eBay Partner Network account, then go to the top menu for Tools, then Widgets (graphic above). Go to the first toolbox widget, "Editor Kit", select "eBay US" (or your appropriate program) and then click "Go". Alternately, you can choose the other widget "Custom Banner" which is in Beta, to create eBay product flash banners for your websites or blogs.

Here's to your success,
The Monetizer

Real Estate Deal: $350,000 Miami Condo for $100!

With the economy just barely treading water, the current real estate market offers some real bargain prices, but there's a current deal that offers a beautiful piece of property for just one Benjamin Franklin. A couple in Miami has decided to give away their Miami condo property via a raffle with tickets costing just $100 a pop. Sound too good to be true? Well there's a great reason for the raffle. Tim Sureth, a 42 year old Army vet, and his wife Diane Thorne are holding the raffle on behalf of Veterans Retreat, a charity group they started which allows wounded veterans to go on fishing trips.

The $350,000 Miami Beach condominium is a spectacular piece of property which includes a pool, courtyard and bay view (Tim's also throwing in a local boxing club membership). It overlooks Biscayne Bay and Star Island, which just so happens to overlook Shaquille O'Neal's house. Other celebs said to be living in that area include Madonna. Tim and Diane had originally planned to sell the property several years ago, but then the market tanked. Now they have decided the proceeds from their raffle can pay the mortgage and help wounded vets all at once. The plan is to use the sale money to buy a retreat in the Florida Keys where wounded vets can fish near and relax at.

Worried about taxes? Tim and Diane have agreed to pay all taxes and maintenance fees through the end of 2009. The catch to their contest is 5,000 or more tickets must be sold. If less than 5,000 are sold, the couple will split the total sales money 50/50 with the winner. Either way, not a bad return on your hundred dollar raffle ticket.

Raffle tickets can be bought at Paypal through the Veteran's Retreat Website.

(Story Source: NYDailyNews.com)

2 Rookie Google Adsense Mistakes to Avoid

So many of the Make Money Online bloggers like to talk about making money with Google Adsense, whether it be how they are planning to purchase a house with their checks someday, or how they're struggling to even earn the minimum for their first check. Some say it's the only way to truly make decent money online, while others will denounce it. You'll even read claims by some that Adsense isn't worth setting up, implementing, testing and re-testing until you get it right. I respectfully dissent.

There are people earning decent amounts and better on a monthly basis from the Google Adsense program, The Monetizer included, and you can be one also. You've seen the infamous checks of bigwigs like Jeremy Shoemaker (Shoemaker.com) and Markus Frind (Plentyoffish.com). While my checks aren't near that size, they are good part-time income from one of my recommended money making sources. When I first started out, I was a rookie with Adsense, and to a degree I still consider myself learning the ropes, but I am earning a decent amount. I won't lie as we all know making money usually takes some work or effort, and when it's coming from a publicly traded company like Google, you better believe they don't want to just give it away. That's where Smartpricing comes in, and my understanding is it's to basically protect the people buying ads on Google, so that they are getting "worthwhile clicks from potential buyers" rather than social media clicks or untargeted traffic clicks.

This past weekend The Monetizer decided to undertake a project based on several posts I read about "Google Adsense Smartpricing". In essence, there's been strong suggestions made that you should seriously consider removing Adsense from any site or blog where you're not getting a 2% click rate or higher. Some even suggest it should be 3% or higher, or else remove the Google Adsense ads from that particular page or site. I've had one blog site in particular which has had tons of traffic, but in recent months I saw per click amounts really plummet. Despite that, I've had other sites which had high clicks, making me question if I was smartpriced or not. I decided better safe than sorry, and why risk it happening if it hasn't?

One mistake I made was putting Adsense in too many places, that is on too many blogs and sites. Some topics just don't pay well for Adsense, so why have a site generating pennies, especially if it's not getting clicks? When you start out, your goal is always to make as much as you can, but don't get overzealous and put Adsense everywhere. Testing is good, but overdoing it can cause a headache later. In my case, I made this mistake and was using a free web host just to bypass buying hosting. That lead me to having a lot of html pages I uploaded, each with Adsense ads in them. You can imagine the work it takes to undo that mistake!

The second mistake I've made was I didn't track every single Adsense unit, ad or search box used. I realized now that I had placed a search box somewhere which is generating money and clicks, but didn't track it at all. When you've got a lot of sites and blogs with Google search on them, not knowing which is your top earner can be devastating, even if it's still bringing the money! From the get go, make sure you've put some specific identifying titles on each ad you use on your sites, so you can track each one's effectiveness.

So over this past weekend I ran an advanced report on my Adsense account, and took a look at the overall stats by channels for the past 2 years. Then I began the arduous task of removing Adsense from various pages where the CTR% was below 2%. I've fixed many pages, and if I notice my Adsense income shoot back up, I'll know I've discovered the culprit and hopefully fixed the problem. My goal was to see Adsense earnings continually increase, not hit a lull as I kept doing more work. As I wait to see if click rates increase, I will continue to remove the ads on sites which have low percents, and suggest that anyone else feeling this smart pricing effect do the same. Taking precaution now can help you on your way to those nice monthly income checks from Adsense that other bloggers blog to you about.

One final word: I read an interesting free e-book PDF this past weekend, which made a good point saying you should master one monetization method fully before moving on to mastering the next method. While it's ok to add in some other affiliate offers or ads on your site(s), consider making mastery of Adsense a priority if you truly want to earn those monthly checks from the Big G..

Recommended reading:

How To Get Worthless Adsense Clicks by Courtney Tuttle

Is Adsense Smart Pricing Killing Your Earnings? by Grizzly