Google Feeds the Monetizer Ad Treats

Happy belated Halloween! Hopefully you all received nice 20's, 50's and crisp 100 dollar bills in your trick or treat bags last night! The Monetizer didn't receive candy, but Google recently provided The Monetizer with a nice additional treat, another way to make money online! It took about a month or two before Google transferred over my various blog feeds from Feedburner's site. Feedburner is now integrated with the Google Adsense Feeds, where I have set up several of my feeds with Adsense and am implementing tests.



As seen in the picture above, the Adsense feed ads can be adjusted just like regular Adsense code. You're allowed to choose text/image, just text or just image ads for your blog. You can arrange color schemes of your choosing, and set how many ads are seen on your feeds (every feed, every 2nd item, every 3rd, etc). It's a nifty little setup. If you haven't transferred your feeds over yet, give it a shot, as I've already seen some profit from it. To get started you'll need to log into your Google Adsense, go up to "Manage Ads" and select the Feeds tab or link. There should be a link on the next page which you can click to "migrate feeds" from Feedburner. Google is now in control of Feedburner (as they are of most online stuff), and you simply supply your Feedburner login info to migrate all of your feeds into the new Google Adsense setup. It may take several weeks or month for the migration so get to it early!

Once you're migrated, any Feedburner feeds will have a new feed URL which will now have "googleproxy" in it's URL, rather than Feedburner. This new URL won't automatically be updated if you've manually added it to spots on your blog or blog entries. For example, if you've put a link on your blog sidebar to allow Feedburner RSS subscription, it will most likely need to be changed now to the new URL address. And you may need to update other widgets on your blog that use the feed link such as the buttons that allow people to choose their reader. (If someone has had a different experience with this, please comment below). The good news is that when you log into your Feedburner account, they will have your new RSS feed links correctly listed. So the Google + Feedburner connection seems to be paying off and going smoothly.

I referred to the great John Chow's feeds and have mimicked his Feed ad style. Currently Chow uses the basic blue URL links, a light gray border around his items, and allows both text and image ads to run above each of his feed items. Give it a try yourself, or if you have been using Adsense feeds, drop a comment to let me know of your experiences or findings.

I also want to give a nod to John Cow who presents a great way to find "golden nugget" search terms for your blog or website using Google Insights tool. Check out Cow's blog entry to find Search Keyword Gold! It's a great technique for creating blog entries that will bring in more traffic!

How to Find Legitimate Work at Home Jobs

A July 10th, 2008 Wall Street Journal article examines the concept of working at home, during these tough economic times with high gas prices, job losses and credit crunches. The article cautions those looking for cushy jobs where they can earn a regular salary from home, saying that many of the work-at-home opportunities are for mundane, difficult tasks that other people would find tough. An example is telemarketing, transcribing inaudible MP3 files from meetings, or hours of tedious data entry.

Another caution is that you often receive spam emails or see sites advertising simple data entry for thousands of dollars salary a week. Be warned that these need to be treaded cautiously and can be scams. The WSJ article provides some great resources on freelance type jobs such as virtual assistant or travel agents. The three sites listed below will help you identify if a job you've found online for working from home is legit or not.

3 Sites to Use to Find Legitimate Work-at-Home Jobs:

bbonline.org - Click on "For Consumers"

WomenForHire.com - offers resources/ideas on working from home.

FTC.gov - In the search box enter "work at home scam".

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Websites for Legitimate Work-at-Home Jobs: The following websites were all profiled in the WSJ article. As always read the details and find print on any opportunity you get involved with. These all appear to be legitimate companies which hire freelancers for clients, post job listings, and provide work at home opportunities.

Arise.com - 8,000 home business owners as agents, with plans to add another 4,000 by year's end.

AlpineAccess.com - 7,500 home agents, hiring at least 2,500 more by December 08'.

Elance.com and oDesk.com - Link clients with freelancers from around the world. Freelancers can take skills tests on the site and have results posted. The sites also work on commission, taking 4 to 10% of the freelancer's fees. A college student dropped out of school realizing he could make up to $60,000 doing computer programming on a freelance basis through oDesk.com.

LiveOps.com - Has 20,000 home agents who work on at least a part time basis each week.

Sologig.com - A work at home posting site with screened free-lance opportunities.

TeamDoubleClick.com - Offers $10 to $20 an hour for "Virtual Assistants", who perform the tasks of Administrative Assistants, but from home.

VirtualAssistants.com - For $14.95 a month get screened job postings for at home work.

WestCorp (west.com) - Has 15,000 at home agents and is currently expanding.

(Info source: Wall Street Journal "Nice Work If You Can Get It: We Sites for At-Home Jobs" - WSJ 07/10/08)

Note: Another great site to check out is WAHM.com which provides info on work-at-home job opportunities, points out scams and much more!

Keep this work out home sites in mind and you just might be working from the comfort of your aeron chair in your own home office...That's the American dream right?

Casino.de Offers Online Blacjkack Training and More!

The Monetizer recently checked out a website which offers a variety of helpful resources for the beginning or avid gambler. Before we get too far into a look at the site, realize that the site is written in German. If you read or speak the language you're all set. However, they also offer a sister site, which is in English, which The Monetizer also examined.

The look of the site is appealing just as many online gambling sites are. This site provides a great number of links to help you learn gambling skills, rules and possibly improve your chances at winning big. The Casino.de site provides instructional trainings on various casino games such as Baccarat, Blackjack, Craps, Poker, Roulette, Slots, Video Poker and the recently popular Texas Hold Em'. Casino.de also provides reviews of various online casinos and betting sites as well as links to check them all out. Upon checking out the American sister site, www.online-casinos.com, you can find a wealth of info regarding various gambling systems and methods. I found the information to be easy to access and plentiful. The gambling strategies section provides several gambling methods such as the d'Alembert System (based on "The Law of Equilibrium") and the Fibonacci Sequence developed by the Italian mathematician Leonardo Pisan in the 1700's.

The fun starts when you try out the online training and practice tools at the site. I found the Video poker tutorial fun and informative to try out. As you play it keeps score of how many correct moves you make while playing. This way you can practice and practice for free, then take your skills to an online casino or real life one and hopefully cash in with your newfound skills! Casino.de also offers several free slot machines online such as "Fruit Fiesta" and Pub Crawler". These slot machines offer prizes to the top scorers each month.

Overall, the American version of the site is a great wealth of info for gamblers, and even though the Casino.de site is completely in German, it appears to offer the same quality and amount of information. So get started and give your luck a boost with their training guides and resources if you love to gamble!

MagicJack Review: Make Phone Bills Disappear!

The Monetizer will be the first to admit a love for new technology. While some hate it, I embrace it. I also love making money, and saving it. So today, I wanted to let you all know of an interesting and impressive piece of technology today called the MagicJack. MagicJack seems to be a worthy rival to the well-known Vonage VOIP phone service. You know the company which allows you to make calls using your home computer and claims to cut down on bills? Well MagicJack is just a small device with a USB jack on it that you plug into your computer. Plug a regular phone cord into Magic Jack from any phone you'd like to use with it. Turn your PC on and presto! Within 3 minutes, MagicJack has installed itself and downloaded the latest upgraded software to allow you to make FREE phone calls through your hi-speed connection. (Windows XP, Vista or Intel based Macs)

I set Magicjack up today, but have to admit I was slightly skeptical before I tried it. I've heard people complain about delays, echos and poor sound quality with Vonage. Hasn't been the case yet with MagicJack. Once the software installed, it allowed the Monetizer to choose any area code for my MagicJack phone number. What's great about this, you could essentially set up a virtual business office somewhere else in the US (New York, LA, etc) and make it seem as if you're an established business. Also, you could choose an area code from a state perhaps where many friends and relatives are located, making the calls cheaper for them. Quite a cool concept. MagicJack allows you to change your area code for free one-time, and then you can change it for a charge of $10 each additional time.


(A look at the cool display/interface for MagicJack on the PC)

MagicJack offers some great additional, no extra cost features as well. First off, you can see in the screenshot above, there's a cool interface that you get on your computer screen. It displays a phone keypad, menu options, contacts, website favorites, link to Google, Redial, 411 and more. You can dial your phone/check Voice mail from the computer, or the phone itself. When a call comes in, it pops up a message on your screen to "ACCEPT" or "IGNORE" the call. If ignored, the call heads straight to your no extra-cost voice mail. The same happens when your computer is shut off, or if you lose hi-speed service, calls go straight to the voice mail, which you can also set up with various messages.

So far I like what I've seen and heard with MagicJack. It's definitely a viable option to eliminate long distance phone bills or cell phone bills which can really add up. MagicJack's phone service is free for a year from the date of install on your PC. Then it costs $20 or so annually to keep the service going. Calls are free, and you can even bring MagicJack with you on road trips/travel and use your current phone number to make free calls.

With Vonage I've heard the complaints: hard to hear the people on the other end of the phone, monthly bills, and the fact you need a special extra device hooked up to make it work. Not the case with MagicJack..Until it starts bringing in tons of telemarketer calls, calls from The Ring villain, or acting possessed, I'd fully recommend this little device which can be picked up for about $35-40 if you shop around! Check out some of the latest MagicJack auction listings on eBay to find yourself a deal, and start saving money!

Find out more info about this product at MagicJack.com's official website.