ShoppingAds Payment hits a Snag

ShoppingAds is a popular monetization method that I've recommended before here at the Monetizer blog. They offer banner style images and text links which direct people to eBay auctions. Should someone purchase the item, you profit with a nice commission. The minimum amount to be earned is $50 before payout.

The Monetizer had surpassed that $50 mark and was on schedule to receive my first payment from the company on January 26th, 2009. Lo and behold upon logging in on Monday, ShoppingAds had the following note covering my account area:

All currently accrued monthly earnings are pending.
Unfortunately for reasons beyond our control,
they may be disqualified at any time by our affiliate advertising partner before the next payout date.

To receive payment your traffic must follow the following guidelines:
* No adult content, your website/blog can not have adult content or themes.
* No forcing ANY clicks what so ever, any computer program or forced website popups (and so on) forcing your web visitors to receive a ShoppingAds click when they visit one of your webpages is strictly prohibited.
* No homemade eBay or ShoppingAds banners or graphics of any kind for your links, you must run a ShoppingAds banner generated from the website "get ads" page or valid ShoppingAds link that contains the words "on eBay" in the visible link text.
* We must be able to see your incoming referrer information, if you are running ads in an environment which obscures where your clicks are coming from, we'll need you to contact us with the URLs where your ShoppingAds are being displayed.
* Absolutely no posting of links or ads to 3rd party websites!
You must be the owner of the website where you are displaying ads.
I.E. posting links to "craigslist" pages, "woot.com" forums, etc.
or any other forums/blogs (and so on) that you are not the website owner of is prohibited.
* You may not display ShoppingAds links as an advertiser through a 3rd party ad network.
I.E. signing up for "adbrite" and buying your ShoppingAds links out for different website publishers to display.
* You may only have ONE ShoppingAds account.
If the same one publisher is caught running ads on more than one ShoppingAds signup all related accounts will be removed from the program.

If you do not follow the above guidelines our affiliate partner may remove your account and not pay for your traffic, therefore you can not receive your earnings.

Our staff here at ShoppingAds will work hard to make sure that your traffic is accounted for and will be considered valid for payment.

Contact us right away if you have any questions about how your blog or site may be disqualified.
(include the URL where ShoppingAds are running as well)

Thank you and we appreciate you for being a publisher!

Ok no problems there, but it's funny how bill collectors will all but knock down our doors with a battering ram if a payment isn't on time. The "unfortunately for reasons beyond our control" part doesn't sit well with me. Things do happen, but that language right there is very similar to Google's policy of just yanking an account without paying up, with no explanation. It's disappointing in the regard that people can honestly run ShoppingAds on their blog or website, and then be declined a payment which may have taken several months to acrrue. Of course I have a few more days to go to see if they pay up and will post the results.

In the meantime, a lesson learned is to tread with caution when using affiliate programs or moneymakers. As I blogged once before each program has specific rules to be familiar with, and "fine print". Some pay once every few months, some every other week, etc. Clickbank has an interesting payment policy based on how many different credit card and check or Paypal orders you've received. You can see in the text block above many of ShoppingAds rules and restrictions for accounts. Another thing to consider is the fact that while you may be self-employed blogging or running niche sites, having just one or a couple programs running really controls your finances. If they choose to not pay you or just flat go out of business, you could find your income source greatly diminished or gone.

I recommend if you have a decent traffic site to choose eBay partner Network if your site qualifies. They offer a payout every few weeks for a minimum of just $5. New eBay signups can earn you up to $25. Many bloggers and marketers are keen on building niche sites using eBay's Partner Network as it can provide some nice passive income if done properly.

Here's to your success!

Free Money + Free Audiobook!

Extra, extra hear all about it...You may have heard about the recent class action lawsuit which allowed customers to line up for blocks at department stores and get free cosmetics. That lawsuit is still going on and customers can claim their cosmetic goods up until Monday. Well now there's another lawsuit settlement involving Bank of America and several other banks. The lawsuit applies to anyone who was a member of BOA or several other banks named, who had a debit card with their account and payed a late/overdraft fee within 5 days of it being assessed. This had to occur in the time period of December 6, 2000 to December 31, 2007 for you to be eligible.

The lawsuit if settled as planned could pay you up to $78. You must submit your claim by May 2009. If you qualify, simply fill out the online claim form or mail it in. Funny enough, MSN.com which reported on the story said these lawsuits may become the new way of passive income...hmmm. There's another one here for up to $35 if you bought a copy of the popular Grand Theft Auto San Andreas video game and were offended by "virtual sex"!

Today there's also a great freebie deal going on at Audible.com. The website which sells audio books is giving away a free download of Stephen Covey's popular title, "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People"! This book can help us all in the New Year to perform closer to our potentials. It's free so give it a try, download it to your iPod or make a CD and play it on your commute to work! Please note you will need to sign up for a free audible.com account (requires full name, email, password) and also download a very small audible installer to get your audiobook.

Synopsis of the audiobook which is 3 hours 24 minutes in length:

What are the habits all successful people share? In this audio presentation, Stephen R. Covey answers that question and teaches you how to make the Seven Habits a part of your life. Each audio system is designed to help you create an empowering center of correct paradigms from which you can effectively solve problems, maximize opportunities, and continually learn and integrate principles of effectiveness in an upward spiral of growth.

Follow this link to get your free download. Enjoy!

Check Your Free Credit Report!

I recently received a letter from BNY Mellon Shareowner Services, a company I've used for Dividend Reinvestment Plans or DRIPS's as they're called in the Wall Street world. The letter alerted me to the fact that some backup data tapes had been lost during a transfer to an off-site storage facility. These tapes contained some of my personal data such as name, address and Social Security #. While Mellon claimed they did not believe my data would be accessed or misused (not sure how they determined this), they extended the offer to all those impacted to receive 3 free months of a credit-monitoring service. This would safeguard people from potential identity theft, by allowing them to monitor the credit reporting agency's data on them, just in case you started seeing strange credit card charges for thousands of dollars from a strip joint that you didn't make...ok, bad example but you catch my drift...

One of the biggest concepts in becoming wealthy or "getting ahead" is not only knowing where your money is coming from, but also knowing where it's going to. That means the tedious task of figuring out all your monthly bills/expenses and other "money-takers", so you know exactly what sort of spending you're doing. Another thing we all neglect to do thinking we're all good, is checking out or credit report on a regular basis. Some avoid them out of shear terror, while others just assume everything is going alright. Your credit is a big deal though especially with the recent mortgage foreclosure and bank scrutiny against loans. Financial pundit Suze Orman says you'll need an even better credit score than before to even be considered for a new home loan. And as you can see from my brief tale above, identity theft is definitely a big thing to watch for these days. There's all sorts of Paypal, eBay, banking and credit card scams and phishing going on online. Also when data's lost or your social security number is taken, that can spell potential trouble. We've all seen the commercials about the guy who has to work in a seaside fish restaurant because his identity was stolen. He recommends in his catchy tune that you get your free credit report. According to the letter I receieved from BNY Mellon, you can check your report free of charge once every 12 months.

To get yourself a free copy of your credit report simply visit http://www.annualcreditreport.com. Check it out, see the good, the bad and possibly the ugly. It will take about 7 years to fix some of the worst mistakes such as late payments made to credit cards, but you can get a good idea of how you rank credit-wise and insure that nothing malicious is going on behind your back.

Entrecard Forum, Approvals & Top Droppers

Yep, in case you forgot about it, the Entrecard website and blog advertising universe still exists! A few days ago they released a monumental announcement via email that they have opened up a new forum per the request of members. This forum will be more like other forums you're accustomed to, and will allow post signatures (hint hint - a new place to link build). Hopefully the new forums will allow great discussions amongst the blogging community and a place to link exchange.

Another announcement Entrecard made is regarding blog submission and approval. From now on they become stricter in terms of which blogs they allow, because they're using a manual approval process. There's also a "quality control" procedure going on to check the current blogs which are using Entrecard.

"Top Droppers Day" which will be a new Entrecard holiday on January 31st. That Saturday you can participate in the holiday by doing either of the following:

1.) Write a post thanking your top droppers! From your Entrecard Statistics page you can see a list of the 10 bloggers who have dropped their card for you the most times in the last 30 days. Writing a post thanking them, linking to them, and writing a nice compliment about their blog is a great way to reward them for being loyal visitors.

2.) Drop!! Because so many people in Entrecard are participating in Top Dropper Day this month, the chances that bloggers will link to you increases dramatically. Dropping is a great way to earn credits and drive traffic to your blog, and this month it's going to help you get links from other bloggers too. So drop frequently and often for the greatest rewards!

I'll be the first to admit Entrecard started out as a fun tool to use but it's sort of taken a back burner at times to other blogging tasks. It's a great tool for those just starting up a blog though, and also a fantastic place to network and find out tips from other bloggers. If you're just getting into blogging head over to Entrecard.com to get yourself a free account.