Ebay Marketing E-Book

I was looking for e-books to review when I came across one I read a long time ago. It is called The Silent Sales Machine Hiding on Ebay. When I first came across it I was selling, or at least trying to sell, quite a bit on Ebay.

I read the book and used it to make a few hundred extra dollars, which is an obvious perk. After a while my life circumstances required me to take a break from Ebay for a while, so the book slipped to the back of my mind.

I am getting ready to jump back into the Ebay swing of things, and plan to use what I learned in this book to give myself a big head start. I would recommend this book to you. I linked to the page where you can purchase this book. I would ignore the "Get Rich Quick" aspect of the website. Like I said, I made a few hundred after reading the book, which at the time was pretty cool. Here is the link again: The Silent Sales Machine Hiding on Ebay

In the interest of disclosure, all blogs regarding e-book sales will have a note similar to this in nature. I only blog about books I have read and used, or am about to read and use. I will not endorse a book I don't believe in. If you encounter any problems with this seller, please let me know. I will try to facilitate satisfaction on your part wherever possible.

SocialSpark - A New Community for Bloggers

I recently signed up for SocialSpark, a new social networking site where bloggers and advertisers can get together to maximize blog profitability. So far I am enjoying the site quite a bit. Within minutes of signing up I had 5 friend requests. I thought that was pretty impressive.

SocialSpark offers a variety of methods that help you make money. Among the chocies are a sponsored post, a blog sponsorship, or a spark. From what I can tell, a spark is a free post in exchange for a post on someone else's site. It encourages collaboration among friends. A blog sponsorship is a per day agreement with an advertiser. Here is a sample of available sponsorships.

I haven't signed up for a sponsorship yet, but I plan to in the near future.

Some opportunities are only available for blogs with higher page ranks, but there are many opportunities available for the beginners. As Google has been stomping bloggers who advertise, SocialSpark doesn't look at Google page ranks for the higher-end opportunities. They use a tool called RealRank. This is a data-based method that gives you a more accurate picture of who is visiting your site and how valuable your site really is.

SocialSpark opportunities range from $5 - around $40, from what I have seen so far. I don't think there is a cap on how much a post can be worth, though. Here is a screenshot from the opportunities page.

On the right of the image you will see two small rectangles, either green or red in color. This helps you know if the opportunity is open, and lets you know if you qualify for the post. I think is is a pretty nice feature. It saves you time when you want to look for a post you are actually eligible for, and you don't have to click through a bunch of non-qualified posts.

Another tool for narrowing down your available opportunities is by using the search tool. This helps you narrow your search by the price you are looking for as well. I have used this tool a lot, and am happy with it.

SocialSpark cares about blogger integrity, and they have an extensive code of ethics. Here are some of the basics:

• 100% Audit-able In-Post Disclosure
• 100% Transparency
• 100% Real Opinions
• 100% Search Engine Friendly

You can read more about their code of ethics by visiting http://socialspark.com/code_of_ethics.

So far I have been very pleased with SocialSpark. I have found a couple of friends who I am in touch with, and have been introduced to many new opportunities. I think this is a great place to find advertisers for your blog and intend to use this site frequently. I highly recommend this site to you.

PayPerPost - A New Adventure

I recently joined a new online community called PayPerPost. It is a gathering place for bloggers to meet advertisers and vice versa. The page looks pretty sharp, and I am looking forward to exploring it more.

PayPerPost is a great way to bring in some extra income. They offer a variety of methods to earn money. You can sign up for an existing opportunity, have an advertiser sponsor a blog post, allow other members to review your blogs, and more. This looks like a pretty good way to get a little extra money. Hopefully I can turn this into an opportunity to fill up my gas tank from time to time.

I signed up for PayPerPost for a number of reasons:

• Gas prices are through the roof
• I spend a lot of time on the internet looking for opportunities like this
• I am expecting a new baby and want to save some extra money
• I enjoy blogging and figured it would be fun to be paid to do what I enjoy

The PayPerPost dashboard is easy to understand, and I have been working my way through the pages. The widget for having an advertiser contact you for a post is really easy to install. They made it even easier for installing into a blogger account. I am looking forward to receiving my first request.

The PayperPost website has a lot of helpful tools to get you started. Among these are both blogs and video tutorials. The Open Opportunities interface is very easy to understand. It breaks opportunities up into three sections, blogs available to you, blogs unavailable to you, and blogs that have reached capacity and are no longer available. They color code it so you can't go wrong.

I am pretty new to the site, so I don't have a lot of experience with customer service or the rate of review/pay. I will be sure to update this post when I have been active a bit longer.

I would recommend this site to anyone looking for a great way to connect to fellow bloggers and get paid for what you love to do.