After reading Thoughts on Forced Continuity and Similar Scams from Caroline Middlebrook’s blog, I’m taking the opportunity to digress from my Internet Business Ideas Guide series and blog on the sincerity of sales pitches.Internet Marketers in general, have always been successful in painting a very convincing picture of the success of their business. More often than not, they are associated with overselling, and at times, delivering products that turn out to be less than spectacular. Truly, their “solutions to all your problems” often turn out to be disappointing to many buyers.

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If you are a frequent visitor of What-Sells-Online.com, you’d immediately notice the change in the look and feel of this blog. What is most apparent would be the new header. I wanted to create something that looked flashy, interesting and attractive. Perhaps, the shopping bags of the old blog didn’t have that much of an appeal. I also wanted my blog design to immediately grasp the attention of stumblers. I only have several seconds each time to make a positive (and hopefully, lasting) impression!

The New What Sells Online banner

The Old What Sells Online Banner

Why did I stop using Typepad?

Typepad is a great blogging service to start with. It provided some flexibility needed for a commercial blog, an easy-to-use interface, and most importantly, short descriptions of each section. Typepad gave me a whole lot of hand-holding I needed in starting my first commercial blog. For instance, I could easily add widgets, customize my own header and have it on my own domain.

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I’ve been following Caroline Middlebrook’s blog since I started What Sells Online, and I must say that she is one of the most inspiring bloggers I’ve seen online. Most importantly, I’ve learnt a lot from her posts, which greatly helped in setting me on the right track with my own online marketing efforts.

With this, I thought it was timely that I conducted an email interview with her, and post it here so that everyone can learn from her. Here’s the transcript:

1. What are your virtues that you think have made your blog successful?

In a word - Honesty. I have always spoken my mind, been open about what I am doing and about my opinons. I know I have been labelled the “honest blogger” quite a few times and I like that.

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Reading the JohnChow.com2007 Blog Income Report indicates that we don’t necessarily have to sell stuff online to make money. Working on a blog, with the right publicity, traffic generation techniques and some writing skills on the right topics, are some of the key ingredients for success.

Of course, all these do not come free. I’m certain that at some point or other, John Chow had to work hard to promote his blog before the money came pouring in. And, if you review his Blog Income Report for 2006, there is actually a significant difference in the income he’s getting. Apparently, according to this report - How Top Bloggers Earn Money-John Chow dot Com Income Report-August 2007 – John Chow had only started with a few hundred dollars of income in the first month. To me, this small amount is
great, as it indicates the effectiveness of his traffic drawing methods. Apparently, he started with only $3,440.66, which then grew to a whopping $27,240.83 at the end of the year.

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One of the most inspiring methods I’ve found online is the potential of Blogs as tools to help us sell
online. While blogs have become tremendously popular, this channel of self expression has been successfully turned into a money making tool.

Most money making bloggers often utilize blogs as publicity and promotional tools for their other products. However, with the stiff competition from the millions of blogs online, each of them fighting for attention, bloggers have to work hard to carve a niche for themselves. They need to be creative in their traffic generation strategies.

Pay per click advertisements are often a source of side income for these blogs. While this money making channel may seem puny at the beginning, large volume of incoming traffic has the potential to help the blogger earn thousands of dollars.

A recent great example of this is Shoemoney, who recently shocked the Blogosphere by revealing the outrageous income he is generating from Google Adsense alone. He raked in a whopping $132,994.97 just for the month of  August. This was generated from 125,175 clicks, about 1% of the 13 million page impressions. (Oh, apparently Google Adsense income is just his side income. His blog is
actually his publicity tool for other products that he sells online.)

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