HubPages: The Good, Bad and Ugly

I thought I would post an update on HubPages since it has been awhile since I have done so. As you can see, not everything is coming up roses. I thought I would first start out with the good news, move on to the bad news, and end with the ugly.

Good News: I finally was able to finish my 100th Hub. Actually, I think the news is great. I feel a wonderful sense of accomplishment for having completed this. It also turns out that it is my longest Hub and will probably remain so until number 200. It is an article that goes into explaining the process of writing an online article for the purpose of making money online. I think it is a good article and is very helpful, especially for those just starting out. I try to put everything together in one place. Here is a link--What I Wish I Knew From Hub #1

Bad News: For me, this news is terrible. I struck out yesterday. No earnings at all from any site. This doesn't affect HubPages alone, but since I have 100 articles on the site and have spent the most effort on that site, I attribute the issue there. My last day to totally strike out was on August 9th. Over the last 2 months, I have either earned something through AdSense or on eHow. I thought those days of earning nothing were over. Woe is me! I plan on hitting it hard now. Oh well, I have had some great days this week and still hope to make my first AdSense payout by the end of the month (unless I have a string of days like yesterday). Which leads to--

Ugly: My traffic is simply ugly! I don't know what it is. I would think with 100 articles I could at least get 100 views in a day. I could barely muster 50 views yesterday on HubPages. What is up with that. I figured that as I increased my article count, traffic would slowly and steadily improve. That was the general assumption from the 30 Hubs in 30 days Challenges. Yes it worked early on when I went from 30 to 70 articles. But moving from 70 to 100 articles, my traffic has slowly been dissipating. This despite putting links on Xomba. I just don't understand it. I am seriously wondering if HubPages is being penalized for some reason. I am sure that part of it is my lack of traffic generating skills, but I can't be that bad, can I?

Oh well, I suppose it is part of the up and down emotions of earning money online. Thank goodness I don't yet depend on this for my major source of income or I would be in serious trouble after a day like yesterday. That is all I had for today. I hope to have better news the next time I write.

Mid-Month Review

Alright, it is that time again. I want to look back to my October goals and see how I am progressing to know where I need to put additional effort if possible. By writing and recording my writing goals, I can determine where I am going and whether or not I am getting there. I think this is important to accomplish tasks without drifting along and not doing anything.

HubPages: My goal was to be at 100 Hubs by the end of the month. I am at 99. This should be easy to accomplish. I will probably write more. I had thought about being at 120 after finishing 30 for the month but that may not happen. I am still pleased. I don't know if I will get to 10,000 views since traffic has stalled somewhat.

eHow: I had hoped to be at 50 articles by the end of the month. I am at 40 now. I lost one in a sweep. I could still get it done, but it will take some effort. I think I want to try, though. Views are almost 3100 now. I don't think I will hit 4500. Traffic there has remained steady but is not growing like I thought.

Xomba: I didn't put down any numeric goals. I have written 2 feature pieces. I think that is helping my traffic and also resulting in people reading my stuff at HubPages. I am enjoying Xomba.

InfoBarrel: No particular goals were expressed, but I have added 2 articles.

My Online Income: I continue to post almost every 2 days. I am getting lots of growth on the site. I love all you followers. Yippee! I did post the SEO experiment post on the blog carnival that I have been using. I don't know whether that may bring added traffic or not. It can't hurt, however. That should come out early next week.

Real Assets: I continue to post there as well, about 2-3 times per week. It is slowly gaining traffic. I don't think it will catch up with this one, but I enjoy the topic.

AdSense: This is the exciting one! Despite not getting as much traffic as I would like, I am getting quality traffic. I almost have as much revenue as I did all last month through AdSense. At this pace, I will make my first AdSense payout. That will be awesome.

Quick SEO Experiment Update: I am beginning to feel like a yo-yo. I have been back in the Google search results at position number 85. The interesting thing is that one of my Hubs entitled Why Am I Doing an SEO Experiment? is showing up at position number 35. I guess we will just have to see where this all goes. I still have to complete a few more articles and post them over the next several weeks. So, there is some more backlinking to do.

That is all I had for today. I need to get writing, especially for eHow. Thanks for reading.

A Few Words About Xomba

First of all, I would like to say a warm and heart-felt "Thank You" to all of my followers. I have noticed that there are 11 now. I never expected to have so many of you. I certainly appreciate that you have taken the time to come by and look over what I am writing. Thank you so much!

Now About Xomba

Xomba is rapidly becoming my second favorite site for making money online. It is only second to HubPages at this time and could even end up in the top spot. Why is this you ask? Well, Xomba is actually two sites in one. It is a social bookmarking site that can help drive traffic to your other sites and articles, and it is an article writing site. AdSense is displayed next to both your links (called Xomblurbs) and articles (called Xombytes).

You can put up links to interesting articles that you find on the web or link to your own articles. You have to include a minimum 50 word summary of the article. I can do this in 2-3 minutes while watching football on TV. The site definitely works for driving traffic since I have received 23 visits to the 20 Hubs I have linked. I previously went through and linked to all my eHow articles as well.

The best part is the earning potential. Xomba has been responsible for about 30% of my AdSense revenue so far this month. That is with a whole lot less effort than what I am spending at HubPages. I need to start spending more time at Xomba. If you want to read a little bit more about Xomba, I posted an article over at HubPages.

Also, if you would like to join please consider using this referral link since I will get 10% extra AdSense ads displayed from Xomba's cut. The typical split is 50:50.

Quick SEO Update

I posted an article on InfoBarrel. I took me three tries to get accepted and not be "overly promotional". But, it is done. That makes 3 spokes in my 6 spoke link wheel.

I must be in the sand again since I have been unable to find the blog post for the past 24 hours in the first 500 results. I envision some pimply faced computer nerd at Google reading all this and laughing while he moves my post back and forth in the results. Who knows what the answer to SEO really is? I suspect quality content is the best thing anyway.

PS--I might make AdSense payout this month. It is going to be close given the current pace. I need to hustle over at Xomba.

That's all I had for today. Again, thank you for reading.

SEO Experiment Update

So, I haven't had a lot of time to write over the past few days since I took a few family days to visit family and friends in Ohio and visit Cedar Point. I am writing this from a hotel in Van Wert, Ohio. We will be returning back to a regular schedule tomorrow. The awesome thing about passive income is that while I had no time to write and limited internet access, I was able to earn $8.10 from AdSense (HubPages, Xomba, blogs) and $3.08 with eHow. That's not a lot, but it was enough to pay for my chicken sandwich, fries, and drink at the Chik-Fil-A at Cedar Point (price gougers).

Out of the Sandbox?

Anyway, I have been checking the Google search results, and today I was at position number 70 for my blog post that I am trying to rank! I was impressed since I thought it might take forever to show back up in Google. I was actually in the same position yesterday morning also. Does this mean I am out of the sandbox and have graduated to the beach? Who knows?

It will be interesting to see what happens in the next 24 hours since I have the InfoBarrel article written and ready to go. I will be posting that either tonight when I get back home or tomorrow morning. It will link to the blog post as well as my eHow article which has already gotten 25 views on eHow.

My articles on HubPages have gotten a total of 64 views combined. Not only did I write one on SEO tips but also one on why I was doing this. I am finding this very interesting and educational since my next online income step will likely involve starting my own site and possibly doing some affiliate marketing. I will be paying for this with the proceeds from article writing so that no expenses will come from out of pocket. I think as soon as I reach Google payout and get that first check, I will pull the trigger. I will be sure to let everyone here know about my progress.

I think the next post will be an extensive Xomba update since I have a lot of good news on that front. Talk to everyone later. Time to get the free continental breakfast.

Playing in Google's Sandbox

Well, the SEO experiment continues. Yesterday the specific blog post that I trying to optimize showed up at the 392nd position on Google. Today, I gave up looking after 592 results since that was all that Google listed. I also looked on Yahoo and gave up after 400 results. I could spend all day looking through all 23,000 results. And I would rather be spending my time writing.

Getting Out of the Sandbox

While I have been here getting sand in my shorts, I decided to look up some info on the "sandbox". According to Wikipedia, Google denies its existence. I can understand the denial, but I believe it probably does exist. A computer algorithm will only do what it is told to do. Why would a site show up high early on in search results and then disappear entirely? Since Google controls the majority of the information that is seen, they control a big portion of the destiny of the internet. WOW! That is power.

Anyway, in my research, I have come to the conclusion that there is no "quick" way out of the sandbox. I will keep putting out my links on a periodic basis and let you know when I do. It will be interesting to see how long this takes. My guess is probably longer than most people are willing to devote which may be the purpose of the sandbox concept. If someone keeps at trying to earn income online or gain traffic to a certain site and keeps posting at the site for 4-6 months, Google must figure that they are serious about their site and are offering quality content. Crooks would try to move onto the next scam in that time frame.

So, while I am here in the sandbox, I will just keep posting quality content, work on building links, find other keywords that interest me and keep writing on HubPages, eHow, Xomba, and InfoBarrel. I will build up my traffic one article at a time and try to write something each day unless I am too busy. So far, that is what seems to be working the best. Writing each day and adding to my article total is the ultimate key. That is all I had for today. I will be sure to keep everyone posted.

SEO Experiment Thus Far

Yesterday, I wrote the second article for my link wheel and published it on eHow with a link back to the "SEO Experiment" post. I did not add any other links since that was my third article in the wheel. The second article in the wheel will go on InfoBarrel but since IB requires editing, I wanted to have the eHow article completed so that I could put the link in the IB article in the first draft and not have to change it.

It wouldn't have been that complicated had I written it out more intelligently when I set up my wheel. That is why I am practicing with this keyword that is not that important to me. I don't want to go through all the research to find a good niche and mess up on the SEO.

Yesterday, my post ranked as high as 29th position on Google. This morning it is at position #392. I hope that this is the lowest it goes and has nothing to do with building the link wheel. I have heard that once you are indexed, you end up going into the sandbox for a little while. I guess I am just making some sandcastles. It will be instructive to see how long this lasts. I will be sure to keep you up to date.

I have the InfoBarrel article complete. I am waiting to post it for a few days in case the loss of rank has to do with the rapidity of posts linking to my blog post. I will likely send it out on Sunday since I will be away for a few days and have limited internet access. In the meantime, I can work on my other 3 "spoke" articles. I have some rough ideas and can get some writing done finishing up the research when I get back.

That is all I had to report. I wanted to let everyone know that 2 spokes were done, and I am playing in sand. Talk to you later.

Building Backlinks

So, here it is--day #1 of the SEO experiment. I went through and noticed last night that my blog post had been indexed by Google and was showing up in the number 150 position at the bottom of page 15. It is in the same place this morning. Interestingly, I posted a thread on the HubPages forum which received a lot of activity. It started on page 4 and this morning is on page 2! How's that for interesting?

Building Our Link Wheel

I am going to begin the process of building a link wheel for the original post. What is a link wheel? Glad you asked. If you imagine a bicycle tire, at the center is the blog or site we want to "advertise" if you will. Extending out from the center are all the different spokes. What we want to do is create a bunch of different links that all point to the focus article and to each other through one way links.

I will be creating several different articles related to search engine optimization all pointing to my SEO experiment post. I already had written an article for HubPages entitled "Search Engine Optimization Tips for Newbies". This was before I came up with the experiment idea. I posted a link on that article back to my blog post.

Next, I will be creating another article and will post it on another writing site like InfoBarrel. I will then put a link from my HubPages article and point it to the InfoBarrel article. The IB article will point toward the main blog post. I will place a third article on eHow with a link from the IB article. The eHow article will also point to the main blog post. Get the idea?

Since most article writing sites will allow 2 self-serving links, one link points to the center main focus of your marketing efforts. The other link points to the next article in the circle forming the rim of the link wheel.

I have accounts at HubPages, eHow, InfoBarrel, Squidoo, Xomba, and ezinearticles. When all is said and done, I will have 6 links pointing at my main blog post. I will also have 6 more unique articles, 5 of which have the potential to earn revenue while they point to the main post and each other. The goal is to funnel traffic to the main post and rank higher and higher for the targeted keyword. In the process, I would like to increase the readership of this blog and help others learn about SEO techniques.

I will be writing and posting these articles over the next several days. Before I do, however, I am actually going to write down what article I would like to have at each site and the direction I would like them to point so that there can be a coherent flow to the process. I also think this is important since eHow has a specific article structure which will limit what I can do at that site.

I will probably write other stuff at those sites as well and will be making other blog posts. But I will keep everyone updated on the progress of the SEO experiment. Don't worry about that. I would love to hear your comments. And if you want to link to the SEO experiment post, feel free. That would certainly be a help and illustrate the power of one way links.

That is all I had for this morning. Gotta get building those supplemental articles.