A Domainer is someone who buys and sells domain names on the internet. A domain name is like “misinterpreted.org” or “SupermanLives.com.” This is virtual real estate, and people make a lot of money at it. Well, some people. A lot of good domains were taken early on, but there are still ways to find yourself some hidden gems.

One of the most interesting things about domaining is that you can get lucky when you find a valuable domain name that has expired. For whatever reason, the current owner didn’t pay to keep it for another year. You can snag it up and park it, put up a web site, sell it, or let it age…

But how do you find good expired domains? Network Solutions just invented an incredible tool. It’s an RSS feed creator that you can use to generate a simple, easy to read feed with info on upcoming expiring domains.

It’s awesome. Visit their feed creation page, input a few details, and you’re done.

Let’s try finding domains that include the word “myspace”…

Ok, here are the results. Neat! There’s hottestmyspacepics.com, yesmyspace.com, myspacehelpforparents.com… Wow, this tool is really helpful.

So if you’re interested in domain names and would like to try out this crazy new domain name RSS Feed, simply head on over to Network Solutions and get started today!

"South Park" recently aired an episode showcasing a bunch of YouTube celebrities and how they were all theoretical multi-millionaires. I think the guy who sang "Chocolate Rain" is supposed to be $100,000,000 richer, at least according to the show. So how does that work?

In the old days, you'd be in the real, physical world, and set up a stage. Then you'd get on that stage and perform. And people would pay to see you do it. So if everybody pays $1, and you have an audience of 100, you just made $100.

Now, with the internet, we can all show our performance to many, many more people with incredible ease. So, if 100 million people see your $1 show, then you are theoretically $100 million richer!

But this is where the problem is. (From here on might be excruciating because I guess I'm spelling out what many consider to be common sense.)

You perform for a camera. Save your video. Upload it to YouTube. It becomes Google's property. Google shows advertisements. Every time a viewer of your video clicks an ad, Google makes money.

Google is stealing our Theoretical Dollars!

It gets interesting though. The $1 show is now free for the audience. Whoever clicks an ad generates revenue, but one click is usually worth less than a dollar. Say 20 cents.

So 100 million people watch your video. One million (one in a hundred) click. Twenty cents per click times 1 million clicks = 20 million cents, = $200,000.

100 million viewers = $200,000, for Google not you.

If you set up your own site, then you could collect. For every hundred viewers (audience members), you get 20 cents. (Or $2 if you're on the ball.)

BUT!

You don't have to pay to see all the other shows…

So it's like you're a Rock God, and in your contract it stipulates that you'll receive only 1/500 of your normal salary, because the rest covers lavish "complimentary" trips to all the other rock concerts in the world, ever. Sweet…

Frustrated with Google AdWords? You might turn to Yahoo, where the "ad quality" standards are less stringent. But it costs $30 to sign up. So who else is there…? Microsoft! Many have said that they've got softer standards, and some of the lowest costs per click around! And adCenter only requires $5 to sign up. Plus, since they're the new kids on the block, they've got codes all over the internet for free clicks!

You may have seen an offer for a $25 credit.

You may have seen one for $50.

I've got one for $150.

I did a quick search, and came upon this page:

https://partner.microsoft.com/US/40044077

Trying to visit it, both IE and Firefox warn that it may not be a trustworthy site, as something seems to be wrong with its certificate. However, it's part of Microsoft.com, so I found it trustworthy enough to visit. I haven't noticed any problems.

Once there, a visitor is presented with a promotional offer of $150 in free adCenter credit for the first 5000 Microsoft Partners to sign up. From what I can tell, a Microsoft Partner is a special VIP of sorts. I'm not quite clear on the requirements.

However…

The page says the first 5,000 people to sign up for adCenter using the promotional code MSPP-150QL-08 by June 30, 2008 will receive $150 in free adCenter credit, and 60 days of QuickLaunch campaign support, in which an expert helps you optimize your PPC campaign for free.

To continue with QuickLaunch after 60 days, you must be spending at least $30 per day.

Participation in QuickLaunch is optional.

To continue with adCenter after 90 days, you must pay for all subsequent clicks. After 90 days, your $150 credit expires.

Minimum cost per click (CPC) is $0.05.

Unraveling The Mystery

"Be among the first 5,000 partners to sign up…"

What do you have to do to be a partner?

"This offer is valid only for new advertisers opening a new account with Microsoft adCenter."

So that's anybody, right?

"Promotional credit good only for residents in the 50 United States and Washington, D.C."

Ok, so anyone new, in America.

Maybe the trick is to go through their special sign up link. And if that doesn't work, here's the regular link.

From what I've heard, when you sign up and enter the promotional code, adCenter will make no mention of your free $150 credit. However, it should appear under the Billing Activity section of Accounts & Billing in your adCenter user area. Also, this should work even if you don't have a Microsoft Partner account.

Randy Walker mentioned how this Microsoft Partner Program $150 promotion is part of the Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Certification program. He says you can sign up through the regular link, and using the code you should get the credit, so I think this will work for anybody. Let me know if you try it. Good luck!

RealRank is still fairly new, so to build up some buzz they're holding a contest. The owner of the top RealRank-ranked blog for each week of February will receive $1000. It could be you!

All you do is sign up with Izea and put a little piece of javascript on your blog template. Once that code can be seen by the RealRank Robots on every page of your blog, they'll begin collecting data, and you'll be automatically entered in the contest. If you don't mind having spies analyze information regarding your blog and the habits of your visitors, this could be for you. And the best part? You've got four chances to win.

Here's a chunk of the rules:

"The eligible blogger with the highest RealRank for the … weekly entry periods will receive a prize. There will be one (1) winner for each weekly period; a total of four (4) winners throughout the Contest. The winner in any previous week is ineligible for the following week(s). Odds of winning depend on number of bloggers signed up for RealRank, and, as stated above, the weekly winner will be the blogger with the highest RealRank. The RealRank algorithm weights blogs as follows: seventy percent (70%) on daily unique visitors, twenty percent (20%) on daily active inbound links and ten percent (10%) on daily page views as reported by IZEA Toolkit.

All winners will be notified by email on or about seven (7) days after the applicable weekly entry period ends."

So, there are two definite pluses here. First, there likely wouldn't be a $4000 giveaway (split 4 ways) unless Izea thought the appeal of the contest would suck in a whole new group of bloggers. That means new blogs being added to the system every day, with the RealRank code being added to those blogs for mega-tracking purposes. So since odds of winning are dependent on how many competitors there are, and Izea is obviously saying "We need more blogs," a decent blog with a good amount of traffic probably has a fair shot at snagging a thousand bucks.

The second plus is that even if you join in the middle of February, you still qualify for the remaining entry periods.

And if you're the kind of blogger who values privacy of information, and yet still thinks you've got a shot at winning, you could always:

1. sign up,
2. install the tracking code,
3. win in one of the 4 periods,
4. collect the cash,
5. and then remove the code.

But that's only for those bloggers John Chow might call… evil!

I'll just run through a quick list of some solid ways to generate income on the web:

1. Build a web site that offers a valuable service, and run AdSense on it.
   

2. Build a web site with high Page Rank (PR) and Alexa rank, and sell Text Link Ads on it.
3. Build a decent web site or blog and sell it.
4. Start a blog and sign up with pay-to-blog programs. Each paid post will get you around $5 at the least, and much more if your blog has good traffic, subscriber numbers, PR, Alexa rank, and Technorati authority.
5. Get paid to write content for other web sites, blogs, and eBook sellers.
6. Write your own eBook and sell it.
7. Sign up with an affiliate program like Amazon or ClickBank and advertise their products.
8. Buy domain names with proven traffic and park them with a site like Sedo that pays you for every click an ad on your page gets.
9. Sell your stuff on eBay.
10. Sell your web design or coding skills on a job-by-job basis.

    Bonus:

11. Trade stocks or currencies (Forex) online.

With the rise of the internet came the rise of digital merchandise — downloadable information that people are willing to pay good money for. People buy eBooks all the time. Looking for info on every conceivable subject, web surfers will every now and again find "the promised land," a web site that apparently has all the answers, distilled into a simple, downloadable eBook. Out pops the credit card, and money flies through cyberspace. You can get some of that money.

What is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate Marketing is a form of business. An affiliate will market someone else's products, for a fee. ClickBank is a well-known, established company that facilitates business deals between eBook buyers and sellers, and between affiliates and product creators. There are three ways you can interact with ClickBank:

The third option is what we will consider here.

How does it work?

Let's say Misinterpreted dot Org decides to write an eBook about some key ways to earn a living online. As the author and creator, I would sign up with ClickBank and pay them to list my eBook in their marketplace. I decide to set the price of my eBook at $97. A user just randomly happens to find my eBook, and buys it. I just made $97. I'd like to make more, but I'm not interested in advertising my eBook. I've got other stuff to take care of. So not many people show up. I don't make that much money. What can I do?

I set an affiliate commission at 50%. Joe Genius is already signed up with ClickBank as an affiliate marketer. He searches for new products to promote, and comes across my eBook. He thinks it's a worthy item, and believes he can convince others to buy it. So he creates a special "hoplink" that will direct web surfers to my product, and keep in mind that it was his link and no one else's.

He goes to work, and drives traffic through his hoplink to my special product page. Some surfers leave, but others decide to buy. Every time someone Joe Genius sent me buys my $97 eBook, he gets $48.50 (50%) credited to his ClickBank account. Joe Genius is truly good at his job, so he ends up sending tons of people who are eager to buy. Let's say he sends me X visitors a day, 10 of which buy my eBook. That means that $970 is collected every day. So Joe Genius and I each earn $485 a day. Better for me, since I wouldn't have had nearly as many buyers without my trusty affiliate. And it's great for Joe, since he's making money just by moving people around on the internet!

What's so great about Affiliate Marketing?

An affiliate marketer with ClickBank doesn't have to touch physical goods. There's no shipping, no wrapping, no boxes, no postage, and no insurance to worry about. All you have to do is send prime buying candidates through a hoplink to a page they're likely to buy from, and you earn a commission.

What's the catch?

There are a few details regarding ClickBank that you should be aware of. First, the % you earn depends on the product. It can range from a low number up to 75%. But what is also important is the price. If you successfully refer a $1000 sale, and you make 10%, that's $100. But if you refer a $20 sale, and make 75%, that's only $15. So even though percentages might be higher, your overall earnings could still be lower. Lower still if the product doesn't sell very well.

Once you earn your first commission, ClickBank will credit it to your account. However, you won't be able to touch any of that money until you refer enough sales so that at least 5 different credit cards were used to buy. This is to prevent people from simply registering so they can buy through their own hoplink and get a discount. If you were to buy my imaginary eBook through your own hoplink, you'd pay $97 up front, but get $48.50 credited to your ClickBank account. You just paid half price. ClickBank doesn't think this is a good thing, and so they've got the 5 credit card number rule to try and filter out the "bad seeds" from the good affiliate marketers.

Another issue to be taken into consideration is how much and when you get paid. When you earn commissions, ClickBank creates a "ball of money" in your name. When it comes time to get paid, you only get a portion, while the rest "rolls over" for some reason. Doesn't seem fair right? Well they've spelled out their reasons at their site. The logic that can allow someone to overlook this apparent injustice is that if you make enough sales, you'll still get paid a good wage, even with the rollover in effect.

Let's get going

So how do you get started? Once you sign up, you'll be able to create your first hoplink. You go to the marketplace and find a product that fits the theme of your site, or perhaps one you plan to build a site around.

Your hoplink will look like this:

http://jgenius.ebookauthor.hop.clickbank.net/?tid=TRACK

jgenius is where your ClickBank user name would go

ebookauthor represents the creator of the product you want to promote

hop.clickbank.net is a standard portion of the hoplink

?tid=TRACK is a tracking option you can choose to use (not a requirement)

TRACK can be anything you want, anything you want to keep in mind, like EBSELL or FIRST or 0108

At the Marketplace, each product listing will have a "create hoplink" link that opens up a small window where you input your user name and optional tracking code. Once you create a hoplink, you can do all kinds of stuff with it.

More on hoplinks

You can use it in an article you write. You can check to see if the product page had a link to a special affiliate section where you can get product banners and images. Then you could use those images on your site and link them to your hoplink. You could even create an AdWords campaign and use your hoplink as the destination URL that an ad-clicker would end up at.

When someone clicks your hoplink, they are taken to the product page, and a cookie is installed on their computer to keep track of the fact that you are the one deserving a commission. If someone clicked on your hoplink, arrived at the product page, left, then clicked on someone else's hoplink, and finally bought, that affiliate would get the commission, and you would get nothing. So it pays to have your hoplink clicked last, just before the purchase.

Where's the big money?

Some people are conceivably earning incredible amounts of money through affiliate marketing. They are very good at what they do. These people are rare. Many (maybe even most) affiliates are searching for the secrets to such incredible success. There is a lot to consider:

Finding true success

There are many more variables to consider. The more you work, study and learn, the better you'll do. The ideal scenario would be to find a system that produces more money than you put in, and work on expanding it. The more aspects of that system you can put on autopilot, the better. If you work hard enough, and have the luck to find something that works, you might end up living the dream, and earning a mostly passive income online through affiliate marketing with ClickBank.

If you've got a web site, you can make money with Amazon.

When Amazon.com started out, books were their main focus. The appeal was you could find pretty much any book in the world through Amazon. It was a good deal. So good, in fact, that Amazon decided to branch out. They started to offer other, non-book items. Amazon was trustworthy, careful, and professional; business continued to be great. So they kept branching out farther and farther, until they became the powerhouse we know them as today. You can order nearly any product online through Amazon.com.

"Well, that's great," you might think. "I can do the same with eBay." True. And eBay is often the place to find that super rare item that Amazon just doesn't carry. But the difference between Amazon and eBay is trust.

When you buy through Amazon, you buy through a company that has proven it will uphold its end of the bargain. When you buy through eBay, you're often buying from a new seller each time. Many transactions on eBay are person-to-person. So there's no corporate history of good business there. All you know is how the seller treated their previous customers, and maybe how they handled a previous transaction with you. There's a big difference between eBay and Amazon.

Many people feel much safer dealing with Amazon. Personally, if something I want to order is on Amazon, I don't have to worry about eBay. The great thing about Amazon is that the prices are usually better than you'd find in stores. There's a decent discount that you'll find on most products that is highly appealing. And most orders over $25 can be shipped free.

So Amazon is great. How can you make money with them? By becoming an affiliate.

Lots of sites out there like to have ordinary people like us push their products to others. "Hey, Joe, why not buy through these guys?" Joe takes your advice, and you get a referral commission. You get a percentage of a sale that you made happen. Being an affiliate marketer (selling other people's products) can be a great way to make money online. You don't handle the goods, you simply deal in ideas. It's your job to make your product sound so great that your visitors just can't stand not buying it.

What really helps smooth things over with a potential buyer is when they can trust the company you're recommending. You can sell them on the best product in the world, but if they don't have faith in the seller, you won't get a commission. That's what is so good about Amazon. They've already proven to most people that they can be trusted.

The basic Amazon Affiliate process is this: You sign up, get approved, and then gain access to a part of Amazon where you can create links and widgets advertising Amazon products. You put those links and widgets on your web site. If someone clicks one of your links or widgets, they'll be taken to the Amazon site through your referral link. That creates a 24 hour window. If within that window the customer buys an item, you will receive a 4% referral fee. That means that if they purchase a $100 item, you'll be credited with $4. Once a purchase is made, the 24 hour window closes. If the customer adds an item to their shopping cart, but doesn't buy it, you'll still receive the referral fee once they buy it, as long as it happens within 90 days. If the customer goes through your link to Amazon, leaves, and then clicks on someone else's referral link, your 24 hour window will close.

You can earn a higher % referral fee (up to 8.5%) if you refer lots of customers to buy. There are other products you can earn even higher percentages on. Right now referring Kindle products (the Kindle is Amazon's new $399 ebook reader) will earn you 10%. Amazonmp3's will get you 20%.

So, let's go through the signup process.

Go to Amazon.com, and scroll down to the bottom of the screen. You should see this:

Click the Join Associates link.

Click the Click Here link.

You can use the same email and password for your customer account with Amazon, or you can create a separate account specifically for your use as an Associate. Assuming you already have a customer account, and will be using it for Associate purposes to, you'll be brought to the following page.

Fill in all the information, agree to the terms, click continue, and you should see this:

"You can start making money today by adding links to your Web site or creating an aStore now! You choose the links you want, we create the HTML for you, and you paste the HTML into your site."

Once you've got access, you can begin to familiarize yourself with all the different options for creating referral links. There are simple, classic links, and some newer flashier ones. My advice would be to try each one. You may find that some fit the theme of your site better than others. Most of the widgets are highly customizable. Blending (making new links, widgets, etc. look like they belong) is usually a good idea.

Be sure not to post anything like, "Sponsored by Amazon" on your web site. I once read about a site that did that. A visitor emailed Amazon complaining about that site. They were shocked that Amazon would sponser them, because they didn't feel the content featured there was morally upright. Technically, no site is sponsored by Amazon just because it uses their affiliate links. Amazon decided to sever their agreement with that site. No more referral commissions for them. Don't make the same mistake.

The trick to make the most money is once you've got your affiliate links all set up, drive as much traffic to your site as possible. The more people who encounter your links, the more who will click, and the more who will buy.

Good luck, and happy Amazonian trails.

Since there are thousands of systems out there telling people how to make money online, there must be many thousands of people interested in doing it. I know I am! And as appealing as it sounds to earn a living online, losing momentum will occur from time to time. You hit a snag, a setback, a problem that just won't go away, and suddenly things seem bleak. How can you get back your mojo?

One thing I've found that helps me build enthusiasm is to think of the idea of success. What does success mean to you? What I usually imagine is a scenario in which I've got money coming in on autopilot from the net. And not just a trickle of cents from somewhere. I mean substantial income, enough that I don't really have to worry about financial security.

Money on autopilot!! Don't we all wish. But that wish can keep dreams alive.

Can you see how great achieving that would be? Imagine you've finally done it, you've finally set a system in place or built a website that is extremely easy to maintain, and is a guaranteed generator of revenue. You're making money while you eat breakfast, while you visit with friends, while you watch TV. You make money while you're sleeping! Awesome!!

Ideas like that keep me motivated. I believe there's actually a motivational concept behind that relating to "experiencing results in advance." You get to live your dream in your mind, which keeps you motivated to make that dream come true.

Part of what also appeals to me and motivates me about making money on the internet is the comparison with winning the lottery. The differences and similarities are really interesting. Both ideas pretty much entail financial freedom. If you can successfully make money online, you're pretty much set. If you win the lottery, you're golden! But the lottery is a finite prize. And in the end, the most you can do to ensure success in that area is to buy tickets and hope for the best. But the internet is different. You've got the power. Success is up to you. And if and when you do make it, the possibilities are limitless. You're not tied to a predetermined amount of winnings. If lighting strikes you online, you could potentially make billions. That may be remote, but only slightly more remote than winning the lottery, and a jackpot online is a thousand times greater.

So how do you stay motivated, even when things aren't working out? Think of all the potential wonders and benefits that will come of your success. Just the idea of financial freedom can be a huge motivation to keep working toward your goals.

Today I read a post John Chow wrote last month called, "There Is No Secret Formula." In it he writes how sometimes he get complaints from readers wanting him to stick to the subject of how to make money online. They feel that any diversion is pointless, and just want to know the secret to online success.

His response, as you can probably tell from the his post's title, is that there is no secret. There are programs, products, web sites, and tips and tricks galore all designed to fool people into thinking that if they just read, if they just watch, if they just buy, they'll learn the secret. But just like with achieving a breathtaking physique, making money online has no secrets. There's just common knowledge that most people seem to dislike.

However, I think there is another factor at work here. I think there really are secrets to getting fit, just like there are for making money online. What makes them so secret is that they're hiding in plain site. The knowledge is so apparently commonplace and straightforward that it is easily dismissed. People think, "It can't be that simple, can it?" and refuse to consider the true secrets to success. But now that we're no longer blind to the power of plain truths, we can benefit from them! So what did John Chow reveal?

Hiding in Plain Site Secret To Getting Fit:

"Eat less, workout more."

Hiding in Plain Site Secret To Making Money Online:

"Get traffic, optimize ads."

AHA!!! The Quickening empowers me! I know everything!! I am everything!!!

But wait… What are the secrets to getting traffic? What are the secrets to optimizing ads?

Well at least we've narrowed our focus. Traffic and ads, traffic and ads.

I don’t normally buy a lot of ebooks, but a few months ago I decided to get myself a copy of “Day Job Killer.” Part of the reason I bought it was because the web site was saying how some “whiz kid” teamed up with a guy and found all the secrets to making money online. I thought, “Come on, what secrets?” And besides, who in their right mind with the kind of information that allows someone to make literally thousands of dollars a day would be willing to share?

But I kept wondering. Maybe there were secrets out there that I just didn’t know. So I thought, what the heck, I’ll buy this book, give it a quick read, and hopefully learn a thing or two. Well, it took a little longer to read than I expected, since the copy I got was 69 pages long. As Bill and Ted would say, “69, dudes!”

Anyway, I was surprised to learn some things in that book that I hadn’t ever heard of before. There really were secrets out there, if you can consider something you personally don’t know a secret. But maybe lots of other people didn’t know that stuff either. That could very well be, since much of it wasn’t obvious. I mean it made sense once you thought about it, but it’s too intricate to spontaneously occur to most people. Well, to me at least.

So what secrets did I learn? Well, I learned a trick for getting your Google AdWords ads to the top of pages without simply throwing gobs of money at your campaign. I learned ways to think outside the box when it comes to finding sources of traffic to your site. I learned a method that can be used to convince the buyer of a product to go through you, the affiliate, instead of right to the source. That way you earn commissions on sales that are practically guaranteed. And I learned some devious ways to use affiliate links.

I don’t think I ever would have come up with those ideas on my own, and I haven’t read anything like them anywhere else. I think the information must be the kind that is kept hush-hush outside of the guidebooks themselves, since it’s somewhat sneaky, and can be highly effective in the right hands. It’s like why tell your opponents the secret to your success? At least charge for it.

I tried a few of the techniques, the ones I was comfortable with, and I got some mild results. I could have tried using everything I had learned, but a couple of the tricks didn’t fit how I thought of myself. I think another reason I wasn’t immediately successful was because I didn’t take the extra steps to research things a bit more. I was in the mood for fast results, so I limited myself to just going the basic route. I think the guys that make the most money using the techniques in Day Job Killer are the ones who go the extra mile and tweak everything.

That’s probably why the creators are willing to sell the info. If most people don’t do what it takes to make the systems work, then the people who do have nothing to worry about. No competition.

This post contains affiliate links.